Earlier this month, Athens, Greece hosted the Mayors Summit Against Antisemitism, held in partnership with the Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM), Center for Jewish Impact (CJI), and Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA). I was privileged to participate as a featured guest speaker, along with mayors, deputy mayors, and municipal officials from cities around the world, including representatives of New York City, Vienna, Paris, Dortmund, Malmo, Albuquerque, Richmond, Ft. Lauderdale, Dresden, Jackson, Mississippi, Graz, Thessaloniki, Bialystok, Beverly Hills, CA, Aventura, FL, Jackson, MS, and others.
The perceived need for such an event on this world scale underscores what too many mayors have seen in our home cities – that instances of antisemitism are on the rise, and institutions of antisemitism remain pervasive in societies of drastically varied composition and locale. While the commonality of this problem is concerning, an air of optimism was nonetheless present, stemming in fact from this same widescale recognition, in that it enables mayors around the world to think globally, but act locally in a united front against antisemitism.
The setting in Athens – the birthplace of democracy – held both historical and topical significance. Athens Mayor Kostas Bakoyannis noted that his city faces threats of rising fascism and intolerance the same as or perhaps worse than many others. He described how the decades long economic crisis in Greece allowed fascist movements to take root in search of scapegoats, and how it required the courts to quell these uprisings. “Respect begins at home, and cities are the closest Democratic institutions to the people,” Bakoyannis said. “The engine of evil is picking up the pace, and we must isolate those that are intolerant. The threat is always one election away, and we need to be extra vigilant when choices in leadership are afoot.”
Greek President Katerina Sakellaropoulou traced this sentiment back further, speaking of the centuries of presence of a Jewish community in Greece that were “interrupted,” as she put it, by the Holocaust. “This is a moral healing duty,” she stated, “to turn memory into action and prevent racism and hatred.” Other Greek officials spoke of the need to bring Holocaust education into the digital era and increase ties to Israel as preventative methods of addressing rising antisemitism.
These comments call to mind an alarming trend of celebrities with large social media influence, such as Kanye West and Kyrie Irving, spreading harmful rhetoric on Twitter, with conversations spilling over into broader media consumption. As antisemitism continues to evolve, it becomes even more clear how important Israel is as an insurance policy against the latest incarnations of hatred. Our integrated worldwide social media connections are tremendous in many ways, but also present fertile grounds for those who seek to misuse them. Amidst these digital wars without frontiers, a physical home and safe haven for a people and a faith ensures that the Jewish community can not only endure any attacks that come, but can also offer support and resistance to any people suffering from bigotry and intolerance in any location. We should be proud of the accomplishments Israel has built for the global community, and must be sure to continue to support its progress.
Mayors from around the globe also recognized this danger to their communities, but it was our own neighbor, New York Mayor Eric Adams, who spoke as poignantly as any on the perils of antisemitism becoming not just pervasive, but normalized, by circumstances such as these.
“This is the gym. This is not the ring,” Mayor Adams opined regarding the conference. “We come here to learn the skills that we need to go out and fight in the ring. The ring is on the ground in our communities… going into our schools so we don’t continue to have pipelines to hate, and have our children learn to come together and learn how to use and teach each other. We must start infusing knowledge, intelligence and not ignorance, because they are competing with a professional desire to make them start out hating each other. We can’t remain silent. We can use social media as a weapon to defeat hate. We have to be front and center, but also go into the crevices of the community to root out hatred.”
When serving as Brooklyn County Executive, Mayor Adams undertook a plan called “Breaking Bread and Building Bonds,” consisting of 100 dinners across the city, with 10 people at the table each night from different ethnic, cultural and religious backgrounds. “We did something revolutionary,” Mayor Adams said, “We talked to each other. We don’t realize it but we are a segregated people, hardwired to coalesce among the people that look like us, talk like us… but it’s time to break free of that, to lean into the discomfort of knowing something and someone new and appreciate what diversity has to offer. We all realize we’re in the pot together, and that there’s a temperature increase. Now it’s going to take a concerted effort from all of us not just to turn down the heat, but we will destroy the flames that fed the boiling pot in the first place.”
The necessity for a mayor to be both proactive and reactive in such a manner was a common theme, but even more so, was the importance of mayors accepting roles beyond what might be within our official scopes. My home city of EnglewoodN.J., is fortunate to have some of the finest representatives we could ask for at the federal, state, county and local level, but when a resident needs something, their first reflex is often to turn to the mayor, regardless of purview. The challenges are great in navigating complex issues between diverse segments of our communities that lack an official chain of command, but the opportunities to act as the connective tissue to build real relationships and promote progress are among the most fulfilling aspects of public service.
Adams described a similar sense of a light on the horizon through united localized efforts. “I am extremely optimistic serving during a time where a cohort of mayors… we get it,” he stated. “We know we must come together and help shape a national agenda – there must be a real urban agenda. No one goes to the national leader when a pothole needs to be fixed or their child needs to be educated or there’s crime on the streets. They go to the mayor.”
The key to success lies with the world’s mayors – to solve the national problems on the local level.
The concept seems straightforward in pursuit of the common goal, until one considers the vast differences between various cities around the globe, and the nuances that each individual community holds. Within the overall discussion of the conference, I had the honor to lead a panel entitled “Intercommunal Challenges and Opportunities to Ensure Diversity.” As a four-term Mayor of Englewood, this is a topic I live every day, governing a city of great diversity, and though tremendously inclusive on most levels, still bearing divisions within our community. Some of these are as simple as the day on which we pray, which is innocent in nature, but can cause rifts simply from a separation community activities.
Throughout my tenure as mayor, I have taken great pride and gone to great lengths – by foot no less – in regularly walking across town on my Shabbos, to ensure that every resident feels the same respect of having their city officials support and participate in the important matters in their lives, no matter the day of the week. With the onset of the Black Lives Matter movement, I marched for 18 consecutive Saturdays in various social justice demonstrations along with people from every part of our community. When the late civil rights icon Congressman John Lewis visited Englewood, he signed a picture for me that said, “Keep Walking,” in recognition of how a small gesture can have a much larger meaning in the relationships among a community. I have always treasured this gift and the sentiment it bears.
In Englewood, I take great care in seeking out individuals to appoint or nominate to the various boards and commissions that help run our city – in their qualifications to be sure, but also to see that these governing bodies reflect the makeup of the people who they will serve. I was proud to additionally install a Cultural Affairs Committee, promoting even greater connectivity between leaders in our faith, business, education, health, arts, historical, and other communities. At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, I initiated a virtual “Coffee with the Mayor” zoom session, to take the place of a weekly in-person event I previously held downtown to give residents a chance to share their thoughts. For nearly three years now, sparing only a handful of cancellations, this has continued as a regular Friday morning occurrence where people know they can reach me and other leaders in the community for updates on local happenings, and to discuss whatever matters are on their minds.
These are a few of my own methods of working to connect communities and heal the divisions that can otherwise lead to hatred. Mayors from Germany spoke of their public observance of Jewish holidays, making latkes and lighting candles as signs of reconciliation and fostering education in their home cities. Every mayor has their own methodology, each of forming a link in a chain of the global endeavor we are undertaking. Ultimately, our task is to shed light wherever we can, and this project has laid a groundwork to connect our lights to shine around the world.
