#richmond rcmp

[allthecanadianpolitics]

More than 1.5 million views on a road safety video might be considered good, if they weren't accompanied by comments such as "delete this," "shame on you" and "this is brutal."

Richmond RCMP posted a public service announcement video Friday morning on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, that received such a response. 

[...]

But advocates and many commenters on X argue the video unhelpfully focuses on pedestrian behaviour when drivers and road design ought to be the focus of safety efforts.

"Every year we get public safety campaigns that effectively victim blame. They put blame on vulnerable road users — outside cars," said Lucy Maloney with Vision Zero, a group which aims to stop traffic deaths.

Full article

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

#cdnpoli #canada #canadian politics #canadian news #canadian #richmond #british columbia #BC #RCMP #richmond rcmp #traffic safety #road safety #pedestrian safety #pedestrians

[occrpnewsagency]

Lynn Valley Care Centre hoaxer pleads guilty to obstruction of justice

A man convicted Jan. 27 of holding a man against his will in Richmond, and using weapons to coerce the victim to commit bestiality, pleaded guilty Tuesday to obstruction of justice.

In B.C. Supreme Court before Associate Chief Justice Heather Holmes, Taymour Aghtai, 28, waived his right to a trial. He will be sentenced May 5.

After Holmes read the charge against Aghtai, he agreed that he used threats, bribes or other corrupt means in a bid to persuade another person, whose name is covered by a publication ban, to not testify at his trial. The offences happened between Jan. 19, 2021 and April 13, 2021.

“As I understand it, you were in custody at the time and you made phone calls to your mother and, essentially, asked her to relay messages, either directly or indirectly to [the witness]. Is that correct?

“Yes,” Aghtai said.

"And the purpose of your doing that was to try to cause [the witness] not to testify in the trial.”

about:blank

“Yes,” he said.

At trial, Holmes heard that once Aghtai arrived at the apartment near the Richmond Olympic Oval on Sept. 4, 2020, he hit the victim on the head from behind, and restrained him with handcuffs and zap straps. The victim testified that Aghtai and others assaulted and humiliated him over the course of 30 hours until he escaped. The man testified that Aghtai “was not the main aggressor, but played a very significant role,” Holmes said in her verdict.

Aghtai denied the charges, but Holmes found the evidence showed beyond a reasonable doubt that Aghtai kept the man restrained physically and sometimes used threats and intimidation against the victim.

Holmes found Aghtai guilty of sexual assault with a weapon, assault with a weapon, extortion, unlawful confinement and use of an imitation firearm in relation to the unlawful confinement.

Aghtai had known the victim since they were teenagers and was in the business of buying and selling merchandise from his home.

Aghtai was also sentenced Feb. 7 in North Vancouver Provincial Court to time served for public mischief and conveying a false message with intent to alarm.

He had pleaded guilty in December 2021 to making 63 malicious crank calls to four managers, six nurses and two administrators at the Lynn Valley Care Centre early in the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020.

He also pleaded guilty to a hoax phone call to a Parksville Fields store and RCMP detachment in November 2019, claiming that a black man was shooting people in the store. Police attended and found no such incident.

Judge Patricia Janzen chastised Aghtai for putting others at risk of harm in both incidents, especially any black men near the Fields store and senior citizens and staff at the Lynn Valley Care Centre. She said the senselessness of his crime was only matched by its cruelty.

“Your criminal record is appalling,” Janzen said.

A 2014 psychological assessment provided to the judge concluded that Aghtai was a narcissistic, anti-social alcohol abuser with psychopathic tendencies. 

Aghtai has a criminal record dating back to 2008 for making hoax phone calls that falsely alleged heinous crimes or impersonated police officers. He also has a record of assault, robbery, break and enter, confinement and weapons offences, and violating court orders.

In 2020, he stole personal protective equipment from a seniors care home and escaped lawful custody at Richmond Hospital where he assaulted two corrections officers by threatening them with a contaminated syringe. 

[atlanticcanada]

#nova scotia #news #politics #canada #atlantic canada #CBCNS

[pzfingerprinting]

Criminal Record Check Services in Langley, BC and Richmond

Obtaining a criminal record check is a crucial step in various aspects of life, from employment to volunteering and even personal safety. The possibilities for criminal background checks in Langley, British Columbia, and Richmond will be discussed in this article, with an emphasis on the services offered by regional organizations and companies. Whether you are a resident or a newcomer to these areas, it's essential to be aware of the available resources for obtaining this vital document.

Criminal Record Check Near Langley, BC:

Langley, located in British Columbia's Lower Mainland, is a thriving community with diverse needs for criminal record checks. Several institutions and organizations in the area offer these services. One such notable provider is the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) in Langley, which can assist you with both vulnerable sector checks and standard criminal record checks. The RCMP's Langley detachment provides a comprehensive and reliable criminal record check service, ensuring that individuals and employers have access to accurate information. This service is essential for those seeking employment or volunteer opportunities that involve working with vulnerable populations, such as children or seniors.

Criminal Record Check Service Richmond:

Richmond, another vibrant city in British Columbia, also offers a range of options for obtaining a criminal record check. The Richmond RCMP detachment is a primary source for these services. They offer criminal record checks for various purposes, including employment, volunteer work, and immigration. These checks are crucial for anyone looking to establish their credibility and trustworthiness in various roles within the community. Richmond's RCMP detachment is committed to providing efficient and timely services, ensuring that individuals receive the documentation they need to pursue their goals while maintaining public safety. With their expertise and professionalism, you can trust that your criminal record check service in Richmond will be conducted accurately and confidentially.

Conclusion:

In both Langley, BC, and Richmond, individuals and organizations can access reliable criminal record check services through their local RCMP detachments. Whether you need a standard criminal record check or a vulnerable sector check, these organizations are committed to delivering precise and quick outcomes that satisfy your needs. If you are in Langley or Richmond and require a criminal record check, consider reaching out to the local RCMP detachment for assistance. Additionally, for added convenience and speed, you can visit the website pzfingerprinting.com.

Our website is a great place to find additional information.

Record Suspension Process Richmond BC

Judicial Matters Check Vancouver BC

[thenewssmedia]

Obstruction of justice the latest guilty plea for the Lynn Valley Care Centre hoaxer

A man convicted Jan. 27 of holding a man against his will in Richmond, and using weapons to coerce the victim to commit bestiality, pleaded guilty Feb. 21 to obstruction of justice.

In B.C. Supreme Court, before Associate Chief Justice Heather Holmes, Taymour Aghtai, 28, waived his right to a trial. He will be sentenced May 5.

After Holmes read the charge against Aghtai, he agreed that he used threats, bribes or other corrupt means in a bid to persuade another person, whose name is covered by a publication ban, to not testify at his trial. The offences happened between Jan. 19, 2021 and April 13, 2021.

“As I understand it, you were in custody at the time and you made phone calls to your mother and, essentially, asked her to relay messages, either directly or indirectly to [the witness]. Is that correct?

“Yes,” Aghtai said.

“And the purpose of your doing that was to try to cause [the witness] not to testify in the trial.”

“Yes,” he said.

At trial, Holmes heard that once Aghtai arrived at the apartment near the Richmond Olympic Oval on Sept. 4, 2020, he hit the victim on the head from behind, and restrained him with handcuffs and zap straps. The victim testified that Aghtai and others assaulted and humiliated over the course of 30 hours until he escaped. The man testified that Aghtai “was not the main aggressor, but played a very significant role,” Holmes said in her verdict.

Aghtai denied the charges, but Holmes found the evidence showed beyond a reasonable doubt that Aghtai kept the man restrained physically and sometimes used threats and intimidation against the victim.

Holmes found Aghtai guilty of sexual assault with a weapon, assault with a weapon, extortion, unlawful confinement and use of an imitation firearm in relation to the unlawful confinement.

Aghtai had known the victim since they were teenagers and was in the business of buying and selling merchandise from his home.

Aghtai was also sentenced Feb. 7 in North Vancouver Provincial Court to time served for public mischief and conveying a false message with intent to alarm.

He had pleaded guilty in December 2021 to making 63 malicious crank calls to four managers, six nurses and two administrators at the Lynn Valley Care Centre early in the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020.

He also pleaded guilty to a hoax phone call to a Parksville Fields store and RCMP detachment in November 2019, claiming that a black man was shooting people in the store. Police attended and found no such incident.

Judge Patricia Janzen chastised Aghtai for putting others at risk of harm in both incidents, especially any black men near the Fields store and senior citizens and staff at the Lynn Valley Care Centre. She said the senselessness of his crime was only matched by its cruelty.

“Your criminal record is appalling,” Janzen said.

A 2014 psychological assessment provided to the judge concluded that Aghtai was a narcissistic, anti-social alcohol abuser with psychopathic tendencies.

Aghtai has a criminal record dating back to 2008 for making hoax phone calls that falsely alleged heinous crimes or impersonated police officers. He also has a record of assault, robbery, break and enter, confinement and weapons offences, and violating court orders.

In 2020, he stole personal protective equipment from a seniors care home and escaped lawful custody at Richmond Hospital where he assaulted two corrections officers by threatening them with a contaminated syringe.

Cleo Hale

[blogynews]

"Uncovering the Mysterious Richmond Shooting: Mystifying Case Claims a Life, as Homicide Experts Unravel the Truth - BC"

Homicide investigators were summoned to the vicinity of Cooney Road and Anderson Road in Richmond in the early hours of Sunday morning in response to reports of a shooting incident. According to reports received by the Richmond Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), gunshots were heard at approximately 4:52 a.m. Upon arrival at the scene, officers discovered a victim in a critical medical…

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[blogynewz]

"Uncovering the Mysterious Richmond Shooting: Mystifying Case Claims a Life, as Homicide Experts Unravel the Truth - BC"

Homicide investigators were summoned to the vicinity of Cooney Road and Anderson Road in Richmond in the early hours of Sunday morning in response to reports of a shooting incident. According to reports received by the Richmond Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), gunshots were heard at approximately 4:52 a.m. Upon arrival at the scene, officers discovered a victim in a critical medical…

View On WordPress

[blogynewsz]

"Uncovering the Mysterious Richmond Shooting: Mystifying Case Claims a Life, as Homicide Experts Unravel the Truth - BC"

Homicide investigators were summoned to the vicinity of Cooney Road and Anderson Road in Richmond in the early hours of Sunday morning in response to reports of a shooting incident. According to reports received by the Richmond Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), gunshots were heard at approximately 4:52 a.m. Upon arrival at the scene, officers discovered a victim in a critical medical…

View On WordPress

[scoremedia]

He put people’s lives at risk with dozens of phoney calls that unleashed coronavirus chaos at a seniors care home: prosecutor

The 28-year-old North Vancouver man guilty of one count of conveying a false message with intent to alarm a seniors’ care home actually made 63 malicious crank calls to four managers, six nurses and two administrators early in the pandemic.

Crown prosecutor Lara Sarbit told a Provincial Court sentencing hearing on today that Taymour Aghtai was motivated by “his own entertainment” March 7-8, 2020, after public health officials declared a COVID-19 outbreak at Lynn Valley Care Centre. Aghtai pleaded guilty in December 2021 for pretending to be a B.C. Centre for Disease Control employee who ordered the facility to lock down and send staff home. Sarbit said Aghtai even falsely told at least one employee that she had contracted the virus.

Sarbit said that staff were already afraid to work because of the outbreak and uneasy about the mixed messages they received during the night Aghtai spread disinformation. Some areas of the facility missed more than 80% of staff on the morning of March 8, 2020. Night shift staff worked overtime, managers less familiar with residents reported to work and some family members even stepped in to assist their relatives.

One of the elderly residents became the first-known victim of the disease in Canada later on March 8, 2020.

“[Aghtai] put people’s lives at risk,” Sarbit said. “I certainly cannot say that the male who passed away that evening wouldn’t have passed away but for Mr. Aghtai’s actions. It may well have been that he passed away regardless, but, certainly Mr. Aghtai’s actions would have impacted on the amount of care and attention he was able to receive in his final hours.”

The calls were reported to the RCMP on March 9, 2020.

Three months later, by the time the outbreak was declared over, 76 residents and staff had caught the virus and 20 residents had died.

Aghtai also pleaded guilty to public mischief and conveying a false message with intent to alarm after a swatting incident that targeted the Fields store in Parksville on Nov. 15, 2019. Sarbit told court that Aghtai called the Oceanside RCMP detachment, pretending to be a store employee hiding in a store bathroom, claiming that a black man wearing body armour was randomly shooting people in the store.

Ten police officers rushed to the store on high alert, but found no shooter and no victims. Aghtai also called the store manager at her home the next day, pretending to be a police officer.

“It’s clear from Mr. Aghtai’s history that he knew his false call prompt a large police response.

In doing so, he was placing any black males who may have been in the vicinity at risk of harm,” she said. “His choice to impersonate a police officer when calling the manager the next day on your private number of causes for loss of fear and sorry a sense of fear and a loss of trust.”

The mobile phone that Aghtai used for both crimes was in his name, but paid for by his mother.

Sarbit said Aghtai comes from a family with significant wealth, but his employment history is limited —he has worked as a computer technician for his father’s construction company and as a security guard in a brothel.

“He would have what I would describe as an entitled upbringing, where his parents continue to support him financially.”

Sarbit said that Aghtai had a criminal history dating back to 2008 for making hoax phone calls that falsely alleged heinous crimes or impersonated police officers. Sometimes he made calls to seek revenge against enemies, other times to coax recipients to inadvertently cause damage. He also has a record of assault, robbery, break and enter, confinement and weapons offences, and violating court orders. Also in 2020, he stole personal protective equipment from a seniors care home and escaped lawful custody at Richmond Hospital where he assaulted two corrections officers by threatening them with a contaminated syringe.

Sarbit said a 2014 psychological assessment concluded that Aghtai was a narcissistic, anti-social alcohol abuser with psychopathic tendencies.

Sarbit recommended a sentence of two years less a day plus three years probation. Aghtai’s defence lawyer, Josh Oppal, asked for a 16-to 18-month sentence.

A judge reserved decision. Since Aghtai has remained in custody since September 2020, and is eligible for a time-served credit, he is unlikely to serve more time for the Parksville and North Vancouver crimes.

Oppal said his client should receive a shorter sentence because his guilty plea cancelled the trial and that his time behind bars happened during the pandemic when there were limited visitation opportunities and frequent lockdowns.

“Clearly serious offences, clearly a related record, it’s not denied these are offences that had some impact,” Oppal said.

When Aghtai addressed the court Jan. 16, he expressed remorse for the crimes and apologized to everyone at the Lynn Valley Care Centre, the Fields store and his family.

“I want to apologize to the families of the people at the Lynn Valley Care at the time, I didn’t think it would have as much of an impact as it did, I was really looking at it as tunnel vision I was under the influence,” he said.

Aghtai vowed not to repeat the behaviour and said his goal is to become a law-abiding, respectful member of society.

“I have to think of the words to describe it, but I find it disgusting and sad that I’ve wasted so much. It’s my actions that have resulted in loss of so much time,” he said.

[tvrecord]

Lynn Valley Care Centre hoaxer pleads guilty to obstruction of justice

A man convicted Jan. 27 of holding a man against his will in Richmond, and using weapons to coerce the victim to commit bestiality, pleaded guilty Tuesday to obstruction of justice. In B.C.

A man convicted Jan. 27 of holding a man against his will in Richmond, and using weapons to coerce the victim to commit bestiality, pleaded guilty Tuesday to obstruction of justice.

In B.C. Supreme Court before Associate Chief Justice Heather Holmes, Taymour Aghtai, 28, waived his right to a trial. He will be sentenced May 5.

After Holmes read the charge against Aghtai, he agreed that he used threats, bribes or other corrupt means in a bid to persuade another person, whose name is covered by a publication ban, to not testify at his trial. The offences happened between Jan. 19, 2021 and April 13, 2021.

“As I understand it, you were in custody at the time and you made phone calls to your mother and, essentially, asked her to relay messages, either directly or indirectly to [the witness]. Is that correct?

“Yes,” Aghtai said.

"And the purpose of your doing that was to try to cause [the witness] not to testify in the trial.”

about:blank

“Yes,” he said.

At trial, Holmes heard that once Aghtai arrived at the apartment near the Richmond Olympic Oval on Sept. 4, 2020, he hit the victim on the head from behind, and restrained him with handcuffs and zap straps. The victim testified that Aghtai and others assaulted and humiliated him over the course of 30 hours until he escaped. The man testified that Aghtai “was not the main aggressor, but played a very significant role,” Holmes said in her verdict.

Aghtai denied the charges, but Holmes found the evidence showed beyond a reasonable doubt that Aghtai kept the man restrained physically and sometimes used threats and intimidation against the victim.

Holmes found Aghtai guilty of sexual assault with a weapon, assault with a weapon, extortion, unlawful confinement and use of an imitation firearm in relation to the unlawful confinement.

Aghtai had known the victim since they were teenagers and was in the business of buying and selling merchandise from his home.

Aghtai was also sentenced Feb. 7 in North Vancouver Provincial Court to time served for public mischief and conveying a false message with intent to alarm.

He had pleaded guilty in December 2021 to making 63 malicious crank calls to four managers, six nurses and two administrators at the Lynn Valley Care Centre early in the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020.

He also pleaded guilty to a hoax phone call to a Parksville Fields store and RCMP detachment in November 2019, claiming that a black man was shooting people in the store. Police attended and found no such incident.

Judge Patricia Janzen chastised Aghtai for putting others at risk of harm in both incidents, especially any black men near the Fields store and senior citizens and staff at the Lynn Valley Care Centre. She said the senselessness of his crime was only matched by its cruelty.

“Your criminal record is appalling,” Janzen said.

A 2014 psychological assessment provided to the judge concluded that Aghtai was a narcissistic, anti-social alcohol abuser with psychopathic tendencies. 

Aghtai has a criminal record dating back to 2008 for making hoax phone calls that falsely alleged heinous crimes or impersonated police officers. He also has a record of assault, robbery, break and enter, confinement and weapons offences, and violating court orders.

In 2020, he stole personal protective equipment from a seniors care home and escaped lawful custody at Richmond Hospital where he assaulted two corrections officers by threatening them with a contaminated syringe. 

[neyatimes]

Canadian police warn crypto investors on growing home robbery trend

A Canadian police department has issued a public warning of a possible trend where high-value cryptocurrency investors are being robbed in their own homes. On July 19, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) in Richmond, a city south of Vancouver, said several similar robberies involving cryptocurrency investors have occurred over the last 12 months. Staff Sergeant Gene Hsieh of the Richmond…

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[msmeiriona]

#WTFIWWY #make the cops work for it at least #you are bad at crime #ceiling hiding

[atlanticcanada]

#new brunswick #news #politics #canada #atlantic canada #CBCNB

[nedsecondline]

Richmond RCMP confirm investigation into alleged Chinese police station - BC News - Castanet.net

Richmond RCMP confirm investigation into alleged Chinese police station – BC News – Castanet.net

Richmond RCMP confirm the Integrated National Security Enforcement Team is looking into an alleged Chinese police station in Richmond. — Read on www.castanet.net/news/BC/401941/Secret-police-station-probed

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[bluepointcoin]

RCMP visit Richmond friendship society in investigation into Chinese 'police' stations

RCMP visit Richmond friendship society in investigation into Chinese ‘police’ stations

A friendship society in Richmond, B.C., has become a focus in an RCMP investigation into allegations of secret Chinese “police” stations operating in Canada. Officers visited the Canada Wenzhou Friendship Society on Saturday and conducted interviews with people who live nearby in the suburb south of Vancouver.  CBC spoke with neighbours who confirmed RCMP officers spoke with them, asking if…

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[ruminativerabbi]

Fiends on the Patio

Like most American Jews my age, I think, I have mostly only been exposed to anti-Semitism in its least virulent versions: an insulting joke overheard in the locker room at the gym, a hostile slogan painted on a wall I was driving past, an unmistakable chill from some idiot at the registration desk in some low-grade motel when I offered my (unmistakably Jewish) last name to confirm my previously-made reservation. Stuff like that.

Even when I left the Jewish cocoon in which I was raised (and it didn’t get more cocoon-like than Jewish Forest Hills in the 1960s), I experienced nothing like the virulent hatred for which my own lifelong task of reading everything of importance relating to the Shoah prepared me almost to expect. My first foray into the non-Jewish world was in my junior year of college, when I suddenly found myself the only Jew (and the only American) in a men’s dormitory in eastern France where the large majority of the other residents were from French-speaking West Africa or French-speaking Southeast Asia. (If anything, I was a kind of a curiosity: the guy across the hall, Jean from Niger, seemed vaguely surprised I didn’t know Jesus of Nazareth personally, us being cousins and all.) And when Joan and I lived in Germany itself in the mid-1980s, we experienced, if anything, a weird and slightly creepy version of philo-Semitism, as though our neighbors were consciously vying with each other to prove just how unreasonable it would be to consider them as having anything to do with the Nazis merely because they spoke the same language, lived in the same country, and were directly descended from the people who put Hitler into office in 1933. Our strange upstairs neighbors invited us over as we were preparing to leave Germany to show us a life-size bust of, of all people, Golda Meir that they kept in a kind of living-room shrine devoted to her memory. (Being invited over was a very big deal—Germans generally invite guests into their homes only after having known them for decades, if then. If I remember correctly, that was the sole invitation to a German home that we received in our two years in Heidelberg.)

Even my one encounter with vicious Jew-hatred itself came with a silver lining. I came to our synagogue in Richmond (in British Columbia on Canada’s Pacific coast) one Sunday morning in 1987 to discover that it had been defaced overnight by vandals painting horrific things on the front wall of the building, including at the center of the effort, the horrific words “Six Million Wasn’t Enough.” We called the police, of course, but were amazed when the RCMP officers who responded dismissed the whole thing—six-foot high bright red swastikas and all—as just some sort of dopey teenagers’ prank. (Richmond doesn’t have its own police force, so policing is the job of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the national Canadian police force. I particularly remember the officer basing his dismissive analysis of the situation on the fact that an adult would have written “weren’t enough,” not “wasn’t enough,” as though no serious adult anti-Semite would have less than impeccable grammar skills.) So that was horrific. But an hour or so later there arrived at our congregation dozens and dozens of Sunday-morning worshipers from the Catholic church down the block, St. Joseph the Worker. Father Pascal, a friend, had told his people that they had something more important to do than conducting their own worship service, then asked them to go home and regroup at our synagogue with brushes, turpentine, ladders, and rags so that they could assist us in removing the hateful slogans from the front wall of the building. We took pictures. The RCMP guys took their own million pictures. And then our friends from next door got to work. Within a few hours, the building was presentable. But what followed was even more amazing than Father Pascal’s call-to-arms in the first place: we began to receive letters of support and cash donations from all across Canada…and mostly from Christian churches of various denominations and sizes. We ended up with hundreds of such letters and thousands of dollars in gifts. The whole incident, instead of making me terrified, left me feeling supported and encouraged, secure that, even if there are bad people in the world, there are also very good people who loathe prejudice and hatred, and who are willing to put their money where their mouths are. The Reverend Dr. Ed Searcy, known to all Shelter Rockers from his place of permanent prominence on the list of people for whose recovery from illness we pray every Shabbat, was one of the local ministers who came forward to offer his public support and his assistance, and who later also became a good friend.

So that is my story with respect to anti-Semitism. For a Jew born in the middle of the twentieth century, it’s pretty benign stuff. And I think my experience mirrors the experiences of a majority of Jewish Americans of my generation. Yes, of course, there are exceptions, including some gigantic ones. But for the most part, the years of my life in this place have been characterized by slow, but distinctly noticeable, progress towards considering overtly expressed prejudice based on religion, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or gender more or less taboo in the public square. I have never felt afraid to be who I am, and to be so overtly and without feeling the need to hide. In this way, among many others, I feel blessed to be of my time and place.

But so did the Jews of the Weimar Republic. Indeed, it was precisely because they felt so at ease, so much a part of things, so fully integrated into the society in which they lived…it was because they were so fully German that they somehow failed to take note of the rising tide of anti-Semitism that eventually became a full-fledged tsunami that left only death, destruction, and exile in its horrific wake. And so I, who feel so fully integrated into the world in which I live, try not to replicate their mistake. When those fascist goons appeared out of nowhere to march in Charlottesville a few years ago while chanting overtly anti-Semitic slogans, I took it more than seriously. (To read my thoughts on that whole incident, click here.) When a bad man came to a synagogue in Pittsburgh one Shabbat morning just a year later with a semi-automatic rifle and three Glock pistols with the intention of murdering as many Jews as he could kill before anyone stopped him, I took that even more seriously. (To revisit my analysis from that week, click here.) As I know so also did all of you.

But, paradoxically, the tide of public feeling isn’t substantially altered by big-ticket events like Charlottesville or Poway or Pittsburgh, incidents that are widely deplored by all. Instead, what marks the end of civility in a given place is the slow erosion of sensitivity to prejudice, to hatred, to bigotry. It can begin innocently enough with tasteless jokes that even thoughtful people like myself feel embarrassed to make a big deal about. B-list celebrities like Kyrie Irving, whom I admitted a few weeks ago to never having heard of, are suddenly famous for making anti-Semitic comments in public. A tidal wave of protest follows. But the barrier has been breached. When Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, threatens in public to murder Jewish people when he’s a bit more rested, there is a similar uproar. He loses some very lucrative contracts. He is ridiculed as a bigot and as a fool. But the uproar dies down and, as it does, the barrier is yet again thinned. When, a few weeks later, a famous comedian like Dave Chapelle speaks resentfully about Jews in the entertainment industry from the very public stage of Saturday Night Live, there is almost no response at all. After all, isn’t it true that lots of Jews work in Hollywood?

And now we have the latest incident to attempt to unpack. A former President of the United States has dinner last week on the patio of Mar-a-Lago with Ye and Nick Fuentes. (Milos Yiannopoulos, the former Breitbart News editor who was forced to resign after being accused of promoting pedophilia, was also present.) Ye is the one who is “going to go death con 3 on Jewish people.” Fuentes is a relatively unknown anti-Semite and racist who denies the truth of the Shoah, doesn’t think women should be allowed to vote, marched in Charlottesville, believes men should have the legal right to beat their wives, and would like January 6 to become a national holiday honoring the insurrectionists’ riot at the Capitol. All three, but particularly Ye and Fuentes, represent and actively promote views that should be anathema to all Americans, yet there they were both dining in full view with Donald Trump, who is actively pursuing a bid to win the Republican nomination for President.

Yes, there was a huge outcry. Some of the negative comments came from expected sources. Senator Schumer, for example, said clearly that he considered the former President’s behavior “disgusting and dangerous,” and that the whole incident was one redolent of “pure evil.” So that’s pretty clear. But also expected. As also was the very clear and pointed comment on Twitter by Elan Carr, Trump’s own State Department anti-Semitism monitor, who wrote that “No responsible American, and certainly no former President, should be cavorting with the likes of Nick Fuentes and Kanye West.”  Less expected was the blanket condemnation of the former President’s decision to host Ye and Nick Fuentes at his home from groups like the Zionist Organization of America and the Republican Jewish Coalition. Some actual Republican congressmen and senators also voiced extreme distaste. Senator Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana), for example, went on record as saying that “President Trump hosting racist anti-Semites for dinner encourages other racist anti-Semites. These attitude are immoral and should not be entertained.” Representative James Comer (R-Kentucky) commented simply that President Trump “certainly needs better judgment in who [sic] he dines with.” Eventually, Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy weighed in, the latter apparently comfortable only with condemning the act but not the actual actor.

So that’s all satisfying to hear. But, yet again, the wall is breached, the barrier thinned, the taboo more ignorable. It would be easy to focus on the image of an ex-President dining on his own patio with a Nick Fuentes and to use it to condemn former President Trump himself. But the real challenge is to understand that this isn’t ultimately “about” Donald Trump. It’s about the tenor of American society with respect to anti-Semitism, about the degree to which the water in which we swim has warmed up a notch without us knowing what precisely to do. The incident with Ye and Nick Fuentes will be gone from the headlines almost immediately. But that incident has made slightly thinner the wall that protects Jews from the vandals at the gate. In the end, the incident will be remembered as a footnote. But as a footnote in the story of the rising tide of anti-Semitism in the world, not as one primarily “about” the former President’s bid for his party’s nomination to run in 2024.

#anti-Semitism