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For Isadore, this discrimination was a fault not of the United States, but of some of its citizens, who had not respected the ideals of the country. His faith in the country itself has never faltered. He then worked for the federal government for about four decades and has always spoken with reverence about the "golden opportunities" and freedoms of the country.
The United States made my grandfather's story possible. But the only opportunity can not open a business. He can not feed the children or provide them with warm clothes to wear in winter. This requires money. The money that helped my grandfather's family settle in Pittsburgh came mainly from an organization: the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society.
Before Robert Bowers entered the Pittsburgh Tree of Life Synagogue on Saturday morning, he wrote a final message on the Gab social media site. "HIAS like to bring invaders into this killing our people, "he wrote," I can not stand by and watch my people get slaughtered.I'll go there. "Bowers then slaughtered himself, according to the criminal complaint filed by the federal government, opening fire on the faithful during the Sabbath service and killing 11.
Bowers was referring, of course, to HIAS in his current incarnation. The group was founded in 1881 to help Jewish families who, like mine, were fleeing the dangers they faced in Eastern Europe and were trying to start life in the United States again. Today & # 39; hui, HIAS no longer provides mainly aid to Jewish immigrants, but supports and advocates for the well-being of refugees from many religions and ethnicities around the world. "Because we have helped more than 4.5 million people escape the persecution," says the organization's website, "HIAS is particularly qualified to deal with the current refugee situation, which has turned into a global humanitarian crisis. " In other words, as wrote its current president, Mark Hetfield, HIASThe new mission is to "help refugees not because they are Jews, but because we are Jews".
There is some kind of twisted logic in Bowers' horrible act. If you think, as Bowers claims, that refugees are "invaders" and that HIAS, rooted in basic Jewish values, is responsible for their entry, and if you are so angry about it that you are driven to commit murder, you can target HIAS, or you could target what is at the heart of its self-proclaimed principles: Jewishness itself and those who practice it.
President Donald Trump did not understand this logic: "This act of perverse mass murder is pure evil, hard to believe, and frankly, something imaginable," he said. Overall, Jews were less surprised by Saturday's events. Even for those of us who are lucky enough to be born at a time and place where we do not need to fear for our life simply because we are Jewish, this sense of danger remains relatively recent. in our collective memory. My grandfather, one of 4.5 million people HIAS helped, lived.
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