The local temple, Bet Haverim, gathered the community for song, prayer and moving speeches in Central Park
By HANNAH SCHRADER — city@theaggie.org
On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas, the Islamic Resistance Movement, launched an attack on Israel resulting in the death of over a thousand people, largely Israeli citizens. This attack sparked the currently ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict which recently surpassed a year in length.
To mourn the loss of life and heal as a community, Bet Haverim, the local temple, organized a vigil that was held in Davis’ Central Park. The vigil consisted of prayer, song and music.
Members of the board of Hillel House Davis, an organization that aims to provide a community for Jewish students, gave speeches at the vigil.
Barry Klein, the president of Hillel House for the Davis and Sacramento region, reflected on hearing of the attacks for the first time on Oct. 7, 2023, which coincides with his birthday.
“I woke up on Oct. 7 at 3 a.m. for various reasons, but I always check my email to see if one of my children had sent me a happy birthday,” Klein said. “And I saw the attack by Hamas on Israel, probably before most people in the U.S. had seen it, so that’s burned in my memory as the most horrible birthday I’ve had.”
Klein then discussed his responsibility as a leader in the Jewish community to help students through this painful time.
“[I’m] currently the president of the board of Hillel [House] at Davis and Sacramento, and so that immediately opened the door to lots of things we needed to take care of to make sure that students on campus were safe and secure and able to pursue their studies in a stress-free environment,” Klein said. “And we do a lot of grieving for all the loss of life in Israel, and my prayer is that the evil people who perpetrated those attacks would disappear so this would never happen again.”
Klein then discussed the aspect of the vigil most moving to him, and the impact of the Davis community.
“So Israelis took it particularly hard because there are Israelis at UC Davis, the students, faculty and [others just] visiting,” Klein said. “I just took it particularly hard because everybody was touched personally by what happened and it took us out.”
Rabbi Jeremy Simons, the co-rabbi of the Bet Haverim congregation in Davis, discussed the intent behind organizing the vigil.
“In the Jewish faith, we mark the anniversaries of deaths,” Simons said. “It’s called a Yarhzeit and Oct. 7, in addition to being the the anniversary of the terrorist attack, is also the anniversary of the deaths of well over 1,000 people. And so it was a chance to say the traditional memorial prayers and also just to mark how we’re all feeling, because this has been a very difficult year in the Jewish community, a very upside-down year. And it was a chance for the community to come together and to mourn and grieve.”
Simons then talked about the significance of the attack to him and the Jewish community at large.
“I don’t think it was in my imagination that those things [attacks] could even be possible, or something that I worried about or thought about,” Simons said. “Just reading the reports on that day was, I have no words to describe it […] A lot of other people I ran into that day were just crying, crying, crying, so yeah, it was a deep shock to the Jewish community. It’s not that big all things considered, so there are a lot of connections, like we have people here who have connections to people who were taken hostage, to people who were killed and people who are serving in the military.”
Simons then reflected on the outcome of the vigil and how it served the Davis community.
“[The vigil] provided a space for people to be able to come together, to be with other people and not feel alone, and to just mark what was otherwise a really, really hard day,” Simons said. “I know a lot of folks just told me they took Oct. 7 off from work or didn’t go to class, just because it just hits that hard.”
Written by: Hannah Schrader — city@theaggie.org
