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Pittsburgh jury condemns Tree of Life synagogue killer to death

A man prays at a makeshift memorial outside the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on 31st October, 2018.

Reuters A federal jury on Wednesday voted to sentence Robert Bowers to death for killing 11 worshippers at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue in 2018, the deadliest anti-Semitic attack in US history. In June, the jury found Bowers, 50, guilty of dozens of federal hate crimes in a trial held at the US District Court […]

Pittsburgh synagogue attacker found guilty of hate crimes, could face death

Flowers and other items have been left as memorials outside the Tree of Life synagogue following last Saturday's shooting in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US, on 3rd November, 2018.

Reuters A jury on Friday found Robert Bowers guilty of dozens of federal hate crimes for the killing of 11 worshippers at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue in 2018, the deadliest anti-Semitic attack in US history. Bowers, 50, now faces the penalty phase of his trial at the US District Court in Pittsburgh in which […]

US lawsuit: NRA’s rhetoric spurred deadly synagogue shooting

PittsburghAP The son of a couple killed in a Pittsburgh synagogue attack that killed 11 worshippers is suing the National Rifle Association, arguing the group’s inflammatory rhetoric led to the violence. Marc Simon, the son of Sylvan and Bernice Simon, filed the wrongful death lawsuit Thursday in Allegheny County Common Pleas Court against the NRA, […]

Tom Hanks, Joanne Rogers to raise money to rebuild Tree of Life Synagogue site

Tree of Life synagogue Pittsburgh Oct 2020

RNS The Jewish congregation that once gathered in the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh’s Squirrel Hill neighbourhood is inching forward with a plan to repurpose its building, two years after an attacker shot and killed 11 Jews in an anti-Semitic rampage. On Wednesday, the congregation named a raft of celebrities who have signed on […]

ESSAY: HOW SAFE IS YOUR PLACE OF WORSHIP?

Security in US religious places graphic

CHRISTOPHER P SCHEITLE, of West Virginia University and JEFFERY T ULMER, of Pennsylvania State University, look at what their research reveals about congregations in the US in this article first published on The Conversation…

Pittsburgh suspect’s hatred of Jews, HIAS part of larger anti-immigrant surge

Pittsburgh HIAS1

RNS No one knows yet why a gunman singled out the Tree of Life Congregation, out of all of Pittsburgh’s synagogues, as the site for a virulently anti-Semitic shooting spree.  But Robert Bowers, the man accused of gunning down 11 congregants in a rampage Saturday in the city’s Squirrel Hill neighbourhood, was known to hate Jews […]

ESSAY: WHY PITTSBURGH MATTERS

Synagogue Shooting1

Rabbi JEFFREY SALKIN, in an article for his column first published on Religion News Service, says the attack on the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh was not only an attack on Jews or Judaism but an attack “on all that we hold sacred”…