Shlomo Danzinger, the Orthodox Jewish mayor of Surfside, Fla., is reportedly under police protection following a neo-Nazi death threat against him and his family.
Danziger received a threatening email on Aug. 4 from someone who purported to be part of the Fourth Reich, “a reference to a potential resurrection of a Nazi party, with the unknown sender suggesting the possibility of coming to Danzinger’s house to ‘teach his family a lesson,’” VIN News reported.
The publication added that authorities saw it as a credible threat.
Danziger, his wife, and their children (9, 14, 15 and 20) have been remaining in their home, and the couple’s 21-year-old son, who is serving in the Israeli Defense Forces, offered to come help protect the family. The family declined, per VIN News.
“I told them that they weren’t leaving the house unless someone comes with them and that if they see flashlights around the neighborhood, it is people who are protecting us, just as a precaution,” Danzinger told the publication.
“Antisemitism is at historic levels not only in the halls of Congress and on social media but on the streets of South Florida that I and hundreds of thousands of Jewish Americans call home,” Bryan Leib, executive director of CASEPAC, told JNS.
Leib called on the entire Florida Jewish community, both Democrats and Republicans, to pray for Danzinger and his family.
“No Jewish public official should have to be put into police protection because they are an outspoken Jew,” Leib told JNS. “But that is exactly what is happening right now in Surfside. Antisemitism has no place in Florida.”