Anti-Semitic mailing sent to Palo Alto council members

Members of the Palo Alto City Council recently received a mailing stuffed with anti-Semitic material.

There were no swastikas printed on the 10 or so pages of material, which contained no threats, but Councilwoman Judy Kleinberg said the “skinhead and Aryan” literature was clear in its message.

Headlines proclaimed “Jews Own New York’s Four Papers” and “Jews Control Democratic Party — Sleep in White House.”

Kleinberg and other members of the nine-person council agreed that the literature was likely sent because two Jewish issues have been controversial topics in Palo Alto this year: a squelched attempt to build an eruv and the school district’s push to take over the current home of Albert L. Schultz Jewish Community Center.

Although the mailing made no reference to either controversy and had an Aug. 21 Oakland postmark, Councilman Jim Burch said it “could have been” sent by someone who doesn’t believe the Palo Alto government should be helping the JCC find a new home.

“There have been a couple of people who have expressed strong positions against the eruv and the JCC that are blatantly anti-Semitic,” he said. “I just dismiss them.”

Kleinberg said the letter was probably sent by “the people under the rocks that come out when there is a controversy” involving Jewish issues.

The No. 10 envelope contained about 10 pages of reproduced material and fliers, according to Vice Mayor Sandy Eakins, who also received the letter. It included articles about “how to save our country from immigration and for the white race,” according to Kleinberg, and “how it’s dangerous having so many Jews in the entertainment industry in high positions,” according to Eakins. The fliers had information on white supremacist Web sites, they said.

“I read about half a line and then quickly got rid of it,” Councilman Victor Ojakian said. “I said to Judy, ‘Thank God we’ve got mixed-paper curbside recycling.'”

Kleinberg, the lone Jew on the City Council, at first feared she was the only one who received the letter, which she said arrived at the city clerk’s office. After casually checking with other council members, however, she determined that she had not been specifically targeted.

Because there were no personal threats or overt Nazi symbolism in the mailing, and “because it’s free speech,” Kleinberg said the council made no formal move to inform the Anti-Defamation League or the Palo Alto Police Department.

Jonathan Bernstein, the S.F.-based director of the ADL’s Central Pacific region, said Tuesday that he wished someone had reported the matter to his office.

“You want to report all these things because you never know where it’s going to lead,” he said. “The temples that were firebombed in Sacramento [in 1999] had fliers delivered several weeks before the bombings. There were no threats or anything like that, but if those fliers were taken more seriously, maybe the police could have had a leg up.”

While Eakins was “not concerned that something is going to boil over” in Palo Alto, she did express sadness about anti-Semitic viewpoints that have emerged in the eruv and JCC debates this year.

In the volatile eruv situation, a City Council vote in July prevented an Orthodox-led group from constructing a contiguous border that would permit observant Jews to carry objects or push strollers within its boundaries on Shabbat.

Some letters to the editor in the Palo Alto Daily and Palo Alto Weekly have come down hard on the Jews and others supporting the eruv and the JCC.

“To me, [the anti-Semitism] has been rather thinly veiled and I’m saddened that this kind of response is coming to the surface,” Eakins said.

Anti-Semitic mailing sent to Palo Alto council members

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Andy Altman-Ohr