JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The Anti-Defamation League reports extremist incidents like those seen this weekend around Jacksonville have been on the rise since 2020 both here in Florida and nationally.
News4JAX spoke with local faith leaders, as well as the deputy director of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) of Florida.
MORE: State attorney: Antisemitic messages seen around Jacksonville protected by 1st Amendment
They all condemned the hate seen here in Jacksonville over the weekend- and said we need to speak out against this as a society and not let it become normalized.
Florida has seen a dramatic rise in anti-Semitic incidents, according to the Anti-Defamation League—a 50 percent increase from 2020 to 2021.
And this weekend, there were more displays of hate.
Jesse Holzer is a cantor at the Jacksonville Jewish Center. He was asked if the messages make him feel less safe.
“It was quite disheartening. It makes me check my rearview once in a while,” Holzer said. “I wear a skullcap, a kippah, and so I express my Judaism outwardly, not inwardly, and so it makes me second guess, do I wear a hat [when] I go certain places. Do I not go certain places now?”
The latest FBI data on hate crimes is from 2020 and it shows about 55% of religiously motivated hate crimes were committed against the Jewish community. In Florida, it was 80%, with 16 anti-Jewish crimes reported.
“The individuals that express antisemitism usually don’t stop, by the way, just with antisemitism. When people express racism, they usually don’t stop with racism. So we need all community leaders, all elected officials and candidates everyone to speak out forcefully and frequently to say that Jacksonville and Duval County are no place for hate,” said Lonny Wilk, Deputy Director ADL Florida.
Holzer said the best way to counterbalance hateful rhetoric is to stand up against it and love your neighbors.
“I hope that we don’t have to turn off the lights, metaphorically and literally, but rather we can share that light with others and that we can realize that that’s the message of this season of darkness that we are in is to spread light and not spread hate,” Holzer said.
The ADL keeps records of antisemitic incidents and asks people to report them to adl.org/report-incident.