Antisemitic flyers distributed around Palo Alto
A series of antisemitic flyers have been distributed around neighbourhoods in Palo Alto, California, prompting concern from local community leaders and law enforcement.
The flyers claim that certain named American federal officials and politicians are Jewish and blame them for the COVID-19 pandemic.
The flyers were placed in plastic bags and weighed down with rice to stop them from being displaced by the wind before being placed in the front yards and porches of houses and apartment complexes. They are believed to have been distributed by the antisemitic Goyim Defence League (GDL), led by Jon Minadeo II
The GDL is a group is responsible for stunts such as visiting a Chabad centre to claim that “these Jewish terrorists” were behind 9/11, and hanging a banner on a Los Angeles overpass reading “Honk if you know the Jews want a race war.” Last year, Mr Minadeo II created t-shirts carrying antisemitic slogans such as the Holocaust was “a hoax”. Recently, they hung a banner from a bridge in Austin, Texas that read “Vax the Jews”.
Jeff Schwartz, teacher and Mitzvah Director at the Congregation Kol Emeth synagogue expressed his concerns about the flyer’s use of antisemitic themes, saying: “When you see a swastika on a building or something similar, it just hits you right in the heart. We know [antisemitism] is always there, but you don’t really believe it until you see something like this.”
We reported last month that the FBI was investigating antisemitic flyers, also connected with the GDL, that were deposited in the driveways of members of the Colleyville synagogue where a British Islamist recently took four people hostage.
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