<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/22/nyregion/occupy-wall-street-criticized-for-flashes-of-anti-semitism.html">http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/22/nyregion/occupy-wall-street-criticized-for-flashes-of-anti-semitism.html</a><br>
<p>
The <a href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/o/occupy_wall_street/index.html?inline=nyt-org" title="More articles about Occupy Wall Street." class="meta-org">Occupy
Wall Street</a> protests, now in their second month, have increasingly
been criticized by a variety of groups, most of them politically
conservative, for flashes of anti-Semitism. Among those calling
attention to the issue have been the Republican National Committee, Rush
Limbaugh and the columnist William Kristol. </p><p>
But the protests have also, on occasion, had a distinctly Jewish flavor:
The encampment has coincided with the busy Jewish holiday season and
has witnessed, in its midst or on its edges, a crowded Kol Nidre service
on Yom Kippur, festive dancing with a scroll on Simhat Torah on
Thursday night, and the sukkah. </p><p>
The protesters, clustered together in a kind of ad hoc Athenian
democracy in the canyons of Lower Manhattan, firmly deny that their
demonstrations against corporate greed and the political power of banks
exhibit antagonism that singles out Jews. </p><p>
�You�re going to get a few wackos,� said Aaron Moses Miller, 25, a
slender, unemployed man from Ridgewood, Queens, who had been in the park
for 16 days. �You can�t help it in a population of this size.� </p><p>
Mr. Miller, who is Jewish, said that he had not seen the man holding the
anti-Semitic signs, but said: �If I had seen him, I would have said
something to him. My name is Aaron Moses Miller.� </p><p>
Jeff Smith, 41, part of the press team for Occupy Wall Street, assailed
those who he said ascribed the views of one sign-holder to the entire
movement. </p><p>
�To put someone out there to say, �This is who the group is,� is about
as dishonest as you can be,� Mr. Smith, who is also Jewish, said. �It�s
yellow journalism.� </p><p>
And Marjorie Dove Kent, executive director of Jews for Racial and
Economic Justice, which has taken part in the protests, said that the
movement had a diffuse leadership and that individual protesters had
indicated their condemnation of the sign-carrying man by shouting him
down. </p><p>
But much as the Tea Party movement initially grappled with accusations
of racism, Occupy Wall Street has been consistently confronted with
accusations of anti-Semitism. Several conservative Web sites and
television programs have shown video of the sign-holder, as well as of a
woman at an allied demonstration in Los Angeles who identified herself
as a public school teacher and decried �Zionist Jews who are running the
big banks and the Federal Reserve.� </p><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>P2P Foundation: <a href="http://p2pfoundation.net" target="_blank">http://p2pfoundation.net</a>� - <a href="http://blog.p2pfoundation.net" target="_blank">http://blog.p2pfoundation.net</a> <br>
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