OAKLAND After locals discovered antisemitic graffiti at Lake Merritt, Rabbi Dovid Labkowski of the Chabad Center for Jewish Life in Oakland said what was meant to be a holiday celebration descended into sadness and terror.
We’ve noticed a lot of graffiti surrounding it. We witnessed Sinwar’s life. However, the following day, we received messages stating that there were racist, antisemitic, and anti-Israel statements on the platform adjacent to the menorah,” Rabbi Labkowski told CBS News Bay Area.
According to him, the community has been celebrating Hannukah at Oakland’s Lake Merritt for the past 19 years.
However, they have previously seen vandalism over the holiday.
“We had an incident last year where the menorah was shattered and dumped into the lake. We found local volunteers to assemble that piece by piece, and we put it on display directly outside our center,” the rabbi stated.
The first message on this year’s damage was reported by locals on Sunday evening.
Volunteers sprang into action the following day to hide even more antisemitic remarks close to the menorah. But similar cruel tweets surfaced again on the final day of Hannukah.
“We live in a city that has so many different types of people, and we should all be able to live in peace and harmony together,” Rabbi Labkowski stated.
To cover those ugly inscriptions beside Lake Merritt, local volunteers from the grassroots Oakland Jewish Alliance organization came together. They informed Oakland police about it as well.
“We truly feel that we are the only ones working on this project and that we are being singled out. Zoe Levine, the founder of the Oakland Jewish Alliance, told CBS News Bay Area, “I sincerely hope that at some point there will be more togetherness, more community, and more allies speaking up.”
About 140 Bay Area Jewish community members banded together, she said, to paint over these antisemitic remarks. The organization was established in November 2023.
We have been logging on average eight times a week for more than a year. That’s more than 400 cases of graffiti that have only been recorded, and it doesn’t even include the stickers that we occasionally fail to report,” Levine stated.
“It is very difficult to go day after day, looking at this vandalism and having to live with this,” Levine stated.
However, she and Rabbi Labkowski stated that they will not compromise.
This year, an even bigger 15-foot menorah has taken the place of the one that was destroyed the previous year. Thankfully, the Hannukah celebrations this year did not do any damage to the menorah.
According to Rabbi Labkowski, he and his community intend to keep sharing the message of hope and resiliency.
“There is no justification for hatred. It’s acceptable for you to hold different views, whether they are in favor of or against what is occurring on the other side of the globe. Since we’re all living here together, we ought to be able to coexist peacefully,” he stated.
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