H eadlines
Eradicate Hate Summit Ends, Work Just Starting
NATIONAL TOBY TABACHNICK AND
ADAM REINHERZ | JE FEATURE
THE ERADICATE HATE
Global Summit, which brought
more than 100 experts from an
array of disciplines to Pittsburgh
to discuss the proliferation
of hate, ended Oct. 20, but
according to summit organizers,
the work of those committed to
change has just begun.

Now those experts will
form working groups and, over
the next year, try to develop
feasible and effective solutions
to combat hate. They will then
present their solutions at a
summit next year.

The Eradicate Hate Global
Summit, which took place Oct.

18-20 at the David L. Lawrence
Convention Center, was
conceived by attorney Laura
Ellsworth in the wake of the
2018 antisemitic attack at the
Tree of Life building. Ellsworth
co-chaired the event with Mark
Nordenberg, University of
Pittsburgh chancellor emeritus.

In her concluding remarks
to a crowd of 500 in-person
attendees, and another 1,000
people watching online,
Ellsworth pledged to “be here
next year, on our feet, account-
able to all of you for following
through on our commitment
to take what happened here
in this city of Pittsburgh, and
to transform that pain into
hope, into progress, into actual
change in the field of hate and
the fight against hate.”
Having experts from various
fields coming together to share
their knowledge and ideas was
“extraordinary,” said Meryl
Ainsman, immediate past
chair of the Jewish Federation
of Greater Pittsburgh and a
member of the summit’s
steering committee.

“The interdisciplinary
approach to one particular
subject, which is fighting and
combating hate, has been fasci-
nating,” she said.

Experts in various fields are
often siloed, she said, but “this
was an unbelievable opportu-
nity for people to interact and
learn from each other.”
Ainsman is confident the
world will see positive results
stemming from the collabo-
rations formed this week in
Pittsburgh. “I have a firm belief, a 100%
belief, that deliverables will
come out of this,” she said,
“and by this time next year, the
world may look like a little bit
of a different place.”
Summit panels cast a wide
net in their definition of “eradi-
cating hate,” but largely seemed
to focus on identifying how
hate speech and violent actions
have metastasized in the social
media era.

Some were focused on
security. A panel on crypto-
currency on the second day of
the summit discussed how bad
actors have employed largely
untraceable online payments
to fund terror operations.

Others focused on legis-
lation. Several
speakers discussed the need for better
regulation of social media
to prevent the spread of hate
speech online. (Section 230 of
the Federal Communications
Decency Act, which effectively
immunizes internet publishers
from legal responsibility for
the content users publish on
their site, was a hot topic; many
conservative lawmakers have
been seeking in recent months
to overturn or reform the law,
saying that it provides a shield
for partisan attacks.)
Attendees of the Eradicate Hate Global Summit 2021 chat at the end
of the day’s sessions on Oct. 18 at the David L. Lawrence Convention
Center in downtown Pittsburgh.
Photo by Lindsay Dill
Day three of the summit
pivoted once again to discuss
victim responses. Other panels
ran the gamut from covering
domestic terrorism laws to the
link between online speech and
real-world violence in Myanmar.

A panel led by Maggie Feinstein,
director of the 10/27 Healing
Partnership, discussed
trauma-informed care for the
survivors of extremism.

Fareed Zakaria, a host at
CNN and a columnist for The
Washington Post, in a virtual
keynote address, painted a
grim picture of the current
“culture of intolerance”
worldwide, along with the rise
of right-wing extremism.

He cautioned that we are
“heading toward a world of
political violence.”
“We all have to recognize that
we are heading down a path
where, far from eradicating hate,
we are encouraging, we are facil-
itating hate,” he said. “And in a
sense, we are almost approving
of it if we don’t stop right now.”
Still, attendees
were optimistic about the prospect
of changing the paradigm.

Jeff Finkelstein, president and
CEO of the Jewish Federation
of Greater Pittsburgh, called
the summit a “beginning” and
said he was encouraged by the
collaborations between panel-
ists and participants.

“I’m hopeful,” Tree of Life’s
Rabbi Hazzan Jeffrey Myers
said, “because we’re all in it
together.” It’s especially important
that this summit occurred in
Pittsburgh, because of the attack
at the Tree of Life building,
said Wasi Mohamed, a summit
steering committee member
and senior policy officer at
The Pittsburgh Foundation.

Pittsburgh is “a community
that’s especially committed to
this fight,” he said.

It is vital for people to
know that Pittsburgh wasn’t
See Summit, Page 23
10 OCTOBER 28, 2021
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H eadlines
NEWSBRIEFS Neo-Nazi Group Hangs ‘Vax the Jews’ Banner
in Austin, Texas Near a JCC
NEO-NAZI GROUP MEMBERS displayed a banner
from a bridge in Austin, Texas, on Oct. 24 that read
“Vax the Jews,” JTA reported.

The banner was hung by the Goyim Defense
League, which has been behind other antisemitic
banners hung in public places. The Anti-Defamation
League calls the group “a loose network of individ-
uals connected by their virulent antisemitism.” Social
media photos showed group members standing
behind the banner making the Nazi salute.

Austin Mayor Steve Adler, who is Jewish,
condemned the incident in a tweet.

The banner was hung a few blocks away from
the Shalom Austin Jewish Community Center and
several synagogues. The incident occurred a few days
after racist and antisemitic graffiti was discovered at
nearby Anderson High School.

Biden Names Atlanta Jewish Leader as Envoy
to United Nations Human Rights Council
President Joe Biden named a leader of the Atlanta
Jewish community to the United Nations Human
Rights Council – a body often criticized for being
hostile to Israel, JTA reported.

The Atlanta Jewish Times said Biden chose Michèle
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM Taylor, who is the daughter of a Holocaust survivor,
a founder of the Or Hadash congregation outside of
Atlanta and a past member of the U.S. Holocaust
Museum Memorial Council, among other things.

The Trump administration quit the Human Rights
Council in 2018 because of what the body alleged were
Israeli human rights abuses while allowing other countries
with controversial human rights records to be members
and help set the agenda. Israel has never been on the
council and refuses to cooperate in its investigations.

Biden and past Democratic administrations
acknowledge the council’s bias but say the United
States is better served as a group member working
to advance its human rights agenda — and to tamp
down anti-Israel rhetoric.

Medieval Jewish Prayer Book Sold for $8.3M
A 700-year-old Jewish prayer book from Germany,
offered by a French Jewish organization to shore up its
finances, sold at auction on Oct. 19 for $8.3 million,
JTA reported.

Known as the Luzzatto High Holiday Mahzor, the
prayer book beat the $4-6 million presale estimate by
Sotheby’s New York auction house, with four bidders
battling for five dramatic minutes.

The item, which was sold to an unnamed private
buyer, comes from the collection of the Alliance
JEWISH EXPONENT
Israélite Universelle, a 160-year-old French Jewish
organization that operates schools in Israel, France
and Morocco.

Only one Judaica item has ever fetched more at
auction: the Bomberg Talmud from the Valmadonna
collection, which sold for $9.3 million in 2015.

Environmental Group Quits Democracy Rally
Because of Presence of ‘Zionist’ Groups
The Washington, D.C., branch of national climate
action group Sunrise DC turned down a role at a
voting rights rally because a “number of Zionist
organizations” will be taking part, JTA reported.

“Given our commitment to racial justice, self-gov-
ernance and indigenous sovereignty, we oppose
Zionism and any state that enforces its ideology,” the
group said in a statement posted Oct. 19 on Twitter.

Sunrise DC named the National Council of Jewish
Women, the Reform movement’s Religious Action
Center and the Jewish Council for Public Affairs as
groups supporting Israel.

The Freedom to Vote Relay-Rally on Oct. 23
featured a bike ride to the U.S. Capitol from West
Virginia, the home state of Democratic Sen. Joe
Manchin, who is sponsoring a voting rights act
named “Freedom to Vote.” l
— Compiled by Andy Gotlieb
OCTOBER 28, 2021
11