Troubled by evidence of the sexualization of children in his town’s schools and library, Marc Aisen of Marblehead, Massachusetts, went to a campaign event to question a local Democrat politician about the social trend.
His questioning earned Aisen, an Orthodox Jew, a beating.
Aisen described the assault to The Epoch Times, saying, “Her supporters grabbed me from behind by my shoulders. I was quickly surrounded by at least five men and shoved back and forth.
“Suddenly, I was struck by a forearm blow to my neck, a sort of clothesline-style punch.”
Disoriented by the pushing and the forearm shiver to the throat, Aisen said he remembered thinking, “This could end really badly for me.”
Aisen believes he was attacked for peacefully expressing his religious convictions against the sexualizing of children.
Who Are the Attackers?
According to the website of CAM’s Antisemitism Research Center, the organization investigates an average of five reported antisemitic incidents each day.Aisen provided details of the role his Jewish views played in him being attacked in Marblehead, telling The Epoch Times, “First the candidate denied that sexualization of kids was going on and called me a liar. Then, she asked me my religion. I told her I am Jewish, and that the LGBT lifestyle is not sanctioned by my faith and that I did not want my tax dollars spent on promoting their agenda to children.”
As tones escalated and the shoving began, the police appeared on the scene.
“Someone in the crowd must have called the city police. When they arrived, an officer told me they had been told that I was armed –an armed man creating a disturbance.
Exercising First Amendment
“I have no record of violent crime. For three years, I have been lobbying politicians for religious liberty and education reform without incident,” Aisen said.After the police separated people and began trying to further sort things out, Aisen told The Epoch Times that his main assailant went after him again.
“He threw a glass of vodka in my face while the police just stood there. They watched him do it. I was detained but my attackers were still granted freedom of movement.”
According to Aisen, who had by this time begun recording his treatment on his cellphone, an officer asked him why he was at the event.
“I told him I was there raising religious objections to the sexualizing of Marblehead’s children.
“He asked me about my religion, and then he brought up sex change and questioned me about my beliefs on transgender.
“He asked me if I thought the Jewish religion was to blame for young people committing suicide?
Letter from Police Chief
A letter from Marblehead police chief Dennis King to Aisen dated Sept. 2, 2022, identifies Aisen as “the victim” in the attack and states that charges of assault and battery were filed against two individuals.King also informed Aisen that the officer in question denied knowing anything about Aisen’s religion or transgender issues, and that the 2020 carving of a swastika by an officer into the surface of a fellow officer’s personal car “was determined not to be a hate crime by the District Attorney’s office.”
The owner of the defaced vehicle was not Jewish.
The carver of the swastika no longer works at the department.
Demise of ‘Objective Reality’
Rabbi Noson Leiter of the Help Rescue Our Children Organization told The Epoch Times that the LGBT activist movement poses a threat to humanity “including those on behalf of whom they purport to advocate via the spread of sexually transmitted diseases … as well as the rampant, surgical, chemical, emotional, and educational abuse of children under the pretext of ‘Transgender’ mythology.”Rabbi Yaakov Menken, managing director of the Coalition for Jewish Values, told The Epoch Times that the Torah (a.k.a. the Old Testament) makes it clear that “sexuality is limited, even for adults, to be part of the special bond between husband and wife.”
Menken acknowledges that Orthodox Jews are paying a price for adhering to their religious convictions and sharing about them, saying, “We are called ‘homophobic’ for believing sexuality is between husbands and wives, ‘transphobic’ for believing in biology, ‘misogynist’ for believing fetal life has sacred value …”
He said that Jews face all the same challenges as other traditionalists face in America today, “plus an additional dose of hatred” because of their attachment to Israel.
Battle for Biblical Morality
“I think it’s important to recognize that we are in a battle. People call you a series of hateful names for adhering to traditional, Biblical values,” he said.Menken believes the point of all the attacks, intimidation, and name-calling “is to cow people into silence, because if there’s an actual marketplace of ideas, you win.
“So don’t be silent,” he said to encourage those who are scared but want to speak up for their beliefs.
Aisen told The Epoch Times that he believes people would be more vocal about biblical morality if they weren’t afraid of reprisals.
He said of his ordeal in Marblehead, an affluent community where he didn’t expect such violent behavior, “I wanted to set an example and encourage parents to have the courage to represent a controversial viewpoint.
“The first thing we want to do is protect kids. To clean up every school in America as defined by rejecting ‘queer theory.’”
Aisen said that, like himself, most Jewish religious protestors he knows believe in equality and treating all people fairly.
He said the Left equates “not celebrating pride” with hate.
“In the minds of LGBT activists and American leftists, anybody not celebrating pride is guilty of oppression.
“LGBT is like a religion to them. It is their religion.”
Is Violence Justified?
“They think violence is O.K. if they are offended by your religious beliefs,” Aisen added.“It’s not antisemitic to disagree with Jews about Judaism but it is antisemitic to demonize us because you don’t like our beliefs.”
Leiter told The Epoch Times that the LGBT agenda promotes “antipathy toward Jews for believing, speaking, and acting as Jews are commanded to by God himself.”
He stated that LGBT ideologues view the Jews’ fidelity to Bible-based rejection of the act of sodomy as “bigotry, deserving ostracism and even punishment, if not worse.”
Leiter said that the anti-Jewish persecution comes on the heels of LGBT persecution of some Christian faith groups for “their refusal to capitulate to the ever-expanding panorama of LGBTQ demands.”
“We can’t afford to cede yet more ground to the LGBTQ movement by wallowing in victimhood. We must proactively rescue salvageable remnants of society by electing genuine advocates for morality,” Leiter said.
