At our Seder tables, we retell the Exodus story of the liberation from bondage of the Jewish people. Throughout the Passover holiday, we read of the power of redemption. Sadly, at the very same time when we celebrate the gift of freedom, we also recall the history of anti-semitism which weighs so heavily on us today.
We are deeply saddened and outraged at yet another senseless shooting of worshippers at prayer. This time, at the Chabad synagogue of Poway in San Diego County, one innocent woman has been murdered and three injured, including a child and the synagogue’s rabbi. It is not lost on us that this violence came both on Shabbat and the end of Passover, exactly six months to the day after the deadly shooting of Pittsburgh’s Jewish community.
Jews and all people of faith should be able to enter their houses of worship and live out the lives of their faith without fear, whether in Paris, Oak Creek, Charleston, Pittsburgh, Christchurch, Opelousas, Sri Lanka, Sunnyvale or Poway.
Deeply angered that modern-day anti-semitism has led to the increasing number of attacks on synagogues and Jewish institutions in the United States, we must stand together and condemn all hatred and bigotry. We need to be among the voices that oppose the rising tide of white nationalism and racism, as well as anti-semitism. We must be clear that language matters and indifference to it breeds violence.
The Jewish Community has kept the promise of redemption alive for thousands of years. We will not be deterred as we, along with people of all faiths, continue to work for the day when “Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree and no one will make them afraid. (Micah 4:4)
Rabbinical Assembly
USCJ
Cantors Assembly
Federation of Jewish Men’s Clubs
Jewish Educators Assembly
Jewish Theological Seminary
Jewish Youth Director’s Association
The Masorti Foundation
Masorti Movement in Israel
Masorti Olami
MERCAZ-Canada and Canadian Foundation for Masorti Judaism
MERCAZ Olami
MERCAZ USA
North American Association of Synagogue Executives (NAASE)
The Schechter Institutes, Inc.
Seminario Rabínico Latinoamericano
Women’s League for Conservative Judaism
The Zacharias Frankel College
Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies
