Re: Jewish Journalist Arrested for Objecting to Islamic Terror Symbol in Grocery Store

 https://rairfoundation.com/jewish-journalist-sloan-rachmuth-arrested-objecting-islamic-terror/
 Sloan Rachmuth, a Jewish journalist and political commentator, was arrested at
her home in front of her terrified children on November 3, 2024. Her alleged
crime? According to Rachmuth, she objected to a supermarket employee at Harris
Teeter wearing the controversial keffiyeh, a political symbol widely
associated with Hamas and its ambitions to destroy Israel and the Jewish
people worldwide.
 Rachmuth, an outspoken advocate against antisemitism and a contributor to
national media outlets on Middle Eastern affairs, explained to RAIR Foundation
in an exclusive interview that she was handcuffed, marched through her
neighborhood, and charged with cyberstalking after she posted about the
troubling incident online.
 Rachmuth explained the police never asked for her side of the story, nor
investigated the credibility of the alleged victim. Her arrest was based
solely on an unverified accusation, raising serious concerns about law
enforcement's complicity in this apparent retaliation.
 Rather than uphold its corporate attire and political expression policies,
Harris Teeter-- a subsidiary of The Kroger Co., the largest supermarket chain
in America-- ignored its regulations. Indeed, Harris Teeter allowed an
employee to wear a threatening symbol of Islamic and Palestinian terrorism,
visibly wrapping it around her head while working with customers.
 Rachmuth describes this as not just corporate censorship or police overreach
but state-backed antisemitic persecution and the criminalization of those who
publicly object to terror support and antisemitism.
 On October 31, 2024, Rachmuth entered Harris Teeter on Sunset Lake Road in
Holly Springs, NC, a store where she had shopped regularly for seven years.
According to Rachmuth, as she checked out, she noticed an employee handling
food while wearing a keffiyeh-- a garment long associated with the Palestinian
Liberation Organization (PLO) and frequently worn by Hamas militants and
supporters. In America, the keffiyeh has been used as a rallying icon for
violence against Jews during demonstrations. Even countries like the United
Arab Emirates and Egypt-- both Arab nations-- have banned its political use,
recognizing its ties to Islamic terror groups.
 Aware of its political significance, Rachmuth says she politely asked the
employee, Amira M. Fattah, "It's Halloween; are you wearing this as a
costume?" Fattah replied, "No, it's for Free Palestine," confirming she wore
the keffiyeh as a political statement rather than for religious reasons.
 As a Jewish woman and a longtime customer, Rachmuth was deeply uncomfortable
with a store employee openly supporting an ideology that symbolized the
destruction of Israel and the Jewish people while handling food. While at the
store, Rachmuth escalated her concerns to store manager Sheronna Irick,
expecting Harris Teeter to uphold its policies against political speech in the
workplace.
 Instead of addressing the hostile work environment created by an employee
wearing a symbol of Jewish oppression, Irick dismissed Rachmuth's complaint
outright and told her, "Like it or leave."
 Realizing that the store manager was indifferent to the issue, Rachmuth
contacted Harris Teeter's corporate office to inform them of what had
occurred.
 Frustrated by the store manager's hostile response, Rachmuth turned to social
media and posted about the encounter on X (formerly Twitter). She included a
photo of the employee wearing the keffiyeh--showing only the employee's
profile-- along with a caption questioning the corporation's stance on
political speech in the workplace.
 The post quickly gained traction, sparking widespread debate about corporate
complicity in antisemitism. Rather than address the concern, Harris Teeter's
employees escalated the situation by calling the police in what appears to be
an act of retaliation against a customer.
 According to arrest records and law enforcement, store manager Sheronna Irick
played a pivotal role in facilitating this retaliation and made it clear that
the Harris Teeter manager's actions directly enabled Rachmuth's
falsely-charged arrest.
 Three days after Rachmuth's X post, Holly Springs Police officers-- Elliott
Warren, Benjamin Marino, and Edgar Hernandez-- arrived at Rachmuth's home and
began pounding on her door.
 To understand how this politically motivated arrest unfolded, examining events
leading up to it is important.
 A Timeline of the Political Arrest
 October 31, 2024: Rachmuth reports that she noticed a Harris Teeter employee
wearing a keffiyeh, questioned her about it, and later posted images on social
media.
 November 2, 2024: Holly Springs Police took a report from the employee and
store manager, who alleged that Rachmuth called her a terrorist in the store--
an accusation Rachmuth vehemently denies.
 The incident report officially labeled the case as ANTI-ISLAMIC (MUSLIM),
suggesting that law enforcement intentionally framed the situation as a
bias-motivated offense. This classification raises serious concerns about
whether police exaggerated or misrepresented the nature of the allegations to
justify Rachmuth's arrest. If Rachmuth's concern over a political symbol was
rebranded as a 'hate crime', does this mean that simply objecting to
Hamas-affiliated imagery is now considered a criminal act? The implications of
such a designation are chilling-- especially given that there was no
investigation into whether the allegations against her were truthful.
 November 3, 2024: Officer Elliott Warren obtained an arrest warrant, accusing
Rachmuth of using her cellphone to "harass, embarrass, or terrify" the
employee.
 Later that day: Police arrived at her home with an arrest warrant in hand,
leading to what many believe was an effort to humiliate her publicly.
 Rachmuth, a mother of two, says she was shocked and confused by the officers'
presence. When she demanded the reason for her arrest, Officer Benjamin Marino
chillingly replied, "Something you did made her uncomfortable, all right?"
 Rachmuth's arrest video shows she was then handcuffed with no questions asked.
She says the police paraded her through her neighborhood before taking her to
Wake County Jail. Adding to the cruelty of the arrest, this occurred on her
17th wedding anniversary, as her terrified children, concerned husband and
protective German Shepherd watched helplessly.
 Rachmuth states that despite the alleged crime being an unarrestable
misdemeanor, she was forced to pay a $1,000 cash bail-- a sum typically
reserved for serious offenses-- and was treated like a violent criminal during
the booking process.
 Democratic activists and their media swiftly circulated her mugshot and charge
sheet online, weaponizing the arrest as a political smear campaign. Major
left-wing outlets, including The Independent, The Intercept, MSN, Daily Mail,
and other partisan publications, immediately jumped on the bandwagon,
launching coordinated attacks against Rachmuth. They spread her mugshot far
and wide, framing her as a villain-- without even attempting to reach out to
her for comment.
 This rapid media blitz has left many questioning who contacted the media so
swiftly and how they were able to mobilize coverage within hours of her
arrest. Just as questions linger over who at Harris Teeter initially called
the police, suspicions are growing that this was not an organic reaction but
rather a carefully coordinated effort to weaponize the criminal justice system
against a Jewish journalist. Many believe this was a deliberate, politically
motivated attack meant to silence and intimidate her-- setting a dangerous
precedent for anyone daring to expose antisemitism or radical extremism in
America.
 The charge against Rachmuth-- cyberstalking-- has no legal precedent or
justification. The accusation alleged that she used her phone to take a photo
with the intent to embarrass someone-- an assertion unsupported by any state
or federal law and one that raises serious 1st Amendment concerns.
 Even Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman, a Democrat, acknowledged
the blatant injustice of the case and dropped all charges the next day,
stating that the alleged conduct did not even come close to meeting the
elements of the offense.
 However, this charge's legal overreach and selective enforcement remain deeply
troubling. North Carolina's cyberstalking statute, G.S. 14-196.3, requires
repeated electronic communications made to a person with the intent to "annoy,
threaten, or harass" an individual. Rachmuth's single post about a store
policy does not meet this legal threshold. Nor was Rachmuth's post directed
*at* the employee as the statute requires. It was *about* the employee but not
sent *to* the employee in any way. Furthermore, legal precedents in State v.
Bishop (2016) and State v. Shackelford (2019) have reinforced the principle
that vague and overly broad interpretations of online speech statutes violate
constitutional protections of free speech and press freedom.
 If this charge had moved forward, it would have set a chilling precedent for
journalists, activists, and citizens engaged in lawful political speech. The
case raises serious questions about lawfare and the use of activist law
enforcement to target political dissenters.
 While Freeman ultimately dropped the charges, the fact that the Holly Springs
Police Department pursued them in the first place-- despite clear
constitutional and procedural concerns-- demonstrates the selective
weaponization of the law to intimidate and silence individuals exposing
antisemitism and Islamic radicalism. The police department has yet to
acknowledge any wrongdoing in Rachmuth's case.
 The damage is done. Rachmuth has been publicly humiliated, smeared as an
extremist, and left to deal with the lasting emotional trauma inflicted on her
and her children. Left-wing media outlets quickly distributed her mugshot and
charge sheet, weaponized to destroy her credibility and intimidate others from
speaking out.
 The swiftness with which the media picked up the story-- without even
verifying the charge's validity--further supports the growing suspicion that
this was a coordinated attack on a Jewish journalist for daring to challenge
the glorification of Hamas and its genocidal ideology.
 According to Rachmuth, her arrest raises serious concerns about how political
and ideological biases impact law enforcement actions, particularly when it
comes to Jewish Americans who challenge the normalization of anti-Jewish
hostility.
 Rachmuth also points to what she describes as a two-tiered justice system at
play. Between 2022 and 2023, she lodged multiple detailed complaints with the
Holly Springs Police Department regarding relentless harassment,
cyberstalking, and threats she received for being Jewish and having an Israeli
husband. Internal documents shared with RAIR show her detailed police reports
of the doxxing of her family, anti-Jewish slurs, and ongoing harassment from
known perpetrators were ignored by the police chief. Emails show the police
declined to take action, stating that 'no criminal North Carolina General
Statutes have been violated'.
 In a letter to Rachmuth dated January 9, 2023, the police admitted that they
had thoroughly analyzed the documentation, consulted with the North Carolina
State Bureau of Investigation (NC-SBI), and ultimately concluded that the
harassment fell under '1st Amendment protected speech'-- even though it
included threats, public exposure of personal records, and clear targeting of
her family. In an email, the police chief justified inaction by citing the
need to follow a chain of command before presenting charges for judicial
review.
 Yet, regarding her arrest, no such legal scrutiny or procedural delay was
observed, as evidenced by the charges being dropped within 24 hours. She was
promptly taken into custody without the due diligence police had claimed was
necessary in previous cases. The statute requires 'repeated' communication
directly to a person, a requirement absent from the arrest warrant.
Furthermore, North Carolina courts have overturned similar cases on
constitutional grounds.