Homeland Security Network Blog
In A Texas Synagogue, 11 Hours Of Terror
The Washington Post
‘Some People Just Don’t Like Us:’ In A Texas Synagogue, 11 Hours Of Terror
By Marc Fisher, Drew Harwell and Mary Beth Gahan
Rabbi Charlie had spoken just the previous Saturday about how hard it is now. Life seemed overwhelming, he said in his last sermon before the man came into the synagogue and changed everything.
“We are living through a challenging time,” Charles Cytron-Walker told members of Congregation Beth Israel in Colleyville, Tex. “We don’t always know how to cope. . . . There’s a lot of fear and there’s a lot of uncertainty.”
But the Jewish people had been here before, the rabbi said, and had always endured. “They’ve been enslaved and they are watching plague after plague,” he said. “Imagine . . . watching the world get turned upside down time and time again. It would have been amazing to experience — and terrifying.” On Saturday, the call came into Colleyville police at 10:41 a.m. Emergency at the synagogue.
A man came into the sanctuary during Sabbath services and took hostages. The terror was broadcast to worshipers at the Reform Jewish synagogue in a suburb of 26,000 people, northeast of Fort Worth, and to anyone else around the world live on Facebook.
And as the intruder lashed out at Jews and Israel and America, in Colleyville and Dallas and Washington, the American machinery of counterterror switched from Ready to Go.
When you subscribe to the blog, we will send you an e-mail when there are new updates on the site so you wouldn't miss them.
