Connecticut communities stand together and speak out against hate

By Paul Bass/New Haven Independent, with additional reporting by Judie Jacobson

In Hartford. Photo Credit: Maxine Lerrman

In the face of terror, Connecticut stands together.

That message resounded at local communal vigils hastily organized and held at synagogues and JCCs around the state on Sunday evening, Oct. 28, in support of the Jewish community of Pittsburgh, where 11 Jews attending Shabbat services at Tree of Life synagogue were massacred by a gunman spewing antisemitic vitriol.

The massacre in the city’s peaceful Squirrel Hill neighborhood sent waves of horror through Jews throughout the world, especially to those who happened to have been sitting in their own synagogues that same morning, singing “etz chayyim hi” – “it is a tree of life” – as the Torah was returned to its ark after the weekly reading.

In New Haven. Photo credit: Paul Bass

In New Haven, West Hartford, Stamford, Middletown and Storrs, Jews filled synagogue sanctuaries, Hillel houses, and JCCs, joining hands with people of different faiths to affirm their determination not to let terror and hate defeat us; and to recite the names of those, as Howard Savronsky, CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Hartford, put it, “whose only crime was being Jewish.”

Sovronsky remarks were delivered before a crowd of more than 500 people gathered outside Congregation Beth Israel in West Hartford. Among those in attendance were a slew of local clergy, community leaders and dignitaries.

Sovronsky’s emotions ran high.

“It is time to end the cesspool of demagoguery and dehumanization of people who are different; of those who come from different lands,” U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal told those gathered, in an implied reference to HIAS – the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, the nation’s largest agency aiding in the resettlement of refugees. The gunman’s alleged anti-immigrant stance and hatred for HIAS were reportedly factors motivating his deadly attack. The Pittsburgh Synagogue reportedly is a local HIAS affiliate.

In Stamford.

Blumenthal recalled his father’s arrival in “this great country” in 1935, to escape persecution in Germany, “alone, with only the shirt on his back.”

Blumenthal recalled telling his father that what happened to Jews in Germany could never happen in America. His father disagreed. “This can happen, good people fail to stand up and act,” he told his son.

Also addressing the issue of unity as well as immigration was a clearly emotional Dr. Anwar Saud, who told the crowd, “Muslims were attacked yesterday.”

“This synagogue was practicing one of the most basic Jewish values: take care of the refugee,” Saud, a former mayor of South Windsor and an active advocate for the Muslim community in Connecticut, told the crowd. “That was one of the reasons it was attacked. We need to invest in one another so that we become one. The Muslim community stands united with you. We will overcome this together.”

Dr. Anwar Saud. Photo Credit: Maxine Lerrman

Following the speeches 11 yahrzeit candles were lit in memory of those murdered and Rabbi Philip Lazowski, a Holocaust survivor and rabbi emeritus of The Emanuel Synagogue in West Hartford (which recently merged with Beth Hillel Synagogue in Bloomfield) recited El Maale Raachamim – the Hebrew prayer for the dead.

With their arms draped around one another, those assembled swayed as they sang the hopeful words of Psalm 133: Hinei mah tov uma nayim/ shevet achim gam yachad (how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity).

That same inspirational hymn rang out at vigils held across the state, including a vigil held at the Jewish Community Center of Greater New Haven in Woodbridge, where 500 people filled the auditorium, with another 300 spilling out into the hallway, according to Jewish Federation of Greater New Haven CEO Judy Alperin, who organized the event.

At UConn Hillel

At the Woodbridge gathering, the names of the 11 Jews gunned down flashed on a screen behind the evening’s speakers, which included clergy of all faiths.

Temple Beth Shalom Rabbi Benjamin Scolnic set the universalist tone for the evening.

“When a gunman shoots children in a school in Connecticut, or churchgoers in South Carolina, or a concert in Las Vegas; when bombs are sent to many of our finest leaders, there is no distance” between us and tragedy, Scolnic said.

“And when you’re in shul on Shabbos morning, and you hear that people in another shul were just killed, on that morning, on that Shabbos, there is no distance. …

“Distance was a lullaby that helped us to fall asleep.

“There is not distance anymore,. We have to understand that if someone is a hater, it doesn’t make any difference if they happen to hate this ethic group or that nationality, or this skin color, or that sexual identity.

“If anyone hates any group, they hate us.

“Because we are part of the human ‘us.’

In Stamford.

“If you hate any group, you hate me. Hatred of anyone is hatred of everyone. … We are united in our grief. But we are also united in our hope.”

The Rev. Steven Cousin recalled how New Haven Jews joined other New Haveners in a similar coming-together in his church, Bethel AME Zion on Goffe Street, in 2015 after a racist gunman shot dead nine African-American members of an AME congregation in Charleston, South Carolina.

“You stood with us on that night to say that you were here for us and ‘we are grieving with you. We are mourning with you. And we love you.’

“And so on this night I would like to tell those of the Jewish community that we are standing with you. We love you. We are mourning with you. And we are grieving with you.

“In the African-American community, we know all too well what it’s like to lose lives, especially in a house of worship. Our churches have been burned down. Four little girls lost their lives to a church bombing in Birmingham, Alabama. And then what happened in the church in Charleston, S.C., in 2015.

“We have much more in common than we do have that divides us. It is through our grief and through our mourning that we can form a bond so strong and so potent that on a night like tonight we can send one clear message: Love will always outweigh hate.”

Similar themes of unity were echoed at vigils around the state, including:

Pictured here at the New Haven vigil to remember those killed in the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre are: (l to r) Monte Frank, Independent candidate for Lt. Governor and a grandson of Holocaust survivors; U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro; and State Sen. Gayle Slossberg. Photo Credit: Paul Bass.

In Stamford, more than 700 people attended a vigil organized by the United Jewish Federation of Stamford, New Canaan and Darien together with UJA-JCC Greenwich, ADL Connecticut, the Stamford Board of Rabbis, the JCC and the Interfaith Council of Southwestern CT at Congregation Agudath Sholom.

In Storrs at UConn Hillel, where State Senator Mae Fleer,Mansfield Mayor Paul Shapiro, Reverend Brian Blayer and Rabbi Shlomo Hecht of UConn Chabad were all in attendance.

In Middletown, organized by Temple Adath Israel.

As the Ledger went to press, a vigil was also planned for Monday, Oct. 29 on the campus of the University of Hartford, organized by UHartford Hillel.

In the wake of what is being called the worst attack on Jews in U.S. history, Connecticut congregations, day schools, JCC and other Jewish communal institutions plan to review their security protocols.

Reprinted with permission of The New Haven Independent (newhavenindependent.org). With additional reporting by the Connecticut Jewish Ledger.