-Combined news releases-
A rally in New York City for the 17 murdered victims of the Charlie Hebdo and Hyper Cacher attracted 1,000 participants in New York City and more than 700 people gathered at Congregation Adas Israel for an AJC program of solidarity with France’s Jewish community.
The Jewish community of New York held its memorial gathering at the Lincoln Square synagogue Sunday, Jan 11. It was co-sponsored by the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York, Lincoln Square Synagogue, and the West Side Sephardic Synagogue. Nearly 1,000 participants attended inside, with an overflow crowd that gathered outside in the cold to listen. Noted rabbis, dignitaries and elected officials recited Psalms and lit candles in memory of the seventeen victims of terror.
Stella Amar, a young leader of the World Jewish Congress American Section, served as one of the masters of ceremonies of the event, and spoke movingly about the deep connection between the Jewish community and the people of France, as well as the necessity for world leaders to unite in order to combat terrorism.
Among the dignitaries who addressed the gathering were Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY), Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Ambassador Francois Delattre, ambassador of France to the United Nations, French Consul-General Bertrand Lortholary, and Consul-General of Israel Ido Aharoni. Other dignitaries in attendance were Ambassador Ron Prosor, ambassador of Israel to the UN, New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer, New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark Viverito, UJA-Federation CEO Eric Goldstein, and special guest Chelsea Clinton, joined by Rabbi Yehuda Sarna and Imam Khalid Latif, who lit a candle together.
Members of the French Jewish community in New York led the participants in a heartfelt rendition of the French national anthem, followed by the American and Israeli anthems and El Maleh Rachamim, a traditional prayer of mourning.
At the Washington, D.C. rally, Gérard Araud, Ambassador of France to the United States declared: ““We are at war against terrorism, against radical Islam.
“Journalists and Jews are on the front line of democracy,” he added, referring to the deadly attacks on the French magazine Charlie Hebdo and a crowded kosher supermarket.
“We will not waver in our commitment to defeat the scourge of anti-Semitism,” said White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough. “This is not an issue for any single community or nation to deal with by itself,” he continued. “From the President on down, you have my commitment that we will wage this fight together.”
The solidarity and memorial event took place four days after an Islamist terrorist killed four of his hostages shoppng hours before the onset of Shabbat at a kosher supermarket. The four Jewish victims were buried in Israel on Wednesday, Jan. 14
A rising tide of anti-Semitic violence in France has placed the Jewish community, the largest in Europe, on edge and prompted 7,000 French Jews to move to Israel in 2014 alone.
Echoing French President Hollande’s concern for the well-being and security of the country’s Jewish community, Ambassador Araud said, “We want the Jews of France to remain in France.”
Other Obama Administration officials attending Tuesday evening included Julieta Valls Noyes, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs; Ira Forman, State Department Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism; and Charles Kupchan, National Security Council senior director for Europe. U.S. Representatives Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Ted Deutch and Jan Schakowsky participated. Representatives of the Muslim and French communities also attended.
“We are here to insist that anti-Semitism and all forms of religious and racial hatred are intolerable, that the fight against violent extremism must be waged comprehensively and relentlessly, and that the Jews must not and will not be driven out of Europe,” said Jason Isaacson, American Jewish Committee’s Associate Executive Director for Policy.
Isaacson read aloud a letter from the Tunisian Ambassador to the United States, M’Hamed Ezzine Chelaifa, who eulogized one of those murdered at the Paris kosher supermarket, Yoav Hattab, a son of the Chief Rabbi of Tunis.
AJC has longstanding ties with the Jewish community in France and with the Ffench government, and maintains an office in Paris, headed by Simone Rodan-Benzaquen.
A memorial gathering also took place Monday at AJC headquarters in New York, addressed by U.S. Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power, French Ambassador to the UN Francois Delattre, and Consul General of France in New York Bertrand Lortholary.
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