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April 20, 2007
Synagogue subjected to hate
Beth Tikvah sprayed with graffiti on eve of Yom Hashoah ceremony.
KATHARINE HAMER EDITOR
Anti-Semitic graffiti and swastikas were sprayed at Beth Tikvah
Synagogue in Richmond last Sunday.
In the early hours of April 15, as the congregation prepared to
mark Yom Hashoah, the graphics and hateful messages, among them
"Kill the Jews," "F*** the Jews" and "Sieg
Heil" were painted on the shul's front entrance. The act, which
was apparently perpetrated by two young men, was recorded on the
synagogue's security cameras. Shul administrators immediately contacted
police, Canadian Jewish Congress, the Jewish Federation of Greater
Vancouver and members of the congregation.
"The people who need to know, know," Beth Tikvah Rabbi
Claudio Kaiser-Blueth, in a brief interview with the Independent
on Monday. "The needed precautions were taken immediately on
the scene, by my president, by myself."
The rabbi did show the graffiti to youngsters attending Hebrew school,
as a means of letting them know that "anti-Semitism is still
unfortunately very much alive."
The graffiti was erased Sunday afternoon, well before a group of
seniors arrived at the shul for their Monday morning activities.
"Imagine if that would have been outside, and these senior
citizens, who are survivors or whatever, come into the synagogue
and see that?" said Kaiser-Blueth.
The rabbi was reluctant to speak at length about the incident for
fear of inflaming the situation. He said he turned away television
news crews attempting to document the graffiti Sunday morning.
"The more we publicize it, the more we are encouraging these
people from outside to do it, to say, 'You see? I'm now famous –
I was successful.' And that would encourage more kids to do it.
And that's the reason why we're downplaying it," he said.
Tuesday morning, Kaiser-Blueth was interviewed about the incident
on City TV.
This is not the only time that Beth Tikvah has been targeted. The
synagogue was sprayed with graffiti in another incident two-and-a-half
years ago.
"Unfortunately, that's how these anti-Semitic people operate,"
said Kaiser-Blueth. "They don't want to come and discuss. They're
too afraid of it. They want to do a hit and run.
"We are not going to win the battle completely, unfortunately,
no, because there's always a crazy guy. There's always a meshugana
who needs to do this destruction."
"This was a malicious act of cowardice specifically targeting
the Jewish community," said CJC Pacific Region chair Mark Weintraub.
"We cannot allow manifestations of racism and intolerance to
become the norm."
The incident is being investigated by Richmond RCMP and the RCMP's
provincial hate crimes division. Kaiser-Blueth said he hoped to
be able to bring the perpetrators, once they were caught, to the
shul, in order to apologize to the congregation and learn about
Judaism.
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