Miracle - Chronicle Online/The WORD 03/12/2026

Weekly On-line Rabbi's D'var-Torah

March 12, 2026

23 Adar 5786

Shabbat Hachodesh

Parashat Vayakhel-Pekudei

I sat down at my computer after teaching my Talmud class and eating some lunch, and I began seeing notifications about an active shooter incident at Temple Israel in suburban Detroit—my hometown. I’ve since learned that the shooter has been confirmed dead and that there were no other fatalities. Thank God.

This comes just days after two synagogues in Toronto—Beth Avraham Yoseph and Shaarei Shomayim—were shot at this past Shabbat. And those two shootings took place only days after Temple Emanu-El in Toronto was shot at on the eve of Purim, March 2.

Sigh.

I cannot find the words to adequately express my outrage. Why should Jewish people have to live like this?

Over 225 years ago, newly elected President George Washington wrote a letter to the Jewish community of Newport, Rhode Island. He wrote the following words: “May the Children of the Stock of Abraham, who dwell in this land, continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other Inhabitants; while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and figtree, and there shall be none to make him afraid.”

I wonder what President Washington would say after reading about two Jewish men being attacked at an outdoor restaurant simply because they were overheard speaking Hebrew. I know that this particular child of the Stock of Abraham is not feeling especially safe—or unafraid—today.

Perhaps it’s time for the people who have been falsely labeling all Jews as baby-killing, colonialist, ethnic-cleansing perpetrators of apartheid to consider the impact of their words. When Jews are portrayed as subhuman criminals, it gives permission to unstable individuals to act on that hatred.

It should be clear to anyone actually interested in the facts that Israel is not a colonialist project, has not engaged in genocide, is not an apartheid state, and does not perpetrate ethnic cleansing. These accusations are, in many ways, projections. Colonialism, genocide, apartheid, and ethnic cleansing can be found in various places across the Middle East—just not in Israel.

Three years of libelous and false accusations have consequences for everyday Jews. We are increasingly seen as evil and therefore deserving of violence. It has to stop.

We need our non-Jewish friends and allies to call it out as well. Our voices alone are not loud enough.

In this week’s Torah portion, Moses completes the work of the Tabernacle, and we read: “The cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the Presence of God filled the Tabernacle.” It was a protective presence.

Apparently, that same protective presence somehow shielded Temple Israel—and Beth Avraham Yoseph, and Shaarei Shomayim, and Temple Emanu-El.

Our tradition teaches that we should not rely on miracles. Yet days like today make it impossible not to notice them. But it would be a whole lot better if, instead, we took action to minimize the threat to the Jewish community.

Shalom,

RAF.