GUILTY NJ - Detective Joseph Seals, slain, 5 others killed including 2 suspects, Jersey City, 9 Dec 2019

[imstilla.grandma]

”Enough already,” said Joshua Sayles, director of the Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh.

“When something happens to the Jewish community outside of Pittsburgh, we’re very aware that it affects Pittsburgh,” Mr. Orsini said Wednesday.

“We talk about the same things we talk about in our synagogues and day schools,” he said. “We try to help them secure their facilities as best as possible.”

Meryl Ainsman, board chair of of the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh, said in a statement that “we are all too familiar in Pittsburgh with the havoc that such vicious attacks wreak on a community.”

“We are eternally grateful to law enforcement officers who, at the cost of their own lives, ran toward danger to protect Jewish people,” she said. “May the victims’ memories forever be a blessing, and may those wounded heal quickly and completely.”

Rabbi Yisroel Rosenfeld of the Lubavitch Center in Pittsburgh said that while he didn’t know the victims directly, the news served as a reminder that “we need to continue to do whatever we possibly can, as Jews and anyone in this world, to bring more goodness and kindness in the world, which is what we try to do on a daily basis.”

 

[MassGuy]

I wonder who owned the Lincoln that MR was found in the trunk of? A stolen car also? Just speculating on the connections. The shooters could have stolen a Lincoln and stole the U-haul from MR or knew him in some way. He appears to be tough but maybe just normal Jersey tough or ex gang? My impression of his facebook. Very sad for his girls and loved ones. May he RIP.

I think that was MR’s Lincoln. I recall reading that he was found in the trunk of his own car.

 

[LadyL]

Shakes head. Every single day I come home from work to news about a mass shooting in the United States. Every single day. Let that reality sink in...I can't even keep them straight any longer.

I remember the years when we were thankful they didn't occur frequently. And now here we are.

 

[mickey2942]

I remember the years when we were thankful they didn't occur frequently. And now here we are.

It reminds me of watching tv as a child, with pictures of the shootings in Beirut and Jerusalem. I was so glad I didn't live someplace dangerous like Beirut. Sigh.

 

[imstilla.grandma]

“The why and the ideology and the motivation — that’s what we’re investigating,” New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal said, adding that authorities are also trying to determine if anyone else was involved.

“The report from the Jersey City mayor saying it was a targeted attack makes us incredibly concerned in the Jewish community,” said Evan Bernstein, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, the Jewish civil rights organization. “They want answers. They demand answers. If this was truly a targeted killing of Jews, then we need to know that right away, and there needs to be the pushing back on this at the highest levels possible.”

“We shouldn’t parse words on whether this is a hate crime at this point. This was a hate crime against Jewish ppl + hate has no place,” he tweeted, adding: “Some will say don’t call it anti-semitism or a hate crime till a longer review but being Jewish myself + the grandson of holocaust survivors I know enough to call it what this is.”

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio likewise said the attack was a “premeditated, violent, anti-Semitic hate crime,” while New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo called it a “deliberate attack on the Jewish community.” They announced tighter police protection of synagogues and other Jewish establishments in New York as a precaution.

The kosher grocery is a central fixture in a growing community of Orthodox Jews who have been moving to Jersey City in recent years and settling in what was a mostly black section of Jersey City, causing some resentment.

Mordechai Rubin, a member of the local Jewish emergency medical services, said the small Jewish community has grown over the past three or four years, made up mostly of people from Brooklyn seeking a “nicer, quieter” and more affordable place to live. Next to the store is a synagogue with a school and day care center where 40 students were present at the time of the shooting, he said.

“It’s unfortunate what happened, but we don’t even want to think about what would have happened if they made their way up to the day care or to the synagogue,” he said.
Fears mount that New Jersey shooting was anti-Semitic attack

 

[dotr]

rbbm.
Online posts tied to suspected New Jersey deli shooter pushed anti-Semitic conspiracies
"One of the two suspects in Tuesday’s shooting at a kosher deli in Jersey City pushed anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and praised past attacks on Jewish people in New York and killings of police officers, according to social media posts seen by NBC News.

Police identified the suspects, who were also killed in the shootings, as David Anderson and Francine Graham. Police also identified Anderson as a follower of the Black Hebrew Israelite movement, a designated hate group known to proselytize in the streets about anti-Semitic beliefs, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal also named Anderson and Graham as the prime suspects in the beating death of Michael Rumberger, a 34-year-old Uber driver whose body was found in the trunk of a car over the weekend. Grewal offered no other details on how the crimes might be linked or a motive for Rumberger’s murder."

"Two law enforcement officials, who were not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity, told NBC News that a Facebook account with the username “Dawada Maqabath” likely belonged to Anderson. That account was first active in 2016 and is filled with photos believed to be Anderson, identified by facial tattoos, and images of album covers from his music recordings."

"NBC News found social media and internet posts linked to Anderson and the Maqabath username going back more than seven years. Anderson was prolific online until 2015, when his posting seems to have stopped. In 2014, he was using several online aliases, including Baryon Bloodbourne and AKANapoleonHill to promote hip hop music that he recorded."

 

[imstilla.grandma]

The movement dates to the 1970s, though some sects claim the roots of their beliefs stretch back as far as the 19th century, according to Oren Segal, the director of the Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism.

“They reject Christianity, Islam, Judaism and [claim] that the true Jews are black,” he said. "And that the current ‘so-called Jews’ are liars and have stolen that religion from the true Jews of the world.”

“There are many different sects which refer to themselves with the name Black Hebrew Israelites. It’s not a monolithic group,” he said. “Not all are extremists or outspoken anti-Semites or racists.”

“It’s a very small group in Jersey City,” the Rev. Nathaniel Legay, president of the Jersey City branch of the NAACP, said of the Hebrew Israelite movement. “There is no real presence here.”

“Any movement that has anti-Semitism or hatred of any kind as foundational tenets always runs the risk of having their followers lash out at their enemies,” Segal said.

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, more than half of the 18 hate groups operating in New Jersey in 2018 were extremist black supremacist groups like the Hebrew Israelite movement.

Segal said people who have encountered Hebrew Israelites likely did so in a public place like Manhattan’s Times Square or Baltimore’s Inner Harbor, where street preachers of the movement have been known to use inflammatory speech to try to provoke confrontations with passersby.
Who are the Hebrew Israelites? A suspect in the Jersey City shooting has ties to the movement.

 

[imstilla.grandma]

Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop said Wednesday morning that the gunmen targeted the market, with surveillance video showing them driving slowly through the city's streets before stopping outside, calmly exiting their van and immediately opening fire.

"We could see the van moving through Jersey City streets slowly," he said. "The perpetrators stopped in front of (the market), calmly opened the door with two long rifles - him and the other perpetrator - and began firing from the street into the facility."
Jersey City shooting: Device found in U-Haul was operable pipe bomb

 

[fred&edna]

Not sure it matters but he didn't work for Uber per this:

The man, who was identified by police as Michael Rumberger, 34, of Jersey City, was a full-time car service driver, but did not work for Uber, his family told NJ Advance Media. He was found in the trunk of a Lincoln Town car in the area of 17th Street and John F. Kennedy Boulevard in Bayonne with trauma to his head and pronounced dead at the scene late Saturday.

Jersey City shooters were suspects in murder of car service driver in Bayonne, AG says

 

[imstilla.grandma]

ADL experts in its Center on Extremism developed this unique visualization with data points extracted from information sources including news and media reports, government documents (including police reports), victim reports, extremist-related sources, Center on Extremism investigations and more.
New Jersey stats:
ADL H.E.A.T. Map

 

[imstilla.grandma]

“The Jewish community is shaken,” said Evan Bernstein, the New York and New Jersey regional director of the Anti-Defamation League. “We want to get the details and understand what happened.”"

"This potentially may be the worst anti-Semitic incident in New Jersey, it is very possible," added Avi Schnall, the director for New Jersey's Office of Agudah Israel of America, an organization that represents the interests of the Orthodox Jewish community.
Jersey City shooting 'may be the worst anti-Semitic incident in New Jersey'

 

[imstilla.grandma]

The Jewish community in the Greenville section of Jersey City established the Jersey City Victims Emergency Fund (JCVE) to help the JC Kosher Supermarket owner's family. According to the JCVE website it plans to help support the family, cover funeral costs, renovate the store and "establish robust security and protection in the Jersey City Jewish Community."

"JC Kosher was the Ferencz family’s livelihood," JCVE's website explains. "Yesterday, JC Kosher was a sign of a newborn Jewish community coming to life. Today, its Mezuzah speckled in blood, JC Kosher is sadly blanketed in the dark shroud of Anti-Jewish hate."

The JCVE founders proclaimed on its website, "we, the global community of good people everywhere, will not stand silent as the blood of our people flows along the Hudson River!"
Fund established for victims of antisemitic Jersey City shooting

 

[imstilla.grandma]

 

[imstilla.grandma]

 

[imstilla.grandma]

Mr. Anderson repeatedly played audio recordings of a man the neighbor believed to be Louis Farrakhan, and sounded like he himself was growing agitated. He shouted bible verses and then chanted out his interpretations of what they meant.

The neighbor said the most common theme was that Mr. Anderson’s religion was the only true faith while others — specifically Catholicism and Judaism — were false.

He soon heard Ms. Graham join in the chanting and said she sounded “coerced.”

She quit paying her common charges for the condominium they shared and also stopped paying her water bill, he said.

Eventually, in 2018, her condo unit went into foreclosure, the neighbor said. She and Mr. Anderson were evicted, but they repeatedly busted into their former home to spend the day there, leaving each day around 6 p.m.

As for Ms. Graham, he said he had not seen her in a year. He learned of the Jersey City shooting when the police banged on his door at 2:30 a.m.
Jersey City Shooting: Suspect Linked to Black Hebrew Israelite Group

 

[margarita25]

(I’m reminded of an old Chris Rock skit where he’s blind and he’s a white supremacist but he doesn’t know he’s really black.)

 

[mickey2942]

(I’m reminded of an old Chris Rock skit where he’s blind and he’s a white supremacist but he doesn’t know he’s really black.)

That was actually Dave Chappelle.

Iconic "Clayton Bigsby".

 

[fred&edna]

That was actually Dave Chappelle.

Bigsby

 

[margarita25]

That was actually Dave Chappelle.

Iconic "Clayton Bigsby".

(Oh yeah! My bad!!!!)

 

[imstilla.grandma]

“This remains a very fluid and fast-moving investigation,” said New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal.

“It was an act of terror,” said de Blasio said at a City Hall press conference where a Wednesday moment of silence was held to honor victims Moshe Deutsch, 24, and Leah “Mindy” Ferencz, 31 — a pair of Brooklyn natives.

“It was violent. It was directed. There is still a lot we need to know … but it is enough to tell us that this was an act of hate and an act of terror.”

Anti-cop and anti-Jewish posts were also found on Anderson’s social media pages, sources told NBC.

The lengthy firefight finally ended after an armored police vehicle crashed through the storefront and into the supermarket, officials said.

Fulop and Jersey City Police Chief James Shea, the brother of NYPD Police Commissioner Dermot Shea, said neighborhood surveillance and CCTV cameras captured Anderson and Graham zeroing in on the grocery at Martin Luther King Drive and Bayview Ave.

Their U-Haul moved slowly through city streets before stopping directly outside the Jewish store, with both shooters calmly exiting the van and marching across the street to the execute anyone inside the supermarket.

“It was a targeted attack on the Jewish kosher deli,” Fulop told reporters during a brief press conference Wednesday morning.

“We now know this did not begin with gunfire between police officers and perpetrators and then move to the store,” Shea said. “It began in the store.”

“This tragedy not only befell our family, but the Jewish community from coast to coast in the U.S.,” he said. “But certainly the closer you are to the victim, there is much more pain.”

NYPD Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said the extra protections on Jewish sites throughout the city will remain for the foreseeable future.

“We denounce this act of senseless violence,” said Shea, adding there is currently no threat against the city.

The NYPD has also created a new unit to focus on growing levels of racial extremism in the city, de Blasio said.

The Racially and Ethnically Motivated Extremism Unit, known as REME, will “focus on identifying any trends and signs of racial and ethnic extremism and act before any terror or bias crime occurs,” de Blasio said.
Jersey City Killers Drove Straight to Kosher Supermarket After Killing Detective