A teenager has been indicted for vandalizing a Jewish cemetery in New York.
Eric Carbanoro, 18, is being indicted for allegedly being a part of a group that emblazoned anti-Semitic graffiti on Beth Shalom Cemetery in Warwick, NY, which included the words “Heil Hitler” and multiple swastikas, on Oct. 9, 2016.
The indictment also alleges that Carbanoro deleted incriminating images from phones belonging to other people, including a meme that stated “secretly spray paints Jewish cemetery and gets away with it.”
As a result, Carbanoro is being charged with conspiring to commit a hate crime and tampering with evidence.
District Attorney David Hoovler denounced the vandalism in a statement.
“There is no room for this type of hateful desecration of religious property here in Orange County,” said Hoovler. “These anti-Semitic symbols and messages do not reflect the values of the overwhelming majority of Orange County and Warwick residents.”
Carbonaro has yet to be arrested. It is believed that he conspired with two others to commit the hate crime, both of which have yet to be identified. The investigation is still ongoing.
The terror suspect, who has been identified as 29-year-old Sayfullo Saipov, reportedly drove a white Home Depot truck on the opposite side of the bike lane on the West Side Highway in Lower Manhattan, striking people in its wake. The truck eventually crashed into a school bus and another car, and the driver fled the vehicle while carrying fake guns before being shot by police.
It is also being reported that the terrorist shouted “Allah Akhbar!”
Here is a picture of the suspect being apprehended:
“This was an act of terror, a particularly cowardly act of terror, aimed at innocent civilians,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a press conference.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) said in the same press conference that the attack appears to be a “lone wolf attack” and that New York is a prime target for those who despise America’s values.
“The truth is New York is an international symbol of freedom and democracy…that also makes us a target,” said Cuomo.
Cuomo praised the first responders on the scene of the terror attack.
“We have the finest security on the globe,” said Cuomo.
President Trump called the terrorist “a very sick and deranged person”:
In NYC, looks like another attack by a very sick and deranged person. Law enforcement is following this closely. NOT IN THE U.S.A.!
One of the witnesses, Greg Ahl, told 1010 WINS he “noticed along the bike path a bunch of wrecked bicycles and as I drove it was just more and more completely and totally wrecked bicycles and people mulling around to the side.”
Another witness, Uber driver Chen Yi, told CNBC that he saw “a lot of blood” and “a lot of people on the ground” on the bike path where the terror attack took place.
Ah! The trusty costume-in-a-bag. The fail-safe last-minute resort. Enter any Halloween store today and you’ll see walls stocked with costumes in cellophane bags. But in 1937, two Jewish brothers saw potential in an untapped market, when Halloween was a little-known holiday, a speck on the calendar.
They’d go on to create Ben Cooper, Inc. and revolutionize the Halloween costume industry. If you were born before the ’90s, chances are you probably sported one of their budget-friendly vinyl costumes. Their company reportedly owned nearly 80% of the Halloween market in the ‘60s, moving a remarkable 2.5 million units in 1963.
Ben and Nat Cooper in costume showroom (Courtesy of Ira Cooper)
Ben and Nat Cooper were the products of Ellis Island Jewry, raised on the Lower East Side. Their father was a fairly successful restaurateur, but Ben and Nat both yearned for something of their own.
“They wanted to assimilate,” Ira Cooper, Nat’s son, told the Journal. This was the groundwork that inspired two Jewish brothers to pursue the shmatteh business and dominate a Pagan holiday.
Maybe this “otherness,” their desire to assimilate, allowed them to observe cultural trends from an outsider’s perspective. Maybe their Jewish roots equipped them with the resources and acumen to revolutionize a holiday that wasn’t even theirs.
For Ira, growing up under the Halloween legacy wasn’t a big deal in the household. “We polished the silver for Passover, we didn’t polish it for Halloween,” he told the Journal.
What made Ben Cooper, Inc. so successful, besides the affordable price point, was their character licensing. Rather than offer generic costumes of ghouls and goblins, the Coopers took it a step further. In 1937, Disney released their first animated feature Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.
“They took the train out to California and met with Walt [Disney],” said Ira. On that trip, the brothers got a license to start manufacturing Snow White costumes. Simple as that. “It was a handshake deal,” Ira said.
Soon after, the brothers went on a licensing spree. Of course, other costume manufacturers followed suit, but Cooper, Inc. was ahead of the curve, securing licenses for comic books like Batman and Superman, nabbing licenses for TV shows like Laverne & Shirley and Happy Days. They even licensed Star Wars.
In the 1950s, they started producing lines of their own made-up superhero concoctions (and trademarking the word “Super-Hero” along the way). They had a Snake Man, a Bug Man, and, yes, a Spider Man (circa 1954)- eight years before Stan Lee and Steve Ditko would publish their Peter Parker franchise. Now, a Ben Cooper, Inc. Spider Man costume goes for a whopping $20,000.
“It was one of those serendipitous things that happened at the same time,” Ira said about the Spider Man fluke.
In 1991, Ben Cooper, Inc. filed for bankruptcy and was eventually bought by their competitor Rubie’s Costume Co. However, the company has since celebrated a homecoming, and Ben Cooper, Inc. is now Ben Cooper, LLC, run by Ira Cooper and Jon Miller.
When asked if he would dress up for Halloween, Ira responded, “God, no!”
Daniel Kupfert Heller is assistant professor of Jewish studies at McGill University. Dr. Heller received his PhD from Stanford University and his undergraduate degree from the University of Toronto.
In the previous round, you presented an ambivalent picture of Jabotinsky as a leader who was “increasingly willing, when it was politically expedient to do so, to embrace a leadership style that his contemporaries associated with fascism,” but who also “relished his persona as a champion of democracy and individual rights.”
In this last round, I would like to focus on where this ambivalence leaves Jabotinsky’s legacy and our understanding of the “Jabotinsky way,” which many Israeli leaders still claim allegiance to.
Where does your account leave Jabotinsky as a possible source of Ideological inspiration for where Israel is currently at? What can modern-day leaders and thinkers learn from his thought? In what way, if at all, is Jabotinsky’s thought and practice still relevant for thinking about the challenges facing Zionism today?
We’d like to thank you once again for participating in this exchange.
Shmuel
***
Dear Shmuel,
Like many historians, I believe that the study of the past, with all of its complexities and contradictions, can rarely (if ever) offer neatly packaged lessons for the contemporary world. More often than not, political activists distort history in order to create lessons that justify their actions in the present and visions for the future. This includes making sweeping generalizations for which there is not adequate evidence, and ignoring or suppressing evidence and facts that challenge their preferred view of the past.
Part of what makes Jabotinsky’s ideological legacy so fascinating is that, in many respects, his afterlife in contemporary Israeli politics proves this very point. Zionists of every persuasion invoke his name to justify their views on a staggering array of issues facing Israeli society, from the role of the rabbinate in legislating the lives of Israel’s Jewish citizens and the status of women in civic life to the repercussions of economic inequality. Perhaps the most powerful testament to Jabotinsky’s persistent presence in Israeli politics comes from debates among leaders within the increasingly fractured Israeli Right. Drawing on certain statements by Jabotinsky while deliberately ignoring others, these politicians continually produce contradictory interpretations of his legacy to provide legitimacy for their competing views on the Arab-Israeli conflict.
In 2005, for example, when Prime Minister Ariel Sharon sought to justify to Israelis the disengagement from Gaza, he turned to Jabotinsky’s prose, including a passage from a 1915 essay insisting that settlement was not “an end in and of itself.” Opponents of disengagement responded to Sharon’s speech by citing passages from Jabotinsky’s prose calling for a Jewish state that stretched from the Mediterranean sea to the western borders of today’s Saudi Arabia and Iraq.
Inspired by Jabotinsky’s articles promising the equal treatment of an Arab minority within a future Jewish state, president Reuven Rivlin has argued for extending citizenship to Palestinians in the West Bank while retaining Israeli control of the area. In contrast, Avigdor Lieberman, who describes his party, Yisrael Beitenu as “a national movement with the clear vision to follow in the brave path of Ze’ev Jabotinsky,” has called for a two-state solution that would include a population transfer of Palestinian citizens of Israel and Jews living in the West Bank. He could easily turn to Jabotinsky’s musings in 1940 on the potential merits of Arab emigration from the future Jewish state.
Lieberman has also called to strip Palestinian citizens of Israel of their citizenship if they do not publicly pledge loyalty to Israel as a “Jewish and democratic state.” Referring to Palestinian citizens of Israel at a conference in March 2015 devoted to the future of Israeli politics, Lieberman mused, “Those who are against us, there’s nothing to be done — we need to pick up an ax and cut off his head. Otherwise we won’t survive here.” A spokesman for the party quickly “clarified” Lieberman’s comments by noting that he was, in fact, “paraphrasing Jabotinsky, who said that we should be very generous to those who stand with you and cruel to those [who] physically stand against you.” Israeli journalists appalled by Lieberman’s statements assembled passages from Jabotinsky’s writing, accusing him of betraying the founder or right-wing Zionism’s commitment to protecting minority rights.
Had Jabotinsky observed Israelis at war over his legacy, he would have discovered that his political prose remains just as elusive as he had intended it to be between the two world wars. The tensions and contradictions that characterize Jabotinsky’s lessons are, perhaps, the key to his staying power.
Buying a home for the first time is exciting. This big step in life needs thorough preparation. At one given point there are usually many homes in the market. It calls upon you to discuss with your realtor what space and neighborhood you desire to live in, and for what price. Before committing to buy a home, envisage how your life might pan out in the next five years.
Size and location
Between location and size, what is of prime importance to you? You can either choose to buy a small house in your favorite part of the city, or a big house further from the city but at an affordable cost. If you plan on growing your family shortly, then the big home in a suburb might serve you right.
Mobility
A home is a long-term investment. You don’t want to buy and sell it in less than five years; it is financially unwise. So before buying that new home think again where your career is going to take you. In case you don’t get to live in your home for five years, consider renting out instead of trying to sell it shortly after purchasing.
Do a thorough inspection
A home inspection before purchase helps to unearth the beautiful and the ugly details. You can get the seller to repair the defects you spot during the inspection, but if they don’t do this, you better keep looking to find the right home. You just don’t want to buy a house then undergo extra costs of fixing broken fixtures.
Beat down the price after inspection
Every home has some flaws. You can use what you found during your review to get the further price reduction on the property. This way you can save money to do remodeling and add décor that suits your tastes.
Neighbourhoods
Specific amenities in your community may cause the value of your home to appreciate with time. It is a good investment to buy a house near a school for instance. On the other hand, if your new home is in a district surrounded by expensive mansions, you will cough out more money in property taxes.
Financing
How much can you afford to pay every month for your new home? This largely depends on the amount of your income, your assets, savings, and debts. The rule of thumb is this; don’t spend more than 36 percent of your monthly income on a mortgage. Banks might decline you for a mortgage if you have bad credit reports. Credit repair measures like paying your bills on time, maintaining low balances and paying over the bottom line should get you out of the red zone before buying your first home.
Sometimes people use consolidation loans to get another loan. You borrow against your home so that you can use the money to settle other smaller debts so that you just have one loan to service- the house. This is a risky undertaking that might tie your home in an unending debt cycle.
To make the right decision about home buying and get the best deal, first time home buyers need to seek guidance from realtors and mortgage advisors continually.
