Dutch Chief Rabbi’s Son Harassed On The Street, Called ‘Cancer Jew’

Amsterdam Image by iStock

By JTA June 18, 2018

AMSTERDAM (JTA) — The son of a chief rabbi of the Netherlands and his family were accosted on the street by people he said intimidated the family, shouting at them “cancer Jews.”

Rabbi Yanki Jacobs, the son of Binyomin Jacobs, complained to police on Sunday about the incident, which occurred the previous evening, the AD news website reported.

On a street corner in a heavily Jewish area in southern Amsterdam, “two young men called out at the family: ‘Cancer Jews’ and ‘f—- all Jews’ at our direction. They repeatedly drove in our direction in an intimidating manner,” Yanki Jacobs is quoted as saying.

He also listed on Twitter the license plate number of the vehicle he said the two men were in, with a request to help identify them. The men appeared to be of Middle Eastern descent, he said.

“I have had enough,” he told AD, adding he had been cursed on the street before. “I’ve grown accustomed to thinking about it as normal but now thought that we as a Jewish community must no longer agree for this to happen to us. If I do nothing, who will? I walk around my neighborhood, a tenth-generation Amsterdam Jew and I will not be driven out of this city.”

The home of Binyomin Jacobs, Yanki Jacobs’ father, has been vandalized five times in recent years. In 2014 police advised Binyomin Jacobs to not use some trains for fear for his safety.

Alyssa Fisher is a news writer at the Forward. Email her at [email protected], or follow her on Twitter at @alyssalfisher

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