UC Davis “anti-Zionists” vandalized a Sukka on the campus.

Student Programs and Activities Center representatives reported a hate crime yesterday, as graffiti was found defacing a small hut on the Quad being used for a Jewish holiday.

The booth, called a Sukkot or Sukkos, was set up on the east Quad as part of a weeklong celebration of one of three Jewish holidays known collectively as Shalosh Regalim.

The graffiti was discovered by SPAC and then reported to several organizations on campus, including the UC Davis Police Department and Hillel. Mike Amerikaner, program director of Hillel, said that the vandalism is unrelated to the holiday, though it made reference to Israel.

“This is a religious structure that has nothing to do with Israel,” he said.

No, it doesn’t. Except for the fact that Israel is the homeland of the Jews. Can we stop pretending that denying Israel the right to nationhood isn’t anti-Semitic now, or do we still have to pretend that people who want an end to the Jewish State aren’t anti-Semites? At least in thought, if not in deed, as someone else—who got fired for that and other things—said.

The Chabad rabbi is in shock over the attack. That’s because he doesn’t know UC Davis.

Rabbi Shmary Brownstein, co-director of the Chabad House with wife Sorele Brownstein, said in an interview on Sunday that a Hillel official notified him of the vandalism on Friday, the last day of Sukkot. In more than four years on campus, he said, this is the first time he’s had to deal with someone singling out a sukkah for vandalism.

“This is a sukkah,” he stated in amazement. “The existence of it is a religious requirement and not a political statement in any way.”

It doesn’t matter. The anti-Zionists crossed the line into anti-Semitism a long, long time ago. UC Davis shows that. And apparently, so does San Jose State.

Another California sukkah, the one outside of S. Jose State University’s Hillel of Silicon Valley, was found torched last week.

Because what’s a Jewish holiday without a little religious-symbol burning, hm? Sure, make a statement about those nasty Israelis. Burn down your college sukkah. That’ll show those “zionists.”

There are pictures at both links. Disgusting. But remember, they keep telling us it isn’t anti-Semitism.

Except that it is.

Vandalzing a religious symbol is not a protest against “occupation.” It is the vandalization of a Jewish religious symbol.

The body of a Christian official who was kidnapped over the weekend was discovered in Gaza City early Sunday, Palestinian sources said. The man was identified as Rami Ayyad, 31, director of The Teacher’s Bookshop, which is operated by the Palestinian Bible Society. Although no group claimed responsibility for the murder, a number of Christians in Gaza City told The Jerusalem Post that Ayyad had received several death threats in the past from radical Muslims who accused him of conducting missionary activities. His bookshop and the Palestinian Bible Society had been the target of repeated attacks over the past two years.

I do believe I have purchased my copy of Koran in some British bookshop. I distinctly don’t remember any special protective measures undertaken by the bookseller in case some radical Jew or Christian decides to bomb the shop or to dispose of a seller or two.

Have to check with some Brits or Yanks on this one.

Oh, and it will be educational to hear the response from the Church of England’s chief…

Cross-posted on SimplyJews.

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The daily rocket and mortar fire—which somehow doesn’t get nearly as much notice by the media as the daily “humiliations” of checkpoints—continues to fall on Israel.

Eight mortar shells and four Qassam rockets landed in the Negev Sunday morning, as residents continued to suffer the brunt of Palestinian munitions fired at the country.

The eight mortar shells, which were launched from the northern Gaza Strip, landed in the Eshkol Regional Council kibbutz of Keren Shalom. One of the shells hit a house, causing a fire. Fire fighters rushed to the scene; no one was injured.

“Luckily for us, the kibbutz dwellings are fortified, and the open areas of the kibbutz are also fortified. I really hope something is done to stop the shooting,” said Eli Aharon, deputy head of the Eshkol Regional Council.

The rockets are falling because the rocketeers aren’t suffering many consequences. It’s rare that the IDF manages to actually get the ones firing the rockets, and when they do, there are always more ready to take their places. And oh, yeah—those “crude, homemade rockets”—not so much.

The Salah-al-Din Brigades, the armed wing of the Popular Resistance Committees, claimed responsibility for the mortar shell attack, and said the rocket that landed near the Netivot cemetery was a new and improved type of mortar shell.

According to findings by the Negev police explosives lab, the rocket was in fact a Katyusha rocket.

Sources in the IDF claimed it was a long-range Grad missile. Further testing of the missile is still underway.

Imagine, if you would, that this man lived in San Diego, and suffered continuouous rocket fire from Mexican terrorists who were trying to “liberate” California from the U.S. and return it to the indigenous people (in spite of the fact that the real indigenous people would be, gee, the Mexican Indian tribes that were massacred by the Spaniards centuries ago). Let’s do that for a moment:

San Diego manager Ilan Regev told Ynet that mortar shells frequently landed in the town. “It’s scary, but we live with it. This is the first time a house was directly hit. Before, windowpanes were broken, but never something like this,” Regev said.

Now, what it really looks like:

Kerem Shalom manager Ilan Regev told Ynet that mortar shells frequently landed in the kibbutz. “It’s scary, but we live with it. This is the first time a house was directly hit. Before, windowpanes were broken, but never something like this,” Regev said.

Really. The concept of rockets and mortars falling on your town on a regular basis? “It’s scary, but we live with it.”

Why? Because Olmert is not a leader. Because the world will rise up in unrighteous indignation if Israel sends in the IDF to clean out the nests of terrorists firing rockets at civilians, though they will not rise up in protest of the Palestinians trying to murder Israeli schoolchildren in Sderot. Because the world thinks that if the Palestinians only get their own state, the terrorists will stop trying to make Sderot a ghost town.

Why would they stop? The rocket fire is working. Not even Israel cares enough to make it stop.