{"id":215197,"date":"2025-04-30T17:51:07","date_gmt":"2025-04-30T17:51:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/activist\/mayor-of-chicago-under-attack-for-donning-palestinian-keffiyeh-cair-chicago\/"},"modified":"2025-04-30T17:51:07","modified_gmt":"2025-04-30T17:51:07","slug":"mayor-of-chicago-under-attack-for-donning-palestinian-keffiyeh-cair-chicago","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=215197","title":{"rendered":"Mayor of Chicago under attack for donning Palestinian keffiyeh \u2014 CAIR-Chicago"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Jewish groups have slammed Chicago Mayor, Brandon Johnson, for wearing a Palestinian keffiyeh at an event celebrating Arab Heritage Month last week, saying his actions were provocative.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Chicago chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Chicago) defended the mayor\u2019s position, accusing the groups of spreading hatred rather than combating it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rabbi Ari Hart, a representative of the local Jewish community, posted on Facebook: \u201cChicago Mayor Brandon Johnson (appropriately) commemorated Arab Heritage Month this week. Arab Heritage should be honoured and celebrated, but would it not be possible [to] commemorate Arab Heritage without wearing the symbol that millions of Jews around the world saw worn to celebrate the murder, rape and kidnapping of October 7th?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Lisa Katz, chief government affairs officer of the Combat Antisemitism Movement, said in a statement: \u201cWe understand that Mayor Johnson may not have intended to cause harm, but at a time of historic antisemitic threat levels, including in Chicago, symbols matter. Their public use, especially by elected officials, carries weight and meaning.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The Chicago Jewish Alliance also condemned Johnson\u2019s behaviour, saying in a Facebook post: \u201cFor the mayor of Chicago to stand there \u2014 cloaked in a symbol now synonymous with Jewish bloodshed, flanked by an organisation that justifies it \u2014 is more than tone-deaf. It\u2019s a betrayal,\u201d adding, \u201cIt tells Jewish Chicagoans: your pain doesn\u2019t matter. Your dead don\u2019t count. Your safety is negotiable.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

WATCH: <\/strong><\/span>US senator says keffiyeh is a \u2018terrorist rag\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

CAIR-Chicago rejected the accusations, saying the Chicago Jewish Coalition has revealed its true colours as a hate group, noting that \u201cReducing an entire people\u2019s heritage to terrorism is not advocacy \u2014 it\u2019s dehumanisation.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cBy their logic, should the kippah be cancelled because Israeli soldiers wear it? Of course not. But that is their argument,\u201d added CAIR-Chicago.<\/span><\/p>\n

CAIR-Chicago noted that the alliance previously criticised the late Pope Francis for simply expressing his grief over the victims in Gaza, demonstrating, according to the statement, that even expressing sympathy for Palestinians has become unacceptable to them.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mayor Brandon Johnson told Mother Jones<\/em> magazine that what is happening in Gaza \u201cis not only egregious, it is genocidal,\u201d calling for the need to recognise this and the need for political pressure to end the bombing.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n