
California Governor and Los Angeles Mayor Call for Action Against Anti-Semitism
California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass have called for action to address anti-Semitism in the state after the recent attack targeting the Jewish community in Boulder, Colorado.
Bass condemned the attack and said she would call an emergency meeting at City Hall to address safety and security concerns in Los Angeles.

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Boston Globe
an hour ago
- Boston Globe
Federal authorities arrest dozens for immigration violations across Los Angeles
Advertisement In Los Angeles, Mayor Karen Bass said the activity was meant to 'sow terror.' Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Federal immigration authorities have been ramping up arrests across the country to fulfill President Donald Trump's promise of mass deportations. Todd Lyons, the head of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, defended his tactics earlier this week against criticism that authorities are being too heavy-handed. He has said ICE is averaging about 1,600 arrests per day and that the agency has arrested 'dangerous criminals.' Protests recently broke out after an immigration action at a restaurant in San Diego and in Minneapolis, when federal officials in tactical gear showed up in a Latino neighborhood for an operation they said was about a criminal case, not immigration. Advertisement Dozens of protesters gathered Friday evening outside a federal detention center in Los Angeles where they believed those arrested had been taken, chanting 'set them free, let them stay!' Other protesters held signs that said 'ICE out of LA!' while others led chants and shouted from megaphones. Some scrawled graffiti on the building facade. Officers holding protective shields stood shoulder to shoulder to block an entrance. Some tossed tear gas canisters to disperse the crowd. Officers wearing helmets and holding batons then forced the protesters away from the building by forming a line and walking slowly down the street. 'Our community is under attack and is being terrorized. These are workers, these are fathers, these are mothers, and this has to stop. Immigration enforcement that is terrorizing our families throughout this country and picking up our people that we love must stop now,' Salas, of CHIRLA, said at an earlier press conference while surrounded by a crowd holding signs protesting Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Yliana Johansen-Mendez, chief program officer for the Immigrant Defenders Law Center, said her organization was aware of one man who was already deported back to Mexico after being picked up at a Home Depot on Friday morning. The man's family contacted her organization and one of their attorneys was waiting for hours to speak to him inside the detention center, she said. Authorities later said he had already been removed, and the man later contacted his family to say he was back in Mexico. Videos from bystanders and television news crews captured people being walked across a Home Depot parking lot by federal agents as well as clashes that broke out at other detention sites. Advertisement KTLA showed aerial footage of agents outside a clothing warehouse store in the fashion district leading detainees out of a building and toward two large white vans waiting in a parking lot. The hands of the detained individuals were tied behind their backs. The agents patted them down before loading them into the vans. The agents wore vests with the agency acronyms FBI, ICE and HSI. Armed agents used yellow police tape to keep crowds on the street and sidewalk away from the operations. Officers throw smoke bombs to disperse crowd Aerial footage of the same location broadcast by KABC-TV showed officers throwing smoke bombs or flash bangs on the street to disperse the people so they could drive away in SUVs, vans and military-style vehicles. The station showed one person running backward with their hands on the hood of a moving white SUV in an apparent attempt to block the vehicle. The person fell backward, landing flat on the ground. The SUV backed up, drove around the individual and sped off as others on the street threw objects at it. Immigrant-rights advocates used megaphones to speak to the workers, reminding them of their constitutional rights and instructing them not to sign anything or say anything to federal agents, the Los Angeles Times reported. Katia Garcia, 18, left school when she learned her father, 37-year-old Marco Garcia, may have been targeted. Katia Garcia, a U.S. citizen, said her father is undocumented and has been in the U.S. for 20 years. 'We never thought this would happen to us,' she told the Los Angeles Times. Pitts O'Keefe said in a statement that one additional person was arrested for obstruction. The California branch of the Service Employees International Union said its president was arrested while exercising his right to observe and document law enforcement activity. Advertisement
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Antisemitic vandalism prompts heightened security at Philly Holocaust memorial
The Brief Millions of Jewish lives were killed in the Holocaust and a permanent symbol of remembrance sits on the corner of 16th and Arch in Center City, with the Horwitz-Wasserman Holocaust Memorial Plaza. The park is adding a new security measure aimed at stopping antisemitic vandalism. They say the goal is to also teach visitors about the memorial while serving as an added layer of security. CENTER CITY - Temporary barricades have been placed at the Wasserman Holocaust Memorial Plaza, due to events in the city over the weekend, but visitors will soon see more full-time security at the memorial, after someone scrawled a Holocaust denial message on a memorial panel. What we know In the shadow of City Hall, in Center City Philadelphia, stands a 61-year-old bronze statue at Horowitz-Wasserman Plaza, the nation's oldest public Holocaust Memorial. Sadly, someone scrawled a Holocaust denial message on a memorial panel. "When you operate a Holocaust memorial you want to offer a safe, clean space and welcoming space and, due to antisemitic incidents and the homeless problem in Center City, we are struggling to do that," explained Eszter Kutas, Executive Director of Philadelphia Holocaust remembrance Foundation. In light of numerous acts of vandalism in the past couple of years, including spray-painting of swastikas, the foundation has erected a new security booth and is hiring two park managers to deal with security issues. The announcement comes on the heels of an antisemitic attack in Boulder, Colorado where 15 people were injured. What they're saying Kutas stated, "We need to do the utmost to make sure people feel that coming here the space is welcoming them and they're not worried about personal safety." The managers will be at the memorial during the day, seven days a week, to engage visitors and hopefully provide a deterrent against vandals. The plaza already has 24-hour camera surveillance. "It's sad that vandalism is always there and you have to worry about it," stated tourist Jennifer Nomberg. The Nomberg family was visiting the memorial Friday and noticed two temporary barricades and were sad that anyone would vandalize a place to memorialize Holocaust victims and families. Jennifer added, "Now you realize the importance of protecting these things so that history shouldn't repeat itself."

2 hours ago
Panama's president appeals to a higher power as nearly 2 months of protests roil nation
PANAMA CITY -- Panama's José Raúl Mulino appealed to a higher power on Friday, calling in an archbishop and a rabbi to deliver a message to striking banana workers after nearly two months of social protest that have roiled the country. Mulino has said he won't reverse controversial changes to Panama's social security system, courts have deemed the strike illegal and top banana Chiquita Brands fired nearly 5,000 striking workers last month in Panama's western Bocas del Toro province. But nothing has stopped the protests. So at his weekly news briefing Friday, Mulino said he had met with Archbishop José Domingo Ulloa and one of Panama's leading Jewish figures, Rabbi Gustavo Kraselnik, to enlist them as intermediaries. He gave Ulloa a personal letter to bring to Francisco Smith, leader of the striking banana workers' union. In the letter, Mulino said, he committed to send proposed legislation to the Congress that would be favorable for the country's banana sector, above all its workers. But he conditioned the proposal on former workers lifting their protest. There was precedent for the maneuver. In 2022, Ulloa brokered a dialogue that eased protests over the high cost of fuel and food. In 2018, Ulloa mediated a dispute between parts of the government. Smith, secretary general of the Banana Industry Workers Union, had said earlier Friday before Mulino's announcement that he was open to dialogue. Union leaders planned to travel to the capital Monday to meet with the president of the National Assembly and present a list of demands. He insisted, however, that changes be made to the social security reform. Smith, who has led the protest in western Bocas del Toro province, has said the social security reform passed in March threatens the special privileges laid out for banana workers in another law, covering things like subsidies and labor protections. The impact has been acute. Chiquita Brands said last month they had lost at least $75 million before announcing a temporary halt to their operations in Panama. Demonstrations have not been limited to the banana workers, to Bocas del Toro or even to the social security changes. At various times teachers, construction workers and students have protested as well. Authorities have said they'll withhold the pay of 15,000 treachers for their strike. On Thursday, border police clashed with protesters who had blocked a highway in eastern Darien province, leaving injured on both sides. In addition to the social security changes, demonstrators have protested a security agreement giving U.S. troops access to some Panamanian facilities and efforts to reopen a massive copper mine.