Lehigh County Commissioner Amy Zanelli was incensed Sunday when she saw a Nazi flag flying from a home in her West Bethlehem neighborhood.
Zanelli, who is Jewish, confronted the man who hung it, but instead of excoriating him for fomenting hatred, she reached an understanding with him. She enlisted neighbors to take down the flag, which Robin George said was hung on his home to protest the quality and high costs of the medical care he received in the amputation of his leg from diabetes complications.
And then Zanelli offered to help George navigate the health care system.
“His medical bills are astronomical. I’m going to see what I can do to help him share his story,” Zanelli said. “I’ll reach out to him soon personally and hopefully we can work together to do what we can to advance health care and bring some good out of this situation.”
Word spread quickly around the neighborhood Sunday that a red flag with a swastika in a white circle was flying from a home on the 300 block of Eighth Avenue, about a block from Calypso Elementary School. Passing cars slowed while drivers tried to read the message scrawled around the swastika:
“HEALTHCARE THE NEW HOLOCAUST ITS VICTIMS BILLED”
Upset neighbors called police, who said they couldn’t infringe on George’s First Amendment rights, no matter how distasteful the flag may seem.
“You may not like it, it may suck, but it’s not a crime. It’s like being offended by somebody for what they say or stand for, but it’s not a crime. They have a right to stand for something despicable,” DiLuzio said. “Freedom is a two-way sword. It goes both ways.”
George told The Morning Call he hung the Nazi flag next to his front door to protest what he views as the failures of the medical system, not because he wanted to offend Jews. George said he is uninsured and has racked up six figures in medical bills. Doctors have amputated his left toes and his right leg, and he blames the treatment he received for his poor health.
“I didn’t want to offend anybody,” said George, who also had a sticker with a Confederate flag-wielding veteran with the slogan “Hell no! I’ll never forget!” on his door. “In fact, I’m against Nazis.”
When it became clear police wouldn’t take it down, Zanelli said she decided to ask George to take down the flag.
“I can understand your frustrations with the health care system that needs to be addressed, but my kids who are … Jewish just think there’s someone here that wants to kill them,” Zanelli said to him.
Her children are 12, 10 and 7.
It’s not the first time someone has flown a Nazi flag to draw attention to an issue.
Nancy Baron-Baer, the regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, said people are sometimes tempted to make comparisons between current issues and the Holocaust. Those comparisons, she said, trivialize “the worst time in our history.”
“The fact that the person also chose to display the flag of Nazi Germany, which is one of the most potent hate symbols in the world, simply goes beyond the pale,” she said.
She said using the Nazi flag as a way to address issues with the health care system is unacceptable.
“People should never use hate symbols in order to garner attention for their cause, and we hope that the homeowner learned a lesson in this instance,” Baron-Baer said.
George later called and apologized to Zanelli’s wife, Angela, who is also Jewish. Zanelli said the family accepted the apology without condoning George’s decisions.
“I understand that desperate people do desperate things,” she said.
During the exchange at George’s doorstep, the 61-year-old gave Zanelli permission to take the flag down. She didn’t even want to touch it, but wrapped it in a blue flag to handle it and take it down.
The blue flag’s message: “Hate has no home here.”
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Source: Morning Call
URL:
http://www.mcall.com/business/healthcare/mc-nws-nazi-flag-20180902-story.html