Jewish
Explosion!
Yonatan Shaul Not-So-Tov-in
Jewish Exponent
staff
A Jewish holiday carnival turned to violence and terror this week as the
City of Brotherly
Love reeled from its second riot within weeks.
Purim revelers ran amuck on Philadelphia’s South Street following the
traditional Fast of
Esther, leaving the famed hangout and much of the
neighboring Society Hill in ruins.
Hundreds of inebriated Jewish celebrants poured out of local synagogues and
proceeded to
begin to turn over cars, rip up cobblestones out of the street
and paint pro-Israel graffiti
on storefronts.
This Purim violence came only a week after Mardi Gras riots in the same
area resulted in
81 arrests.
One hundred and eighteen people were arrested in the Purim melee, including
18 rabbis
and 36 persons who listed their occupation as either cantor,
mohel or kosher-food
supervisor. Others were listed as employees of the
Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia,
the American Jewish Congress and
the Female Hebrew Benevolent Society.
Rabbi Yochanan Goldman of Lubavitch of Center City said there would have
been no trouble
but that a few rowdy “outsiders” from Northeast
Philadelphia were the cause of the
disturbance.
Schnapps and rock ’n’ roll
“It started with the normal Purim
fun, with drinking and dancing to celebrate our close escape
from genocide
at the hands of Haman. But once we ran out of schnapps, the mob
turned
ugly.”
Rabbi Menachem Schmidt, also of Lubavitch of Center City was performing
with his
rock-and-roll band when the violence began.
“Somebody started demanding we play louder to drown out Haman’s name, but
no matter
how high we turned up the amps, it didn’t work,” Schmidt said.
Those attending the Chabad celebrations were not the only Purim revelers
who got into
trouble. More than 50 members of two Center City Conservative
congregations became
involved in a fracas when a member of Temple Beth
Zion-Beth Israel challenged a member
of the Society Hill Synagogue,
claiming that BZBI’s spiritual leader, Rabbi Ira F. Stone, had
a larger
vocabulary than Society Hill’s Rabbi Ivan Caine.
The argument soon led to blows as the two congregations clashed in a
running brawl that
spread from Spruce to Lombard streets and then mixed in
with the ongoing riot on South
Street. Most of the evening’s casualties
stemmed from this incident.
Fifty-four persons were listed at local hospitals as injured. One of the
casualties, Burt Siegel,
executive director of the Jewish Community
Relations Council, said he had tried to break up
one of the fights but that
eventually he was dragged under by the stream of humanity surging
up
Lombard Street.
Speaking from his hospital bed, Siegel said, “My intention was to make
peace, but tonight
Society Hill was just as violent as the Middle East. And
that’s another good reason why Jews
should visit Israel.”
Neither Caine nor Stone were available for comment about the incident the
following day.
A spokesperson for Stone said that the rabbi deplored the violence and was
secluded,
writing a poem about the incident in iambic pentameter.
Society Hill Synagogue issued a press release also condemning the violence,
but added that
Caine was definitely the smartest rabbi in Center City.
Local storekeepers and restaurant owners were particularly incensed.
The owner of one bar who preferred to remain anonymous said that this time,
the city
couldn’t blame the alcohol consumption on local merchants.
“These people won’t even come in to our places because we’re not kosher,”
the bar owner
said.
The store owners also were upset that at the first sign of the Jewish
rioting, the Philadelphia
Police forces on the scene turned and ran from
the Purim rioters.
Police Commissioner John Timoney said he would investigate this charge but
that, “under
the circumstances, I can’t entirely blame those officers who
chose to save their lives rather
than get in the middle between Chabadniks
and Conservative Jews running wild.”
Mayor John Street, who surveyed the damage the following morning, said he
would be
meeting with the leaders of the Center City Kehillah to plan how
to prevent similar mayhem
next year.
“I know that on Purim everyone is supposed to get so tipsy that they can’t
tell Mordechai
from Haman, but this is ridiculous. Maybe in the future
we’re going to have all the Purim
parties held at Veterans Stadium and have
the police and a court standing by to handle
anybody who steps out of
line.”
