filed under Local Media | Only In RI | Religion | WTF?
Teens Charged in Molotov Fire at Abandoned South PVD Synagogue
12:20AM ON
03/20/2008
BY
Ariel Werner
A teenager allegedly threw a Molotov cocktail outside a long-vacant Jewish temple in South Providence early yesterday, but the police caught him and two of his apparent accomplices. The teens apparently intended to toss the Molotov cocktail into a vacant lot across the street from the temple in order to enjoy the sight of it shattering and flaming, but it was hastily cast aside onto the grass outside the temple when a police cruiser approached, the police said.
[...] The former temple apparently was not the target, and the incident apparently has no connection to Saturday’s attempted firebombing of a multifamily house in the Mount Hope neighborhood, where a representative of an Israeli educational group lived, the police said.
[...] In a statement that referred to yesterday’s incident, Robert Trestan, eastern states civil-rights counsel for the Anti-Defamation League, said, “While there are some similarities to the weekend attack … no one should leap to any conclusions that the events are related or are clearly hate crimes.”
As someone who has long admired the abandoned Temple Beth El, at Broad and Glenham streets, I am saddened by this news. But also, two Molotov incidents in Providence in one week? This is just plain bizarre…
March 20th, 2008 at 12:35PM
anne Says:
This is really unsettling, and makes me wish I understood the context better. Does this actually happen all the time, and we never hear about it in the newspapers because it’s just seen as dumb kids making noise? (Or because it happens in neighborhoods that don’t get covered as much, or where other news items take precedence?) Bored teenagers do stupid shit all the time — are molotovs a recent fad or anything?
Sorry to do the stupid “Is that what the Kids are doing these days?” thing . . .
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March 20th, 2008 at 12:43PM
Ariel Werner Says:
The use of Molotovs is particularly striking. I think of them as an explicitly political weapon, which is why I am perplexed by the lack of association between the fire-bombing of Yosi Knaffo’s home and the fire-bombing of a South PVD synagogue. I too wonder if this is a recent fad…
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March 21st, 2008 at 11:38AM
joe bernstein Says:
this looks like a couple of nitwit kids-i would sincerely doubt political overtones-”molotov cocktails”originated as improvised anti-tank weapons on the eastern front during ww2-there isn’t anything “political” about them except that they were named after the soviet foreign minister-mostly they’ve been used by street gangs,rioters,and organized crime on occasion.you can make a crude napalm cocktail by adding laundry detergent to the gasoline-there was a nasty improvised item that people used to settle disputes in brooklyn where i grew up-lye mixed with vaseline-if it hit you,it was hell to get off
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