Absolutely devastating news from Australia that at least 11 people were killed in an antisemitic attack on a Hanukkah celebration in Sydney. One of those who was murdered, Alex Kleytman z”l, was a Holocaust survivor. His wife, also a Holocaust survivor, saw as he was shot. I cannot imagine the grief and pain she and many others are feeling.
My heart is with all the victims and their loved ones, as well as the broader Jewish community in Australia. May the memories of the victims be a blessing.
We deserve to be able to congregate and observe Jewish holidays without fear of violence, in Australia and globally.
Being a Jew in America right now is so bizarre. The president's right hand man endorses a far-right German party that wants to remove Holocaust memorials and ban the sale of kosher meat, members of the ruling party are doing nazi salutes at rallies, and standing members of congress openly repeat conspiracy theories about the Rothschilds and Jewish space lasers. Then you see a news article about antisemitism and it's like "we need to do something about all these college students protesting mass killings."
the way some people talk about jews makes it sound like they just discovered the concept of human culture. “they have a word for outsiders 😡” yes most people do
my synagogue was set on fire last night during Shabbat at 3:00 AM in an arsonist attack.
no one was injured, which i am extremely grateful for. they have several security cameras, so there is a suspect in custody. the details and motivation haven't been shared, but it can be reasonably assumed to be a hate crime.
this was the first synagogue established in the state, the only one that's not hours away, and certainly the largest in the area. two Torah scrolls are destroyed beyond repair, 5 are damaged. the library where children have religious school and morning Shabbat service is held has been completely burnt down, much of that section of the building that's left is covered in soot and ash. the administrative offices were also lost.
our Tree of Life, which was for important life events like bar/bat/b'nei mitzvahs, was destroyed. i was just looking at it this past Tuesday while waiting for a meeting with my rabbi. it was dozens of bronze plaques in the shape of leaves with commemorations on them placed above a trunk. there is a photo of the wreckage that makes me cry every time i look at it.
we have a rescued scroll from Nazi-era Czechoslovakia (it is thankfully unharmed). we have a Holocaust memorial garden. we have names of dead loved ones displayed. memories in and on the walls. there are so many deeply meaningful and largely irreplaceable things here.
my rabbi was out of state for the last several days. i cannot imagine how he's feeling.
im fucking pissed at the police department. they said that they would patrol the grounds more often in light of the worldwide rise in antisemitism. I have not personally seen them once. they let the only area for our community to gather be set on fire.
i am exhausted. i am angry. i am thankful it is not any worse, because it easily could have been, but tonight i am grieving that little library full of vintage Jewish books.
EDIT: I have a reblog with the donation link for helping us rebuild in the comments, but here it is again just in case.
i don’t know how to explain to my non-jewish audience what it means that two torah scrolls were destroyed in an arson attack but what i can tell you is that during the los angeles wildfires, three staff at the synagogue in pasadena made 4+ trips each back into the building to rescue torah scrolls while the fire was close enough that ashes were falling in the parking lot.
what i can tell you is that we have a holiday once a year where we hold the scrolls and hug them and dance around them. what i can tell you is that they are written with love by hand by trained scribes who take exquisite care to make sure each word, each letter, is perfect. when we read from them we do not touch the parchment directly so that it won’t be harmed by the oils from our fingers.
we make beautiful clothing for our torah scrolls, embroidered cloth coverings and shining worked metal crowns to sit atop them or carved wooden cases plated with gold and silver. the torah is to us the words of the living God, the tree of life, the record of who are and where we’re going, and the torah scroll is our most holy ritual object.
the torah scroll never touches the floor. if it is dropped accidentally, everyone in the room must fast for forty days in mourning. the desecration of a torah scroll is the utmost level of desecration that can be done to a jewish community, short of killing its members. nazis burnt and destroyed torah scrolls as part of their campaign of terror against the jewish people even before widescale mass deportations began. in ancient times, the romans wrapped the rabbis who led our community in torah scrolls when they burnt them at the stake.
this past shabbat, in the middle of the night, a synagogue in jackson, mississippi was intentionally set on fire. the library was burnt to ashes and seven torah scrolls were damaged, with two of them completely destroyed.
i don’t know how many books were burnt, how many jewish holy texts and how many stories of jewish life and philosophy and love and resilience flew up with the smoke. i do know that the library was where the congregation had shabbat services and torah and talmud study. it was a sacred space. this is not the first time that people who hate us have destroyed our sacred spaces and our holy texts and our torah scrolls in order to terrorize us. i dearly wish it was the last.
I volunteer at an elementary school through a school club. For the end of year party, I was discussing the logistics with the organization's president when she broke the news that there'd be no pizza.
"Aw, shucks!" Was my response. "You couldn't order it from a school approved vendor? Even with our funds?
"Basically," she groaned. "The usual place isn't open that day and I wasn't going to order from the other one."
"What was the other one?" I asked.
"It's" she wrinkled her face and whispered. "A kosher pizzeria."
I waited for the follow up. It didn't come. I repeated her words. "because it's kosher ? "
"Yeah." She sighed. "I just can't endorse that. With global politics."
"You can't endorse a local restaurant so you're not getting pizza for 8 year olds?"
"Yeah. And I bet that their stuff isn't that good -"
"Actually," I interrupted. "That place is fantastic. I love their pizza."
I couldn't tell you her response because I walked away from that conversation. But I am still reeling. This is just the many ways antisemitism shows up and we are all lesser for it.
