‘It could have been us’
'Jews are not the problem, Muslims are not the problem, people of colour are not the problem ... the disconnect in our common humanity is the problem’.
IT is often said the worldwide Jewish community is like a large extended family. So on Monday evening, when some 60 Melbourne worshippers ached to express their grief for the 11 murdered US congregants at Tree of Life, a Masorti (Conservative) synagogue in Pittsburgh, their destination was Kehilat Nitzan, Melbourne’s Conservative shule.
And in a service at which Kaddish was recited and candles for the slain were lit by congregants, Nitzan’s Rabbi Yonatan Sadoff, a recently arrived American in Melbourne, revealed that his cousin Sherry Sadoff Hanck, who lives in Pennsylvania, was brushed by Saturday’s tragedy.
Their family had been celebrating the bat mitzvah of a daughter at another Pennsylvania shule last Shabbat, but at the conclusion of the service, the rabbi who had conducted the joyous ceremony learned someone close to her had been killed at Tree of Life.
The Nitzan service, attended by Rabbi Allison Conyer of the Rabbinic Council of the Union for Progressive Judaism, representatives of other congregations, and Caulfield MP David Southwick, saw worshippers take turns to light shivah candles.
As the candles were lit one by one, Rabbi Sadoff gave short profiles of each of the murdered American congregants. Rose Mallinger was a 97 years-old, who had attended services for decades, he said, quoting a former Tree of Life rabbi who on hearing of her killing said, “I feel a part of me died in that building”.
She was the oldest of the slain, who included Dr Jerry Rabinowitz, an enthusiastic lay leader, Cecil Rosenthal “a big man who loved to give bear hugs” as he greeted worshippers, and his brother David. (Rabinowitz was the brother-in-law of Asher Ostrin, a senior Joint executive in Israel, who cut short his Australian visit to fly to the US).
Rabbi Sadoff quoted his cousin, who posted on Facebook, “It could have been us.”
“My cousin Sherry says, ‘Jews are not the problem, Muslims are not the problem, people of colour are not the problem, immigrants are not the problem, LGBTIQ people are not the problem, Republicans are not the problem, Democrats are not the problem. The disconnect in our common humanity is the problem’.”
PETER KOHN
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