Demonstrators against the war in Gaza targeted a pumpkin carving event that state Sen. Scott Wiener hosted Saturday in Noe Valley, a protest local Jewish community leaders called antisemitic.
About 50 demonstrators showed up at the annual family-friendly event at a small park at 24th and Douglass streets. As families with children carved pumpkins, the group of protesters chanted, “No more money for genocide” and “Wiener, Wiener you can’t hide. We charge you with genocide.” Some of the protesters waved Palestinian flags.
Wiener, a Democrat from San Francisco, has said he supports a two-state solution that creates a Palestinian state separate from Israel.
Some of the demonstrators also shouted profanities and antisemitic remarks, recorded in a video posted by the Jewish Community Relations Council on X.
“JCRC is appalled that anti-Israel agitators would target a family-friendly pumpkin carving event hosted by a Jewish state senator to spew hateful, violent rhetoric in response to the situation in the Middle East,” the group said in a statement to the Chronicle. “Targeting a Jewish elected official who has no role in international affairs — and not their colleagues with the same views — is textbook antisemitism. Every San Franciscan who supports peaceful and productive discourse should join us in condemning these actions in the strongest possible terms.”
San Francisco Chronicle
October 27, 2024
