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Passover at Rikers Island: How the notorious jail complex holds a seder for Jewish inmates
(New York Jewish Week) — Miriam Tohill, a Jewish chaplain intern at Rikers Island, is looking forward to co-leading Passover seders for Jewish inmates this year for the first time. But conditions at the New York City jail complex are not ideal.
For the seders, held on the first and second nights of the holiday, some 70 to 100 inmates will be bussed from different parts of the island complex to a gymnasium that “feels like a high school gym,” said Tohill, 32, who uses the pronouns “she” and “they.” Sending participants to hunt for the afikoman, a hidden piece of matzah, is “discouraged,” she added, “for obvious reasons.”
The seder tradition of putting pillows on the room’s flimsy folding chairs, they said, is likewise prohibited. And while the door of the gym, rather than a door to the outside, will be opened for Elijah the prophet, they said, “the symbolism is obviously muted.”
Beyond that, Tohill added, it may be a challenge to create a festive mood. Corrections officers will be sitting on bleachers at the side of the room, which has a “squeaky floor, very tall ceiling, [and] terrible acoustics.”
Nonetheless, Tohill expects the seders at Rikers to be filled with meaning. She and others who work with Jewish inmates at the jail say that the holiday — which celebrates the ancient Jewish exodus from slavery to freedom — takes on a different resonance when celebrated by people currently behind bars.
“It’s both easier and harder to talk about slavery, freedom and hope when you’re incarcerated, but we’re all hoping for freedom and rehabilitation and growth in the future,” said Rabbi Gabriel Kretzmer Seed, Rikers’ Jewish chaplain. “People had beautiful insights about what freedom means to them, especially talking about how they feel free even when they’re incarcerated. I was very inspired by that.”
Seed, who received ordination from Yeshivat Chovevei Torah, the liberal Orthodox seminary in the Bronx, began working as a chaplain at Rikers in 2018. The jail has been criticized for harsh conditions, which include evidence of inmates caged in tiny showers and sleeping on floors next to a pile of excrement. The complex has also been the site of suicides, beatings and more. Nineteen people died at Rikers in 2022 — the jail’s highest death rate since 2013, and the city is required by law to close it by 2027, though whether that will be possible is unclear.
Seed said that while Rikers can be a volatile and intense environment, it has also given him a sense of gratitude, highlighting the Jewish concept of teshuva, or repentance, and the idea that everyone deserves a second chance. Seed said Rikers’ Jewish inmates come from a range of religious backgrounds, from haredi Orthodox people educated in yeshivas to others who decided to explore their Judaism once they were incarcerated. He holds weekly services at the jail that draw up to 12 attendees; this week’s teachings discussed the concepts of freedom and slavery as a precursor to the seders.
“I’m kind of buoyed by those values,” Seed said, referring to teshuva. “When I’m having a rough day, I leave my office, go to a housing area, and people are just so grateful for even a few visits, a few minutes when I step into their housing area, or when I get to teach and engage with people, and that just lifts me up and reminds me why I do this work.”
Year round, Rikers Island offers kosher food, which is provided by the city. Seed and Department of Corrections officials would not provide specifics on where the food comes from, saying only that it comes from “different caterers.” And matzah isn’t only available on Passover: Jewish inmates eat the unleavened bread year-round at Rikers because it is a kosher food option that is easily available.
There are Orthodox volunteer groups that help bring kosher food into the jail, including members of L’asurim, a nonprofit that supports prisoners, and the Lubavitch Youth Organization, a branch of the Chabad Hasidic movement.
Rabbi Shmuel Tevel, who is active in the Lubavitch group, told the New York Jewish Week that he visits Jewish inmates regularly at Rikers and other prisons across the state. “For an inmate sitting in a prison cell in those darkest moments, in a state where they feel they’re at the end of their rope, they need to tie a knot and hang on,” he said. “That’s what we give them.”
The Lubavitch Youth Organization outside of Rikers Island doing outreach work during Purim. (Courtesy)
Ahead of Passover, his group is delivering 40 pounds of matzah, along with grape juice, haroset and vacuum-packed seder plates to some cells whose inmates won’t be allowed to attend the seder.
Zalman Tevel, Shmuel’s brother, who runs the group’s volunteer initiative at Rikers, told the New York Jewish Week that he spoke to a guard after visiting inmates during the holiday of Purim last month, and the guard told him the inmates were “in a better state.”
“They are closer to God,” he said. “It leaves a very good impact.”
Tohill described her work on Rikers, which includes working with inmates in other ways, in similar terms. Tohill said the work allows her to provide Jewish teachings in “a place that has so little space for joy, or God.” She compared the seder at Rikers to the tabernacle that the ancient Israelites built in the desert.
“We put all this care into it, knowing that it’s temporary, and we’re going to take it down again,” Tohill said. “We are in the wilderness and desperately need a place to meet Hashem. It is so temporary and imperfect, but that makes it even more worth putting the time into.”
For Tohill, co-leading the seders is part of their master’s project at the Union Theological Seminary, a traditionally Protestant seminary in Manhattan that now focuses on “training people of all faiths and none who are called to the work of social justice in the world.” Tohill’s project explores the meaning of Passover for oppressed people.
“I was in a position to ask, what does this Seder do for us spiritually, emotionally, communally?” Tohill said. “What does it promise to us if we have no access to freedom for people who are incarcerated? That became a big question for me, a theological question about what does this ritual do and how do we as Jews think about liberation?”
Tohill, who lives in the uptown Manhattan neighborhood of Washington Heights, said that some of the inmates have written about their personal stories and will share how they relate to Passover at the seder.
“We have congregants who have written poems about what sense they make of the Exodus story or of the four cups of wine,” Tohill said, referencing a central ritual of the seder. “We have congregants who have done drawings about their family that, to them, feel related to the Passover story in different ways.”
Requests to speak to an inmate planning to attend a seder, or to see inmates’ drawings or writings, were denied by the Department of Corrections.
Tohill called Rikers “a broken system” and said celebrating Passover feels particularly urgent there. They compared Rikers Island to “a floating trash heap in the middle of the ocean that we don’t want anyone to notice.”
“Passover is an opportunity to notice and ask who is being made invisible,” Tohill said. “The rest of the people in New York City who are not directly impacted by the prison industrial complex get to pretend it’s not happening. I would like to ask that, this Pesach, people take the opportunity to stop pretending.”
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Shabbat HaGadol and the Story of Elijah
A Torah scroll. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
“Behold I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great awesome Day of God, and he will reconcile fathers to children and children to fathers” (Malachi 3:24).
This is part of the Haftorah for Shabbat HaGadol, the Shabbat before Pesach. But who exactly was Elijah? It is true that in terms of stature and his place in our tradition, he was the greatest of the prophets, even if no book is attributed to him. His public victory over the prophets of Baal during the reign of Ahab and Jezebel was his most famous triumph. But just as significant was the Chariot of Fire that took him up to Heaven when he died, which became the symbol of mysticism with which he was always associated.
In the Talmud, Elijah figures prominently in the debates about messianism and whether he was to be the messiah, or the pathfinder and precursor. Eventually, it was settled that Elijah would pave the way for a messianic era and instruct us what to do and what parts of our tradition would be revived or survive when it came about.
In the Talmud, there are many episodes in which Elijah is said to appear to rabbis and guide them, and he is associated with solving unresolved halachic issues.
Elijah has multiple associations with Pesach. The most obvious being when towards the end of the Seder, we dedicate the fifth cup of wine to Elijah, and we invoke his presence in asking God to remove our enemies.
Why is this fifth cup specifically Eliyahu’s?
Explanations range from the rational to the mystical. According to Maimonides, the coming of the messiah is a time in which oppression and hatred are removed, and we are free to explore our spiritual lives unimpeded. That’s the mystical.
Practically, there is a debate about if we should drink four or five cups of wine at the Seder. Those who advocate for four cups say it is done for the four terms used in the Torah to describe the process that gave us our freedom from slavery — “I freed you, I saved you, I redeemed you, I took you out.” But others believe “I brought you” counts as a fifth.
Are there four or five words, and should there be four or five cups?
The debate is left unanswered. Although we are obliged to have four cups of wine, we add an extra one just in case — and our tradition happened to dedicate that one to Elijah.
This year we have much to be sad about. So many beautiful young and not-so-young lives have been killed by our enemies. So many more lives have been injured or ruined. And yet there have been so many examples of deliverance, self-sacrifice, and heroism.
Is this the year the messiah will come? We can hope. But in the meantime, we have to do our best to reconcile and heal the chasms amongst us, and to come together to go forward united with pride and joy. Thank you, Eliyahu.
The author is a writer and rabbi based in New York.
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Unreported: Palestinian Authority Brags It Killed More Jews in Second Intifada Than Hamas
Palestinians, including children, celebrating the Second Intifada. Photo: Screenshot.
The Palestinian Authority Security Forces (PASF) had the largest number of terrorists in the Second Intifada, boasted a senior PA official.
PA Tulkarem District Governor Abdallah Kmeil bragged how the number of PASF members killed fighting Israel far exceeded the number killed by other terror organizations combined during the PA-led terror campaign of 2000-2005:
“Tulkarem District Governor Abdallah Kmeil: Let’s speak in a scientific language, in the language of numbers, which is the strongest language. There were 2,089 Martyrs from the [PA] Security Forces in the second Intifada … The Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades of Fatah had 632 Martyrs, the Al-Quds Brigades of the [Islamic] Jihad had 415 Martyrs, and the [Izz A-Din] Al-Qassam Brigades of Hamas had 378 Martyrs.”
[Tulkarem Governorate, Facebook page, Feb. 13, 2026]
By comparing PASF casualties to those of recognized terror groups, Kmeil showed that the PA Security Forces — who were trained and funded by the West to fight terror — were actually the leaders of Palestinian terror.
The Second Intifada was the PA-directed and controlled terror campaign, during which Palestinians carried out thousands of terror attacks, including suicide bombings on buses, in shopping malls, and on main streets, murdering more than 1,100 Israelis.
Last year, PA TV aired an interview with a PASF member jailed by Israel for terror offenses during the Second Intifada, who explained that the PASF “responded to this call” — to join the terror organizations in fighting Israel:
Released PA Security Forces terrorist prisoner Naji Arar: “I was a member of the Security Forces, of the security establishment. When we responded to the call of the homeland – we responded to this call through the Security Forces.
Do you remember the Al-Aqsa Intifada? The ones who resisted there were the Security Forces members, of course, in cooperation with our people and the factions.
I was arrested in Ramallah and sentenced to 18 years… It was shocking. But for Palestine, everything is insignificant. We were released… and met the security establishment through which we launched [our activity back then]. It welcomed us.”
[Official PA TV, Giants of Endurance, May 30, 2025 and Sept. 20, 2025]
Most importantly, the PASF leadership role in terror continues today unabated, as exposed in the June 2025 report by Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) titled “Terrorists in Uniform.”
In 2023, after calling the killing of 12 Israelis that year “acts of resistance,” Fatah-run Adwah TV reported that “the members of Fatah and the Security Forces form the core and the arms of the resistance [i.e., terror] groups in the West Bank, together with the other Palestinian factions.”
PMW has likewise documented Fatah honoring dead PASF members who were terrorists killed while attacking Israelis.
Therefore, Kmeil’s words were surely no slip of the tongue. They were a public expression of what the PA and Fatah know: that PA Security Forces members take a leading role in Palestinian terror, a role that is a source of pride, to be celebrated.
This is all the more reason why any talk of parts of Gaza being handed over to the PASF to police the Strip is misguided and unacceptable, since it would be simply replacing one terror group, Hamas, with another — PA Security Forces.
Itamar Marcus is the Founder and Director of Palestinian Media Watch (PMW). Ahron Shapiro is a contributor to PMW, where a version of this article first appeared.
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Three Months Into His Term, Mamdani’s Radicalism Rages
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani delivers a speech during his inauguration ceremony in New York City, US, Jan. 1, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Kylie Cooper
This year’s news cycle is evolving at an unprecedented pace, making mere months feel like a lifetime in today’s political environment.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani will soon hit 90 days in office, and the young politician has managed to fill his short time as leader of one of America’s most important cities with a litany of policies and positions that would make any anti-Israel Democratic Socialist proud.
Many left-leaning Jewish voters who cast their vote for Mamdani, believing that the ambitious, inexperienced mayor would be far too consumed with learning to manage the largest municipal budget in the country to indulge his anti-Zionist objectives, are now facing the consequences of their electoral choices.
Within minutes of taking office, the new mayor got to work signing several executive orders that removed critical protections for Jews, including revoking New York City’s adoption of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism.
A surge in antisemitic attacks soon took hold, with hate crimes against Jews increasing 182 percent during Mamdani’s first month in office compared to the same period from the previous year. It’s hard to believe there is not some correlation between the two.
Mamdani displays no signs of retreating from his radicalism. On the contrary, he appears to be hardening his ideological, anti-Israel fixations, while using his platform to demonize the Jewish State.
It comes as no shock that the mayor — who refuses to condemn the slogan “Globalize the Intifada,” a rallying cry calling for the murder of Jews — is stacking his administration with leading anti-American figures, including appointing Ramzi Kassem, a lawyer who defended an Al-Qaeda terrorist and anti-Israel Columbia grad, Mahmoud Khalil, as Chief Counsel.
It’s also worth noting that Mamdani’s first three months as mayor coincided with the Islamic holiday of Ramadan.
The city’s first Muslim mayor could have used the nearly month-long observance period to promote interfaith dialogue or to channel the list of NYC functions commemorating Ramadan towards attaining his lofty promise to represent “all New Yorkers.”
Mamdani set the problematic tenor when he began Ramadan by being feted at an area mosque alongside Abudllah Akl, Political Director of the Muslim American Society of New York, who once called on Hamas to strike Tel Aviv, yet was granted the distinction of introducing Mamdani earlier this month.
Days after deliberately stoking confusion by refusing to denounce Islamic terrorism after two Muslims attempted to carry out a terror plot in front of Gracie Mansion on March 7, the mayor and his equally (and proudly) anti-Israel wife, Rama Duwaji, hosted Mahmoud Khalil and his spouse for an Iftar meal.
The released photo of the foursome dining together was appropriately dark, and accurately captured the unsettling moment in which Jewish New Yorkers now find themselves.
While Mamdani’s mayoral reign is still in its infancy, it’s clear that his Islamic roots (including a father who notoriously hates the Jewish State) and his animosity for Israel will blanket much of his rhetoric and decision-making.
Jewish New Yorkers are not only reckoning with a mayor whose destructive agenda fails to dent his popularity, but the city’s Jews must also accept the fact that Mamdani’s radical ideology gained purchase with neighbors, coworkers, and friends who ultimately comprised the mosaic of the nearly 50 percent of voters who propelled him to victory.
The Democratic Party’s energy now lies with its antisemitic activist base, as more liberal politicians, once considered so-called “moderates,” publicly flex their anti-Israel bona fides.
Eyeing the dynamic unfolding in New York City, several 2028 Democratic Presidential hopefuls are distancing themselves from previously held positions supporting Israel’s right to exist and praising its pluralistic society.
Having traveled to Israel shortly after the October 7, 2023, terrorist attacks in an act of solidarity, California Governor Gavin Newsom recently stated that he has never taken money from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and, drawing inspiration from Mamdani, likened Israel to an “apartheid state.” Newsom has since walked those comments back, but it’s clear in what direction he — and the party — are heading.
Newsom is no outlier in his lurch to the anti-Israel left, and pro-Israel Democrats seeking to engage constructively with politicians once thought to be their ideological allies may soon find that they have no pivotal part to play in a party once thought to be their political home.
Mamdani was always transparent about his disdain for Israel.
No longer restrained by the campaign guardrails, the mayor has grown bolder in his statements and actions.
Whether it’s breaking bread with activists who openly celebrate the slaughter of Jews or creating antisemitic spaces within government-run entities, Mamdani’s anti-Jewish agenda has only been strengthened over the last three months.
His political ambitions will not stop at New York City’s doorstep.
Mamdani is leveraging his popularity and easing the path for Democrats across America to follow his lead.
Irit Tratt is a writer residing in New York. Follow her on X @Irit_Tratt.