A rabbi told the United Nations this week that God created humans “for a reason.”
Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein was speaking to the United Nations about his experience in April when a shooter opened fire at his Poway, California synagogue.
“Do you want to live in a world of blood and tears? Or a world of love and beauty?” he said.
In the April attack, the shooter killed a 60-year-old woman, Lori-Gilbert-Kaye, and wounded two others. Goldstein was also wounded in the attack.
“We are all human beings created by God almighty,” he said. “We are all created by God for a reason. The day each one of you were born God said the world can no longer exist without you. Each one of us need to look at each other as a human being, not by the color of our skin, not by our language, not by our religion.”
“We are all children of God and this is what we need to begin realizing and appreciating,” Goldstein continued. ” Anti-Semitism isn’t a Jewish problem. It’s a problem for the world.”
In May, Goldstein told Fox 5 News that the synagogue had a dedication ceremony for Kaye.
“It has been a difficult past couple of weeks for our community, and especially for the Kaye family,” he said. “Lori was such a kind, loving soul, and she knew everyone here, so this is really an opportunity for the community to come together and heal, and celebrate the life of a very special person who was brutally taken from us.”
A member of the Chabad of Poway, Goldstein’s synagogue, said the shooting was “unbelievable.”
“We are strong,” she added. “We are united. They can’t break us.”
The 19-year-old shooter surrendered to police and was arrested. He could face 109 federal hate crime charges, according to Fox 5 News.
The April shooting in California happened just six months after a shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue. In that attack, 11 people were killed. That attack is the deadliest on Jews in U.S. history.
Photo courtesy: Getty Images/David McNew/Stringer
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