The Crown Heights Riots, 25 Years Later

By: Al Sharpton - Wiki Commons

By: Eli Verschleiser

There is no shortage of reminders these days about how easily peace can turn into violence. Protests turn into disturbances very easily — all too often resulting in senseless crime directed against people who have no connection to the grievance that sparked the unrest.

The Crown Heights riots of 1991 were a different, and fortunately still singular, kind of event in America. They constituted the first time, perhaps since the lynching of Leo Frank in 1915 Georgia, that a rampant violent mob targeted Jews. Hopefully it will be the last.

Looking back, it’s hard to understand how the rumor that a Jewish ambulance squad refused to treat a dying black child spread so quickly, and for so long, without being effectively dispelled. In reality, it was the police who told the Hatzolah ambulance crew, who wanted to save the child’s life, to leave the scene for their own safety.

A “perfect storm” of tragedy mixed with dysfunction followed. There was a lack of sufficient official, accurate information channeled through community leaders when it was needed most. And to top that off, there was incredibly weak leadership at the police department and in City Hall.

Into this nest of chaos (as police, for whatever reason, failed to forcefully quell the riots with mass arrests) walked Yankel Rosenbaum. One man was later convicted of inciting the mob with “get the Jew;” and the mob did just that. And many others went free who were just as guilty.

The vacuum of competence seemed to follow Rosenbaum from the unprotected streets to Kings County Hospital, where an untreated stab wound led to his death.

The next day, things would go from bad to worse. The Reverend Al Sharpton, then an angry preacher, didn’t change the narrative when he arrived in Crown Heights. He viewed this as another case of racism, almost as if the Hassidic driver had targeted the black child. The streets echoed with chants of “No justice, no peace,” even though there was already no peace, and there had been no chance to properly analyze the accident.

On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of these events in 2011, Rev. Sharpton admirably reflected on his actions and noted in a Daily News op-ed that he should have chosen his words at the time more carefully, especially at the funeral of the deceased child, Gavin Cato.

“With the wisdom of hindsight, let’s be clear,” he wrote. “Our language and tone sometimes exacerbated tensions and played to the extremists rather than raising the issue of the value of this young man whom we were so concerned about.” He added that he also should have expressed concern about the value of Yankel Rosenbaum’s life and that “there was no justification or excuse for violence.”

But this was not enough, according to Rosenbaum’s brother, Norman, who noted that the preacher has yet to demand justice for the 28 people who took part in the mob that attacked Yankel. Few if any people were ever charged with lesser counts of vandalizing property and terrorizing Crown Heights Jews in their homes.

Looking back on the events, so many people still try to present an alternative version of events: blacks and Jews scuffling with each other over neighborhood issues, as the New York Times tried to cast it, or the legitimate indignation of the rioters spilling over into unfortunate violence because of the August heat (and unemployment in the black community).

But the truth, as Norman Rosenbaum put it, was that the riots at their core were a result of people, mostly agitators from outside Crown Heights, exploiting a tragedy to vent their resentment of Jews in general and the Crown Heights Hassidim in particular — and to inflict harm on innocent people.

If we are to learn any lesson at all, it is how leaders such as Sharpton and Mayor David Dinkins failed to act quickly and unambiguously to stop the violence.

Investigators have never disproven what Mayor Dinkins has long maintained: That he never ordered the police to let the rioters vent. But that doesn’t matter. As his successor, Rudy Giuliani, showed, the city’s chief executive gets the credit when things are running well because he appoints the leaders, and they answer to him.

I believe that a similar incident would not happen in 2016. Today, we’re able to Tweet and email accurate information to catch up to falsehoods and quickly organize leaders to restore calm; furthermore, with police alertness perpetually high out of terrorism concerns, it’s likely a strong show of force would stop such an outbreak.

Finally, New Yorkers have learned to vote smarter. Hopefully when they look at the next election for City Hall, they’ll factor in the important question of, when there’s a perfect storm, who will be holding the umbrella?

Originally Published: The Algemeiner

Lewd Awakening: Clean Up Times Square by Taxing Naked Nuisances

By: Eli Verschleiser

When I was growing up, Times Square was a seedy place full of adult movie theaters, greasy fast food joints, video game arcades and souvenir shops that – open secret -- also made and sold fake IDs.

In the early 90s, started under Mayor David Dinkins and continued under his successor Rudy Giuliani, the makeover began and all those mom and pop businesses were swept away, replaced by big chain stores and restaurants and media headquarters for Reuters, MTV, ABC and Conde Nast.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg took the beautification a step further in his reign, sealing off a large section of Broadway to traffic and creating a place for tourists to dine, hang out between shopping and matinees and take in the view and excitement from the Crossroads of the World.

Now, the Square is once again in danger of becoming the kind of place you can’t take your kids. It started with the aggressive panhandlers in Elmo costumes, some of whom have displayed unstable and even violent behavior. But even when they behave it’s a nuisance to traverse the area when every four feet a costumed character wants to snap a picture with you for a buck. Mayor Bloomberg wisely recognized the legal reality that you can’t stop people from free commerce or dressing any way they please, and pretty much left the situation alone.

Now comes the scantily clad women who make Vegas showgirls look overdressed. Perhaps inspired by the novelty of the Naked Cowboy, who has been raking in the dough for years (not in fact fully naked), an influx of entrepreneurial women are taking advantage of a 1992 state court decision that there is no fundamental difference between a man or women going shirtless in public. Parents of small children who feel otherwise may enter the area at their own risk.

It’s not just a matter of protecting young eyes. One of the women was reportedly arrested on Sept. 2 on drug and prostitution charges hours after a man accused two others of stealing his wallet. With complaints pouring into City Hall, Mayor Bill de Blasio has decried the situation and even put together a task force to address the problem.

Good luck. Since they are breaking no law, any effort to remove or restrict the women or their overdressed Muppet or superhero counterparts will land the city in court, bringing us back to the days when Mayor Giuliani frequently fought losing battles with civil liberties groups. The women can easily declare themselves performance artists and invoke their Constitutional right to free speech, commerce and assembly.

Bill de Blasio may also see fit to reopen the Square to traffic and let cabs and buses do his dirty work.

But there’s a better way to address the problem: Let them work. But make it expensive. After all, the main appeal of this kind of work is the low overhead.

As we know all too well, the city can tax and regulate almost anything it wants. It already taxes hotels, taxis and street vendors. What if the performers had to get on waiting list for a limited number of permits, with a fee and taxes? Every street vendor in NYC does.

Right now the performance artists are only subject to personal income tax on their earnings. To get their permit renewed, they’d have to show they met their tax obligations.

Bill de Blasio and City Council should earmark the proceeds for specific and related purposes. How about paying for the increased sanitation and police service necessitated by the upswing in tourist activity thanks to these performance artists.

My City Council sources tell me there is no reason this scenario can’t happen. All it would take is appropriate legislation, required registration of the vendors/artists/panhandlers or whatever you want to call them, and then collection. So instead of cops chasing them away or sticking them in penned off areas, the city could just send a team of tax collectors to make sure everyone is paying their share.

Shave 20 percent off the day’s cash earnings, and I can almost guarantee you this pesky population of performers will trickle down in no time. Here’s a chance for bureaucracy to improve quality of life, for a change.

This won’t happen any time soon, since nothing gets passed in City Hall without vigorous debate (as it should be), a bunch of partisan bickering and obstruction and perhaps a lawsuit or two. (Remember, Bloomberg couldn’t quite get his soda ban passed.)

But in the interim there is one unstoppable force waiting in the wings in the coming months that is guaranteed, at least for the short term, to remove the naked nuisance from Times Square and bring some modesty back.

Its called winter.

Originally Published: The Huffington Post

Isolate and Contain

By: Eli Verschleiser

Which virus is a bigger threat to the lives of Americans? Ebola, or Islamic fanaticism?

Judging from recent news, both appear to be equally malicious. Almost simultaneously, officials here have been forced to react to a doctor who inadvertently imported Ebola to New York City from Africa, and an outbreak of so-called “lone wolf” terrorism by a jihadi sympathizer who took an ax to two police officers in Queens.

Fortunately in both cases, the threat was quickly contained. The doctor was brought to Belleview Hospital as soon as he became symptomatic and contagious, and the “lone wolf” was quickly put down by police bullets. He is not believed to have any known connections to organized terror groups.

But neither were any of those who engaged in terror attacks in the 13 years since 9/11: The would-be Newburgh bombers who plotted to attack Bronx synagogues, the attempted Times Square bomber and the Boston marathon bomb brothers are all believed to be sympathizers with Islamic terror rather than part of organized sleeper cells coordinating with al Qaeda or ISIS.

That means that like Ebola or other diseases, jihadi ideology can spread across the United States and infect deranged or socially disaffected people here, thus providing an effective way for ISIS and others to terrorize America without lifting a finger. And just as the administration’s reaction to Ebola, with its reluctance to consider travel bans, has been lacking, it has turned its back for too long on the danger posed from ISIS.

Authorities believe ISIS is actively encouraging lone wolf attacks. A law enforcement bulletin obtained by Fox News warned that ISIS uses social media to encourage sympathizers to find members of the armed forces and attack them (although a Homeland Security spokesman said there was no credible, specific threat.) A man in Oklahoma City charged with beheading a coworker reportedly had pictures of ISIS beheadings on his Facebook page.

“The Internet as well as certain specific Muslim extremists are really firing up this lone wolf phenomenon,” California Sen. Diane Feinstein recently said on CNN. “The multiplicity of [worldwide] attacks in 2014 shows that their propaganda is having some effect.”

Several Americans have been apprehended in the process of trying to join forces with ISIS, including three teenage Denver girls of Somali descent who were stopped in Frankfurt and a Chicago man who was arrested in O’Hare airport. Although the girls were not charged, authorities are probing their online contacts to see who might have been encouraging them. The 19-year-old man told authorizes he met a man online who directed him to fly to Istanbul and wait for further instructions, CNN reported. It also said he had pro-ISIS writings and illustrations in his Bolingbrook home.

Just as we are developing protocols to contain and control Ebola, so to we must take measures to monitor both the spread of jihad sympathy and any inroads ISIS may be making to extend its reach into America’s cities. As we head toward Midterm elections, Americans seem less concerned about being struck by a terror attack here than they are about exposure to Ebola, which by all medical accounts is extremely rare. Analytics from Google show Ebola is the more-searched term than ISIS, and a Pew Poll found that 36% of Americans are following the spread of Ebola, while 31% are following America’s strikes against ISIS.

The answer to both problems is the same: education. As doctors, public officials and the general public learn how Ebola spreads and how it can be contained, we must also look at “lone wolf” terrorism as an epidemic.

Speaking on “Meet The Press” Sunday, Michael Leiter, former director of the United States National Counter terrorism Center, said the only way to contain the spread of lone-wolf terror is to “ramp up our surveillance” to detect people who may “have a crisis in their life, are mentally ill and attach themselves to that ideology.” As in the Ebola crisis, he said, the risk is small, not an existential threat, but one we dare not underestimate.

We always hear about “increased chatter” from extremist groups before and after an event. We should be listening more often and more carefully, and we must continue to work with the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court to find ways to be diligent while respecting the privacy of innocent Americans.

The man shot dead by police after the Queens hatchet attack, Zale Thompson, had an online history that involved rants against America and visits to sites associated with terror groups.

Leiter noted that monitoring is not enough: Authorities and their operatives also need to be able to engage extremist forces through social media to mitigate their impact on others.

Based on what we learned in Dallas from the treatment of Ebola patient Eric Duncan, New York officials were able to learn a great deal that may have saved the lives of the first patient in New York, people with whom he came in contact, and the health care workers treating him.

We must take great care to take similar lessons of prevention and response whenever an outbreak of the pro-jihad virus occurs.

Originaly Published: The Huffington Post