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Arson at Jackson synagogue jolts Institute of Southern Jewish Life, but its mission persists
(JTA) — The arson in December at Beth Israel Congregation didn’t just damage the only synagogue in Jackson, Mississippi. It also threw into disarray the operations of a Jewish nonprofit that aims to serve the entire American South.
The Goldring/Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life is housed at the opposite end of the Beth Israel building from the library where the fire started. Most of its activities take place off site, in the small Jewish communities scattered across the region, and much of its archives had been digitized before the fire.
Still, the arson attack struck an institution that, since its founding in 2000, has linked far-flung congregations across the South and imbued generations of Jewish leaders with an appreciation for Jewish life in a region where community is often small, deeply rooted and hard-won.
“This is sort of the hub of where things happen, so we’re still assessing what is truly lost, what can be repaired, what can’t be,” Michele Schipper, the organization’s CEO, said ahead of the synagogue’s first Shabbat since the attack.
Even as the institute embarks on the long road of repairing its brick-and-mortar headquarters, its core mission of connecting and sustaining Jewish communities across the South remains unchanged.
“It will be important for my communities this winter and spring to be with me, to hear from me about what’s going on,” said Rabbi Salem Pearce, who is officially ISJL’s director of spirituality but unofficially “the traveling rabbi of the South.” She roves from her home in Durham, North Carolina, across 70 congregations throughout a 13-state region that extends from Texas to Florida.
Following the arson attack, Pearce said she believed the communities she serves had taken the attack personally because “they identify strongly, both with the ISJL and with the idea of being vulnerable being a small Jewish community in the South.”
“I always want to ground what I do in Torah and in Jewish tradition, and I think that both of those things have a lot to say about the power of community and resilience and being together and survival,” said Pearce.
For years, the institute also placed early-career Jewish educators in Southern communities through its flagship fellowship program. The program ended in 2022, but the network of dozens of former fellows scattered across the country say their work supporting Jewish life in the South left lasting impressions on their own Jewish identities.
Rabbi Lex Rofeberg, an ISJL fellow from 2013 to 2015, was attending a gathering of clergy from the Jewish Renewal movement in Boulder, Colorado, when he first heard the news of the arson.
“I felt in my body like a deep pain, and I immediately flashed to the incredible experiences I had as part of that synagogue community,” said Rofeberg.
He wasn’t the only one at the conference to feel that way. “I was with people that had a shared connection to the space and who I had met through this incredible community, and I thought all that was helpful,” he said. “So it was heartbreaking, and it was meaningful to see in that space a couple hundred people looking to be supportive of this community.”
Molly Levy, ISJL’s director of education, said one of the reasons why the institute shifted away from the fellowship program was that the communities were so strong that they needed more than temporary fellows could provide.
“They’ve all used the curriculum, they’re very familiar with it, and they want to do things that are more experiential, and looking at making their schools fit the students that they have today, as well as having these big conversations around antisemitism, around safety, making sure that their students feel safe,” Levy said.
The communities in the network also bond with each other. For Beth Israel Congregation’s first Shabbat service following the arson attack, the congregation used a Torah borrowed from Temple B’nai Israel, located about 90 miles southeast along Route 49.
“We’re just down the road in Hattiesburg. So people immediately wanted to know, OK, how can we help?” said Rabbi Debra Kassoff of Temple B’nai Israel, who became the ISJL’s first director of rabbinic services in 2003.
During her stint as the ISJL’s resident rabbi, Kassoff traveled across the region to offer rabbinic services to congregations.
“It was an honor, it was fascinating and overwhelming,” said Kassoff. “When I first came here I felt really embraced, people seemed excited to have me, and were glad that I was wanting to be there and be a part of this kind of corner of the American Jewish landscape that is so often overlooked.
In the wake of the attack, rabbis from several Southern congregations quickly voiced their dismay and solidarity with the institute.
Rabbi Jeremy Simons, a former director of the rabbinic department at the ISJL and incoming rabbi of Congregation Beth Israel in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California, recalled his time in Jackson in a post on Facebook and appealed to his followers to donate to the synagogue’s recovery fund.
“While I have plenty of fond memories in that building and in that library, there are so many who call Beth Israel their spiritual home and are feeling a pain neither you or I will ever know (God willing),” wrote Simmons. “I know you don’t have to have spent time in that building, or even know of its existence, to be shaken by this news. I try to remind myself they can destroy our buildings, but they can never destroy our faith. If anything it will only strengthen it.”
Rabbi Raina Siroty of Temple Beth-El in Knoxville, Tennessee, wrote in a post on Facebook that the ISJL had “connected and strengthened Jewish communities from Texas to the Florida Panhandle,” adding that “Southern Jewish communities are woven deeply into the fabric of their cities. They deserve to worship without fear.”
Rabbi Jason Holtz of Temple Kehillat Chaim in Roswell, Georgia, wrote in another post that he had attended the ISJL’s conference within a few weeks of moving to Georgia.
“I remember leaving with a sense of enthusiasm but also amazement at the wonderful people that provide such resources and leadership for Jewish communities all over the South,” he wrote. “When people think of Jewish life, places like Jackson probably don’t immediately come to mind. But Jews all over the South, my congregation included, have benefited so much from the tireless and dedicated people who call Jackson home.”
Schipper said many past fellows and staff of the ISJL had also shared messages of support.
“There’s such powerful messages that they are sharing and remembrances of their time here in Jackson and at Beth Israel, because for many, this was their first non-parent home synagogue,” she said. “I’m overwhelmed in the best possible way of the outpouring of support from the local community to the Jewish community worldwide. It really makes me proud to be Jewish.”
Rofeberg said his two years at the ISJL, which included hosting a “Purim-gras,” or a Mardi Gras-Purim combo at a Louisiana synagogue, were “pivotal” in setting him on a path to seek rabbinic ordination.
“I think I went down thinking I was doing this grand service as somebody who had learned in college about Judaism,” said Rofeberg. “And I really quickly learned how wrong that was, and how so many of these communities I was visiting and the community I was living in had way more to teach me than I had to teach them.”
Megan Roberts Koller, an ISJL fellow from 2007 to 2009 who grew up in Knoxville, Tennessee, said her time with the institute deepened her own understanding of her identity as a Jew in the South.
“I think being in an environment with lots of different types of people helped me realize how special the Southern Jewish experience was,” she said. “It was interesting to be part of something so new and something so different.”
Roberts Koller recalled the fellows going on trips to the Neshoba County Fair and local blues concerts to experience a “slice of life” of Mississippi.
“Especially over the summers, when we were traveling less and we were onboarding new people, there was quite a push to have us experience that authentic Mississippi summer and help people feel both out of their comfort zone and comfortable in Mississippi,” she said.
While Roberts Koller, who lives in Nashville, Tennessee, no longer works in Jewish communal life, she said her experiences at the ISJL had inspired her to continue pursuing Jewish involvement in her own community.
“The experience of working for the Institute of Southern Jewish life and seeing congregational life all across the South and cities large and small, I think, really made an impact and made it a priority to be part of a congregation here in Nashville,” she said.
In recent years, Levy said the ISJL had created a “catalogue” of lessons about Jewish pride and information on teaching students about antisemitism.
Currently, the ISJL’s antisemitism curriculum begins in the eighth grade, but Levy said she was working on starting antisemitism education in the earlier grades.
“When I go into a community, I usually meet with the teens, and will usually have conversations on being the only Jewish kid in your school or being a small population of Jewish kids in your school,” said Levy. “When I ask, ‘Have you heard something antisemitic, or have you had an incident in your school?’ It’s very rare when someone doesn’t raise their hand.”
Looking ahead, Schipper said the institute’s focus will be on building on a firm foundation, not just in its physical space but in the messages it delivers across the South.
“If you look at our curriculum, it already had information on how to be a proud Jew,” said Schipper. “So I think, can we strengthen that message? Can we let people know a little bit more about what we are doing, so that they’re well aware that this organization is providing support to these communities in so many ways.”
For Levy, the aftermath of the attack has underscored the strength of the organization’s broad spanning community.
“It’s only shown us how incredibly powerful our network and how incredibly important these connections are, just because of all of the outpouring of love and support that’s come from our other ISJL communities and how much they want to support Beth Israel,” she said. “It’s been really hard and really sad and really challenging, and we were incredibly ready to activate our network and activate the support that we needed to give.”
Schipper said she could see an upside to the bleak circumstances that brought national attention to her work this year.
“This is not how I would love more publicity,” she said, referring to the arson. “But if somebody else learns about who we are and what we do and goes, ‘Oh my gosh, my cousin’s in Kentucky, and they could really use your resources,’ then great.”
The post Arson at Jackson synagogue jolts Institute of Southern Jewish Life, but its mission persists appeared first on The Forward.
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Holocaust Remembrance Day Marked in Poland, Germany Amid Nazi Displays, Rising Antisemitism
Participants with Israeli flags look at the landmark Birkenau extermination camp gate in Auschwitz Museum – former Nazi German Concentration Camp during the International March of the Living (MOTL) in Oswiencim, Poland on April 14, 2026. Photo by Dominika Zarzycka/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
Eighty-one years after the Holocaust, antisemitism remains rampant in the heart of the former Third Reich, with incidents in both Poland and Germany underscoring a disturbing resurgence of Nazi-linked provocation and hatred across Europe — even as Jews and Israelis around the world marked Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day on Tuesday.
Polish far-right lawmaker Konrad Berkowicz sparked outrage in Warsaw after displaying a modified Israeli flag during a parliamentary debate, replacing the Star of David with a Nazi swastika.
Berkowicz’s act was widely condemned as a deeply troubling distortion of Holocaust memory and a provocative example of “Holocaust inversion,” weaponizing Nazi imagery to target Israel in a manner that promotes hateful rhetoric.
The European Jewish Congress (EJC) strongly condemned the incident, calling on government officials to take swift and decisive action to address the matter, deter similar acts, and uphold public accountability.
“This act constitutes a clear example of Holocaust inversion, distorting the memory of the Shoah, and trivializing its victims,” EJC wrote in a post on X, using the Hebrew word for referring to the Holocaust.
“The use of Nazi symbols in this context is not only offensive, but represents a serious form of antisemitic provocation, particularly on a day dedicated to remembrance,” the statement read. “Preserving the integrity of Holocaust remembrance and ensuring that antisemitism is not tolerated in public institutions is essential.”
Polish MP Konrad Berkowicz displayed an Israeli flag bearing a swastika during a parliamentary debate in Warsaw on Holocaust Remembrance Day.
This act constitutes a clear example of Holocaust inversion, distorting the memory of the Shoah and trivialising its victims.
The use of… pic.twitter.com/zeyRN5yG6T
— European Jewish Congress (@eurojewcong) April 14, 2026
The latest antisemitic incident came as Holocaust survivors from around the world joined thousands of participants in the 38th March of the Living, held at the site of the Auschwitz concentration camp in remembrance of the 6 million Jews murdered by Nazi Germany during World War II. The annual march goes from Auschwitz I to Auschwitz II-Birkenau, the Nazis’ largest death camp where 1 million Jews were killed.
During a ceremony, Revital Yakin Krakovsky, deputy chief executive of the International March of the Living organization, warned that antisemitism continues to endure today despite the lessons of the Holocaust, stressing that its warning signs are once again becoming impossible to ignore.
“Since Oct. 7, antisemitism has surged and is spreading everywhere,” Krakovsky said, referring to the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. “The scale and normalization of this hatred echoes the dark times we have seen before and, today of all days, we know how it ended.”
Like most countries across Europe and the broader Western world, Poland has seen a rise in antisemitic incidents over the last two years, in the wake of the Oct. 7 atrocities.
Germany has also experienced a marked surge in antisemitism, with Jewish communities and Israelis facing an increasingly hostile climate and a growing number of disturbing public provocations.
On Tuesday, workers at the Eggenfelden tax office in Bavaria, southern Germany, discovered a structure over a meter high on the premises, allegedly designed to resemble a crematorium and adorned with a swastika and SS runes. The structure also had the inscription “Zyklon B,” the pesticide used by the Nazis to carry out the mass murder of Jews in gas chambers at Auschwitz.
This latest incident coame just three weeks after a replica of the Auschwitz concentration camp gate, also covered in swastikas, was placed in front of the same tax office.
Eggenfelden’s mayor, Martin Biber, strongly condemned the incident, calling it a deeply disturbing provocation that has shocked the community.
“This shocks me. It’s also a huge disappointment that someone here is so cowardly. Quite apart from the fact that an object that is presumably meant to resemble a crematorium represents a horrific act,” Biber told the German newspaper BILD.
Local law enforcement has launched an investigation into the incident, treating it as a serious suspected extremist provocation.
The incident coincided with a commemoration held by the Israeli Embassy in Germany for the six million Jewish victims of the Nazis at the Sachsenhausen Memorial in Oranienburg, in eastern Germany.
During the ceremony, Israeli Ambassador Ron Prosor called for the resolute protection of Jewish life, warning that “antisemitism is not a relic of the past but remains visible and on the rise.”
He also emphasized that confronting the spread of terror by Iran is not solely Israel’s responsibility, warning of its expanding global reach and ideological influence.
“The mullahs are already part of the war in Europe. Their drones are falling in Ukraine. Their networks operate across continents – and their deadly ideology is spreading faster than any missile,” the Israeli diplomat said.
“Once again, Israel is on the front line. But the free world, especially Germany and Europe, has not only the responsibility, but the duty to confront this deadly ideology that threatens Europe from within,” he continued.
Andreas Büttner, the Brandenburg commissioner against Antisemitism, was also in attendance at the ceremony, where he reaffirmed the urgent need to confront and counter rising antisemitism.
“Antisemitism is not a shadow of the past. It is an open fire burning among us. And this fire is being stoked from various sides – by the extreme right, by the extreme left, and by those who disguise their hatred of Israel as moral concern,” the German official said.
According to newly released figures, the number of antisemitic offenses in the country reached a record high in 2025, totaling 2,267 incidents, including violence, incitement, property damage, and propaganda offenses.
By comparison, officially recorded antisemitic crimes were significantly lower at 1,825 in 2024, 900 in 2023, and fewer than 500 in 2022, prior to the Oct. 7 atrocities.
Officials warn that the real number of antisemitic crimes is likely much higher, as many incidents go unreported.
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Mossad Chief Says Iran Campaign ‘Will Only Be Complete When This Extremist Regime Is Replaced’
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, left, with Mossad chief David Barnea in July 2025. Photo: Israeli Government Press Office (GPO)
The head of Israel’s intelligence agency Mossad declared on Tuesday that the Israeli military campaign against Iran will end only with the collapse of the Islamist regime in Tehran.
David Barnea’s comments during a speech at a Holocaust Memorial Day ceremony came as a fragile ceasefire teetered on the brink of collapse and prospects for renewed negotiations remained uncertain.
Israel secured “significant achievements” after 40 days of intense fighting against “those who have made the destruction of the Jewish state their guiding principle,” said Barnea, who noted that the campaign had reshaped the regional security landscape.
“The Iranian threat grew stronger before our eyes, before the eyes of the world, almost without interruption,” he continued. “We repeatedly warned of the nuclear danger as an existential threat, and time and again we warned about the quantities of ballistic missiles that threaten Israeli citizens across the country, as well as the danger posed to us by the Iranian regime.”
Barnea said that Israel and its close ally the US took matters into their own hands for the good of the entire world and warned that, at least for Jerusalem, the mission isn’t done until the Iranian regime collapses.
“Finally, we took our fate into our own hands and entered two wars out of necessity. Alongside us, in firm alliance and historic cooperation with the world’s most powerful nation, we fought together for the values of justice and freedom,” the Israeli official continued. “Our commitment will only be complete when this extremist regime is replaced.”
Since Feb. 28, when the US and Israel launched joint strikes, Israeli officials have repeatedly said that, in addition to degrading Iran’s nuclear and missile programs, they aim to “create the conditions” for the regime in Iran to collapse, weakening the government to the point that the Iranian people can revolt.
US officials have not publicly adopted regime change as a declared war goal. However, President Donald Trump has at times suggested that Iranians should rise up once the airstrike campaign ends.
During Tuesday’s ceremony, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz also delivered a speech, saying that the US and Israel had “defined the removal of enriched material from Iran as a threshold condition for ending the campaign.”
“Iran’s regional proxies — from the collapsed Syrian regime to Hezbollah and Hamas — have been dealt heavy blows and have lost their capacity to pose a strategic threat to Israel,” Katz said. “There remains the task of confronting the rest of their power, and we are doing so — and will continue to do so — with full commitment and full force.”
On Monday, Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir approved plans to escalate the military campaign against Iran and advance expanded operational planning across multiple arenas in the region if the ceasefire ends, signaling continued pressure on Tehran’s military and strategic infrastructure.
“We are facing a multi-theater campaign unprecedented in the history of our people and of nations — against both immediate enemies on our borders and distant adversaries seeking our destruction,” Zamir said. “We are striking Iran and its proxies, inflicting heavy blows and significantly degrading their military capabilities.”
With the ceasefire deadline approaching in a week and regional tensions escalating, Trump said the White House has received a request from “the appropriate parties” to resume talks, adding that the Iranian regime is seeking to renew negotiations and reach an agreement.
“Iran will not have nuclear weapons. We agreed on a lot of things, but they did not agree to that. And I think they will agree to that. I am sure of it. If they do not agree – there will be no agreement,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social.
According to The New York Times, US officials have proposed a 20-year halt to Iranian uranium enrichment, which Iranian negotiators countered with a five-year suspension that Washington rejected, while also reportedly insisting that Iran dismantle major enrichment sites and surrender more than 400 kilograms of highly enriched uranium.
Meanwhile, Pakistan has offered to host another round of US–Iran negotiations in Islamabad in the coming days before the ceasefire expires, as diplomatic efforts intensify to prevent a renewed escalation.
The Trump administration has also stepped up pressure on Tehran to accept its demands by imposing a naval blockade on vessels entering or leaving Iranian ports through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical global shipping chokepoint for energy supplies.
Since the start of the war, Iran has used control over the Strait of Hormuz as a major source of leverage, militarizing the waterway and sharply restricting maritime traffic through one of the world’s most critical shipping corridors.
Iranian officials warned they would retaliate against any US naval blockade targeting their ports, calling the move illegal and warning that Gulf shipping routes would no longer remain secure if Iranian access were restricted.
Responding to Iranian threats in a post on Truth Social, Trump said, “If one of these boats approaches the blockade, it will be eliminated immediately, using the same elimination method that we use against drug smugglers at sea. It will be fast and brutal.”
Iran has also signaled it intends to maintain control over the Strait of Hormuz even after the war ends, potentially imposing transit fees framed as compensation for wartime damage.
Following the latest escalation at sea, Israel had instructed its forces to maintain a high level of alert and prepare for the possibility of an immediate collapse of the ceasefire agreement, remaining on heightened readiness in case the truce breaks down and talks do not resume.
Israeli officials have said they do not rule out that Iran may be using the ceasefire to rebuild damaged air defense systems and restore military capabilities, while also attempting to bring weapons and sensitive technologies back into the country through overland smuggling routes.
Meanwhile, Iran appears to still be targeting Gulf states despite the ceasefire, with Bahrain intercepting seven Iranian drones in the past 24 hours in what officials described as a clear breach of the agreement.
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Smith College Trustees to Vote on Anti-Israel Divestment Measure
The campus of Smith College in April 2024. Photo: Instagram/Screenshot
Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts is the site of the latest clash between anti-Zionists and administrators over institutional ties to Israel, as its trustees will vote on Thursday on a divestment measure proposed by the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) organization.
Brimming with falsehoods, the proposal distinguishes itself from similar ones put forth at other colleges by accusing Israel of the crime of “femi-genocide,” which SJP describes as “sexual and reproductive violence” and mass murder perpetrated against Palestinian women and girls. The measure continues a pattern of depicting Israel, the most progressive country in the Middle East, as a foe of left-wing causes and an enemy of liberalism.
“The deliberate and disproportionate targeting of women represents an egregious practice of radicalized gender violence intended, in large part, to prevent the reproduction of a population marked for extermination,” SJP charged in the document, submitted in November. “This is a tactic common to settler colonialist projects and a grave injustice affecting women globally.”
Calling on Smith to withdraw investments in armaments manufacturers, SJP went on to describe divestment from Israel as a prelude to divesting from fossil fuels, a subtle but common tactic in which far-left groups place Jews and Zionists at the center of an array of alleged conflicts and social maladies.
“Militarism and the use of explosive weaponry has a devastating impact on our climate: military carbon emissions from the ongoing occupation and genocide of Palestinians exceeds that of several countries combined,” the proposal continued. “We face interconnected human rights crises at home and abroad that jeopardize our immigrant and international students, faculty, staff, and community members. Broader patterns of forced displacement are inseparable from climate change, and are fueled by a longer history of neoliberalization, securitization, and colonization.”
The divestment proposal draws on the principles of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement. Formally launched in 2005, the BDS campaign opposes Zionism — a movement supporting the Jewish people’s right to self-determination — and rejects Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish nation-state. It seeks to isolate the country comprehensively with economic, political, and cultural boycotts as the first step towards its eventual elimination.
Smith College has not responded to The Algemeiner’s request for comment about the upcoming vote.
SJP has historically escalated its pressure tactics in the event that procedure fails to translate its demands into policy. Following Smith College’s rejection of divestment from Israel in spring 2024, dozens of SJP affiliated students occupied the College Hall administrative building for two weeks. The incident led to a face-to-face confrontation with Smith president Sarah Willie-LeBreton in which the students shouted over Willie-LeBreton as she attempted to negotiate with them, prompting her to say, “Screaming at me every time I talk does not show me respect; it does not begin to show me the respect I am showing you.”
Adopting divestment proposals dictated by anti-Zionist groups is a recipe for squandering tens of billions of dollars in endowment returns, according to a report published in September 2024 by the JLens investment network, an arm of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL).
Titled “The Impact of Israel Divestment on Equity Portfolios: Forecasting BDS’s Financial Toll on University Endowments,” the report said BDS would incinerate $33.21 billion of future returns for the 100 largest university endowments over the next 10 years, with Harvard University losing $2.5 billion and the University of Texas losing $2.2 billion. Other schools would forfeit over $1 billion in growth, including the University of Pennsylvania, Stanford University, and Princeton University. For others, such as the University of Michigan and Dartmouth College, the damages would total in the hundreds of millions.
Citing fiduciary concerns, virtually all colleges asked to adopt BDS have turned it down.
In March 2025, Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine did so when its Board of Trustees voted to accept the counsel of a committee that recommended maintaining investment practices which safeguard the institution’s financial health and educational mission. In a report authored by the college’s Ad Hoc Committee on Investments and Responsibility, it said, “Interventions in the management of the endowment that are rooted in moral or political considerations should be exceedingly rare and restricted to those cases where there is near-universal consensus among Bowdoin’s community of stakeholders.”
Boston University rejected divestment the previous month, with its president, Melissa Gilliam, saying, “The endowment is no longer the vehicle for political debate; nevertheless, I will continue to seek ways that members of our community can engage with each other on political issues of our day including the conflict in the Middle East.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.