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Man charged in synagogue attack was star scholar and athlete

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POWAY, Calif. — The man accused of opening fire inside a Southern California synagogue was a star scholar, athlete and musician whose embrace of white supremacy and anti-Semitism has dumbfounded his family and others who thought they knew him well.

John T. Earnest, 19, made the dean’s list both semesters last year as a nursing student at California State University, San Marcos. In high school, he had stellar grades, swam on the varsity team and basked in the applause of classmates for his piano solos at talent shows.

Earnest apparently became radicalized sometime over the last two years and is charged with murder and attempted murder in Saturday’s assault on the Chabad of Poway synagogue, which killed one woman and injured three people, including the rabbi. He is also charged with arson in connection with an attack last month on a mosque in nearby Escondido.

Owen Cruise, 20, saw Earnest every day during senior year at Mt. Carmel High School in San Diego when the two were in calculus and physics together. They were in the school’s amateur radio club together.

Earnest’s piano performances drew audiences to their feet. He did a rendition of “Pirates of the Caribbean” and played Chopin and Beethoven.

“Crowds would be cheering his name,” Cruise said Monday. “Everybody loved him.”

Earnest counted Jews and black people among his friends. His father, John A. Earnest, is a popular physics teacher at Mt. Carmel, where he has worked for 31 years.

“He was very close to his dad,” Cruise said. “He always hung out in his classroom, came to see him at lunch. He always seemed like a nice guy … He didn’t seem like the type of person who would go off the deep end.”

Earnest’s father volunteered to help students with exams and homework, said Cruise, who praised his former teacher for having a big impact on his life. On the morning of the shooting, the elder Earnest was hosting a study hour for an Advanced Placement exam and brought cookies, Cruise said.

Cruise, now a sophomore at the University of California, San Diego, said the suspect lived at home and saw his parents every day.

“The way John T. acted is not representative at all of the way he was raised,” Cruise said. “They are an outstanding family. Some of the finest people I’ve ever met.”

The suspect’s parents said their son and five siblings were raised in a family that “rejected hate and taught that love must be the motive for everything we do.”

“To our great shame, he is now part of the history of evil that has been perpetrated on Jewish people for centuries,” the parents said Monday in their first public comments. “Our son’s actions were informed by people we do not know, and ideas we do not hold.”

The parents, who are co-operating with investigators, do not plan to plan to provide legal representation to their son, whose initial court appearance was scheduled for Tuesday. Family attorney Earll Pott said a public defender will probably be appointed.

Earnest burst into the synagogue on the last day of Passover, a major Jewish holiday that celebrates freedom, and opened fire with an assault-style rifle on the crowd of about 100.

He fled when the rifle jammed, according to authorities and witnesses, avoiding an Army combat veteran and an off-duty Border Patrol agent who pursued him. He called 911 to report the shooting and surrendered a short time later.

Lori Kaye , a founding member of the congregation, was killed. Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein was shot in the hands, while Noya Dahan, 8, and her uncle Almog Peretz suffered shrapnel wounds.

Kaye, 60, was remembered for her kindness Monday at a memorial service at the packed synagogue in Poway, a well-to-do suburb north of San Diego.

A manifesto — written by a person identifying himself as John Earnest and published online shortly before the attack — spewed hatred toward Jews and praised the perpetrators of attacks on mosques in New Zealand that killed 50 people last month and at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue that killed 11 on Oct. 27.

Earnest frequented 8chan, a dark corner of the web where those disaffected by mainstream social media sites often post extremist, racist and violent views.

“I’ve only been lurking here for a year and half, yet what I’ve learned here is priceless. It’s been an honour,” he wrote.

Earnest, who evidently intended to livestream the attack, offered a list of recommended songs for people to listen to while watching, including “Sloop John B” by The Beach Boys and the Pokemon theme song. He said he had planned the attack for four weeks.

“If you told me even 6 months ago that I would do this I would have been surprised,” Earnest wrote.

The FBI said it got tips about a social media post threatening violence against Jews about five minutes before the attack.

The tips to an FBI website and hotline included a link to the anonymous post but did not offer specific information about its author or the location of the threat. The bureau said employees immediately tried to determine who wrote it, but the shooting occurred before they could establish his identity.

A tipster told The Associated Press that he called the FBI tip line at 11:15 a.m. because the post linked to a manifesto that said the author was responsible for the mosque arson in Escondido.

The tipster, who refused to provide his name because of security concerns, said the call with the FBI lasted four or five minutes. He described the FBI as quick and professional and said he did not know what the bureau could have done.

The shooting happened around 11:30 a.m.

___

Associated Press writers Michael Balsamo in Washington, R.J. Rico in Atlanta and Amy Taxin in Poway contributed to this report.

___

This story has been corrected to show the rabbi’s first name is spelled Yisroel, not Yishoel.

Elliot Spagat And Julie Watson, The Associated Press





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UK Government And Media Spread Disinformation About Southport Killer, Evidence Suggests

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Britain’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer answers questions during a press conference following clashes after the Southport stabbing on August 1, 2024. (Photo by HENRY NICHOLLS/AFP via Getty Images)

This is a preview of a breaking story.  Click below for the full report

UK police now say that the alleged killer possessed an al-Qaeda training manual and a deadly biological toxin

The riots in England this summer were motivated by far-right Islamophobia and driven by disinformation online, argued the UK media and government at the time. In July and August, social media posts claimed that a Muslim migrant was responsible for a mass stabbing in the seaside town of Southport. Those claims were false, according to officials and fact-checkers.

The riots began after a 17-year-old named Axel Rudakubana allegedly stabbed to death three young girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance workshop. Rudakubana was born in the UK and raised Christian, the media reported. The rioters, said Prime Minister Keir Starmer, were “far-right thugs” seeking to exploit the tragedy and “target people because of the color of their skin.”

But it now appears that the UK government may have deliberately spread disinformation and used it to justify censorship and repression. Police yesterday issued new charges under the Terrorism Act against Rudakubana, now 18, for allegedly producing ricin, a biological toxin, and possessing an al-Qaeda training manual titled “Military Studies in the Jihad Against the Tyrants.” Since police arrested Rudakubana at the scene of the stabbings, it’s likely they searched his home shortly after, and thus may have discovered the ricin and manual within hours of the attack.

Ricin is a protein toxin derived from the castor bean plant and has no known antidotes. The terrorism charges identify the al-Qaeda training manual as “of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism.” Although the police stated that the case is not yet classified as a “terrorist incident,” these new charges suggest that radical Islamism motivated the attack, contradicting authorities’ previous narrative.

“It is not plausible for the police, Home Secretary, Prime Minister not to have known about the suspect’s background until this week,” said conservative Member of Parliament and former Home Secretary, Dame Priti Patel, in a statement to The Telegraph. “This detail would have materialized within 2-3 days of such a devastating and serious incident with the entire security apparatus focusing on finding answers to key questions.

Mourners gather for the funeral of a nine-year-old victim of a knife attack in Southport on August 11, 2024 (left); Axel Rudakubana, Southport stabbing suspect (center); Britain’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer at 10 Downing Street on August 1, 2024 (right). [Getty Images and Liverpool Crown Court drawing]…

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Canadian man euthanized after COVID shot injuries

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From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

An Ontario man in his late 40s has been euthanized after doctors diagnosed him with ‘post COVID-19 vaccination syndrome’ following three COVID jabs, which caused him to suffer ‘severe functional decline.’

An Ontario man has been granted euthanasia for “post COVID-19 vaccination syndrome.”

According to an October report by the National Post, an anonymous Ontario man in his late 40s has been euthanized after doctors determined his COVID shot injuries qualified him for assisted suicide or “Medical Assistance in Dying” (MAiD) under Canada’s euthanasia regime.

“Amongst his multiple specialists, no unifying diagnosis was confirmed,” the reports issued by a 16-member MAiD death review committee found.

Nevertheless, the doctors “opined that the most reasonable diagnosis for Mr. A’s clinical presentation (severe functional decline) was a post-vaccine syndrome, in keeping with chronic fatigue syndrome.”

The man experienced “suffering and functional decline” following three doses of the experimental COVID shots.

He also suffered from a slew of mental illnesses, including depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and personality disorders. He was admitted to the hospital twice “while navigating his physical symptoms” with thoughts of suicide.

He was eventually diagnosed “post COVID-19 vaccination syndrome,” which is not currently include in Canada’s current vaccine reporting system. Notably, Canada’s program to compensate those injured by the so-called “safe and effective” COVID shots has now spent $14 million, but the vast majority of claims remain unpaid.

His death is further complicated by the fact that multiple specialists failed to agree on his diagnosis, with many questioning if his condition met the criteria for an “irremediable” condition, which is required to seek euthanasia in Canada. Many also questioned if his mental health disqualified him from undergoing assisted suicide.

The man’s death is considered “Track 2,” part of a group who are not “terminally ill” and whose natural deaths are not reasonably foreseeable.

“I think we have gone so far over the line with Track 2 that people cannot even see the line that we’ve crossed,” said Gaind.

“It’s pretty clear that some providers are going up to that line, and maybe beyond it,” Gaind said.

As LifeSiteNews previously reported, internal information has revealed that Canadian doctors are questioning the morality of euthanizing vulnerable and impoverished patients who are choosing death because of poverty and loneliness.

During his time in office, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his government have worked to expand assisted suicide 13-fold since it was legalized, making Canada’s euthanasia program the fastest growing in the world.

Currently, wait times to receive actual health care in Canada have increased to an average of 27.7 weeks, leading some Canadians to despair and opt for euthanasia instead of waiting for genuine assistance. At the same time, sick and elderly Canadians who have refused to end their lives via “MAiD” have reported being called “selfish” by their providers.

The most recent reports show that euthanasia is the sixth highest cause of death in Canada. However, it was not listed as such in Statistics Canada’s top 10 leading causes of death from 2019 to 2022.

When asked why it was left off the list, the agency said that it records the illnesses that led Canadians to choose to end their lives via euthanasia, not the actual cause of death, as the primary cause of death.

According to Health Canada, in 2022, 13,241 Canadians died by MAiD lethal injections. This accounts for 4.1 percent of all deaths in the country for that year, a 31.2 percent increase from 2021.

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