A San Diego cultural center kept a controversial Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) altar honoring leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah on display in Balboa Park despite condemnation from California state lawmakers and local Jewish organizations last week.
Erected annually in early November to observe the Mesoamerican tradition of remembering the dead, an ofrenda (altar) typically features candles, marigolds, and photographs of deceased loved ones, though community art spaces often expand them to make political statements.
At the Centro Cultural de la Raza, a Chicano and Indigenous arts institution operating in a city-owned building in San Diego’s premier public park, this year’s display featured portraits of former Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, Hamas spokesperson Abu Obeida, and Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Qasem Soleimani alongside photos of deceased Palestinian children and journalists.
Initial images of the display also showed flags associated with Hezbollah and the Houthis, which included Arabic text translating to “God is great, death to America, death to Israel, curse to Jews, victory to Islam.”
California lawmakers demand removal of the altar
California State Senator Steve Padilla and Assemblymember Chris Ward issued a joint statement last Thursday, condemning the exhibit and calling for its immediate removal.
“It has come to our attention that an ofrenda honoring leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah has been displayed at Centro Cultural de la Raza,” the lawmakers said in their statement. “These organizations are responsible for the mass murder of civilians, and honoring their leaders in what is a sacred tradition in the Latino culture is wrong. Their continued presence on the ofrenda is deeply antisemitic and hateful. This was not merely an error in judgment; it was reckless incitement and must be removed immediately.”
Ward and Padilla also called on municipal authorities to intervene, noting the venue operates on city-owned land. “Respecting persons’ rights to offer memorial to their personal dead is one thing, providing persons a space in your organization’s name to memorialize terrorists who plotted deliberately to murder and kidnap women and children in their beds is quite another,” they stated. “The leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah are not the honorable dead of our community. Since this display is located on public property, we ask the City of San Diego to engage with its lessee and ensure that all members of the public are respected.”
The Finest Community Coalition, an umbrella group uniting 49 local Jewish organizations across the region—including the Jewish Federation of San Diego, AJC San Diego, the Anti-Defamation League San Diego, the Lawrence Family JCC, the Jewish Community Foundation San Diego, and the Leichtag Foundation—published an open letter on Monday, calling on the center’s leadership to take down the altar.
“Centro Cultural de la Raza, a cultural center in Balboa Park, is using Día de los Muertos to honor individuals and organizations responsible for acts of terrorism and the murder of innocent people,” the coalition wrote. “This is not remembrance. It is a shrine to terrorism on display in one of San Diego’s most beloved public spaces.”
While the Hezbollah and Houthi flags were subsequently removed from the altar after it was erected, the portraits of Sinwar, Abu Obeida, and Soleimani remained on view.
Centro Cultural de la Raza published a statement on Instagram last Friday rejecting the demands to dismantle the exhibit, defending the display against the backlash. “Those who have raised concerns, officials included, have never bothered to build sincere and lasting relationships with our space and extended community,” the center stated. “They raise concerns about pictures of individuals they label as ‘terrorists’, but the intent is to wipe away the crimes of, and complicity with, Israel, a rogue state that has acted with impunity in its ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people.”
The center’s statement continued, “Have they condemned the genocide of Palestinians? Instead, they chauvinistically dare to suggest some lives are grievable and others are not, attempting to dictate who we can mourn. This is a blatant trampling on our First Amendment protections in service of a political agenda that supports genocide. We stand firm in the right to mourn all loss of life, including those at the hands of Israeli aggression, especially given that it is with US complicity and the use of our tax dollars.”
Jewish alumnus says staff ejected him from the center
The dispute escalated last Friday when Daniel La Salle, a Jewish-Mexican San Diego State University alumnus wearing a kippah and a US-Israel pin, entered the center during advertised public hours for a film screening and objected to the inclusion of terrorist leaders on the altar, according to a report he co-authored for San Diego Jewish World. La Salle stated that staff members physically ejected him from the premises during the incident, which was recorded on video.
Adam Maslia, Director of The Finest Community Coalition, told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday, “To my knowledge, the only action taken has been the unacceptable half measure of removing the flags of Hezbollah, the Islamic Republic of Iran, and the Houthis. It makes one question why they would remove the flags of the regimes that called for ‘Death to America’ but left the portraits of the terrorists that were actually responsible for actualizing that horrific motto.”
“San Diego is a military town, and along with the rest of the country, we honored our veterans yesterday for Veterans Day. I can’t think of a more disrespectful affront to our service members than for this altar continuing to be displayed to the public,” Maslia told the Post.
Follow us on GoogleSource: The Jerusalem Post · ALEX CARSON
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