In the year following the Ye and Kyrie Irving antisemitism controversies, some heartening progress was made to repair the historical Black-Jewish alliance.
“He felt very loyal to Jews because they supported the Civil Rights Movement financially and emotionally and by directly participating in it,” said Nancy Kates, the Berkeley-based director of a 2002 documentary about Rustin.
“I wish people would just not see Native Americans as foreign. We are your neighbors. We’re in your synagogues. We’re there davening next to you.”
During his d’var Torah, on the theme of showing respect for others, he acknowledged Ben Ammi Ben Israel, the late spiritual leader of his community who was known as “Abba Gadol,” or “Great Father.”
The Karaites in Daly City have always done things a little differently from the rest of America’s Jews. Now the community has something else that sets them apart: A new Torah scroll that contains nekudot (vowels), te’amim (trope symbols) and colons indicating the ends of sentences.
