JNS publishes a weekly listing of antisemitic incidents recorded and found by Jewish, pro-Jewish and pro-Israel organizations; national and international news; and social media. By the Anti-Defamation League’s count, an average of seven instances of varying measure occur daily in the United States. (Dates refer to when the news was reported, not when the events took place.) Also included are news items detailing efforts to combat antisemitism and research anti-Jewish bigotry.
June 24
White supremacist and antisemitic incidents nearly doubled from 2021 to 2022 (and were up more than 600% since 2017) in the state of Indiana. The mayor of an Oregon city has apologized for sharing a Facebook post that formed a swastika out of gay pride flags. To make a point about censorship, the comedian Roseanne Barr, who is no stranger to controversy, said on a podcast that nobody died in the Holocaust. (She, the host and others have said that the comment was sarcastic.)
June 25
The coastal city of Long Beach, Calif., adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism. In Waukegan, Ill., a rededication ceremony was held at a Jewish cemetery months after tombstones were vandalized with swastikas.
June 26
The penalty phase began in the trial of the Pittsburgh synagogue mass murderer Robert Bowers. Jurors will decide if execution is appropriate. Two former California police officers pleaded not guilty to felony vandalism for allegedly spray-painting a swastika on a suspect’s car.
June 27
In Bowers’s trial, doctors who testified disagreed about whether the 50-year-old defendant had suffered brain damage. Police in Maine are investigating a swastika spray-painted on a road. In Germany, law enforcement began investigating a man dressed in neo-Nazi clothing distributing balloons to children.
June 28
Breitbart News reported that Pedro Gonzalez, politics editor of the conservative magazine Chronicles, has a history of sending racist and antisemitic messages. The Anti-Defamation League found that online hate and harassment have reached record highs. The American Jewish Committee is facilitating a summit on fighting online antisemitism. B’nai Brith Canada filed suit against anti-Israel activist David Mivasair, 69, for defamation. In Finland, a politician was criticized for a Hitler joke, and neo-Nazi associations weathered a no-confidence vote.
June 29
Texas authorities released bodycam footage of a police officer killing a neo-Nazi gunman who opened fire at a mall last month. A Michigan man was charged in federal court for vandalizing a synagogue in 2019. Bangladeshi cleric Enayet Ullah Abbasi, and Islamist who has said that “Hitler did a good job on killing Jews in the Holocaust,” was granted entry into the United Kingdom for a lecture tour.
June 30
A forensic psychologist testified in the Tree of Life*Or L’Simcha Synagogue trial that the murderer had considered other targets to kill Jews at large. French Jewish groups condemned the vandalism of a Jewish cemetery during anti-police riots. In Michigan, a neo-Nazi was indicted for planning a mass shooting of a synagogue. The ADL is calling out the White House for not talking about anti-Zionism enough in its rollout of the federal strategy to counter antisemitism. David Draiman, lead singer of the heavy-metal band Disturbed, called out Roger Waters aggressively in a profanity-laced proclamation at a Tel Aviv concert. “We’ve survived worse than them, and we will continue surviving worse than them!” he said.
