Cincinnati Mayor Condemns Swastika at Rabbinical School

Hebrew Union College, Cincinatti campus. Image by Twitter

By Josefin Dolsten January 4, 2017

(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.

Josefin Dolsten is a New York-based writer who has reported for the Forward, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, The Times of Israel and other Jewish publications. She currently works as an account director at Fenton Communications, supporting organizations that work to advance racial justice, LGBTQ+ equality, reproductive rights and more. Dolsten earned her B.A. in government from Cornell University and her M.A. in comparative religion and Jewish studies from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

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