Get the Jew (2024)
Well, that’s an offensive title, but it was reality back in August of 1991 when violence broke out after a fatal car accident on President Street in Brooklyn. Get the Jew is a concise documentary detailing the events surrounding the Crown Heights Riots that shook New York City. The Crown Heights Riots, followed by the Washington Heights riots the following year, divided New York City and damaged the Dinkins Administration beyond repair. The film makes the case that Crown Heights was the very reason that Rudy Guiliani won the mayoral election in 1993.
If you were in New York in August of 1991, you remember the Crown Heights Riots as several nights of fear where NYPD cars were overturned or lit on fire, stores were looted, and Jewish people were attacked. People wondered if the violence would spread to a citywide incident. Rage filled the streets of many communities.
Get the Jew explores the days long event from the Jewish perspective. The film explores the tensions between the black community and the Hasidic Jewish community in New York City generally and the Crown Heights neighborhood specifically before the fatal car accident that lit the fuse on days of violence.
The film then explains the events surrounding the car accident that killed Gavin Cato, a 7-year-old Guyanese immigrant child. A car in a Hasidic motorcade ran a red (or yellow) light and struck another car, the Hasidic man’s car then proceeded to mount the sidewalk, striking and killing Cato. An angry crowd formed and grew. The film uses firsthand accounts from the NYPD cops like PO Mark Hoppe who responded to the scene to explain what happened and to quash some of the rumors that emanated from the accident.
The crowd at the scene of the accident became violent and began targeting Jewish people in the neighborhood. Hours later several individuals, including Charles Price and Lemrick Nelson, saw Hasidic student Yankel Rosenbaum walking in the street. Price yelled, “Get the Jew”, and the young Lemrick Nelson produced a knife and did just that. Nelson stabbed Rosenbaum several times, killing him.
Get the Jew details the anti-Jewish violence in the days that followed the death of Gavin Cato. More importantly it details the response of Mayor Dinkens and the NYPD. The film uses firsthand interviews of journalists, survivors, and critical players such as Al Sharpton and future NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly. It also uses plenty of video clips of the rioting and the statements of Mayor Dinkins, NYPD Commissioner Lee Brown, Alton Maddox, and Sonny Carson.
Dinkens was alleged to have responded to the violence by saying, “Let them vent”. This statement could not be verified by the filmmakers, but it appears to have been the policy regardless. Things got so bad in Crown Heights that Dinkins himself was pelted by rocks and bottles while trying to calm the crowd, and Police Commissioner Lee Brown had to call a 10-13 (urgent call for assistance) as a mob surrounded his car.
The most critical portion of this documentary is the police response. It is particularly relevant to today, when we see angry mobs of protesters shutting down streets all over the city.
Regardless of the era, one of the lessons of this film is the police response to civil disorder. In 1991, after days of violence, NYPD 1st Deputy Commissioner Raymond Kelly was finally allowed to take control of the incident and take the proverbial gloves off. Get the Jew uses an interview with Kelly to spell out the formula for dealing with a riot.
Kelly details necessary actions - Cordon off the affected area from the rest of the city. Don’t move people, arrest them – take them off the set. Block streets and restrict movements so groups can’t unite. Be professional and don’t accept lawbreaking. Kelly’s actions stopped the riot in a matter of hours. It is a far cry from what we see today when protestors, albeit less violent then in 1991, grind the city to a halt on a regular basis.
Get the Jew is produced and hosted by the Wall Street Journal. The documentary runs 25 minutes and can be found for free on the wsj.com or on YouTube. You will get insight into the antisemitism that shook the city in 1991, and its re-emergence today in some of the protests that we see on NYC streets, bridges, and college campuses. The film is a message to us all to tone down the rhetoric and preach tolerance instead of divisiveness.
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I believe this was also when Al Sharpton began taking the spotlight, stirring up hate and division.