Donald Trump has clearly demonstrated that he is only interested in being president to Republicans. As such, he labels anyone who challenges his 30 lies per day average, and then he labels them as enemies of the people. That applies to Independents, Democrats, the constitutionally-guaranteed free press, anyone who is not a nationalist, and anyone of a different race, religion, or country. The venomous hate speech that he spews out via tweets and rallies is highly contagious.
During a Fiddler on the Roof production at Baltimore’s (Maryland) Hippodrome Theater, a man stood up. He stopped the crowd with a pro-Nazi shout and a pro-Trump salute. People feared that this was the start of another mass shooting.
A man in the audience told The Baltimore Sun what happened. Rich Scherr, 49, spoke about a man in the balcony, who began his “Heil Hitler, Heil Trump,” and other pro-Trump shouts during the intermission. Scherr said the crowd “started running:”
‘People started running. I’ll be honest, I was waiting to hear a gunshot. I thought, Here we go. Of course, emotions ran high. My heart was just racing. I didn’t even really pay attention to the second act.’
Goucher College in nearby Towson, Maryland reported an incident of a swastika and anti-black graffiti found in one of its bathrooms. There was no proof that the two incidents were related, even though they happened on the same day.
Scherr is a contributing writer for the Baltimore Sun. He captured the event on his cell phone and posted his video on Facebook. This verbal attack came weeks after a mass shooter killed 11 people while they were in their synagogue at worship in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Another six people were injured.
Fortunately, this attack was merely meant to instill fear upon the theatergoers. Officers took the man off of the balcony, and the show resumed. Yet, the crowd was still upset, the adrenalin kept flowing, making it difficult to concentrate on the performance.
https://youtu.be/UhlB_c5DGlA
Fiddler on the Roof is a play about a Jewish family’s experience about the persecution of Jews by tsarist Russia. The original story was written in Yiddish. It was only the second night of the performance.
Jewish community members have been meeting with the FBI about the rising number of threats, attempted attacks, and successful attacks against them. There are at least eight major Jewish institutions across the United States and the Anti-Defamation League, which is headquartered in New York City.
According to Maryland police, anti-Jewish incidents nearly doubled within a year. In 2016, they increased 47 percent and increased by 78 percent in 2017. Overall, the increase of reported hate or bias incidents jumped a full 35 percent. There was a direct correlation between the rapid rise of hate crimes and Donald Trump’s well-publicized entrance upon the political scene.
Scherr’s video of the incident was placed in the tweet below:
Sick, sad world. A man stands at intermission of tonight’s performance of Fiddler in Baltimore and yells, “Heil Hitler,” along with pro-Trump references. pic.twitter.com/slDcPwF7re
— Rich Scherr (@writerguyRich) November 15, 2018
Featured image is a screenshot via YouTube
