About a dozen neo-Nazis gathered in Phoenix April 17. It was a relatively uneventful 30 minutes of a few people marching around Eastlake Park and yelling racial slurs.
âGiven how precarious this situation could have been, this represents quite a victory against hate,â said Paul Rockower, executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Phoenix.
Community leaders say the group came looking to spread its message, but the rally instead showed a community unified against hate.
The JCRC formed a coalition with 26 other groups â including the African American Christian Clergy Coalition, the Chinese American Citizens Alliance, the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of Arizona, the Valley Interfaith Project and the Phoenix Holocaust Association â to deny the neo-Nazis their goals of attention and amplification, Rockower said.
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The Jewish watchdog group StandWithUs called on Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) to apologize for being the keynote speaker a week ago at the America First Political Action Conference in Orlando, Florida, an event organized by white nationalist and Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes.
âThis is how the normalization of hate occurs and grows,â StandWithUs CEO Roz Rothstein said in a statement last week. âThe appearance of a sitting U.S. member of Congress at a white-supremacist conference legitimizes racism and anti-Semitism. It seems that some people are unable to learn the lessons of history.â
Fuentes, 22, has a history of making anti-Semitic remarks, including pushing anti-Israel conspiracy theories.
Experts discuss âhorribleâ Phoenix police challenge coin
A controversial challenge coin owned, shared, and sold by Phoenix officers raises serious concerns about the culture inside the cityâs police department and a lack of accountability by top leaders, according to a handful of experts interviewed by ABC15.
and last updated 2021-03-01 21:10:54-05
PHOENIX â A controversial challenge coin owned, shared, and sold by Phoenix officers raises serious concerns about the culture inside the cityâs police department and a lack of accountability by top leaders, according to a handful of experts interviewed by ABC15.
The coins commemorate the moment when a protester was shot in the groin by a pepper ball in August 2017.
The man who stormed the Tree of Life synagogue building on Oct. 27, 2018, murdering 11 congregants in the midst of Shabbat prayer, was an active user of the social