(Submitted by Not In Our Town Bowling Green)
NIOT BG joins the country in expressing our profound sadness and outrage at the senseless killing of these individuals who were living their faith and for those living their daily lives. How many more lives need to be lost for action to take place?
Just before 10 a.m. on Saturday, Robert Bowers shot and killed 11 people while congregants were at the Tree of Life Congregation Synagogue in the Squirrel Neighborhood of Pittsburgh. Six more people were injured, including three police officers in the line of duty.
Clearly this was a hate crime as Bowers yelled “all Jews must die.” Those killed were Daniel Stein, 71; Joyce Feinberg, 75; Richard Gottfried, 65; Rose Mallinger, 97; Jerry Rabinowitz, 66; brothers Cecil Rosenthal, 59, and David Rosenthal, 54; husband and wife Bernice Simon, 84 and Sylvan Simon, 86; Melvin Wax, 88; and Irving Younger, 69.
Also, last Wednesday, a gunman fatally shot Vickie Lee Jones and Maurice E. Stallard in Jeffersontown, Kentucky, at a supermarket. While this is still under investigation, a witness trying to intervene reported the gunman told him “whites don’t kill whites,” indicating this shooting was likely race-related.
In two different towns, citizens lie dead and others remain critically injured, leaving behind pain, anguish, disbelief, uncertainty, sadness and anger in families and all communities involved. We reach out with our deepest sympathy, sharing immeasurable heartache in a world where hate and violence are firmly embedded.
We cannot become numb to the hate and violence. No community is immune from this, but we do have choices on how we aspire to live together in our particular communities. NIOT BG holds up a vision of a Bowling Green community in which community relationships are nurtured in positive ways from school aged on up; a community in which all diversity is not only respected but welcomed, and in which no one need live in fear, regardless of religion, color of skin, sexual orientation, ability, gender, or any other dimension of identity.
We need to work together to continue fostering relationships with each other – our neighbors, our co-workers, strangers who may look different and strangers who may look the same. We need to reassure our children and grandchildren – the next generation – that we care about all human-beings.
As the famed children’s television star and Squirrel Hill resident Mr. Rogers often told children that in times of trouble, “look for the helpers.” Let us all aspire to be “helpers” in all walks of life as we aspire to create a world of hope and love. We all must be convinced by now that being silent is being complacent.
NIOT BG supports all efforts to express solidarity with the Tree of Life Congregation Synagogue in Pittsburgh, to comfort its members, and the community of Jeffersontown, Kentucky, to squarely face the underlying roots of white supremacy and violence in our society. We ask that all in our BG community stand with the people of Pittsburgh and Jeffersontown. We have to do more to stand together to show that hate cannot prevail.
A vigil is being planned for this weekend. Details will be made available as soon as they are confirmed.
