Cincinnati Mayor Condemns Swastika at Rabbinical School

Hebrew Union College, Cincinatti campus. Image by Twitter
(JTA) — The mayor of Cincinnati and the Anti-Defamation League denounced the spray-painting of a swastika on a sign at a Reform rabbinical school.
On Tuesday morning, a white swastika was discovered on a sign on the Cincinnati campus of the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion. It was reported to the police shortly thereafter and later removed, according to Rabbi Kenneth Kanter, associate dean and director of the rabbinical school.
“This act of hate perpetrated against our brothers and sisters at Hebrew Union College is an attack on our entire community. … The city is committed to using all of our resources to bring these criminals to justice,” Mayor John Cranley said Tuesday in a statement.
On Wednesday, the Anti-Defamation League called the incident “troubling” and “an attack not just on HUC-JIR but on the fabric of pluralism and religious freedom in the country.”
“This act of anti-Semitic vandalism is despicable and must be recognized as an attack on the entire community,” Anita Gray, ADL’s Ohio/Kentucky/Allegheny Regional director, said in a statement.
Kanter told JTA on Tuesday that he was not aware of any similar acts of vandalism occurring on the Cincinnati campus in the past five or six years.
In the aftermath of the presidential election in November, the U.S. has seen a nationwide increase in anti-Semitic and other hate crimes.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Most Popular
- 1
Opinion The dangerous Nazi legend behind Trump’s ruthless grab for power
- 2
Culture Trump wants to honor Hannah Arendt in a ‘Garden of American Heroes.’ Is this a joke?
- 3
Opinion A Holocaust perpetrator was just celebrated on US soil. I think I know why no one objected.
- 4
Culture Did this Jewish literary titan have the right idea about Harry Potter and J.K. Rowling after all?
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Protesters clash in Crown Heights as Ben-Gvir visits Chabad headquarters
-
Yiddish ווידעאָ: היסטאָריקער שמואל קאַסאָוו דערציילט מעשׂיות פֿון זײַן משפּחה־געשיכטעVIDEO: Historian Samuel Kassow shares stories about his family history
דער ווידעאָ איז טשיקאַווע סײַ פֿאַרן אינהאַלט סײַ פֿאַר קאַסאָווס נאַטירלעכן ליטוויש־ייִדיש
-
Culture I have seen the future of America — in a pastrami sandwich in Queens
-
Culture Trump wants to honor Hannah Arendt in a ‘Garden of American Heroes.’ Is this a joke?
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.