During the month of June, banners are hanging in Lexington Center to celebrate Jewish American Heritage Month. While JAHM actually falls in May, this year banners could only be hung in June, but will appear next year, and future years, in May. Sharing banner poles with Pride flags, eleven American Jewish figures are displayed in the town center along Massachusetts Avenue. Another eleven banners of various Jewish American figures are hung in Cary Library.
The idea to create banners came about when I noticed that other groups in town celebrate their heritage, including African Americans, Southeast Asian Pacific Islanders, and Pride. The timing for Jewish American banners was more than just ensuring representation, it’s an intentional response to the rise of antisemitism. Today Jewish Americans are acutely aware of the rise of antisemitism in our country and the world. Surprisingly, there have even been cases of antisemitism in Lexington, despite it being known as a diverse town of highly educated professionals and academics. Antisemitic incidents in the Lexington Public Schools have concerned many parents.
Antisemitism takes many forms and is called a “shape shifting” hatred; Jews are simultaneously accused of being all powerful yet inferior, hyper-capitalist yet radical communist, wealthy yet a financial burden. Old conspiracy theories and Jewish tropes hide behind modern ideologies and today that ideology is anti-Zionism. This mutation often crosses the line from criticizing Israeli government policy into holding Jewish people collectively responsible for those actions, questioning Israel’s right to exist, or demanding that Jews disavow Zionism to be accepted in progressive or social justice spaces.
It is within this backdrop that I wanted to do something in our community that positively depicts the contributions of Jewish Americans. Through education and awareness our community may learn that Jewish Americans have made significant contributions in the areas of science and medicine, social justice and civil rights, economics and government, literature, film and music. Figures like Albert Einstein and Ruth Bader Ginsburg are instantly recognizable, but others like Jonas Salk, who developed the cure for Polio, or Emma Lazarus, who wrote the famous poem on the Statue of Liberty welcoming refugees, are less known. I wanted new generations of Lexingtonians to learn that Rabbi Heschel stood next to MLK in the fight for civil rights, Betty Friedan was a feminist activist who ignited the women’s movement and Bella Abzug championed the rights of women in government leadership. Big names like Steven Spielberg and Louis Brandeis, the first Jewish Supreme Court Justice, are a source of pride to Jewish Americans, but so is Sandy Koufax, a Jewish Major League Baseball pitcher who famously skipped game 1 of the World Series because it fell on the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur. Even some local figures were included, such as Drew Weissman, who recently won the Nobel Prize for developing the mRNA vaccine for Covid. Cheryl Aronson was a longtime Combined Jewish Philanthropies (CJP) leader. Both Weissman and Aronson grew up in Lexington. The hardest part of the project was selecting only 22 figures out of a sea of talented and accomplished Jewish Americans, some of whom I learned in the process are Jewish. Since the concept of hanging banners already existed, it is within this framework that I felt I can bring love and curiosity through education to combat antisemitism in our community.
From the onset I had an enthusiastic ally in Rabbi David Lerner at Temple Emunah but I was pleased to receive additional financial support from Temple Isaiah and Chabad Lexington. The Boston CJP, with the help of a group of impassioned Lexington parents, made an important contribution as well. LUAA, an interfaith organization that strives to make Lexington a welcoming, supportive, and safe town for Jewish neighbors, liked the banner idea as well. Having non Jewish allies to stand up to antisemitism is critical and reassuring. Through a GoFundMe I was able to raise the rest of the funds from Lexingtonians who supported the mission in order to cover the costs of a graphic designer and printer. I intentionally selected a local printer, Lexington Graphics, to print these banners to keep this a grass roots effort.
Today, I hope Lexingtonians and town visitors walk through town and into Cary Library to see these banners. I hope they pause in front of each one to read the short tagline highlighting the specific achievement of each Jewish American. I’ve already heard from many members of the Jewish community that these banners displaying Jewish achievements are a source of pride in uncertain times.
Danit Netzer