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(wind blowing, bird chirping)
(crow cawing)
♪ ♪
(shofar blowing)
(sirens blaring)
(shofar blowing)
(sirens continue)
(overlapping shofar blowing)
Officer 1: (on radio) Shots fired. Shots fired.
871, shots fired. Give me all additional resources.
(shofar blowing)
34-23, 34-24.
5898 Wilkins Avenue.
(siren)
(inaudible)
(radio static, chatter)
(Officer 1 speaking)
Officer 2: (on radio) Copy.
(Officer 1 speaking)
(Officer 2 speaking)
(Officer 1 speaking)
♪ ♪
Anthony Fienberg: One of my elder daughters
came running in and asked,
"Did Bubbe go to shul today?"
That's about when my stomach fell out.
I knew something was wrong.
♪ ♪
(Officer 1 on radio)
(Officer 2 on radio)
(sirens blaring)
(screaming)
We got a text from somebody that just said
"active shooter at Tree of Life Synagogue."
I said, "The boys are there."
And in our hearts, we knew.
We knew. We just felt it.
(Officer 1 on radio)
(Officer 3 on radio)
Carol Black: I turned the corner onto Wilkins Avenue
and was looking for the parking lot,
and I saw my brother walking into the building.
That's the last time I saw him alive.
♪ ♪
(Officer 1 on radio)
(Officer 3 on radio)
I was facing forward. I couldn't...
I did not see what was going on behind me
until I heard this sound.
And I turned around to see what the sound was.
And there was the man with the gun.
(praying in Hebrew)
I turned around,
and Audrey was going over
to the left side,
and I followed behind her.
Audrey and I went up, and we found this room
with all kinds of junk in it, and we hid in there.
There was a window in the door, and so, when we realized that,
we made ourselves look like,
as much as we could, the bags of clothing that were in there.
I guess they're donations.
She heard Bernice cry out...
when her husband was shot.
I don't recall hearing that.
♪ ♪
All I remember was, was the man with the gun.
We couldn't run. We were in the back, in our seats.
And I just told my mother, I said, "Just get down."
And I think we both got shot
before we went down.
(radio static, beep)
(Officer 1 on radio)
(static, beep)
Stephen Weiss: As I got into the doorway,
there were a series of probably four or five shots.
And as I'm standing in the doorway, I could see
shell casings bouncing across the floor in front of me.
And having that shootout with these four officers
that were shot. I mean, when I think about it...
Dan Leger: Jerry and I looked at each other.
Jerry's a doctor. I'm a nurse.
I thought that somehow
we could be helpful. And so,
we moved in the direction of the gunfire.
And as you know, Jerry was killed, and I was wounded.
I just laid on the floor. I didn't move.
And I was bleeding a lot. Um...
I think I must have been in shock.
My mother was lying right by me,
and I couldn't... I couldn't look.
I just stayed there until somebody came through.
Stephen: When the police came on scene,
the shooter actually ended up going up into the school wing.
Normally on a Saturday morning, my son and I would be there
to do a junior congregation. One Shabbat a month,
we didn't have junior congregation.
This happened to be that one Shabbat.
Normally, my son would have been sitting in the front lobby entry
waiting for the kids to come in.
(Officer 2 on radio)
(static, radio chatter)
♪ ♪
Andrea Wedner: When I got up,
I just told my mother I loved her,
and I had to go.
I had to live.
So, I knew she...
didn't... wasn't gonna survive.
(Officers on radio)
(siren blaring)
♪ ♪
(insects chirping)
♪ ♪
Rabbi Jonathan Perlman: These cowardly assassins
were going after small, vulnerable places,
and, um...
you know, the shooter killed about half the people
in the building. Half the people survived.
Eleven dead.
(quiet chatter)
Rabbi Jeffrey Myers: The Jewish people have been
here on these shores 355 years.
And if you think about antisemitism,
which has been prevalent all 355 years, um...
Yeah, it's surprising. It's like, well, what took so long?
It was inevitable that there was gonna be
an attack of this nature on a synagogue.
♪ ♪
(birds chirping)
(clicking)
Barry Werber: This is even before I was born,
but it's my aunts and uncles,
my grandmother and grandfather,
my brother, bless his memory.
The two elderly folks in front with the child
between them are my grandmother and grandfather.
This whole thing is falling apart.
(plastic crinkling)
Growing up, the holidays were amazing.
My Bubbe and Zayde, my grandmother and grandfather,
had a little apartment in Terrace Village
up in the Hill District,
and Passover would come, and the relatives would come in
from all over... Chicago, New York, Steubenville.
And we'd all settle around this table
in the middle of their living room,
and by the time the Seder would start,
of course, you start the Seder late,
the kids were underneath the table, sound asleep
because they had sampled the wine. Okay?
And as orthodox as my Zayde was,
he wanted to get the kinderlach home to bed.
He didn't think it was right that they stay up
till 1:00 or 2:00 in the morning for a Seder.
So he'd have a tendency to try and skip pages
on the, on the, the Seder book.
And it was, it was, it was amazing
because he'd go so far, and then he'd turn the page.
And my Bubbe, oh, she was a character.
"Jacob! You missed a page!
"Jacob! You forgot! You didn't do a line!
Jacob! What about this? And what..."
And, and, and my Zayde, bless his memory, would say,
"Shah, still. The kinderlach have to get home to bed.
Shah. Still."
It was hilarious.
- (projector clicking) - (quiet traffic noise)
Rabbi Perlman: I came to Pittsburgh when I was 9 years old.
My father was moving around a lot.
He was shaping his medical career.
It was more of a mix than what we had in Milwaukee.
I remember in Milwaukee that a girl
who was older than me told me
that the Jews had killed Christ.
That was the first time I'd ever heard about that.
So, I always appreciated Pittsburgh.
(crowd cheering)
I remember in 1979,
the Pittsburgh Pirates won the World Series.
And the captain of the team, Willie Stargell,
kept on referring to the Pirates as the family.
And there was a song that was popular at the time
called "We Are Family."
♪ We are family ♪
And all the fans used to sing it all the time.
And it really thrilled me
to feel part of this great family,
and we would sing it all the time.
It was funny because it said, "We are family.
I got all my sisters with me,"
which didn't really refer to the Pirates so much,
but, in my family, where I only had sisters, uh,
it was very special to me to be able to sing
about having all my sisters with me.
(muffled "We Are Family" fading out)
(quiet traffic noise)
(breeze blowing)
(birds chirping)
I didn't feel like watching the Steelers today
because I was afraid they would lose.
But I have to get the score. (laughs)
Pittsburgh Steelers won 17 to 10.
- Director: Mazel tov. (laughs) - Mazel tov indeed.
Director: My father will be very happy.
(laughter)
There are writers who say,
"We are born, we suffer, and we die."
The whole of life in eight words.
And I say...
We are born, we laugh, and we die.
Anyway, uh...
that gives you an idea of the kind of person I am.
Should I talk with my hands on the table,
or should I talk with my hands in my lap?
Should I cross my legs? Should I grab...
Director: If it makes you feel able to speak...
I'm likely to use my hands
because I always do.
I live in Greenfield, but everyone calls it Squirrel Hill
because I'm near the border.
And, in fact, in Squirrel Hill,
Squirrel Hill itself has never been
more than 40% Jewish.
But the flavor of the neighborhood,
all the businesses that were owned
and loudly proclaiming
"Buy kosher meat here" and whatever.
It made it seem like a Jewish community.
- (birds chirping) - (quiet traffic noise)
(turn signal clicking)
(sighs) See?
- (shifts to park) - (clicks seatbelt)
Anthony: I knew them. I sat in synagogue next to them.
They greeted me as I came into the synagogue
where I grew up with them.
(Director speaking)
This is my first time.
(quiet traffic noise, honking)
Magali Fienberg: Joyce was very concerned
about what happened in Paris,
in France, and also in Paris,
because many things happen against Jewish people.
I think she, she would have liked us to, to move.
Director: Did she ever say where she'd like you to move?
In Pittsburgh. Yes.
- Come here, puppy. - Director: She wants to be with her mama?
Yeah! You wanna sit with mom?
-This is my dog, Ziva. That's a Hebrew name. -(panting)
- Ziva. - Director: What does it mean?
It means light and illuminated.
She's been my therapy dog, I'll tell you. For the...
That first week or so afterwards
when there was one funeral after the next.
It was...
Yeah, that was, that was a tough week, um...
- (street noise) - (distant horn)
(rattling)
Augie Siriano: I... I've said to a few people already, um...
"I can't wait to get back home,
but, unfortunately, it's gonna be a while."
Director: When you say, "Can't wait to get back home,"
- what do you mean by home? - Tree of Life. Yeah.
And they looked at me like, "Oh really?"
You know, I was, yeah. You know.
It's 27 years now in there.
(clears throat)
In 1993, my brother-in-law used to work
at Tree of Life Synagogue.
He called me and said,
"Hey, there's a position here." I went and,
you know, I worked for a while, and, you know,
I liked it, so I just stayed.
The people, the hugs and the kisses that I get
once in a while on the cheek, of course,
it's just in general working there.
You know, some of the people, I couldn't wait to come in
for something... You know,
sometimes I would stand at the door and wait
for them to come in and just say,
"Hi, how you doing?" You know?
And I'm gonna miss all that.
- (birds chirping) - (kids chattering)
Carol: I just was not involved in Jewish life
really for my... most of my adult life.
So, Saturday mornings, I would meet my friend at North Park,
and we would run around the lake.
And we did that for many years
until I injured my hip, and I couldn't run.
And I thought, "Well, now what am I gonna do?"
So, thought, "Well, maybe I'll just go to shul."
And so I joined my brother
and got involved,
and it just carried on from there.
Our congregation is a small congregation,
and it tends towards the older side,
and we don't have
our own building anymore.
We couldn't maintain our old building,
and so we sold it
and moved into the Tree of Life.
♪ ♪
We don't refer to it
as the Tree of Life shooting.
We call it the Pittsburgh Synagogue shooting
because we want people to know
that there were two other congregations
that were in that building,
and all three congregations lost people.
So the three congregations, well, of course,
Tree of Life or L'Simcha. It's their building.
There is Dor Hadash,
which also was a tenant,
and that's a Reconstructionist congregation.
And the one that I belong to is New Light Congregation.
And we had only been in that building for 11 months.
We were just getting used to that new home.
Barry: I would go Friday night services
and Sunday morning services.
But, it happened that it was my mother's yahrzeit.
That Saturday morning.
The anniversary of her passing.
And I made it a point to go to shul.
Services started at a quarter to 10:00.
Nobody showed up at a quarter to 10:00.
I like to say Jewish Standard Time.
A quarter to 10:00, 10:00 o'clock,
quarter after, but be there by 10:30.
And that's the way things usually happen.
Dan: It was a rainy morning.
I got there and my dear friend Jerry Rabinowitz
was, was... had arrived
just a couple of minutes before I did.
And Marty Gaynor, our friend,
had arrived just, I think,
a couple minutes after I got there.
Um...
And, um, um...
Then we heard gunshots.
And Jerry and I looked at each other.
Jerry's a doctor, I'm a nurse.
Our, our instincts are counter
to what everyone is trained to do, and should do,
and I encourage them to do,
and that is to run, hide, and fight,
in that order.
But Jerry and I thought that, somehow, we could be helpful,
and so we moved in the direction of the gunfire.
♪ ♪
Audrey Glickman: We were trying to get David Rosenthal
to come with us to hide and not to go back.
And he wanted to go back
and he wanted to call his house, and...
Rabbi Myers was already on the phone to 911.
I didn't have my phone
because I had worn something
with pockets too shallow for a phone.
And so my phone was on the pew, and...
It was a poor decision,
and I'll never go to the synagogue again
without pockets big enough to have my phone on me.
And I think women's clothing should be made
with pockets big enough for phones
because, apparently, it's a matter of life and death.
♪ ♪
Dan: Jerry was killed,
and I was, was shot.
And I, um...
knew that it was very likely
that I was going to be dead in a few minutes.
I was on the stairs, and I...
I didn't feel afraid at that point.
I, I, I had no sense of...
of being afraid about the end of my life coming.
I thought about my life, and I thought,
"Gee, I've had a wonderful life.
My life has been so good. I'm so grateful for it." You know?
The thing I did, and the thing that seemed
to be informed by my values
as a Jewish person was to, in that review
of my life, to be, um...
thinking of the people in my life,
and things that I would want to have done differently,
and maybe that I had offended some of them through my life
in various ways, and to ask forgiveness.
♪ ♪
All of a sudden, I see a camouflaged pant leg
on the stairs next to me, and I grab the pant leg.
It was a paramedic.
And, um, he said, "This one's alive."
♪ ♪
Carol: I came in, and I was a little bit late.
And so, I went down the steps
into our sanctuary space.
I could hear my brother and Dan Stein in the kitchen.
The rabbi was in the front on the right,
and Barry Werber was sitting
right in front of where I was sitting,
and Mel was leading the service.
And I was getting my tallis bag out.
I was, you know, just getting prepared.
And I was holding the tallis bag in my hand,
and I heard the first gunshot,
although I didn't... I didn't recognize it
as a gunshot. I didn't know what it was.
I thought somebody dropped a metal table
on a floor or something. I didn't know what it was.
We all heard the sound,
and then didn't think too much of it.
And then less than a minute later, there was another one.
And I said, "What are they doing up there?"
And Barry got up out of the seat,
walked out, looked up the steps, he came back in, and he said,
"There's somebody laying on the steps."
And then he sat back down,
and it just wasn't occurring to us
what was happening.
And then, I heard bam-bam-bam-bam-bam,
you know, the rapid gunfire,
and then Rabbi said, "We need to get outta here."
And he motioned us towards a doorway
that was in the back.
I had never been in that space before.
I didn't know what was there. It was pitch black in there.
There was no lights, couldn't see a thing.
And I saw a closet
with the door propped open and I went into the closet.
Barry went into the closet.
♪ ♪
And by that time, we knew that there was shooting.
And I had my cell phone out, my dumb phone,
and I called 911.
Now, there were places in that building
where you couldn't get any cell phone reception,
especially in the basement, but 911 went through.
And...
there was a pause.
Carol was, was over here, as I recall,
kneeling behind... behind an area.
And I'm pressed up against a wall,
and Mel is in front of us.
And there seemed to be a pause.
And Mel went
and pushed the door, and we couldn't say anything.
We were afraid of making any sound.
And Mel pushed the door open, and I heard three gunshots.
And he fell back in the room.
♪ ♪
And then there was a little bit of light from the...
from the sanctuary area
and...
the gunman walked in.
And we didn't say a word.
You know, we weren't saying anything.
We knew to be silent
because we were counting on the fact
that darkness was going to be our friend that day,
and that we were not seen.
And after he shot Mel,
Barry saw him. I didn't see him.
I only saw a shadow because I was behind a door.
I couldn't see too much.
I knew... I could see the long gun.
I knew, I knew, I knew the type.
It was some sort of an automatic weapon.
And I couldn't tell much by what I was looking at,
other than the gun.
And he stepped over Mel.
Couldn't see anything.
And I have 911 in my ear, yelling at me,
trying to get me to say something,
and I couldn't breathe.
And then he stepped back out of the door,
and the door closed.
And I guess it was about...
a half hour later, 15 minutes later,
I'm not sure of time. By this time,
I'm talking to the 911 operator.
And a shaft of light
over my shoulder
and footsteps behind me.
And I didn't even know there were steps.
I didn't remember there were steps there.
As I said, I wasn't too familiar with that room.
And this young SWAT officer
comes down the steps and takes
myself and Carol Black out of the building.
♪ ♪
Magali: Celina, our daughter,
she said, "Something happened in Pittsburgh in Tree of Life.
A shooting."
And then, we tried to call your mother.
She didn't answer.
And then, we told her, "Are you sure?"
And maybe one hour later or maybe more,
we, we saw the television, the CNN, and then they said
there is something happened in Pittsburgh.
And then the first thing Adam ask
when we understood
what happened exactly, he said,
"Do you think someone can come and kill us?"
- (Director speaking) - Yes.
Nine.
(Director speaking)
I said yes.
Augie: I was in the men's bathroom sanctuary.
I heard pow, pow, pow, pow, pow, pow.
And started making my way through the sanctuary.
Come through the lobby,
through the... just like a hallway
outside the chapel,
and I see a magazine on the floor,
and I smell a lot of gunpowder.
And I looked in the chapel real quick,
and then all I seen was the lights on. That was it.
I didn't see nobody. I didn't hear nothing.
Well, then I turned and ran outta the building
back, of course, away from the gunfire.
As soon as I got to the exit door in the sanctuary,
I kicked it open and got down on my knees
and said, "I'm just a custodian.
I'm trying to get outta the building."
They just pointed a gun at me,
and Steve Weiss, he just said really loud,
"That's Augie! That's the custodian,"
and he pointed at me.
And then when I got up on the sidewalk on Shady Avenue,
a Pittsburgh police officer walked up.
He had blood coming down his head,
and he was saying
a word I can't say, multiple times.
I guess he had some kind of confrontation with Bowers
at the front door. I'm not sure.
♪ ♪
Martin Gaynor: All of the first responders were just amazing.
I... (sighs)
(inhales, exhales)
I don't have the words...
to describe...
just how wonderful they were,
and the depth of my gratitude.
But, you know, all of the police officers,
our Pittsburgh Police, police came from all over the region.
The EMTs,
they risked their lives without hesitation.
As you know, four of our officers
were wounded very badly, and...
you know, of course, they...
If you talk to any of them, they'll say,
"Oh, I was just doing my job."
They refused to take, you know,
act like they did anything extraordinary.
But, boy,
as soon as they got the notice,
they were there, and
they were in the building,
and the EMTs went in
when it was still a very dangerous situation
because they wanted to see if they could save people.
And thank God they did. They saved Dan Leger.
And if they had not, he might not be here.
(siren blaring)
Dan: I remember very little of the ambulance ride.
I remember arriving at the hospital,
and then I don't remember anything until...
um, I was looking up
through what appeared to be like gauze
or cotton or clouds or something.
And seeing shadowy figures around me.
And I, um,
and I remember thinking to myself,
"This is the chevra kadisha. This is the burial society.
They have come to prepare me to be buried."
And I felt so comforted.
I felt so completely comforted by that notion
that my friends were there taking care of me.
And then again, there's a long period of time
where I don't remember much of anything.
And I remember when the breathing tube was removed.
And I remember looking and realizing
that my family was around me and saying that I loved you.
And the third thing I said was, "God forgive him."
Reporter: Alleged synagogue shooter Robert Bowers
is not believed to have a prior criminal history,
but social media posts attributed to him
contain antisemitic views and other hate speech.
As awful as it sounds, um,
and I'm not trying to say that...
I'm not trying to, to, to give the shooter a free pass here,
but I know that he was made in the image of God
just like I am. He's a human being.
Antisemitism was a fuel. It was a...
It fueled other hate speech that this suspect was posting.
So it wasn't just antisemitism.
It was also hate about immigrants,
hate about other individuals.
But, at the core, was this deep antisemitism
that you see on his a social media footprint.
And several of the messages that he was posting
was against a Jewish refugee resettlement agency.
And that was his point, is that one of the points he was making
is that this agency is bringing people in.
And he said, among many other things,
that "my people are being slaughtered."
Ellen Surloff: The days when synagogues just leave their doors open
and hope that, you know,
no one comes through the doors with a gun,
I think those days are gone.
♪ ♪
Just before the shooting,
we had the woman
who was chair of our social action committee
had organized what was called
a HIAS-Shabbat. And there were...
It was happening all over the country.
There was a particular Shabbat
that was to be focused on immigrants.
And apparently, the HIAS website
listed congregations that were participants,
and congregation Dor Hadash
was listed as a participant.
That's how he knew that
we had something to do with immigrants.
Pundit: This person who committed this act
was very much against immigration.
Immigration to him meant
the existential threat to the white people.
Donald Trump: At this very moment,
large, well-organized caravans of migrants
are marching toward our southern border.
Some people call it an invasion.
It's like an invasion.
Rabbi Perlman: There's a great fear among white people
that whiteness is dying in this country
and that the culture of white America
has been diminished
by Latin Americans,
by Blacks, by Jews.
And it's simply not true.
I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear...
Rabbi Perlman: Part of that fear began with the election of Barack Obama.
You know, as much as we would like
to celebrate the election of the first Black president,
I think that a lot of these people retreated, um,
and they held a great deal of resentment.
They didn't really know what to think.
Hey, I'm the guy on record saying he is
the Black Muslim anti-Christ.
I think the election of Donald Trump
was a kind of triumph for them,
and it emboldened them.
(crowd chattering)
You know, the Second Amendment speaks of forming militias.
I think that's what they're doing now in a quiet way.
You know, they're doing it over the Internet
uh, and they are using this language,
which if you compare the language
that they're using of
invasion and replacement.
The Democratic Party is trying to replace
the current electorate.
It's appearing in all of their manifestos.
What they really want is to replace white people
in white countries.
Before I go on, I want to clarify "they."
- Man 1: Evil elite Jew. - Man 2: Jewish elite.
The Jewish mafia.
Jew-dominated globalism.
Rabbi Perlman: They're taking it to the streets with their,
you know, semiautomatic rifles
which they were allowed to have.
You know, they, they're in a struggle for their lives.
They believe what they hear,
and it scares them a great deal
that their country is being taken over.
Some of the white supremacist actions
that are happening outside of America
are happening in Europe.
There was something that happened in Norway a few years ago.
This attack in New Zealand, was really,
really a fear about Australia
and what's happening in that part of the world.
And these terrorists
are trying to make a statement about
the position of whiteness in this world.
♪ ♪
(crowd chattering)
Classmates threw pennies
because Jews have always been accused of being cheap,
so they would expect that I would go
and pick up the pennies.
The worst was I came home one day.
There were swastikas on my driveway
with "Jeffrey's a dirty Jew."
So that was my introduction to learning about the Holocaust.
♪ ♪
We've seen within the previous century
the horrors of what antisemitism
can, can wreak upon people
that we would think of are civilized,
that could behave that way.
Reporter: This was Madison Square Garden in New York City.
(crowd chanting)
They wore Hitler's uniform,
but they wrapped themselves
in the American flag.
- Heil Hitler. - Heil Hitler.
Mother: Who do we don't like?
- Child: Niggers. - Who else?
Uh, Jews.
The danger of antisemitism
is it doesn't stop with antisemitism.
It, it denotes a moral decay
in humanity when you're gonna treat people
as an other and think of them as less than human.
(typing)
(rock music playing)
(crowd chattering)
(person singing)
(song fades out)
(wind blowing, leaves rustling)
(singing in Hebrew)
(singing continues)
(inaudible)
(singing continues)
♪ ♪
(singing)
(singing continues)
(singing ends)
Ron Wedner: There's a lot of reliance on religion in our country,
and I think everybody seemed touched,
whether they're Jewish or Catholic or Muslim
or, or any other religion,
that this could happen to them.
It's not some random shooting. It was...
a crime against people who...
They were only shot because of what they believed in.
♪ ♪
(crowd chattering)
Wasi Mohamed: What the Jewish community today,
despite facing a tragedy,
what they did for the world was so important.
What the Pittsburgh community did was so important
because of that evil,
every single person touched by that,
hundreds of thousands of people around the world,
all responded with acts of goodness.
(singing in Hebrew)
(singing fades out)
Wasi: My family is largely always from,
like, everybody that I've known, at least generationally,
is from Madras, Chennai, in India.
So southern India and Tamil Nadu, the region.
So they came here like in the late '80s, 1990.
You know, my mom came here a little bit before my father.
Then my brother was born in '91.
And then I was born in '92 in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania,
capital of the Keystone State. Yeah.
I think a lot of people were surprised
to see the Muslim community of all communities step up
and help the Jewish community.
And I think it's because of misconceptions
about both of our communities that people were so surprised.
But our religions are very similar.
Our traditions are similar. Our values are similar.
Our burial practices are very similar.
They're gonna bury in a couple of days.
I knew that Ralph Schugar Funeral Home
is where people go.
And so, I called them and said,
"Hey, I'm from the Islamic Center of Pittsburgh.
"We raised enough money to cover every single funeral.
No matter what, just don't send anybody a bill."
Quite frankly, we did not have that money, you know, like we...
I just was confident in our community.
So then immediately, we started to do a fundraiser.
♪ ♪
Just that online fundraiser was $250,000.
That was what was meant to ensure that nobody would have
to worry about burial costs at a time like this,
or medical costs at a time like this.
We just wanted people to focus on mourning.
♪ ♪
(siren fading in, blaring)
(crowd noise fading in)
(angry yelling)
Protester: Let the families grieve! This is our neighborhood!
You are not welcome here!
Ellen: I remember getting a call
from a Dor Hadash congregant,
and she was beside herself. She said,
"They're blocking off Tree of Life.
"The police are there. They're blocking it off.
I think Trump is coming."
And we had no idea that he was coming
to the actual Tree of Life building.
(sirens continue)
(shutters snapping)
I live two blocks away from here.
Both my daughters are Jewish.
They were threatened to be killed several days ago.
And Trump is using this opportunity
of grief to promote the hate
that generated this situation in the first place.
I don't care if they arrest me!
I care if my kids live in a world
where they're gonna be killed for being Jewish!
I care if kids live in a world
that they're gonna be killed for being Black!
I care if kids are gonna be killed
if we're living in a world if they're immigrants!
(Mourner speaking)
Protester: Trump is not respected.
I care. I care because it's the future of my daughters.
We're grieving.
(singing in Hebrew)
- (singing continues) - (drum playing)
I'm not a very political person.
I think that as the President of the United States,
it certainly was within his right to come and visit
and try to show that he's here supporting us.
I think that there are a lot of people that don't like Trump.
I had no problem with him coming here.
(singing continues)
If the president, whoever it is,
wants to come, the president should be welcomed.
But President Trump
gets support from the white nationalists.
The protesters were right
to express their opinions,
and President Trump should have paid attention
to what they were saying.
(singing in Hebrew)
This was distributed throughout our communities.
This is an actual bag with birdseed
and a flier from the Ku Klux Klan.
It's a delivery system.
You can distribute them from a car.
After the Tree of Life massacre,
probably about 30 or 40 of these
were thrown about in the Squirrel Hill area,
referring to Jews as Satan.
These groups are emboldened,
they're empowered, and they're vocal.
And they feel they can be now.
Director: Why?
♪ ♪
I'm gonna stop you there. I'm a really apolitical guy.
We both know the answer. Okay?
We all know what the answer is, and I'm not gonna answer it.
(fading out) Okay, I'm not gonna answer that question.
♪ ♪
(traffic noise)
Reporter: The Squirrel Hill community
filled the Temple Sinai Synagogue,
hugging each other tightly with tears in their eyes,
promising to stand strong against gun violence.
Carolyn Ban: We will never forget those we lost...
as we work to keep others safe
and spare other families
such terrible losses.
Reporter: Following the attack on the Tree of Life Synagogue,
the community formed
Squirrel Hill Stands Against Gun Violence,
working with community leaders and survivors
to find solutions.
We have to be here to be able to support
and encourage our local leaders
as they pass legislation
that our federal and state government is too broken
and too inept to take care of for us.
(applause)
Brad Orsini: If we didn't change gun regulation
and gun laws
after Sandy Hook, I don't know that we ever will.
I hope and pray there's a day where we do do that.
I'm a marine. I'm an FBI agent.
I've carried a gun my entire professional career.
I think too many people have guns
that should not have guns and that are not qualified...
and fit and sound to carry that weapon.
Speaker: (fading in) ...the right of the people, to keep and bear arms,
shall not be infringed.
(crowd cheering)
Inalienable rights!
(indistinct chanting)
Crowd: USA! USA! USA!
Don't... Don't...
Speaker: I traveled here from Beaver County for one reason.
If we let this shit happen here,
before you know it, it'll be in everybody's backyard
across our nation!
(crowd cheering, fading out)
Gun Shop Owner: They were talking about tearing the building down,
and it was boarded up for a while,
and we got it pretty cheap, but it was in rough shape.
I've honestly have not had one person,
and I've had hundreds of people,
you know, Jewish religion, come in,
and I have not had
one person come in and have a problem with it.
Anyone I've talked to, they were happy
that we saved the building.
Director: Did you hear about the Tree of Life shooting?
It's a shame. It truly is a shame.
I, I have no...
I don't think I have a racist bone in my body,
to be honest with you, in any way.
Just the way I tick, I don't know,
I can't understand people that have that hate.
I just... I can't, you know.
I'm at a point now, I'm 62, that,
you know, I...
I'd have trouble hunting, I think.
I haven't hunted for a few years,
and just, you know, killing an animal now.
Believe me, I would quit selling guns
if I thought it would make a difference.
And I mean... just what really upsets me
is as soon as there's a shooting, okay,
you have the agenda people up,
and they, you know, they wanna ban assault rifles.
And banning assault rifles isn't gonna do anything.
Better background checks, I'm all for that,
but even that is a Band-Aid.
Common sense just tells you
that it's, you know...
these people aren't gonna give up their...
Especially the criminals.
They're not gonna give up their guns.
If anything, I would think,
you know, to arm more people.
(quiet chatter fading in)
(indistinct)
Host: Thank you all for coming
because this is really important.
And we as a congregation, or anywhere,
can spend an infinite amount of money on security
and have the best security in the world,
but your power is in your knowledge
and your ability to respond in a situation,
which is what Brad is here to show us.
- Good evening, everybody. - (applause)
We're gonna talk about some things today
that are hard to hear.
We're gonna talk about death.
We're gonna talk about violence.
We're here talking about it in a synagogue,
in our house of worship,
because we've had and suffered the worst massacre
in our nation's history
to the Jewish population, right?
Since the year 2000,
active shooters, that active threat,
has increased every single year.
I am gonna talk about a commitment to action.
We have to learn how to survive
for three to five minutes.
And that three to five minutes is that time frame
when we call police till first responders typically come.
Steve is a member of Tree of Life.
Steve was there that morning
on October 27th.
And thank God Steve is standing with us here today.
With that, Steve?
Stephen: Thank you.
Good evening.
I'd like to just tell you a little bit about
what happened on Saturday morning, October 27th.
As the rabbi finished the kadesh,
I started walking into the doorway
to go out into the lobby,
and there were a series of four or five shots
that occurred in succession. And while I'm standing there,
I can watch the brass bounce across the floor in front of me.
And I remembered training that I had
in September of 2017 with Brad
where he came into our religious school.
I'm doing pretty well. I mean, I've had a chance
to talk with my students in school,
with a social worker in school, with a lot of different people,
and that's really helped me
work through a lot of this in my mind.
I ran up the side of the chapel,
across the bimah,
and out a door that's on that side of the bimah.
As I was going out of the door,
shots were starting to happen in the chapel itself.
I look back on it and, to me,
God has a reason why I'm still here.
I went down a back stairway.
I wanted to alert the New Light Congregation
that was downstairs, getting ready to start their services.
And I've kind of taken on a mission
to really try to promote ALICE training
kind of as my personal take-out of this whole thing
because I really credit that training with saving my life.
I came back up the steps, went out the main sanctuary,
and out a side door on to Shady Avenue.
And about 30 seconds later, the first patrol car pulled up.
And so, it's up to each one of us to learn this
because it can save your life.
- Brad: Thank you, Steve. - Stephen: It's devastating.
You just start thinking about each one of them
and how you knew each one and how long you've known each one.
Rose Mallinger, I taught her grandchildren
their bar and bat mitzvahs.
Sylvan and Bernice Simon. Bernice knew my mom.
You know, just the little things like that.
But you can't help, you know,
you have to think about them.
All of us have such different memories
and associations with them,
but I think that their memories
really are what we would call a blessing for all of us,
and that part of them continues to live on within us.
- (quiet chatter) - (phone ringing)
Reporter 1: I was wondering if you formed any relationship from people
in other cities
who have also gone through mass shootings
- or other similar events. - Parkland has been here
and the church in Charleston, they were here.
And those were really helpful times
that we spent because...
they were, especially Charleston.
It's been five years?
So, they had some time to, um, to heal
and their knowledge is very helpful.
There's a few people from Parkland that I...
It's crazy. When there's a shooting, we text each other
because you only can relate to...
You can relate to each other. You just know that...
You know what each other is feeling.
Reporter 2: Michele, this question is for you. We read a lot
about your brothers that many of us never knew.
If you had the chance to write about your brothers,
and how would you put it into your words?
♪ ♪
(singing in Hebrew fades in)
(singing continues)
Michele Rosenthal: I don't know two people who were happier
living the life that they had.
(singing continues)
They would carry the Torah,
and it meant a lot to them.
It's an honor to do something like that,
but for them, it was a true honor.
And they were so proud of themselves
when they were able to do it.
And then the rabbi had reached out to me
and asked me if I would carry Torah on Yom Kippur,
which was an absolute yes,
because it was to honor Cecil.
But, I have to say, that day...
I thought I was ready, and I wasn't ready.
And it was probably one of the hardest things
because I heard stories from people
where kids from the congregation
who had gone with their parents were like,
"That was Cecil's. That was Cecil's job."
So, it was just really hard and I just,
I reached out to Cecil in my mind and just said,
"Please get me through this."
♪ ♪
Diane Rosenthal: They learned this through all the years,
going to synagogue with Michele
and my grandmother and my parents,
how to daven and how to...
What the order of the service was.
So, they knew it by heart
because they were there every weekend.
So it was just an integral part of their life.
♪ ♪
Eliezer Rosenthal: They would come home on the Sabbath
or holidays and say,
"I opened the ark," or "I carried the Torah."
And I was real proud of doing that.
And you could notice that in the smiles
as he walked around with the Torah,
with the smile on his face.
- I mean, it's an honor. - He came home and said, "Mom and Dad,
are you proud of me?"
And we were very proud, and we told him.
Joy Rosenthal: We did not learn
about their learning disability.
They developed physically good,
until it was time for education,
like kindergarten and first grade.
They had no more learning ability
of that of maybe a 5-, 6-year-old.
But, I raised them
like normal children.
They were, they were...
I think they were given to us
because God felt we could do it.
And I hope we did.
(emotional inhale)
And I think there was a time that God felt...
that it was time for him to take the boys back,
knowing if we had passed before the boys,
how would they have handled it.
And we tried to explain to the boys
if something happens to us, what happens?
♪ ♪
And Cecil's remark was that,
"Father, I don't want you to die."
Well, that sort of cracked me up,
and I dropped the subject.
I was protective of them.
I didn't want them to get hurt by people
because I think I saw what... How society could treat people.
And I think what we found out after this horrific tragedy
is they actually did a pretty good job
of taking care of themselves.
So the protection that we might have tried to give them...
- They were okay. - (soft laugh)
Diane: They knew more people than my sister and I combined.
People came out of the woodwork that knew them. Shop owners,
- waitresses, bus drivers. - Michele: Bus drivers.
- The fire... - Firemen, policemen.
And they knew them by name.
The people that loved David and Cecil...
I guess we probably took it for granted,
and it means so much to us.
I have people all the time that come up and share stories,
and I will not get tired of them.
- (birds chirping) - (car starts)
(car drives away)
- (rattling) - (laughs)
(store chatter)
I love this.
Florist: Okay. Then, I'll take it out? Okay.
And then there's some water in the bottom,
-so just keep it upright. Okay! Thanks! -Customer: Awesome.
Ronna: Cecil was here pretty much every day.
He would open up the front door and say,
"Good afternoon, beautiful ladies."
Katy: He'd always stick his head against the window first though.
You knew he was coming in 'cause he was coming
-and looking in the glass, and I would go, "Mom!
-Cecil's coming here!" And then he'd open the door. -Katy: Yeah.
And then he would say, "What are you doing? Trouble?"
- (laughter) - He would do that.
So did Cecil have an account here?
- Yeah. Yeah, he did. - That never got filled?
It's okay. It doesn't matter. We used to call him the owner.
We used to say, Cecil the owner.
David, too, would come in here. Not near as much as Cecil
because he was always at the fire station
- because that's what he loved. - Yeah.
Michele: It's nice to know that I was obviously
so protective of Cecil and David
because they had special needs,
but they had a whole other family out there
- that took care of them that none of us realized. - Katy: Yeah.
Ronna: I loved him. It's really weird...
- that he's not here. Yeah. - Sorry.
-I try not to get... -Michele: No, you should cry. It's good to cry.
Yeah. It just feels so much better to finally, like...
-(sighs) get it off my chest. Yeah, a little bit, too. Yeah. -Ronna: Exhale?
This actually is what gets us through.
I mean, I was just with my parents,
and it's the beautiful memories
- that keep us going. - Katy: Right.
- Ronna: Definitely. - Katy: That's why I think that...
What do they say in Judaism?
"May his memory be a blessing," because that's what it is.
(birds chirping)
♪ ♪
(stones clicking)
(chirping continues)
♪ ♪
These gardens were created
for my mother, in her memory,
and my sister-in-law initiated it.
And a lot of people sent rose bushes.
Neighbors and family.
And the yellow ones are...
yellow, light-colored ones, are peace roses.
They were sent by cousins. Aren't the yellow ones
- peace roses? Yeah. - Mm-hmm.
This one is mine.
This one I made. I'm not an artist,
but it's the words.
Everybody loved her, and if...
if love alone could have spared her,
she would have lived forever.
♪ ♪
(wind blowing)
(leaves rustling)
(group praying in Hebrew)
(prayer continues)
Anthony: The Chabad Pittsburgh
did something in the days following the tragedy,
which was to ask people within the congregation
and beyond to do 100 mitzvahs,
good deeds, for every victim.
(quiet chatter, laugh)
Say hi? Ozzy says he would've given his dvar Torah had he known.
He would've given an 11-minute dvar Torah.
Anthony: When you think about
what can come of this this sort of situation,
you need to think about the values
for which the victims stood.
The lives that they lived.
So their lives are about the positive part,
and how we can change other people's lives
in a positive manner because that, in particular,
is what our mother would've wanted as a legacy,
and what we're going to do in a positive light about that.
Each one of you gets one.
You can have yours.
Okay? And any one of the mitzvahs...
Let's say you commit to giving refugee help,
which is supposed to be the irony in all this,
because that's why, that was...
- Daughter: We did refugee. - Well, there you go.
Friend: And what's this for? Why are we doing it, Anthony? For who?
For whose memory?
Son: Everyone that died.
Anthony: Right, exactly. So, how many people died that day?
- Eleven. - There you go.
Friend: And then one of them was Anthony's mom.
So, we're doing it for her, okay?
We're doing it in memory of her.
♪ ♪
(bird cawing)
Carol: Since the shooting, I feel
a lot more connected to Judaism,
certainly to my shul family.
And I've gotten very involved, and, um,
I think if my brother is watching at all,
he'd be happy to see
that that's what I'm doing.
♪ ♪
The shooter, I don't even like to...
I don't speak his name. I never speak his name.
I don't like to humanize him.
He took the lives of people,
and for what? What did it accomplish?
It accomplished nothing.
And whatever chance he had at a life,
he just threw it away.
Because he will never see the light of day again.
If they could just keep him in solitary confinement,
and he can spend the rest of his miserable life
thinking about what he did and why he is where he is,
that, to me, is justice
because I actually think executing him is too easy,
and I don't want him to have it easy.
Anthony: I always thought I was against the death penalty.
What sum of money can give financial reparation?
There isn't. In fact,
we would give all the money in the world
to have another day. So...
Not easy to do that. Therefore,
I am part of, along with my brother
and a couple of others in the group,
are supporters of the death penalty in this particular case.
Will that change anything? Absolutely not, except...
to potentially send a message
to those who believe that perpetrating crimes
of this sort, of mass murder
is a way of achieving something
that it doesn't achieve.
♪ ♪
I hope that one day I will have the opportunity
to speak with him.
Um...
I would like to ask him why he did this.
I would like to have the opportunity
to have a glimmer of influence
that if he is inclined to indoctrinate other inmates
to leave the prison and go out
and do similar things that he should not do so.
I don't believe in the death penalty.
I think that we don't have any right
to take another person's life.
(breeze blowing)
Audrey: I don't even view the shooter
as a person,
as a person at all,
let alone one worthy to forgive.
I look forward to maybe getting to that point
because one of the things that I've learned
from all of this is
how many different religions there are in the world
that teach all the same thing.
Love and peace.
You have to reach out to your fellow man.
You have to be gracious. You have to be generous.
You have to share. You have to...
cause peace to happen.
It's an active thing that we have to do.
♪ ♪
(protester screaming indistinctly)
The Torah, the five books of Moses,
is referred to as The Tree of Life
because these are the laws that we've been given.
This is the code of how to live.
If you take the gift that we were given
of this knowledge of how to treat the world,
treat the others, treat all of life...
(indistinct yelling)
...you tend the earth, you share your crops, you...
All of these rules, you know?
If your... if your neighbor's bull
falls into your pit or whatever,
you owe your neighbor. All these rules,
have... they set forth a pattern of life.
(protesters shouting)
♪ ♪
(shofar blowing)
Reporter: WHYY's Peter Crimmins reports
that the Philadelphia Orchestra
has had a composer in residence
for the last two years writing a new piece.
Peter Crimmins: It starts with a shofar.
(shofar blowing)
This is Audrey Glickman, the shofar player.
Audrey: That's what a shofar does. We call people to action.
- She's a member of the Tree of Life Synagogue. - (shofar continues)
That was the site of a mass shooting last October.
And she was asked to come to Philadelphia
and play the shofar with the orchestra.
The piece is called "Healing Tones,"
a new work by Hannibal Lokumbe.
Hannibal Lokumbe: As a human being,
I found it unfortunate to have to write it.
(muffled trumpet)
This once was a service station. This was the office,
and when I was 5 years old,
I came inside the office here
and asked if I could use the bathroom.
And the response was,
"Niggers can't use this bathroom."
That stayed in my heart.
And I said one day,
I'm gonna buy this place,
and the first thing I'm gonna do
is to tear out the bathroom
I was denied usage of.
And this is the door
to the men's bathroom, which was right here.
And so I wrote "Healing Tones" here.
I write all of my music on this piano.
(playing piano)
I pretty much completed the composition
when I heard of the horrible event in Pittsburgh
at the Tree of Life Synagogue.
And I said to the staff,
"We must make a commentary on this.
"If we could, in fact,
get one of the shofar, the instrument..."
So, they called,
and I was in the office,
and all of a sudden, Jeremy broke in, he said,
"Hannibal! Guess what?
"The shofar player is gonna come!
Has agreed to come and play!"
(church bell tolls)
Oh, okay.
(violin warming up)
- (instruments warming up) - (quiet chatter)
Yeah, always.
(echoing thud)
(orchestra warming up)
(applause)
(applause fades out)
(playing shofar)
(orchestra quietly playing)
(operatic singing)
(orchestra playing)
(choir singing)
(choir, orchestra continue)
(fading out)
(Audience Member 1 speaking)
-I want to give you a hug. Thank you. -Okay.
Thank you, thank you!
- It was really great. - It was tremendous.
- We could all feel it. - Yeah, yeah.
And there was a guy about three feet away
sitting on the bench, and he said, "You were...
one of them?" And I said yes.
-Audience Member 2: It was nice meeting you.
- Joe Charny: Yes, okay. Yes. - And you made it much more memorable, too.
Well, thank you. Thank you. I'm glad you liked it.
Audience Member 2: Thanks.
(loud bang, rumbling)
(cars honking)
- (Joe speaking) - Yes.
(Audrey speaking)
Joe: Of course I'm changed by this.
Who wouldn't be?
The vision of the man with the gun facing me
is not as prominent as it was the first week or two.
But, every once in a while,
he shows up.
I'll read you something.
This is from one of my favorite guys.
"To love God truly,
"one must first love all humanity.
"If anyone tells you that they love God
"and do not love others,
"you will know that they are lying.
"What you must do is love your neighbor as yourself.
"There is no one who knows your many faults better than you do,
"but you love yourself anyway.
♪ ♪
"So must you love your neighbors,
no matter how many faults you see in them."
♪ ♪
♪ Hold my hand, I won't let go ♪
♪ This sacred house now echoes ♪
♪ But it's still our home ♪
♪ The light and dark, the glass and slate ♪
♪ With every sun that rises ♪
♪ The shadows fade ♪
♪ Search deep inside you'll find ♪
♪ That hope remains ♪
♪ There's peace that lies beyond ♪
♪ The pain ♪
♪ Place a stone ♪
♪ Beside their names ♪
♪ No soul forgotten ♪
♪ The tears we cry ♪
♪ All sting the same ♪
♪ We all are human ♪
♪ No matter your prayer ♪
♪ There's light for us to share ♪
♪ I'll hold you tight ♪
♪ Beneath a tree of life ♪
♪ Rest your head ♪
♪ Upon my shoulder ♪
♪ The leaves, they give us shelter ♪
♪ We grow strong together ♪
♪ The earth might shake, the winds may blow ♪
♪ But these deep roots will ♪
♪ Keep us standing tall ♪
♪ So just hold on ♪
♪ We'll walk back through those doors ♪
♪ And we'll begin ♪
♪ To fill our home with joy ♪
♪ Again ♪
♪ So raise a candle ♪
♪ In their names ♪
♪ 'Cause we're not broken ♪
♪ Heavy hearts all beat the same ♪
♪ We all are human ♪
♪ No matter your prayer ♪
♪ There's light for us to share ♪
♪ I'll hold you tight ♪
♪ Beneath a tree of life... ♪
♪ Whoa... ♪
(holds note)
(song fades out)