A business called Ali's Cookies is 18 miles from me. I've never been there to taste their wares; all I know is that it's located near the once hallowed halls of Emory University where the combined undergraduate tuition, fees, room and board for the academic year 2024-2025 will be $83,715. If that were to magically stay the same for four years of matriculation, the cost an undergraduate degree at Emory would be $338,860! (Start saving your shekels.)
It's in this elite academic atmosphere that the bakery sells its delectables nationwide. However, the profits for the bakery have dropped 50%; no business can exist with that free-fall. If your favorite radio station lost half its advertisers, the result would be silence on the airwaves.
The owners are getting mail on fire with hate, with words not fit to see the light of print. Vandals have defiled its walls with slogans vile and disgusting. Death threats to intimidate, defeat, and discourage are nonstop. In spite of this, the owners have said they love America and they aren't going anywhere.
There's a reason for these outrages: the owners are Jewish. They've harmed no one; they've broken no laws. There are those who hate them only because they exist.
There is nothing new under the sun, said Solomon.
The year was 1933:
"On April 1, 1933, the Nazis carried out the first nationwide, planned action against Jews: a boycott targeting Jewish businesses and professionals. Members of the Storm Troopers, with boycott signs, blocked the entrance to a Jewish-owned shop. One of the signs exhorts: 'Germans! Defend yourselves! Don't buy from Jews!'
"They targeted the offices of professionals such as doctors and lawyers. They painted the Star of David in yellow and black across thousands of doors and windows, with accompanying antisemitic slogans. Signs were posted saying, "The Jews Are Our Misfortune." Throughout Germany, acts of violence against individual Jews and Jewish property occurred; the police intervened only rarely."
It isn't just the bakery. In Los Angeles:
“It’s mayhem,” wrote a resident of
a predominantly Jewish community that experienced an outbreak of
violence on Sunday afternoon, June 23 as anti-Israel demonstrators
descended on the area.
"Social media and citizen video along with
firsthand reports describe a melee that combusted outside of Adas Torah
Synagogue following a morning
procession of demonstrators carrying Palestinian flags and wearing
keffiyehs.
"One video shows a brutal beating of a women in the middle the street. Some of the protesters also purportedly wore symbols affiliated with terrorist organizations Hamas and Hezbollah and many had their faces covered with masks and scarves.
"Calls for violence against Jews extended to nearby streets, and while there was a police presence, many report that the officers were told to stand down and not intervene.
What month and year is this in America? Is it June 2024 in America?. No, the month and year in America is April 1933.
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If you would like to send the owners a card with a note of encouragement, the address is:
Ali's Bakery
1561 N. Decatur Rd. NE
Atlanta, GA 30307
