(Source: Bennett Raglin/Getty Images North America)
*Rev. Al Sharpton is set to receive an honorary doctorate from Medgar Evers College, and the move comes 28 years after many believe he inflamed racial tensions during the 1991 Crown Heights riots — which resulted in four days of rioting and assaults in the Brooklyn neighborhood.
Here’s what happened: Back in August 1991, a 7-year-old Black boy named Gavin Cato was struck and killed by the motorcade of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, New York Post reports. Within hours, an angry mob of Black residents fatally stabbed 29-year-old Hasidic scholar Yankel Rosenbaum while shouting, “Kill the Jew!”
A day after Cato’s death, Sharpton organized a protest a day later where hundreds marched through the streets of Brooklyn screaming: “No justice, no peace!” At Cato’s funeral, he reportedly described Jews as “diamond merchants” who hate Black people.
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Rev. Al Sharpton to deliver keynote address at Fisk graduationhttps://t.co/Lw0PFNeMFP
— Reverend Al Sharpton (@TheRevAl) April 12, 2019
Fast forward to 2019 and the college now wants to recognize Sharpton’s “unwavering commitment to racial, educational and socioeconomic equity” at its June 5 commencement, according to The New York Post.
Meanwhile, Norman Rosenbaum, Yankel’s brother, told The Post that Sharpton “is not a person you honor.”
Adding, “Within the last 27 years he hasn’t changed. The same character is there.”
Norman said Sharpton is “a fraud and a charlatan whose actions over the years speak for themselves and they’re not good actions.” He also called him a “man who does not promote peace,” and believes he has “not told the truth.”
Steven Pagones is the ex-prosecutor whom Sharpton falsely accused of aiding in the “attack.” He later won a defamation suit against the reverend, the report states.
“I can’t believe the guy’s being recognized for anything,” said Pagones, noting that Sharpton is “worried about his own political agenda and that’s it.”
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