JACKSON URGES UNITY AGAINST HATE CRIMES.

Byline: Troy Anderson Staff Writer

Helping to reopen the North Valley Jewish Community Center, the Rev. Jesse Jackson urged people of all faiths Monday to join in the fight against a recent rash of hate crimes across the country.

Jackson, accompanied by ministers from the San Fernando Valley and elsewhere in the Los Angeles area, said the gunman's attack on the center Aug. 10 underscores the need for the government to act swiftly to fight extremists by toughening hate crime laws.

``We have underestimated the extent of the rise of hate crimes,'' said Jackson, president and founder of Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. ``Every time it happens, we think it's an isolated event.''

Jackson called on religious and community leaders to work together to prevent similar attacks in the future. ``In times of crisis, people must turn to each other to find hope and healing,'' Jackson said during a news conference.

He said everyone is ``guilty of living in our own ethnic patch'' and finding comfort in those communities, or ``patches.''

``We must sew those patches together and build a quilt of cooperation,'' he said. ``It's not until the underbelly of violence hits our patch that we tend to wake up.''

The wake-up calls have come in rapid succession in recent months, Jackson said, citing the Granada Hills shooting; white supremacist Benjamin Nathaniel Smith's shooting rampage a month earlier of Jews, Asians and African-Americans in the Midwest; the killing of a gay student in Wyoming; and the slaying of an African-American man in Texas.

Jackson cited numerous Internet sites where hate groups spread their gospel of violence. ``This generation of haters makes bombs and blows up buildings,'' he said.

Jackson said the government needs to expand hate crime laws to enact a ``high level of justice'' on those who violate them. ``In the 2000 presidential race, the effort to stop hate crime violence must be central to the campaign,'' Jackson said.

Jackson explained that the GOP's response to gun violence has shifted in the past 30 years. In 1969, the party was advocating gun control because the Black Panthers posed a threat of violence. In 1999, the party is advocating the right to bear arms.

``People are now walking around more heavily armed than the police,'' said Jackson.

Jackson also said the government needs to address the growing alienation of white people who in many communities are experiencing increased diversification in their neighborhoods.

``We must relieve them of their fears,'' he said. ``Somehow, we must inform them, not just disarm them.''

Other ministers joined Jackson in calling for an effort by various faiths to work together to stop hate crimes.

``This has been a wake-up call, especially in the San Fernando Valley, that hate can exist everywhere unless people stand up against it,'' said Rev. Zedar E. Broadous of Calvary Baptist Church in Pacoima.

Broadous asked the public to join in the fight against racism by attending a solidarity march at 2 p.m. Sunday at Em Habanim Synagogue, 7533 Fallbrook Ave., that will continue for one mile to the North Valley Jewish Community Center, 22622 Vanowen St.