Beyond the statistics about antisemitic attacks are shattered communities, threatened existences – and real people. Noah Abrahams, Associate Editor at the Center for the Study of Contemporary Jewry, documented six of their stories

Marcia Zimmerman (65, Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States)

Marcia Zimmerman became the Senior Rabbi at Temple Israel in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 2001, becoming the first woman to lead a synagogue congregation of more than 2,000 families after serving as Assistant Rabbi since 1988. Responsible for Minnesota’s largest Jewish congregation, with more than 6,000 members, Zimmerman is a respected figure in the American Midwest, known for her work alongside former US President Barack Obama touting his health care bill among religious communities in 2010.

Founded in 1878, Temple Israel is the oldest synagogue in Minneapolis.

On December 16, 2024, at 7:20 am, Temple Israel was vandalized with painted swastikas defacing its exterior doors and pillars, one of the darkest chapters in the synagogue’s history.[1]

Zimmerman recalled: “For December, it wasn’t the kind of cold morning you would usually expect for Minneapolis. We had just had our security guard make a round, and then all of a sudden, on the cameras, one of our custodians saw the swastika being sprayed.

Just ten minutes before we spotted the vandalism, our cameras captured a white Honda Civic and a man getting out, spray painting a swastika on one of our pillars. We have five pillars and five doors at the front of the historic part of our building. On one of our doors, there was another swastika. The perpetrator then got back in his car and fled the scene.

“Temple Israel is 146 years old, and we have been in our current building for 96 years. The front of this building faces a very busy street called Hennepin Avenue. Hennepin is a congregational row of downtown churches and mosques. The front of our building was designed to look like the Lincoln Memorial because we wanted to express freedom of religion. The five doors symbolize the ghettos of Vienna, where synagogues traditionally had five windows and five doors. There is no name on the doors because, in the 1920s, Minnesota was the capital of antisemitism in the United States. Interfaith dialogue over time has made life better here for the now 66,000-strong Minnesota Jewish community.

“The swastikas appearing in that very area, where we wanted to open doors to interfaith dialogue and fight antisemitism, was extremely painful. This incident has seen us regress historically instead of progress. It took us a long time to identify the vandal because most people don’t come through our historic entrance. Our cameras didn’t capture the license plate of the perpetrator. However, we did eventually identify the person.

“I am a texting friend of the Minneapolis Chief of Police and was personally informed that the person who defaced our synagogue fled the country to avoid justice.

“The heightened antisemitism people have felt here since October 7 is real. The level of recent antisemitism has taken a generation by surprise. Parents of young kids here thought that antisemitism was something that only happened in the past. Now, they are confronted with it. There is an anger that we are going backward.

“This is the first time in 38 years I have seen anything like a swastika on our building. It felt particularly intense and violent. As a community, we spoke about the upsetting reality of the world we live in today but took comfort in the authorities and even the FBI, who gave us the all-clear of not being in any further danger.

“We are proud of our Judaism, and that won’t go away because of an act of hate. Our Jewish connections here are strong. Minnesota senators are Jewish, our Mayor, Jacob Frey, is Jewish, and the Attorney General of the District of Minnesota is a member of Temple Israel. We have strong leaders here in our community.”

Henry “Hank” Topas (74, Dollard-des-Ormeaux, Quebec, Canada)

Henry “Hank” Topas has been the Cantor at his local synagogue, Beth Tikvah, for 49 years. Founded in 1964, Beth Tikvah is located in a small, predominately English-speaking southwestern suburb of Montreal called Dollard-des-Ormeaux. The Beth Tikvah synagogue has been firebombed twice since October 7 – November 7, 2023, and December 18, 2024; Hank was the spokesperson for the synagogue after both incidents.[2]

On November 7, 2023, exactly one month after the October 7 atrocities, we were hit with the first firebombing overnight. It caused damage other than awakening the community. It showed that these levels of terror are not just reserved for the Middle East.

“Services in our synagogue begin at 7 am. These are our weekday morning services. That means that some people are showing up as early as 6:30 am to open the doors. [On the morning of November 7], one member detected a faint odor of something that did not belong in our lobby and alerted me. We opened the door and realized that there were remnants of a Molotov cocktail in front of the front door of the synagogue and that there were scorch marks over the wooden panel of the door.

“Someone had thrown a bottle that was on fire at the doors of our synagogue. The incident probably happened after midnight in the early hours of November 7. At that point, I called the Montreal Police Department’s Hate Crimes Unit, and they immediately responded with [all their] investigative powers. Sadly, they have not brought anyone to justice.

“November 7 was spent with me and others being interviewed by various members of the Press, in French and in English. I was pleased to greet the local parish priest from the Saint Luke Catholic Church up the street, who came down and gave me a big hug.

“I was not pleased that members of the mosque that I had gone to console, along with other rabbis, when there was a murder in a Quebec City mosque, failed to show. There have been good relations between the two communities in our suburb for many years, and for thirty years, we have run a charity bazaar to help the Muslim community. When disaster has struck and there have been blood drives [to aid struggling Muslims], I have given blood. But no one showed up, not on October 7, not on November 7.

“The person behind the November 7 attack is unknown; we do not know who did it. The cameras did not pick up anything.

“My community is not a part of Montreal but of a self-regulated suburb, yet we share Montreal’s police services. Those police services, we believe, are somewhat restrained. Even though they [the police] have been there for us and are doing the best they can...We have said so publicly. The effect of that has led to unbridled permission for people to protest night after night in the streets of Montreal, with the flags of Hamas, swastikas, and symbols from every other terrorist organization. It’s free speech, they say.”

Following the November 7 firebombing, the Beth Tikvah Synagogue invested in better security cameras and was more vigilant. However, in the early hours of Wednesday, December 18, 2024, terror struck Beth Tikvah once again when a firebomb caused internal damage to the synagogue.

“December 18 was certainly the most grievous attack on our synagogue,” Hank explained.

“The incident happened overnight at approximately 2:00 am. Our improved cameras captured an image of the fellow [who attacked the synagogue], and we have more information that the police will put to good use, hopefully. The man approached the front of the synagogue and threw something through the glass, shattering our windows. It was some form of Molotov cocktail that was thrown into the vestibule separating the doors and the lobby.

“The fire that broke out was so hot that items on the vestibule’s walls melted. Thank God a neighbor reported the incident after she saw the flames. She called the local police, and officers on their morning patrol responded, using their own fire extinguisher to break down the doors and extinguish the flames before the fire department arrived.

“That morning, I was getting out of the shower, and I heard about [the firebombing] on the news. I was a little bit surprised that I had not yet heard about it. The synagogue was notified, and by the time we got there, the police would not let us enter the building because they wanted to ensure an undisturbed crime scene. It was not until the arson investigators arrived at approximately 9:30 am and had checked everything that we were allowed back into the building.

“Eventually, the Chief of Police, Fady Dagher, showed up, and I spoke with him and his number two in-command for some time. The police have been very supportive, and Mr. Dagher has already held two Zoom calls with me and others from the community, fielding questions. When I go to visit the station, I always bring a platter of danishes and food for the officers.

“I was a little disturbed that the smashed glass from the attack was repaired on the same day.

“Why was I concerned? The incident occurred on a Wednesday, and we were hoping to have a solidarity Shabbat with politicians and our members that weekend. The synagogue was packed. Now, for the two weeks before Christmas, that was unusual because the place is usually half empty. I wanted that piece of glass to serve as a token for people to look at, but it was gone.

“The physical damage was that items on the walls were melted. The thermostat, for example, was melted, and other things were covered with heavy soot from the smoke. The lighting fixtures in the ceiling were all melted and have to be replaced. The structure of the ceiling and the sheetrock also need to be replaced.

“We can’t only look at our congregation but at attacks on Jewish buildings and people across the country. In Montreal, there have been schools that have been shot at, and in all of these cases, we have not seen anyone prosecuted or incarcerated. Since October 7, there has not been a single incarceration related to an attack on a Jewish building.

“I send a weekly email to the local precinct commander to let them know what time candle lighting is and how long the walk home will be for those going back in the dark afterward. I carry a police baton on me because we don’t know what will happen.”

Dov Forman (21, London, United Kingdom)

Dov Forman is a 21-year-old history student at University College London (UCL) but is perhaps best known as a New York Times and Sunday Times bestselling author. The great-grandson of the late Holocaust survivor, educator, author, and social media influencer Lily Ebert, Dov dedicates his life to sharing Lily’s story of surviving Auschwitz-Birkenau and to fighting antisemitism. For his contributions to the memoir Lily’s Promise: How I Survived Auschwitz and Found the Strength to Live (HarperCollins, 2022), Dov was praised by King Charles III for demonstrating “a determination to share his great-grandmother’s story with a global audience.”

Dov receives daily antisemitic abuse at its most extreme.

“In university, both because I am known for being an anti-antisemitism activist, but also because I am just a proud, loud Jew who wears a kippah and a hostage necklace, people target me and shout at me. People chant ‘Free Palestine’ or worse, because I am Jewish and because I speak up to defend the Jewish people and our narrative.

“University is supposed to be the time for people to speak up and develop political ideas within the confines of the law. When I am in the library and I hear people chanting outside, or when people say things directly to me, it makes life extremely difficult and it is hard to feel as though university is a safe space where you can learn just like everyone else.

“When we were lighting the Hanukkiah [at UCL], people put up Palestinian flags in response. There we were on a cold, gloomy English night, lighting the candles while a cohort of young people in their twenties were waving their Palestinian signage.

“Fellow students have called me ‘Dirty Jew’ [noticing me]. They know I am Jewish because I wear a kippah or perhaps because they saw me on the news. I have also been called a genocide apologist.

“We have to have security outside of our university Jewish Society and outside other Jewish events. It is not only other students at British universities who terrorize Jews; antisemitism also comes from professors.

“I sit in a classroom of 100 people, and I am singled out because I am the only outwardly apparent Jew or perhaps even the only Jew in the room. I study history, and professors not only distort the past but compare the Holocaust to what Israel is doing in Gaza. This is entirely unfair.

“I have to sit in these lectures where students point at me and make me feel uncomfortable. It is hard to come to terms with the fact that these lecturers are grading my work.

“My great-grandmother was a force of nature until the very last moments. She fought to teach people the dangers of unbalanced and unchecked hatred. Because of her work, particularly on social media and on TikTok, where her story has reached over a billion social media users, we received terrible antisemitic abuse.

“Every single day, especially in the aftermath of October 7, I woke up to thousands of antisemitic messages. It has now died down, and those messages come only in their hundreds.

“But, to wake up every single day and open my phone and read comments like ‘your great-grandmother, I wish she was raped like the girls on October 7,’ or ‘Hitler missed one,’ or that ‘we know you live in London and we are going to come to find and kill you and rape you,’ or things like ‘you and your great-grandmother are going to be kidnapped,’ well, it’s disgusting.

“[My great-grandmother and I] never spoke about politics; we rarely spoke about Israel. Rather, we educated others and told her story to share a message of hope, tolerance, love, and how to rebuild from the greatest darkness.

“Unfortunately, there have been just so many incidents of antisemitism that they are hard to individualize, and repeating them could put me at risk. It is all terrifying, and I have had to get extra security and help. But, I take strength from my great-grandmother, who taught me that, because of the hate, we have to keep going and fighting back.

“I think we are incredibly lucky to be living as Jews in London, in a place where we do have the CST [Community Security Trust] and various organizations looking out for us.

“Thankfully, there haven’t been incredibly violent attacks against Jewish people on the streets, but of course, words can lead to actions. I do think, on the whole, that London is a safe place for Jews; however, some areas are not safe, especially on Saturdays, when thousands of people scream for violence against Jewish people, not just in Israel but here in the UK.

“We are now at a crossroads where people have to speak up and decide if they want to change the current course or if they want to allow the situation to get worse. It is now the time for people to stand up and take serious, meaningful action.

Moshe (70, Johannesburg, South Africa)

Moshe is not the actual name of the Rabbi who asked to remain anonymous due to safety and security concerns. Originally from the United States, Moshe has been a resident of South Africa since 1984, where he spends time in several different synagogues across the Johannesburg area, serving a diverse mix of Jewish communities and denominations.

As a volunteer rabbi, Moshe makes his income as a small business owner, volunteering with Chabad and other synagogues on high holidays and the occasional Shabbat. On a November afternoon in 2023, on the outskirts of Johannesburg, the visibly Jewish Moshe was targeted and attacked.

“It was a warm, sunny Friday afternoon on November 10, 2023, and I was meeting a client. I was driving in my car and approaching the end of the highway, leaving a Jewish area called Sandton and heading for a different suburb. As I got off the four-lane highway, the exit forked, and a car coming from the left side tried to go into my lane.

“I swerved to the right around him and went forward. The guy seemed to have some serious road rage. He didn’t like the fact that I was able to swerve around him and get in front of him, so he came up beside me and stared at me. The man was visibly Muslim, between 35 and 40 years old. He was driving a Renault Kwid, and I was in a much bigger Nissan Sentra Sedan.”

When the man looked at the Rabbi, he got out of his car and started shouting at him, using brutally obscene language to swear and curse him referring to his Jewish identity.

“He told me to get out of my car so that he could beat the… out of me. I did not get out of my car because it would have been too dangerous; he could have had a weapon or something. The traffic light was red, and as soon as he saw that I wasn’t going to get into a confrontation with him, he got back in his car, drove directly in front of me, and reversed. He rammed the rear end of his car into the front of my car and then continued to do so. I immediately knew I had to get out of there.

“I drove off, but he chased after me, following me all around the area, frantically trying to ram my car. I got back on the highway, got off the highway, and even drove against traffic and through lights to get away from him. I returned to the highway, where he tried to hit me from the side.

“In the end, I knew that I had to get off the highway, and I pulled into a BP petrol station. He came chasing after me in the garage and banged on my window with his fist. I didn’t leave the car because that was my protection. He ripped my windshield wiper off and banged on my window, trying to smash it.

“While all of this was going on, people started to realize what was happening, and they held the guy down. This gave me the chance to call the local security company, which escorted me home, where I had an opportunity to look at the pictures I had taken of him.

“I sent the images to the police, and they opened a case. I even managed to take down his registration number, assuming the license plates would link to an address. But, somehow, the police have found nothing.

“The Jewish community organization here has a private investigator for these things, and to cut a long story short, we spent time with the police investigating, but catching this guy would have meant going to court. I was genuinely worried about exposing myself and my address, concerned that he would find where I live.

“I was quite frightened for a long time, primarily because this guy mentioned during the attack that his brother was in the police department. What if the brother could use my registration number to find out where I live? For quite a while, we were really on tenterhooks, thinking he could come after me. Police patrol cars regularly checked on us, and every time I left the house, I looked right and left to see if he was there.

“Nothing ever happened. The police did say that they managed to get a hold of an address but couldn’t find anything.

“The bottom line is that this guy damaged my car, and it cost thousands to fix. Insurance may have covered most of it, but I still had to pay the excess. The damage to my car was significant, but thank God he didn’t smash me up. He was violent and very dangerous, like a raging bull out of control. We’ll leave it up to God to sort him out. What goes around, comes around. He’ll realize one day that he should have behaved himself.”

Kit Boulton (21, Norwich, England)

Kit Boulton is a psychology student at the University of East Anglia (UEA) in Norfolk County, England. Originally from just outside of North-West London in the heavily Jewish-populated town of Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, Kit is now in his second year of studies at a university with one of the fewest number of Jewish students in the country. The UEA has a Jewish Society (JSoc) of approximately 30 members.

Towards the end of May 2024, Kit was working as a bartender in the UEA Student Union bar, Bar SU. As ever for a Wednesday sports night when the weather is warm towards the end of the summer semester, the venue was busy and filled with students, mostly in their twenties.

“It was last summer, and I got a job at the student union bar. I was working there one night, and I believe that I served this guy, who was clearly hammered, the wrong drink. He then turned around to me and called me a ‘kike.’ He knew I was Jewish because I wear a Magen David around my neck, and it was clearly on display. My mates were right there. They told him that he couldn’t say that and called him out over it. You would hope everyone would do the same in that situation. Things got a bit heated, but eventually, the guy backed away and left.

“The Jewish situation here [at UEA] is that we have the JSoc, a very strong Jewish student association that is well run by an amazing committee. There aren’t many Jewish people on campus. If you saw a Jew on campus, you would be like, ‘Oh my God, you’re Jewish?’ Whereas at universities like Leeds or Nottingham, you would be less surprised.

“You expect antisemitism in London; it’s a lot more common. Here in Norwich, however, especially on a university campus, experiencing antisemitism was crazy to me. But, at the time, it didn’t feel like a big thing, so I didn’t report it. Had I reported this to my managers at the Student Union, I know they would have been all over it.

“It was a lot more stressful to be Jewish on campus towards the end of 2023, especially after October 7. But this past year, especially with the support of JSoc, it feels safe again to be a Jew on campus.”

Katrien Van Der Schueren (51, Los Angeles, California, USA)

Born and raised in the small Flemish-speaking town of Leuven, Katrien Van Der Schueren is a Los Angeles-based Belgian-American artist. The mother of two teenagers, born to Catholic Belgian parents and raised a practicing Catholic, Katrien discovered her Jewish heritage at the age of 47 through a DNA test trying to establish the identity of her biological father, who turned out to be a Belgian Jew. Since discovering her origins, she has dedicated herself to learning more about Judaism, her family history, and what it means to have a Jewish identity. She has also become active in her Hollywood Jewish community.

“I grew up in Belgium, where we didn’t really know any other Jewish people. In general, I did not encounter one Jewish person growing up. The only thing that people thought of when discussing Jews were the ultra-Orthodox Jews in Antwerp. People had no other notion of the religion or of Israel. There was no hope for Jewish people there. “After letting the world know that I was Jewish, I immediately was on the receiving end

of remarks like ‘You count your money’ and other preconceived notions that people have about Jews. Now, in the United States, most of the people I know are Jewish. On a recent trip back to Belgium, however, most of my friends and family were against Israel.

“I received messages from people who told me that I wasn’t a real Jew. I decided to order a t-shirt that said, ‘I’m that Jew,’ and I wore it in Belgium in order to start a conversation, however obvious it may have been that people did not want to have it.

“Everybody was surprised when they found out I was Jewish. Five years ago, there was a documentary on Jewish people in Belgium, and people were telling me to watch it as though they were referring to some strange species. [There’s a common perception in Belgium] that Jews are only ultra-Orthodox Jews. It’s just bizarre.

“Recently, I co-organized an event with people who survived the October 7 massacre. I invited the Belgian Consul and sent pictures to the Belgium Press – which I write for all the time. No one responded to my email. It is common for Belgian-Americans to say that Joe Biden lost the election over Gaza and that Jews are extremists. I find myself in a situation where I am frequently the only Jew in a group. I get into fights about Israel all the time.”

Katrien has become accustomed to hearing antisemitic comments in Belgium. However, when cycling back to her Hollywood home from Manhattan Beach in October 2024, a bright sunny day turned dark.

“I was cycling to my home in Los Angeles after a day at the beach. On the way back, I crossed over into a merger lane on my bike, and this white woman with blonde curly hair, also on a road bike, who looked in her mid-40s, started yelling at me, ‘Get out of the way, you fucking Jew.’ I was like, ‘wow.’ I couldn’t believe it. I felt two emotions. The first was proud to have been recognized as a Jew. Even though I don’t know how she knew I was Jewish. But the second thing I felt was my disappointment that ‘Jew’ is now a bad word used to insult people.

“For so long, I didn’t know my identity, but now I am so invested in Judaism. On the front of my studio building in Hollywood, I have posters for freeing the hostages. People are so uncomfortable with it; I don’t know why.

“I have been constantly targeted for being Jewish ever since my discovery. It has been so bad since October 7 in Los Angeles. And in Belgium, in the immediate aftermath of October 7, people would say to me, ‘Your people are killing people.’ Or they were saying that in American society, only Jewish people hold important posts and jobs.

I am so happy that I found out I was Jewish.”

[1] Howard Thompson, “Temple Israel in Minneapolis Defaced with Swastikas,” Fox9, December 16, 2024, https://www.fox9.com/news/temple-israel-minneapolis-defaced-swastikas.

[2] On the November 2023 firebombing see: Thomas MacDonald, “‘Deeply Disturbing’: Montreal Police Investigating Two Firebombings at Jewish Institutions,” Global News, November 7, 2023, https://globalnews.ca/news/10075973/ montreal-synagogue-firebombing/. On the December 2024 firebombing see: Kalina Laframboise, “Fire at Montreal Synagogue Prompts Police Probe, Widespread Condemnation,” Global News, December 18, 2024, https://globalnews.ca/news/10923867/montreal-jewish-synagogue-arson/, and Leora Schertzer, “Beth Tikvah Synagogue in D.D.O. Hit by a Firebomb,” The Montreal Gazette, December 18, 2024, https://www. montrealgazette.com/news/local-crime/article627196.html.