Menorahs Toppled, Rally Follows

The Queens Jewish Community Council joined by local elected officials led a rally on December 30 to protest the toppling of Chanukah menorahs in Forest Hills parks the previous day.
An approximately 20-foot menorah at Federoff Square and another at Gerald McDonald Park were overturned some time between midnight and 9 a.m. on December 29, according to police from 112th Precinct. NYPDs Hate Crimes Task Force is investigating the two incidents as possible bias crimes.
The executive director of Queens Jewish Community Council, Rabbi Manny Behar, said that the menorahs, which commemorate the Jewish festival of lights, were repaired and re-erected with the help of the 112th Precinct within 24 hours.
"This is not reflective of the borough of Queens as a whole," said Behar, whose organization decided to have the rally to protest the two latest anti-Semitic incidents, which follow a string of anti-Semitic crimes committed in recent weeks. "But unfortunately there are anti-Semites in Queens as there are everywhere else."
Behar and local elected officials said wind was not strong enough to topple the large menorahs, which were held down by sandbags. The size of the menorahs leads them to believe that the crimes were more likely committed by more than one person.
Many local elected officials, including Councilmembers Melinda Katz and David Weprin, State Senator Toby Stavisky and Assemblyman Michael Cohen, attended the protest held at Federoff Square.
"It sends the signal out to the community that this type of behavior will not be tolerated," said Katz, praising the 30-plus turnout and the attendance of clergy from other faiths. "When one faith is attacked like that, then all faiths should express that its not acceptable behavior."
Ironically, the menorahs, which were erected by the Chabad of Rego Park and the Chabad of Flushing, were scheduled to be taken down because Chanukah had recently ended. After the two incidents, though, the Jewish community decided to re-erect the menorahs and keep them up for an extra day as an act of standing up to anti-Semitism.
"It was important that we showed we were not intimidated," said Behar.
The toppled menorahs follow a string of anti-Semitic crimes throughout Queens in recent weeks. Over the Thanksgiving weekend, three separate acts of vandalism were committed. The first occured when anti-Semitic epithets and swastikas were scrawled in the elevator and basement of a Rego Park apartment complex. In Long Island City, a swastika was carved into the door post of the Congregation Sons of Israel synagogue. In Ozone Park, the interior of the Talmud Torah, a closed-down synagogue, was vandalized with anti-Semitic and anti-American epithets.
Behar said that anti-Semites often commit hate crimes after an event occurs internationally.
"They are possibly being emboldened by things that are happening at other parts of the world," said Behar, alluding to recent suicide bombings in Israel and Istanbul, Turkey.
The executive director said that the menorah topplings would not dissuade Jewish people of Queens from celebrating Chanukah in the future.
"On Tuesday, December 7, 2004, we will be back there for the first night of Chanukah, and we will be there to light the menorah," said Behar.