“Racially motiated?” Of course not! I don’t think anyone believes that the police officer thought to himself, “I’m gonna kill this <African American>!” as he put and held his knee on Floyd’s neck. Presumably, that officer had countless opportunities to kill people prior to this event.
What happened to Floyd wasn’t racially motivated. It wasn’t a lynching. But it may well have been a result of racism. We probably will never know for sure whether this specific cop has racist attitudes, and whether he treated all citizens equally under the law. This is not the point.
The point is that there is a racist attitude which permeates all interactions between police and black people. Horror stories such as Floyd are the most outrageous expressions of this attitude, but the protest is about every incident of anti-black conduct. It’s about the demeaning treatment they suffer at routine traffic stops. It’s about the presumption of fault against them at minor accidents. It’s about the way they are treated every day of their lives. Sure, it’s about the murder of George Floyd, but it’s also about the relentless abuse of huge numbers of people.
Of course, there is no justification at all for the riots, violence, looting, etc that is currently going on. These people are criminals taking advantage of an opportunity. But this should not blind us to the truth of what happened.
As Yidden, we should understand better than most people the suffering of African-Americans. After all, we’ve been there many times in our history. We should recognize that this is wrong, and we should say so. The Torah, long before the U.S. Constitution, taught us that “all men are created equal,” and enjoy rights “endowed by their Creator.” There is no place in Hashem’s creation for racism in any form.