Robert Bowers (c. 1972- ), a US neo-Nazi, is the suspected gunman in the massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. On Saturday October 27th 2018, eleven were killed, six were wounded.
It is the deadliest anti-Semitic attack in US history according to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). Anti-Semitism has been on the rise across North America and Europe. It took a huge jump in the US with the rise of Trump.
Bowers entered the synagogue, shouted “All Jews must die!” and then opened fire on a bris, a baby-naming ceremony. He used an AR-15 assault rifle and three handguns. There were 100 people in the synagogue at the time. On the way out he shot and wounded four police officers. He was shot several times but lived – thanks to a Jewish doctor. That was shortly after he informed police:
“They’re committing genocide to my people. I just want to kill Jews.”
All this played out just three blocks from where Fred Rogers of “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” (1968-2001) once lived.
Gregory Bush, another White supremacist, tried to shoot up a Black church in Louisville, Kentucky just three days before. Finding the church locked, he went to a Kroger supermarket and gunned down two unarmed Black people.
Cesar Sayoc, a huge Trump fan, was arrested the day before, on Friday, for mailing pipe bombs to more than a dozen Trump critics, like CNN and former President Obama.
Bowers, Bush, and Sayoc were all taken alive by police.
Bowers is NOT a fan of President Trump. As he said on Gab:
“For the record, I did not vote for him nor have I owned, worn or even touched a maga hat.”
(MAGA = “Make America Great Again”.)
Bowers:
“Trump is a globalist, not a nationalist. There is no #MAGA as long as there is a k*** [kike, Jewish] infestation.”
Some of Trump’s top people are Jewish, his son-in-law and daughter among them. Trump claims to be a “nationalist”, which seems to be a dog whistle for “White nationalist”.
Bowers is against Blacks and Latinos too. He used the N-word in nearly 20 posts and made references to lynching.
MAGA fear mongering: Trump and Fox News over the past few weeks have been pumping up fear about a caravan of some 4,000 men, women, and children who have fled Honduras and are now walking north across Mexico. The US is fully capable of handling over 100,000 refugees a year. Despite that, Trump is calling it a national emergency. He is calling them invaders and sending over 5,000 troops to the border.
Bowers liked that word “invaders”.
Six days before the massacre he said:
“I’ve noticed a change in people
saying ‘illegals’ that now say
‘invaders’. I like this.”
Five minutes before the massacre:
“HIAS likes to bring invaders in that kill our people.
I can’t sit by and watch my people get slaughtered.
Screw your optics, I’m going in.”
HIAS is the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, helping refugees since 1881. As Bowers knew, HIAS had an event at the Tree of Life just the week before.
– Abagond, 2018.
See also:
- Jews
- Statue of Liberty
- AR-15
- CNN
- alt-right – aka White nationalism
- Bowers’ beliefs and tropes
- White genocide
- ZOG
- Holocaust denial
- N-word
- Donald Trump
- MAGA hat
- Fox News – Trump propaganda
- David Duke
- Steve Bannon
- Charlottesville riot – neo-Nazis as “very fine people”
- Trump and rising anti-Semitism, part I – written in February 2017
- Bowers’ beliefs and tropes
- White American terrorists
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Correction: I said the Kroger shooting was on the same day as the Tree of Life massacre. In fact it was three days before.
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i don’t recall the kroger’s shooting in ky breaking nationally until a day or two after pgh? maybe it was me.
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also interesting how msn and cnn are leaning on the trump rhetoric angle here and explicitly it’s being used as a defense for the three men that wanted to blow up the mosque in indiana or whatever
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@ v8 driver: No it wasn’t just you i noticed this too.
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“msn and cnn are leaning on the trump rhetoric angle here and explicitly it’s being used as a defense for the three men that wanted to blow up the mosque in indiana or whatever.” – v8driver
Personally, I do not explicitly blame President tRump for the acts of white supremacists. However, I do blame him on an implicit level (dog whistle) for harnessing the energetic and dangerous force of collective white anxiety. His bombastic and frequent rhetoric has either contributed to or created the current social and political atmosphere of which gives credence or a voice to the fringe elements of whites who believe that they are losing power in Amerika.
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A bris of brith is more than a “baby naming ceremony”. It is the Jewish rite of male circumcision, generally performed on the eight day old male infants. It marks the formal entry of the newborn into the Jewish community.
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According to the gay rights site, The Advocate, the mass shooting occurred during a bris ceremony for twin boys recently adopted by a gay couple.
There was no mention in the article about whether the murderer knew these details or chose his victims at random.
https://www.advocate.com/crime/2018/10/28/synagogue-shooting-occurred-during-bris-gay-couples-twins
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Bowers yelling about “genocide” while committing a massacre.
Lazy projection of his actions on others or just a lazy rightwing propaganda meme?
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Social media is filled with crazy racist uncles and aunties who are retirement age who sit at home all day and consume Fox News 24/7 in rotation reducing their feeble brains to mush. And the rise of Proud Boys and other supremacist and nationalists groups that believe in conspiracy theories and other wing nuts.
Trump calls himself a nationalist and he uses all kind of dog whistles to work his disciples into a mad frenzy. The mailbox bomber is a perfect example of someone who is unhinged. Looking at the van he drove with all those crazy bumper stickers was quite telling that the owner of that vehicle was some kind of political wing nut. The bomber of the synagogue would be called a good person by Trump last year as he called those same racist domestic terrorist in Charlottesville.
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The shootings at the Kroger in Louisville and the two dead elderly people was just an afterthought. When the shooter confronted another white man who had a weapon and he didn’t use it to stop this killer. Only to be told by the killer “whites don’t shoot other whites.” This gave me pause. I wonder if the shooter had been a black man would he have used his weapon then?
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Bowers, Bush, Sayoc all were taken alive by law enforcement. They never label them as domestic terrorist. This is something that i find problematic in this country. A thing is never called what it is. These individuals are domestic terrorist and yet the mainstream media will not acknowledge this.
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And lastly Bowers, and Bush, Sayoc all taken alive have the complexion for the protection. I wonder after Bowers murdered all the congregants in the synagogue, did the law enforcement take him to get a burger like they did Dylann Roof after he murdered all those black congregants at Mother Emmanuel Church?
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White men are the biggest terror threat in this country. I want to live my life in peace go to church, grocery shop and not have to look over my shoulder for fear there is some deranged white supremacist threatening my space.
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@ Mary Burrell
Yes! (To those insightful comments).
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@ Mary Burrell
“When the shooter confronted another white man who had a weapon and he didn’t use it to stop this killer. Only to be told by the killer “whites don’t shoot other whites.” This gave me pause. I wonder if the shooter had been a black man would he have used his weapon then?”
That’s a very good question. Did you read about the man who did try to stop the shooter and who exchanged gunfire with him in the parking lot? He is a young black man. It was brave of him, and I also feel he was lucky not to have been killed by some racist white person or cop assuming he was the bad guy.
https://www.wave3.com/2018/11/01/man-who-fired-kroger-shooter-i-was-doing-it-protect-me-my-wife/
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@ Afrofem
You’re right about the bris, but for some reason most of the mainstream media accounts I’ve read are just defining it as “a
baby naming ceremony.”
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@ Mary Burrell
Also, if you read the linked article, the woman that his wife talks about who was standing near them and who they witnessed being shot — I believe that must have been the second victim, who according to the reports I read was killed outside in the parking lot. It’s so sad, her last words were “I just want to get home, Lord, let me get home.”
I agree with you, there has not been enough coverage of this horrible event in the national press.
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@ Solitaire: Thank you for that link. This was not report on social media or in mainstream media. I am thankful that insane gunman didn’t get inside that church of it would have been another incident like Mother Emmanuel Church.
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@ Mary Burrell
I read that when the gunman tried the church door, it was locked and only about a dozen people were still in the building, BUT just a few minutes earlier the doors had still been unlocked because there was a service going on and something like 100 worshippers present. As bad as it was, it could have been so much worse if he had gotten there half an hour earlier.
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