Trigger Warning: Mention of Mass Shooting
A sad day was cast upon not only Jews across the globe but people across the nation. In a world as progressive as modern-day America, I’m not only horrified, but petrified that anti-Semitism this strong still exists today. What happened in Pittsburgh on Saturday was unfortunately not an uncommon event, but nonetheless still very important.
It was a regular Sabbath morning for the Jews of Tree of Life congregation, until the gunman, Robert Bowers, began shooting, killing 11 people and injuring 6. The gunman started shooting in the lobby of the building screaming, “They’re committing genocide to my people. I just want to kill Jews.” After about 5 minutes the police finally arrived, and for 20 minutes were in a shootout with the gunman while dead bodies were all over the floor. This was the deadliest massacre against Jewish people in all of US history.
Michael Eisenberg claims that on a normal Sabbath morning there could be between 100-150 people in the building at that time. Robert Jones, the FBI’s special agent of the Pittsburgh office said: “This is the most horrific crime scene I’ve seen in 22 years with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.”
As a Jew, this is not only extremely devastating but scary to think that this is still happening as of today. That someone is so full of hate to carelessly murder tens of people for no reason except that they’re Jewish. The only word that comes to mind to describe a horrible person such as Robert Bowers is evil. He isn’t deranged or insane or lost his mind, because those words give him an excuse for his actions. He is simply a terrible evil monster, with a heart full of hate.
I want this experience to show that nothing can break apart the Jewish spirit. That racism and anti-Semitism is never the answer, and that we need to take action to stop these heinous killings.
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