The riots at the Adas Torah synagogue in Los Angeles’ Pico-Robertson neighborhood show that American society and authorities do not take the escalating rhetoric and threats by anti-Israel factions in the United States seriously.

The Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) and Code Pink announced the protests on June 20. The synagogue was holding an Israeli real estate event, which prompted the demonstrations, as did similar events at Montreal and Toronto synagogues in March.
Despite having enough time to prepare and, according to Jewish community members, notwithstanding their pleas to the authorities for a strong police presence, the city’s leadership failed to provide adequate security. On social media, congregants complained that the Los Angeles Police Department did not receive the necessary order to properly intervene.
Almost three hours after the event was scheduled to end, Californian politicians finally responded to the riot -- noticeably all at the same time.
The lack of attentiveness to a potential problem is not just a result of not preparing positions and statements ahead of time; it also demonstrates complete unawareness as to how far anti-Israel activists are willing to go. They simply do not take the threats seriously because many of them are students, and, as some commentators have said, they’re “cosplaying” or playing at revolution.
Pro-Palestinian protestors demonstrate as they call for a ceasefire in Gaza amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, in Los Angeles, California, U.S., May 31, 2024. (credit: KYLE GRILLOT/REUTERS)
Pro-Palestinian protestors demonstrate as they call for a ceasefire in Gaza amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, in Los Angeles, California, U.S., May 31, 2024. (credit: KYLE GRILLOT/REUTERS)
RHETORIC AND actions have been heating up with the summer months.
In May, the Detroit People’s Conference for Palestine included many of the major pro-Palestinian groups involved in the post-October 7 protests, who were welcoming members and affiliates of terrorist groups. They praised armed violence and held panel discussions on its importance.

Promoting terrorism at protests

Terrorist flags are steadily becoming more commonplace at protests, such as the New York  City Resistance Coalition’s protest at Hunter College, which saw a portrait of Hamas’s Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar flanked by Lions’ Den, Hamas, Izz ad-Din al-Qassam, Houthi Ansar Allah, and Hezbollah flags.
PYM, one of the Sunday protest organizers, issued a statement of support for the pro-Palestinian group Within Our Lifetime after it received backlash from progressive politicians for demonstrating outside the Nova Music Festival Massacre exhibit on June 10. That day, protesters unfurled a “Long live October 7” banner and praised Nazi leader Adolf Hitler.

The Columbia University Apartheid Divest coalition and Students for Justice in Palestine, which was the progenitor of the encampments that have destabilized campuses across the US, issued a statement of support for alleged serial arsonist Casey Goonan on Thursday. Goonan was arrested last Monday for his involvement in four firebombing and arson attacks at the University of California, Berkeley as revenge for the shutting down of encampments in California.

Later that day, Columbia activists, whose charges over occupying a university building in April were dropped, wore shirts calling for Goonan’s release at a press conference, where they also called for the freedom of five people imprisoned for funneling money to Hamas through the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development.
“We must continue escalating in our tactics until we make life for the war-mongering ruling class untenable,” said an activist at the press conference. “Pacifism is not the path toward liberation.”
Goonan’s actions were called heroic, and the activists embraced arson as a legitimate tactic for US activists.

AS IS often the case, the authorities believe the activists are all talk. They believe that the rhetoric about destroying Israel and the “US Empire” is merely aspirational and that praise for terrorism and calls for intifada and revolution will remain just words within the confines of the encampments. Yet, like in many previous cases, these students have gone out into the world, and surprisingly, they believe the words that they chant.

On April 15, the protesters called to cause economic damage to the US, push the adoption of anti-Israel policies, and shut down major American arteries. They said they would not be voting for President Joe Biden in the November elections and have been willing to go to political war with politicians in their own camp. They claimed that they have embraced a diversity of tactics and that their goal will be achieved “by any means necessary,” as the popular chant states, and now, they are not just spray-painting buildings but burning them down.

When protesters claim affinity with Hamas and call to expel Zionists from their public spaces and cities, it is delusional to pretend that their violence will not escalate but remain confined within the walls of academia. The only lesson they’ve learned on campuses is that they can tear down walls and erect their own, and the consequences they face, such as those imposed by the Manhattan DA’s office, will be a slap on the wrist.
The escalation will continue until the anarchists are forced to stop, and not a moment before. Like with every other chant, whether they understand which river or sea they refer to, they wish for “death to Zionists.”
Jews learned a long time ago that when people say they are going to kill you, we must believe them. Unfortunately, the State of California and City of Los Angeles will likely not believe the threats until they see the dead bodies of Jews, and even then, they may refuse to make the connection between the mouth that called for violence and the hand that wielded the blade.