A menorah in a Jackson Heights park was vandalized \u2014 sparking outrage in the Queens neighborhood that\u2019s been rattled by repeated incidents of antisemitic graffiti, local pols and Jewish leaders said.<\/p>\n
Rabbi Meir Pape, of the Jackson Heights Chabad, said he discovered the large menorah\u2019s center support beam covered in spray foam Saturday, the day before the public Hanukkah lighting ceremony in Travers Park.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt looked disgusting,\u201d Pape recalled Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Vandals foam-sprayed the center support beam of the menorah in Travers Park. Courtesy of Rabbi Meir Pape<\/p>\n
The menorah could still operate, but Pape blasted the apparent hateful vandalism as \u201cmore of a statement.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe menorah is a Jewish symbol, and whoever sprayed it was targeting the Jewish symbol,\u201d the rabbi said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s supposed to be beautiful. It\u2019s a display of light, warmth and positivity. And someone just had to take away that good look from the menorah.\u201d<\/p>\n
A Jackson Heights beautification group scraped the foam off, and the community was still able to hold the public lighting Sunday, for the first night of the Jewish holiday, according to Pape.<\/p>\n
The foam covered the center support of the menorah. Courtesy of Rabbi Meir Pape<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody got together, and the cold weather was freezing cold, was icy, and still people came and showed support,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The neighborhood has been grappling with a string of antisemitic vandalism for the past year, according to Hiram Monserrate, Democratic Party leader for the 35th Assembly District.<\/p>\n
\u201cBeyond the vandalizing of the menorah we have uncovered a steady\u00a0pattern of violent antisemitic messages throughout Jackson Heights via graffiti and stickers being placed at different locations including near the Jackson Heights Jewish Center, Travers Park and Paseo Park for over a year,\u201d Monserrate said.<\/p>\n
He called on the NYPD\u2019s Hate Crimes Task Force to investigate.<\/p>\n
Hiram Monserrate said antisemitic graffiti is commonplace in the Jackson Heights neighborhood over the last year. Obtained by the NY Post<\/p>\n
\u201cHow these culprits have operated freely as long as they have throughout Jackson Heights is alarming,\u201d Monserrate, a former state senator and city councilman, said.<\/p>\n
He shared photos of that showed swastikas drawn inside a Star of David on a neighborhood street, and graffiti that read \u201cHeil Hitler\u201d and \u201cDEATH ZIONISTS.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pape said Jewish leaders in the area were planning to hold a second menorah lighting this coming Sunday in the face of the apparent hateful act.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe worst thing we can do is stop the celebration,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is not gonna get in our way from adding more more goodness and kindness and positivity.\u201d<\/p>\n
The NYPD did not immediately return a request for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A menorah in a Jackson Heights park was vandalized \u2014 sparking outrage in the Queens neighborhood that\u2019s been…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":451820,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,12648,182109,21608,207452,5248,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,4413,67,586,132,5230,68,1154,2969,1130],"class_list":{"0":"post-451819","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-antisemitism","10":"tag-hanukkah","11":"tag-jackson-heights","12":"tag-menorahs","13":"tag-metro","14":"tag-new-york","15":"tag-new-york-city","16":"tag-newyork","17":"tag-newyorkcity","18":"tag-ny","19":"tag-nyc","20":"tag-queens","21":"tag-united-states","22":"tag-united-states-of-america","23":"tag-unitedstates","24":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","25":"tag-us","26":"tag-us-news","27":"tag-usa","28":"tag-vandalism"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115731565387013306","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=451819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451819\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/451820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=451819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=451819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=451819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}