With alarming rise in antisemitism, Congress must pass the Jewish American Security Act

On Oct. 27, 2018, a shooter fueled by hate walked into the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh and opened fire at the congregants gathered for Shabbat morning services. He killed 11 people and injured six others, in the deadliest targeted attack on Jews in U.S. history. The senseless killings were the culmination of an antisemitic radicalization that primarily took place online.

For this reason and many others, exactly one year after this horrific murder, both of us came together to form the first-ever Senate Bipartisan Task Force for Combating Antisemitism. It became our priority to stop such carnage from ever happening again, and to address the anti-Jewish bigotry at the heart of it.

No one should ever be targeted, harassed, or made to feel unsafe simply because of what they believe or how they worship — freedom of religion is a core principle that makes our country the country we love.

The Task Force has grown to include more than half of the Senate — in equal numbers from both sides of the aisle — and we’ve successfully pushed both Democratic and Republican presidents to make strong commitments to fight antisemitism and address it head-on when it arises.

Through the work of our Task Force, we have secured funding to protect houses of worship and community institutions. We have pushed for stronger enforcement of civil rights protections for students. We have passed bills into law to invest in Holocaust education. And we have fought to ensure that antisemitism is recognized, tracked and addressed wherever it occurs, both in the U.S. and around the world.

Our work must continue.

Since Hamas’s terrorist attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, antisemitism and physical attacks against synagogues have spiked in an unprecedented way. In the last year, there were an average of 17 antisemitic incidents per day in the U.S., and physical assaults against Jews were the highest in recorded history. Nearly three out of four American........

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