EL CERRITO, Calif. — On Jan. 6 thugs physically attacked counterprotesters here who were defending Israel’s right to exist and fighting for the defeat of Hamas. The attackers screamed epithets, knocked down and bloodied one woman and grabbed two Israeli flags and set them on fire. Numerous people came to city council meetings in Berkeley, El Cerrito and Albany Jan. 16 and 19 to speak out against the attacks.
“A small group of Israeli supporters were repeatedly harassed and attacked,” Faith Meltzer told the Albany City Council at its Jan. 19 meeting. “Masked protesters surrounded [us] and screamed antisemitic epithets and ripped up [our] signs and burnt [our] flags.”
“I was assaulted,” she said. “Another woman was thrown in the street and left bloodied, bruised and in tears. The police were nowhere to be seen.”
A cellphone video of the attacks, posted on the internet by the Jewish Community Relations Council, record a man masked by a kaffiyeh yelling through a bullhorn inches away from the face of a Jewish protester, who is holding a banner calling for the return of the hostages held by Hamas. “If you want them to go back home all they got to do is just go back to Europe where they belong,” he shouts. Others shouted obscenities.
Protesters chanted “Intifada, intifada,” “From the river to the sea,” “Occupation no more” and other calls for the destruction of the state of Israel. A masked group posed for photos holding a ripped-up poster where only the word “Hamas” was left, making a victory sign.
Jewish residents of the San Francisco Bay Area and their defenders refused to be intimidated. They went to the city council meetings of both Albany and El Cerrito the next weeks to express their outrage and demand that the councils condemn Jew-hatred.
Others came to press the city councils to pass resolutions calling for Israel to stop fighting and implement a permanent cease-fire.
El Cerrito Mayor Tessa Rudnick opened its Jan. 16 City Council meeting by reading a statement against the attacks. “I condemn any actions of anyone who crossed the line and incited violence on Jan. 6 either with their words or with their actions,” she said.
Margaret Trowe, Socialist Workers Party candidate for Congress, spoke at the council meeting and condemned the violent attacks at the Jan. 6 El Cerrito demonstration. “The defeat of Hamas will give more political space to working people in Gaza, in Israel, in Iran and around the world, including in the United States,” she said.