'We absolutely have no place for that': Pensacola rallies together after hateful vandalism

The Pensacola community is standing together in unity and remaining supportive of one another in the face of a spree of hate that even brought the FBI to town to investigate.

Two weeks ago, the Pensacola Police Department arrested four teens, two pairs of brothers, in connection to a string of antisemitic acts around the city. Three religious institutions, a working-class community center, an animal hospital and more were targets of hateful vandalism in Pensacola since mid-July.

The perpetrators of the antisemitic attacks used swastikas to cover bricks and tag buildings during their spree, resulting in broken windows and multiple cleanup efforts to remove graffiti.

Despite the crimes committed across Pensacola, afflicted residents and concerned members of the community have continued to support and uplift one another with positivity.

Related: Two of three Pensacola teens to be tried as adults in antisemitic graffiti case

Dig deeper: Will the 4 Pensacola teens charged with hate crimes be tried as adults? What to know

Pensacola Chabad Center

“Thank God the community has come together in a very strong and powerful way. We’ve gotten a lot of support from so many individuals around town … even beyond Florida and across the country,” said Rabbi Mendel Danow, whose Chabad Center was vandalized a month ago with bricks containing swastikas, hateful slogans like “WLM,” or White Lives Matter, and “No Jews.”

Chabad is a worldwide organization that provides Jewish people a place to gather regardless of their level of knowledge or experience concerning Judaism. Chabad operates more than 3,500 institutions across 100 countries, according to its website.

Danow is from Sweden originally, where his parents ran their own Chabad, and later came to the U.S. at 14-years old.

Danow moved to Pensacola five years ago to provide a Chabad Center to Jewish people seeking one between Mobile and Destin, which each have their own.

“I’ve gotten letters and emails from people sending their support, people have sent donations from across the country … It’s definitely been very heartwarming on that end,” Danow said. “But thank God people have come together, there is a feeling of strong positive energy that has come out of this.”

The maternal grandmother of one of the arrested teens visited the Chabad last Friday and gifted them “beautiful” flowers, according to Danow.

“She came and wanted to express that this is something that she didn’t educate her children on, it's not something they learned at home,” he said. “It was very kind on her part to come, show face, to bring a beautiful bouquet of flowers and a beautiful letter apologizing for what happened.”

When asked what kind of environment could have encouraged this kind of hateful behavior, Danow explains that the internet and conspiracy theories may play a large role.

“There is a lot of people online with all different types of opinions and worldviews, unfortunately there is also a lot of negativity online,” he says. “What we can do about is make sure our online presence is powerful and there is lots of positivity.

“I’m a rabbi and I practice Judaism in my life, but I am someone who you can talk to, someone you can have a conversation with, someone who’s caring, a real person and (we’re) real people,” Danow says. “By showing that online, I think it’s very powerful and suddenly (someone) may realize it’s not whatever they’re being fed online.”

Following the antisemitic attack, the Chabad Center held a Shabbos of light ceremony on July 21 to amplify their message of light and positivity.

Temple Beth-El

The Temple Beth-El, about four minutes down the road from Danow’s Chabad Center, was another victim of the spree of hate crimes and had two bricks thrown through their bathroom window on July 28. Temple Beth-El was founded in 1876 and is the oldest Jewish congregation in Florida.

“There’s certainly an element of shock, of pain. These acts of hate can be disheartening,” said Rabbi Joel Fleekop, who has served as rabbi at Temple Beth-El since 2012. “But the amount of outreach that we’ve received from friends and neighbors offering support and solidarity has really been overwhelming and a great source of comfort; to know that our neighbors are as outraged and disgusted by these expressions of hate as many in our community are.”

Two of Temple Beth-El’s neighboring congregations reached out and sponsored their sanctuary flowers following the incident.

Fleekop says that his favorite part of being rabbi in this area is the warmth of the community.

“My wife and I really enjoy living in the Pensacola area, it is a really friendly place where most people really care about each other and care about their community,” he said.

Fleekop says that this is the lone expression of antisemitism that he has seen in his time serving.

“These are very much out of character with our experience here and talking with members who have been here their whole life, this is the first time they can remember,” he said. “Our feeling is that these acts are isolated. But there’s always a fear that the attention they’ve garnered could inspire copycats.

“It (antisemitic acts) is part of a larger growing trend nationally that has increased dramatically the past few years,” Fleekop said. “We don’t worry about this happening again tomorrow, but when I look at the national discourse … it is part of a larger more troubling trend of lack of tolerance for one another.”

Fleekop said he would love for the community to know more about the Jewish community in general.

“Unfortunately these acts of vandalism, of hate, they get the attention and that’s what people know.

“I want people to know the Jewish community is much more than the victims of this incident,” he said. “It’s a very proud community, it’s a community guided by deep and abiding values and it is a thriving part of the greater Pensacola area that is engaged with building up the community for all of us.”

Fleekop said that Temple Beth-El still plans to do its annual Inter-faith Thanksgiving service and are looking to hold more events for the community in the near future.

Pensacola Liberation Center

Religious institutions were not the only targets of these acts of hatred. The Pensacola Liberation Center, a working-class community center created by the Central Gulf Coast chapter of the Party for Socialism & Liberation organization, was tagged with antisemitic symbols on Aug. 3.

Prior to their building being targeted for the recent spree of hate crimes, PSL had been attempting to organize residents of the community in order to clean up swastikas and other antisemitic images at places around Pensacola like Graffiti Bridge.

PSL worked with residents and local organizations STRIVE, the ANSWER Coalition, the Pensacola Taskforce, and the Emerald Coast Equality LGBTA Democratic Caucus on a cleanup event for Graffiti Bridge on Sunday, Aug. 13. Volunteers cleared the bridge of visible hate symbols and added their own touch in the process. They plan to organize more cleanup efforts at locations in Pensacola that they say still have antisemitic symbols present.

“We felt it was really important to show no matter what group you’re affiliated with, what your perspective is on politics or community issues, that we can come together and say we’re not going to let fascism or Nazi beliefs take root here,” said PSL volunteer Sarah Brummet.

PSL has previously experienced demonstrations of hate in the area. During their demonstration on March 4 to celebrate International Women’s Day, they were confronted by apparent Nazis yelling slurs and performing the sieg heil, a well-known Nazi salute, seemingly as an attempt to disrupt the event and strike fear in those who attended.

Hidden in plain sight: Are there hate symbols being displayed in your Florida community? Check with this list

When asked why PSL believes there is a growing base of Nazi-like mindsets, Brummet explained that misrepresentation of history is her main suspect.

“I think that there is so much to explore. On one hand we don’t know our history … the way that we’re taught history is very much that one person takes a stand and then everything changed, but that’s not real,” Brummet said. “Masses of people have come together to make change. Only when we’ve been united around our similarities rather than the differences … only at those times have we been able to overcome white supremacists and similar challenges in society.”

PSL held a meeting at 6 p.m. Sunday at the Pensacola Liberation Center to address the “growing Nazi threat” and hope to establish a committee that focuses on identifying and preventing acts of hate around the area.

Members of STRIVE or the Socialist Transgender Initiative, an advocacy organization that works to ensure the survival and wellbeing of trans people in Northwest Florida and creator of PensaPride, were among the attending volunteers at PSL's Graffiti Bridge cleanup event.

"We absolutely have no place for that (antisemitic graffiti) not only in Pensacola or anywhere in this world," said Devin Cole, president of STRIVE and a board member for PensaPride. "So we just went out there and did what had to be done. While there may be this string of (antisemitic) attacks, there is also work being done to counteract these attacks.

"The hatred has always been there, it's just become more transparent over the past couple of years with people like Ron DeSantis or Donald Trump who accelerated the flames of hatred and bigotry over these past couple of years," Cole said. "Pensacola is the largest city around besides Mobile and a pretty diverse community of people, so it is really no surprise that this city would be targeted."

Cole added, "When you have events like Pride and Juneteenth that celebrate the diversity of people, you're absolutely going to have the other side of people who want to smash that diversity and really re-instill a sense of hatred, fear and bigotry that we saw 50, 60, 70 years ago when the Klan marched through Pensacola and people like myself could be forcibly institutionalized."

This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Pensacola Jewish community still hopeful after antisemitic incidents