Staying safe

These are scary times at Temple B'nai Abraham. They could use your support.

At Temple B’nai Abraham one morning last week, a few of the members were setting up for a Passover Seder. You could hear the sounds of children’s voices coming from the preschool room.

It felt like a warm and comforting place. But unfortunately for its members, there’s an underlying tension that never really goes away.

Like Jewish organizations around the country, Beverly’s only synagogue is on high alert as the number of antisemitic incidents and violence against Jews continues to increase. There have been horrific attacks around the country, including last month in Michigan when a man drove his car into a synagogue. The Anti-Defamation League of New England reported 638 antisemitic incidents in 2024, an all-time high.

Right here in Beverly, a man was arrested last year after posting threats online to rape Jewish women and inciting others to shoot people outside of synagogues, according to police. They found a cache of guns and a Nazi flag in his bedroom.

I stopped by the other day to talk with Julie Zieff, the temple’s incoming president, and Bonnie Kaplan Goldsmith, the current president. They told me how Temple B’nai Abraham, like other synagogues, has been forced to increase security since the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel. They have armed private security guards for their Friday night and Saturday morning services and Sunday religious school. Its building has been “hardened,” with bullet-resistant doors, a new alarm system, cameras, and secured entrances. They’re planning to install protective bollards in front of the temple, to prevent the type of incident that happened in Michigan.

Temple B’nai Abraham has worked closely with the Beverly police on all this. Julie said a police cruiser will park in the parking lot at some point almost every day. The temple is one of 250 Jewish organizations in the Greater Boston area taking part in a security program through Combined Jewish Philanthropies that provides training and security grants and helps respond to incidents.

Julie said she recently attended a CJP conference via Zoom that included the FBI and Essex District Attorney Paul Tucker. Over 400 people were on the call. “It was comforting in a strange way because people are taking it very seriously,” Julie said. “But it’s also very scary.”

Temple B’nai Abraham is now spending about $25,000 a year on security.

“We operate now with security at front of mind,” Bonnie told me. “Whether we’re here or out in the community, we think about security.”

“It’s a whole new world for us,” she added. “It weighs heavy. When there’s an event (against Jews), it’s PTSD all over again. It’s just like a perpetual cycle of shock and awe that you never recover from.”

All of this has been exacerbated by the Israel-Hamas war, the war in Iran, and the ongoing political and social turmoil in the country. Julie said she finds people are sometimes reluctant to talk about what’s going on because they are not sure where Jews stand on the issues, or they’re afraid they might say the wrong thing. She encourages people to reach out to their Jewish friends to talk about what’s happening.

“There’s many political and social views here,” she said. “It’s very diverse.”

Julie Zieff at Temple B’nai Abraham

I called up Rabbi Alison Adler a couple of days later to ask if she thought it would be helpful if people reached out and talked to their Jewish friends about all this.

“I would like to see that,” she said. “I think our members would like to see that more. They sometimes feel like, ‘Why aren’t my friends asking? Another synagogue was attacked, and another one and another one. Why aren’t they saying anything?’

“People might not know what to say. And there’s so much bad news out there they might not even know about it when there’s an attack. But we feel it in a very intense way. I’m not sure that people that aren’t Jewish understand that. We are a minority, so when Jews are attacked in one place we feel it because there’s so few of us. We’re all connected.”

Rabbi Adler said the leadership of Beverly, including Mayor Mike Cahill and Police Chief John LeLacheur, have been very supportive. Whenever there’s an incident elsewhere in the country LeLacheur will text her and promise to send a cruiser to park outside the temple.

Julie recalled driving up to the temple last December for a menorah lighting and seeing more than 100 people gathered in the freezing cold, many of them people of other faiths.

“It was so heartwarming,” she said.

Another positive note is that membership at Temple B’nai Abraham is on the upswing, including people who want to convert to Judaism. “People need the community, and it’s very warm and welcoming here,” Julie said. But Rabbi Adler said she also knows there are people who are afraid to attend services.

Julie said a friend of hers recently said something that really resonated with her. “We’re not worried about our safety like this when we go to church. You shouldn’t have to worry about it when you go to synagogue.”

Rabbi Adler said she’s always happy to answer questions from anybody about the Jewish faith. And she offered a great suggestion for people who are nervous about talking to their Jewish friends about this:

“Just say, ‘I’m not sure what to say, but I’m thinking of you.’”