Israeli officials arrived in Pittsburgh Sunday to honor the 11 people who were slaughtered during a mass shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue, commenting they were stunned when they got word of the shooting.
“It was total disbelief," Ambassador Dani Dayan, the Consul General of Israel, told Pittsburgh CBS affiliate KDKA. "My heart is broken. I come quite frequently to Pittsburgh and I love the Jewish community here. I have extremely good relations with the mayor, the county executive and I didn’t expect in my worst nightmares that my next visit to Pittsburgh would be under these circumstances. It is really appalling."
Dayan said that after touching down in Pittsburgh, he went straight to the Squirrel Hill synagogue to say a prayer and pay his respects.
Meanwhile, Naftali Bennett, the minister of diaspora affairs for the state of Israel, flew in from Israel to Pittsburgh Saturday night. He spoke during a large vigil held at Pittsburgh's Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall Sunday, calling the shootings the largest anti-Semitic attack in U.S. history, but lauding the city's sense of community.
"I met the people, the leaders of the Jewish community, the leaders of the greater community here in Pittsburgh," said Bennett.
He added that he visited the synagogue with Rabbi Hazzan Jeffrey Myers, the rabbi at the attacked church.
"I did not see death," he said. "I saw life. I saw strength. I did not see darkness. I saw light, much light. I saw a warm, diverse community of love and unity."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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