by Robert Wiener
NJJN Staff Writer

June 18, 2009

Local Jewish institutions are reviewing their security in the wake of last week’s deadly shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, hoping to strike a delicate balance between safety and accessibility.

Nearly all say they have had careful security plans in place for a number of years.

But the museum shooting, combined with other recent plots involving Jewish targets, have heightened the anxiety among the institutions and the people who frequent them.

“In the past several months, we have seen several alarming instances of violence or plots that have been aimed at Jewish targets. This is a severe concern,” said Etzion Neuer, director of the Anti-Defamation League’s New Jersey region, speaking one day after white supremacist and anti-Semite James Von Brunn shot and killed security guard Stephen Johns at the Washington museum.

Neuer sided with the assessment of the ADL’s national office that the shooting was “part of a wave of hate targeting Jews and Jewish institutions and others.”

The ADL cited a number of recent incidents, including the foiled plot by Muslim ex-cons to bomb two synagogues in Riverdale, NY, and a shooting spree in Brockton, Mass., that left two people dead. The alleged perpetrator in that May shooting said he was targeting Jews and non-whites.

Neuer urged caution as well as concern.

“Jewish institutions need to be aware there are hostile individuals, and, unfortunately, as Jews, we need to understand we may be at a higher risk and more vulnerable to terrorists,” he said. “But like in all instances of crisis, perspective is necessary. While we are gravely concerned by these incidents, this is not Kristallnacht; we are not in 1930s Germany.”

He urged Jewish institutions to avoid panic but to review their security plans.

As to whether or not the state’s Jewish institutions are vigilant enough, Neuer said, “We are all over the map on this, but as a general rule, sadly the answer is ‘no.’ One can find many institutions that are doing an excellent job and others that are inexplicably lax about security.”

Declining to identify those organizations by name “for obvious reasons,” the ADL leader said, “The onus lies not only with the administrators but with their constituents who use the buildings and entrust their own lives, or the lives of their children or elderly parents, to those institutions.”

Max Kleinman, executive vice president of United Jewish Communities of MetroWest NJ, said the institution is taking necessary precautions at its campus in Whippany.

“We are prudent. We have upgraded our security. We have drills. We take this stuff seriously. But I’m not concerned about something bad happening here,” he said.

Kleinman spoke of striking a balance.

“We don’t want this to be an armed camp,” he said. “We don’t want to have so many barriers that people will feel uncomfortable visiting here. We are trying to have a mix between an inviting campus and having prudent security.”

A day after the June 10 museum attack, Frank Korczukowski, director of community facilities at the Alex Aidekman Jewish Community Campus in Whippany, which houses UJC MetroWest, participated in an Internet-based presentation sponsored by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security on increased awareness and vigilance.

Korczukowski said that although the campus has state-of-art technology in place, “that doesn’t mean we are 100 percent safe. We are not comfortable in our security methods nor should we ever be. Comfortable is what leads to failure. Vigilance never fails.”

As soon as he heard about the shooting, Stanley Stone, executive vice president of the Jewish Federation of Central New Jersey, instructed his federation’s agencies to “move to a state of heightened security.”

Those agencies include Jewish Family Service of Central New Jersey, the JCC of Central New Jersey, the YM-YWHA of Union County, and the Jewish Educational Center in Elizabeth.

The morning afterward, Stone joined a conference call set up by the Secure Community Network, an organization established by Jewish communities across the country, and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

“We discussed what we should be looking for and generally to update us on the measures to be taken,” said Stone.

He declined to give details about new security measures.

For executive committee members at the Daniel Pearl Education Center at East Brunswick’s Temple B’nai Shalom, the attack had special grim significance. The center sponsors an annual interfaith student trip to the museum.

The group’s chair, Andrew Boyarsky said two of its members remembered Johns at work after seeing his photograph in television newscasts.

“That made it even grizzlier for us,” said Boyarsky. “We were all terribly saddened by the news in Washington, but it makes us even more determined to recommit to our efforts to communicate Daniel Pearl’s legacy of humanity and understanding.”

When asked about the possibility of stepped-up security in the wake of the shooting, Aaron Rosenfeld, executive director of the JCC of Greater Monmouth County in Deal, said, “We don’t comment on our security. We work closely with our security committee and we definitely take all of these circumstances seriously.”

Last December, a former DHS secretary, Elizabeth native Michael Chertoff, told students at Kean University that homegrown threats are likely to become “more and more challenging.”

At that time, Chertoff predicted that homeland security officials would be dealing both with “low-probability, high-consequence” events like the 9/11 attacks, as well as “high-probability, lower-consequence events by disturbed individuals” such as Von Brunn’s assault on the Holocaust museum.

Neuer said the ADL serves as a security liaison between New Jersey law enforcement agencies and Jewish institutions.

“Sometimes there is a feeling of helplessness by the institution for fear of cost, especially in today’s recession. But it doesn’t mean the institution has to be turned into Fort Knox with high-tech security cameras. What it does mean is that at least elementary precautions must be taken,” he said.

“The hard part is it is always a balance between the needs and resources of the particular institution and finding a comfortable medium,” Neuer said.

Elaine Durbach and Debra Rubin contributed to this article.

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NJ legislators decry murder at Holocaust memorial

IN SEPARATE STATEMENTS, New Jersey’s two U.S. senators, Frank R. Lautenberg and Robert Menendez, condemned the June 10 shooting at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington.

Lautenberg, a member of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum Council, said that it was “especially shocking that this attack took place at a museum designed to prevent violence and remind us of the dangers of hatred and bigotry.” 

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the security officer’s family, the staff of the museum and the museum visitors who were there….”

Menendez said, “This was a horrifying act of pure evil by a killer who has made his hatred of religious and racial minorities well known….

“This tragic event is a reminder that, unfortunately, in our country there do remain isolated groups and individuals that are fueled by intolerance. In its most extreme form, this intolerance manifests itself in deadly violence. This despicable act is made even more deplorable by the fact that it seems that the killer chose this particular location: a solemn memorial to the victims of one of history’s darkest episodes. In addition to striking down a noble guard in the line of duty, this seems to have been an attack targeted against the Jewish community, and it is reprehensible.”

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