Ohio Jewish groups tighten security after Australia’s anti-Semitic shooting

Jewish organizations in Ohio began tightening their security after 15 Jews were murdered in a Dec. 14 shooting at a menorah lighting in Sydney, Australia.

Both JewishColumbus and the Jewish Federation of Cleveland released statements after the shooting happened.

“This was a deliberate terrorist act targeting the Jewish community in Sydney as they celebrated the first night of Hanukkah and must be loudly and clearly called out as antisemitism,” JewishColumbus told NBC 4.

The organization added that, as a result of the recent tragedy, it will ensure that Jews in Columbus will be protected even more than they were before.

“The security of the Jewish community is the top priority of JewishColumbus,” the organization said. “Our security team is in close contact with our law enforcement partners, and we are working with our synagogues and partner agencies to ensure that all events planned for today and the coming days are protected by the highest security standards.”

The Jewish Federation of Cleveland also told Spectrum News 1 that it increased patrols around Jewish facilities and throughout the Jewish neighborhoods.

Matthew Capadona, the deputy director of operations for security at the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, told the news source that security has been high since Hamas’s terror attack against Israel on Oct. 7, adding that Jews from Ohio should not be afraid of gathering together after reading about the recent news.

“We don’t want to tell anybody that they shouldn’t go,” he said.

Capadona, however, added that people should still be cautious at large gatherings.

“We believe that people need to be aware of their surroundings,” he said. “Anything suspicious, anything that they see that seems out of place, where there’s a person, where there’s a package, and they need to report it, they cannot sit on it. They need to report it.”

Capadona said that, like JewishColumbus, his organization will communicate with law enforcement to ensure members of his community are protected.

Douglas Murray, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor at City Journal, published a piece in City Journal about the tragedy in Australia.

In it, he criticized the Australian government for not doing enough to prevent the shooting from happening, adding that the government went as far as silencing pro-Jewish and pro-Israel people who tried to speak about Islamic extremists, among whom was Murray himself.

“The problem has been in plain sight all along. It’s shameful that so many people in positions of power decided to metaphorically shoot the messengers, while all the time clearing a path for the real-life shooters to take aim and fire,” he wrote.