Before dawn on Jan. 10 a Jew-hating arsonist set fire to the Beth Israel Congregation synagogue in Jackson, Mississippi, the largest in the state. Two Torah scrolls, holding the most sacred Jewish religious text, were destroyed and five others damaged as the synagogue was gutted. Another Torah, which had been rescued during the Nazi Holocaust, was not damaged. The attack takes place as antisemitic violence has increased since Hamas’ murderous pogrom killed 1,200 people in Israel Oct. 7, 2023.
The police arrested Stephen Spencer Pittman, 19. They said he had confessed, calling his target a “synagogue of Satan.” He faces federal charges of using fire to maliciously damage or destroy a building involved in interstate commerce.
Security camera video the synagogue provided to the press shows a person with a hood covering his face splashing liquid inside the lobby of the synagogue.
“We have already had outreach from other houses of worship in the Jackson area and greatly appreciate their support in this very difficult time,” Congregation President Zach Shemper told the press.
He said they were arranging to continue holding regular services in a new location.
The Beth Israel Congregation synagogue also houses the offices of the Institute for Southern Jewish Life, which organizes school programs and traveling rabbinical services to Jewish congregations across the South.
The synagogue has received a number of messages of solidarity and statements joining in denouncing Jew-hatred. Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, said the attack wasn’t random violence. “An attack on a synagogue is an attack on all Jews.”
Susan LaMont, Socialist Workers Party candidate for mayor of Atlanta in 2025, sent a statement expressing solidarity with the synagogue. “We condemn in the strongest possible terms this and all other acts of Jew-hatred,” she said. “The immediate offers of help you have received, including from other religious denominations, reflect the repugnance with which the vast majority of working people in Jackson and beyond react to such Jew-hating actions.”
Fighting Jew-hatred key for workers
“What happened in Jackson shows again that the fight against Jew-hatred and threat of another Holocaust is a decisive question for workers worldwide, not only in the Mideast,” she said.
LaMont pointed to the recent pogrom on Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, as another example of the renewed drive to exterminate Jews today. “Israel’s defeat of Hamas would remove a huge obstacle to the development of common struggles by workers of all nationalities in the Middle East,” LaMont said. “Israel — the one state that unconditionally offers Jews a refuge — is the only force capable of doing that. It deserves the support of workers everywhere.
“Working people in Iran, who have taken to the streets in recent weeks, are a key ally in the fight to defeat Hamas. A majority of Iranian toilers loathe Tehran’s murderous use of its proxies in the region and its calls for ‘Death to Israel.’”
Beth Israel Congregation has a long history. The Reform synagogue was erected in 1860, at the onset of the Civil War, the first built in the southern U.S. states. There are some 3,000 Jews in Jackson today.
The synagogue has been targeted before for its strong stand in defense of Black rights during the civil rights struggles in the 1960s. It suffered an arson attack in 1967 by members of the Ku Klux Klan, who said they were targeting its rabbi, Perry Nussbaum, for supporting the fight for Black liberation.
Jim Berk, CEO of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, an organization that fights Jew-hatred, said Saturday’s arson attack “is an assault on that legacy of the Congregation.
“Jewish leaders and institutions did not stand by on the sidelines during the Civil Rights Movement,” Berk said. “Synagogues joined marches, they spoke out, they stood with Black Americans against segregation, racism, and terror. Its memory is a warning not to let history slip from view.”
One day later, attack in Los Angeles
One day after the attack on Beth Israel, members of the Pasadena Jewish Temple and Center, which was burned down in the wildfire that swept Altadena in California one year ago, discovered that Jew-hating graffiti had been painted on remaining parts of the destroyed synagogue’s outside wall.
The synagogue’s rabbi, Joshua Ratner, described the graffiti as “hateful and antisemitic.”
Clark Linstone, the congregation’s president, said they wouldn’t be intimidated. “The community is strong,” he said. “I think people are hopeful and looking forward.”