Manhattan, NY – Members of the New York Jewish community gathered for a somber, tear-filled and at points fiercely indignant memorial for the murdered Fogel family at Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun on the Upper East Side.
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Five members of the Fogel family – including an 11 year old, a 3 year old and a three-month old baby girl – were found murdered in their residence in the West Bank Itamar settlement last Friday night, after a terrorist broke and entered the house and stabbed the five to death. Two children managed to escape and survived the attack. The couple, their 11-year old child, 3-year-old toddler, and a three-month old baby girl were found dead from stabbing wounds.
Approximately one thousand people attended the memorial in the full sanctuary of the Orthodox synagogue, organizers said, and at least two thousand more followed the proceedings on line. The memorial was sponsored by numerous Jewish American organizations including Hadassah, Hillel, the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and others.
Many in the audience were brought to tears in a collective expression of mourning and, at points, anger.
Conference of Presidents Executive Vice Chairman Malcolm Hoenlein said in his remarks that in part, he had organized the memorial out of his own profound sense of sadness twinned with indignation at the barbarity of the crime and the inadequacy of the world’s response to it.
“The Fogel family were brutally murdered by the hands of barbaric, inhuman terrorists who planned and plotted this vile and evil act,” Hoenlein said. “Those responsible demonstrate the level of depravity that can only be compared to the worst of the Nazi horrors. This was an attack on the Fogel family and their community, but also on the state of Israel and the Jewish people.”
“Of what were these innocents guilty?” Hoenlein rhetorically asked in front of pictures of the slain family members. Answering his own question, he responded, “They were Jews celebrating Shabbat.”
Hoenlein decried the international response to the murders, saying, “When the media shifts the focus from the perpetrator to the victim…when they denigrate the murdered to justify the murderer…when they ignore and just put a small notice in the middle pages, then what price is there? Where is the outrage? Where is the indignation?”
His outrage continued even into his introduction of Israeli Ambassador to the UN Meron Reuben, as Hoenlein stated, “Nowhere is the hypocrisy to which the Jewish people are subjected more visible than at the UN, where Israel is condemned and those who murder ruthlessly are forgiven and forgotten.”
More in Jerusalem Post
Where is the outrage?
The press may have been distracted by a mere earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown
The outrage was similar to the years 1939-1945.
And then, commenter #1 , there were no earthquakes, Tsunamis or nuclear meltdowns….
Reply to meir
I don’t know if you watch the news but I do and its very evident that the news is looking for something to say. even now with the Japan crisis there’s only so much you can say and update about it. but since the fogels sick story didn’t fit with the news agency’s agendas they decided to stretch the Japan crises and avoid reporting a story which would warp the Palestinian and Arab public image as peaceful people that are suffering at the hands of the occupier, its BS and you shouldn’t fall for it
#1 Meir is correct. In addition to the events in Japan, you have had the horrible bus accident in the Bronx that killed 3x/as many people as the terrorists, the civil war in Libya, the suppression of protests in Bahrain, the return of the Democrats to the Wisconsin Senate (and the refusal of the Republicans to let them vote!), the seizure of the Iranian arms shipments, the hullabaloo over NPR, the brutal attack on an unarmed Arab in an Israeli settlement, and a host of other events.
This is not 1939.
The Japan story I think it reasonable to say was a natural disaster(at first), G’D rules the world, so why would G’D make the two things happen at the same time, to cover out the Yidens tragedy ? what happened to the Fogels r’l is our loss our tragedy, we don’t need to share it with the world, so what are we doing or not doing to stop such tragedies
Malcom Honlien, You’re great!
idiots;wake up since when do you expect outrage or even reaction when jews are killed to the contrary the are quite content and even enjoying
The world will never be outraged when Jews die. That is how it is. The world will be more outraged by Michael Vick torturing dogs than Jews dying. That is why we should not take any “guff” from the world and do what we need to do to survive.