(Jacob Bruns, Headline USA) Masked left-wing activists allegedly assaulted a group of Jews Saturday at a public library event in North Carolina that was advertised as an “anarchist bookfair,” the Algemeiner reported.
Three pro-Israel Jews attended the event at the West Asheville Library titled “Strategic Lessons From the Palestinian Resistance,” during which they said they were attacked and violently dragged out of the event by the activists.
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The event was hosted by a pro-Palestine group that calls itself Another Carolina Anarchist Book Fair—employing the same acronym as anti-police organizations use for the slogan “all cops are bastards.”
According to the group’s website, its aim is to create an “anarchist ritual of spiritual recovery, carves out time and space to gather and rethink our strategies for destroying this world in order to open the door for many others.”
Online advertisements suggest that the group may loosely affiliate with local Antifa-type organizations engaged in domestic terrorism while using the veneer of cultural talks and events to conceal its more subversive activities from the general public.
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Approximately 60 masked pro-Palestine activists attended the event.
Video of the event shows that three Jewish spectators appeared to be seated at the side of the room, recording the talk for a social-media livestream, when the speaker called attention to them.
“I’ll let you guys decide,” he asked the pro-Palestine audience. “What do you want to do?” The activists booed the Jews and told them to leave.
“They are not f*****g welcome here,” one audience member said. “I don’t trust them.”
A mob quickly formed, surrounding the trio and aggressively chanting “Free Palestine.”
The three were soon grabbed and removed forcefully from the library.
Among the Jews who showed up in opposition was Monica Buckley, 48, a self-identified queer, who caught footage of the event and posted it to her Instagram account.
She later recounted the chaotic scene in an interview with the local media station.
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Another Jewish attendee, Bob Campbell, 80, said afterward that he was forced to the floor and struck.
“What really upset me—I was laying on the floor and this big guy was on top of me,” he noted. “The librarian came to the door, looked me right in the eye, turned around and walked back and didn’t do a damn thing. Didn’t call the police.”
Eventually, however, the police were called. Reports indicate that at least one mob participant was arrested.
The third Jewish attendee, David Moritz, 54, posted footage to Instagram himself showing a large welt on his head and a swollen eye, looking disheveled.
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The Jewish participants appeared to be well known activists, having previously spoken out at meetings of the Asheville City Council against anti-Semitism and other related issues.
