East Lansing Jewish Center Vandalized after Bondi Massacre, Community Responds

Benzion Shemtov, rabbi at Chabad Jewish Center at Michigan State University was out of the state when someone spray-painted Nazi symbols on the doors and threw rocks at the windows of the center in the days following the massacre at Bondi Beach in Australia, where 15 people were killed during a Hanukkah celebration.

But when Shemtov returned to East Lansing, he said he was greeted by numerous letters from the Michigan State University community that the center serves.

“I got home and I got letters in the mail from people that are not even Jewish, just writing letters of support. It’s break right now. There’s no one in town…. just to see from students that graduated and maybe came to us, students [that weren’t] necessarily so close with [us] perhaps because maybe they didn’t attend that much, but they were writing, this is their home, this was their home on campus,” Shemtov said. “This will always be their home.”

The East Lansing Police Department reports that on Dec. 16, someone was seen on video throwing rocks at MSU Chabad Jewish Center, and then on Dec. 18 someone was seen spray-painting Nazi symbols on the center’s front door and then throwing rocks at the windows. Evidence indicates the same person carried out both acts. ELPD is asking for help identifying the subject.

The Jewish community has been mourning the lives lost at Bondi Beach in Australia on Dec. 14 after a father and son carried out a mass shooting during a celebration of the first day of the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. Though the harm done in East Lansing was physical damage to a building, and there is no comparison to the lives lost across the globe, Shemtov said the reality of the times Jewish East Lansing residents are living through has become that much more apparent.

Hanukkah is the “Festival of Lights,” where members of the Jewish community light an additional candle on a Menorah each night for eight days, which seems like a good metaphor for what the community’s response should be to acts of hatred like the shooting and the vandalism, Shemtov said.

“The Jewish community is strong. Sadly, this is something that we’ve experienced for thousands of years. Coming on the heels of Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights, every day we add another candle to the eight day holiday… the message of each night lighting an additional candle is that the light from yesterday isn’t enough, we have to keep on growing and expanding that light in our home, with our family and spread the light throughout the community as well,” Shemtov said. “That’s the message how we fight this darkness, just keep on being a light, and hopefully it’s gonna have an effect on us, our family and community.”

Sacred texts of different faiths promote love and compassion for others, Chair for the Interfaith Clergy Association of Greater Lansing Rev. Laura Miller-Purrenhage said.

Incidents of antisemitic violence have seen a stark increase in recent years, Miller-Purrenhage said, and from her perspective, in this last year, things have gotten particularly bad.

Shemtov said this is the first time Chabad Jewish Center has been vandalized, but the local Jewish community has seen several other incidents of vandalism over the years and in 2023, a violent threat was made against a local synagogue.

It’s the holiday season for a few faiths, Miller-Purrenhage said and despite some individuals being in the midst of their celebrations or recognizing their own holy days, across faiths, leaders have reached out to the synagogues in town to offer their support. The interfaith clergy association sent out a letter, which was signed by dozens of local faith leaders, exclaiming support for the Greater Lansing Jewish community.

“We condemn antisemitism in all of its forms, and all violence against the innocent, whether the violence is in words, acts, or acts left undone. In this local community, our interfaith association has helped us to become friends and partners together in building bonds that cross faiths and cultures,” a segment of the letter reads. “So we stand united against any threats to our Jewish friends, against any intimidation or provocation. We commit to encouraging our communities to seek peace and understanding with our Jewish neighbors, as it is only through building strong relationships and educating each other about our perspectives that we can hope to achieve harmony.”

This is not the first moment in East Lansing’s history that residents have faced violence and divisiveness and locked arms across faiths, Miller-Purrenhage said, recalling the interfaith’s collaboration to promote healing in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the deadly shooting on MSU’s campus in 2023 and the 2018 massacre at the Tree of Life Congregation Synagogue in Pittsburgh.

“It’s very important in the face of both the divisiveness, but also…[the] sense of helplessness… there’s a sense sometimes, of feeling frozen in the face of just horrible thing after horrible thing, but when we can stand together and say, ‘it’s not just one faith that believes this, it’s many, and we are actually united in this’, it can help us to feel like we have more people with us and we’re not so frozen,” Miller-Purrenhage said. “We’re definitely not alone and so it encourages that sense of unity, but it can also help galvanize people to work harder at seeking all of those things, justice, peace, compassion, love.”

With the rise in hate crimes against Jewish institutions in the area over the years, Amy B. Bigman, rabbi of the Congregation Shaarey Zedek in East Lansing, told ELi in a written statement that though she appreciates the response local clergy have offered their Jewish neighbors, she’s disappointed at the lack of condemnation of antisemitism from local officials and leaders.

“I am hopeful that people are talking in their houses of worship, businesses, and in local government about how to better protect minorities in our community,” Bigman said. “We must continue to live our lives, observing and celebrating Jewish holidays and lifecycle events; we are not going to allow bad actors to change our beliefs and lives.”