18 | NOVEMBER 12 • 2020 A Jewish cemetery in Grand Rapids was found vandalized with pro-Trump graffiti on Monday, Nov. 2 — the day before Election Day, as President Trump prepared to close out his reelection campaign in Grand Rapids. A caretaker at the Ahavas Israel Cemetery, which is man- aged by Congregation Ahavas Israel in Grand Rapids, discov- ered the graffiti at 8 a.m. The graffiti spelled out “TRUMP” and “MAGA ” on multiple tombstones but does not include any antisemitic lan- guage or symbols. “There were no other words or symbols painted that would clearly indicate that it was an antisemitic attack, ” Rabbi David Krishef of Congregation Ahavas Israel told the JN. “It may just have been oppor- tunistic vandalism against a cemetery which is isolated and hard to see from the road, on Halloween weekend, not an attack against the Jewish com- munity. We don’ t know. ” Carolyn Normandin, Anti- Defamation League-Michigan regional director, told the Jewish News it was unclear whether the graffiti would rise to the level of a hate crime under Michigan law. A tweet from ADL-MI sharing photos of the graffiti went viral. “It hurts when somebody defaces your cemetery, no mat- ter what their motivation may have been, ” Krishef said. “It feels like an attack. Whether it is a deliberate attack, we don’ t know. ” But Krishef also thought back to a different incident at another Midwestern Jewish congrega- tion: the 2019 fire that destroyed a synagogue in Duluth, Minn., where his wife used to live. That story attracted inter- national media attention, and “every interview focused on antisemitism, ” Krishef said. But the culprit was soon revealed to be a homeless man who had built a fire in the synagogue’ s sukkah to keep warm and couldn’ t put it out. The larger media angle had been not only false, but potentially harmful. It’ s for this reason that Krishef is deliberately not calling the cemetery vandalism an act of antisemitism. “I don’ t want to feed that kind of frenzy, where we see some- thing the way we want to see it because it fits the worldview that we believe in, ” he said. “My first reaction was, we better be careful with this. We want to get it right. ” Within the congregation, “people are angry, people are upset, people are afraid, ” Krishef said. He thanked Rabbi Asher Lopatin, exec- utive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council/ AJC, and Steven Ingber, COO of the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit, for attend- ing Ahavas Israel’ s Tuesday morning minyan on Zoom and showing their support for the synagogue. Edward Miller, cemetery chair for Congregation Ahavas Israel, said, “When I received the call about the vandalism, I was shocked and taken aback that something like this could happen to our cemetery. The response from the community, both local and from abroad, has been overwhelming and hum- bling. ” Grand Rapids law enforce- ment are currently investigating the incident, but it’ s unclear what, if any, leads they have to work with. ADL-MI announced a reward of up to $3,000 for informa- tion leading to the arrest and conviction of the individual or individuals responsible for the vandalism. “We are grateful to the com- munity for its support and con- cern, and to the Grand Rapids Police Department for taking this incident seriously and inves- tigating it, ” Normandin said in a press release. A silver lining came in the outpouring of community response from all denomina- tions. Besides words of support, there was also action. Before the synagogue could even send a cleanup crew to the cemetery, anonymous volunteers scrubbed off the graffiti themselves. “I wish I knew who they were so I could thank them in per- son, Krishef said. “I had no idea people would come so quickly. I was really astonished by the response. ” Pro-Trump graffi ti was ‘not necessarily’ antisemitism. ANDREW LAPIN EDITOR Grand Rapids Cemetery Vandalized, But Community Cleans It Up PHOTO COURTESY OF ADL MICHIGAN The graffiti spelled out "TRUMP" and "MAGA" but did not contain any antisemitic language. Rabbi David J.B. Krishef, Congregation Ahavas Israel COURTESY OF RABBI DAVID J.B. KRISHEF