Anti-Israel activists in Philadelphia are demanding that Jewish-owned businesses get out of town ahead of a Sunday protest scheduled for the anniversary of the Kristallnacht Nazi night of terror.
The Philly Bike On Your Left group, along with two other anti-Israel activist organizations, is calling for a bicycle protest targeting Jewish-owned stores in Philly’s ritzy Rittenhouse Square neighborhood.
Marti Lieberman, 37, co-owner of Mac Mart, told The Post she was stunned to learn that her business was among those being targeted — along with K’Far Cafe, Huda Burger, Goldie, Dizengoff, and Schlesinger’s.
“It’s scary,” the American said about the antisemitic messaging.
“You can’t get a break, and now I have to worry about being born Jewish.”
Lieberman pointed out that business has nothing to do with Israel or Judaism.
She suspects that the protesters just assumed she was pro-Israel because she openly wears a Star of David necklace.
“These people think I’m [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu. I literally am just a Jewish girl from the suburbs who started a business,” she added.
The organizers of the boycott described it on Instagram as a way to “show these zio business owners that we see them for the disgusting humans they are.”
“No business for zionists! These zionist establishments must go! Not in our city!” promotion material for the protest read.
Lieberman said that it was especially hurtful to learn that the boycott was scheduled on eve of the anniversary of Kristallnacht — the 1938 Nazi-led riots that sacked Jewish communities in Germany and Austria.
Kristallnacht — “crystal night,” a reference to the broken windows in Jewish-owned storefronts — resulted in the murders of at least 91 Jews on Nov. 9 and 10.
Yehuda Sichel, 40, co-founder of Huda Burger echoed the anger, saying such a protest and boycott only brings to mind the horrors that his Jewish grandparents went through.
“As a Jewish business owner and grandson of Holocaust survivors, boycotts of Jewish businesses are very familiar to me, and not in a good way especially on the eve of Kristallnacht,” he said.
“They said on their own flyer they want to push Zionists out of their city, but obviously we are not going to be intimidated by this kind of stuff,” he said, adding they received “huge support” from the community.
Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday slammed the boycott as “deeply unsettling” and warned against any kind of violence, saying it had no place in the city.
“By explicitly targeting businesses because their owners are Jewish, the organizers are engaging in a form of discrimination that falls back on some of the oldest antisemitic tropes and tactics in history,” Sunday said in a statement.
“This is not simply a protest directed at the policies of Israel, rather it singles out our fellow Pennsylvanians based on their Jewish identity, targeting them for policies they have nothing to do with and no ability to affect because of their faith,” he added.
Various Philadelphia-based Jewish groups, including the Anti-Defamation League Philadelphia, joined StandWithUs in condemning the blatant act of antisemitism.
“It is Jew-hatred, plain and simple,” the groups said. “Marking businesses for removal from Philadelphia is an attempt to intimidate, marginalize and exclude members of the Jewish community from the economic and civic life of our city.”
