opinion
Julie Platt
W hen Malik Faisal Akram,
a British-Pakistani terror-
ist, took four congre-
gants hostage at a small-town Texas
synagogue at this time last year, it
became immediately clear that the
event would have deep and lasting
ramifications for the entire American
Jewish community.

Although it wasn’t by any means the
first violent attack on a synagogue in
America, the incident at the Beth Israel
Synagogue in Colleyville was still a
five-alarm fire, reminding us that terror-
ism against Jews can happen at any
time in any place.

It was noteworthy, however, that the spiritual
leader and congregants of a smaller house of
worship had been prepared to deal with such a
situation. Colleyville Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker
credited major Jewish organizations with training
him to stay calm and wait for an opportunity to
create a diversion. He ultimately hurled a chair at
the terrorist, enabling his congregants to escape
physical danger, though the trauma from the incident
continues to this day.

Though Jewish Federations were already at work
on a plan to guarantee the safety and security of
each of our Jewish communities before Colleyville,
we quickly sped up those efforts. Our plan, known
as LiveSecure, was developed in close collaboration
with the Secure Community Network. It committed
us to build a comprehensive, state-of-the-art system
of security to protect every one of the 146 Federation
communities within three years.

To accomplish this goal, generous donors helped
create a $62 million national fund, matched by donors
in each community, to build local security programs
and support SCN’s abilities to train and organize
communications between these security programs.

At the time of the Tree of Life massacre in 2018,
there were fewer than 30 communities with profes-
sional community security initiatives. Today, there are
more than 70, with the number growing rapidly and
new programs authorized in the last two months in
places as diverse as San Diego, California; Houston,
Texas; Birmingham, Alabama; Rockland County, New
York; UJA-New York; and Jacksonville, Florida.

LiveSecure has already approved 27 grants to
16 JANUARY 26, 2023 | JEWISH EXPONENT
Federations, totaling a commitment of more than $11
million over three years. This includes the creation of
17 new community security initiatives.

Many smaller communities like Colleyville are
finding it advantageous to collaborate with larger
ones to ensure that their security needs are met.

Eileen Freed, executive director of the Jewish
Federation of Greater Ann Arbor, said that through
her participation in LiveSecure, her Federation is in
the process of hiring a community security manager
under the auspices of the community security
program created and supported by the Jewish
Federation of Metropolitan Detroit.

According to Freed, “A lot of communities like ours
are struggling to put together their own security
infrastructure with the limited resources they have
available. By partnering with Detroit to hire our
own director, we will have someone to implement
a community-wide security plan, to offer regular
security trainings and to build and maintain relation-
ships with our local law enforcement.”
In southern New Jersey, William “Bud” Monaghan,
the former police chief of Cherry Hill, who is now the
regional security director for the local Federation, is
enlisting four other Federations in the region to, in his
words, “leverage the power of LiveSecure to create
economies of scale.” Every cent goes further, he
added, when it’s operated through a collective effort.

Jewish communities both large and small are also
ramping up their efforts to attract federal funding
for safety and security. Thanks to the advocacy
efforts of our Jewish Federation system and other
community partners, the Nonprofit Security Grant
program has grown from $60 million at
the time of the Tree of Life shootings to
$305 million today, bringing over $100
million per year into Jewish communi-
ties alone.

Sadly, the threats are not decreasing
but mushrooming. 2021 saw the highest
number of antisemitic incidents on
American soil since the Anti-Defamation
League began tracking such events in
1979. A just-released survey by the ADL
found that 85% of Americans believe in
at least one antisemitic trope and 40%
of Americans believe that Israel treats
the Palestinians like the Nazis treated
the Jews.

A National Terrorism Advisory
Bulletin issued at the end of November
by the Department of Homeland
Security reported, “Lone offenders and small groups
motivated by a range of ideological beliefs and/or
personal grievances continue to pose a persistent
and lethal threat to the homeland.” Potential targets,
the bulletin adds, are “public gatherings, faith-based
institutions, the LGBTQI+ community, schools and …
racial and religious minorities.”
LiveSecure is a beacon of hope in the darkness.

There is no greater value in Jewish tradition than
the preservation of life, and LiveSecure is enabling
Jews, for whom persecution is not new, to continue
not just to survive but to thrive. That is why it’s so
important for local donors to leverage LiveSecure’s
matching fund by contributing to their communities’
security efforts, expanding our safety umbrella one
community at a time.

At the Chanukah celebration at the White House
last month, Rabbi Cytron-Walker said, “Our history
is filled with tenacity and resilience. We have experi-
enced the worst of humanity. And we refuse to give
in to despair. In our darkest hours, we bring light. We
bring light to our family; we bring light to our commu-
nity. We bring light to our country; we bring light to
our world.”
On this first anniversary of Rabbi Cytron-Walker’s
ordeal, we affirm to him and the wider Jewish commu-
nity that the safety and security of our community are
being addressed and that our communities will be
able to flourish and continue to bring light into the
world. ■
Julie Platt is chair of the board of Jewish Federations
of North America.

jayzynism / AdobeStock
A Year After Colleyville, the Jewish
Community Is Rethinking Security