Oct 28, 2018 5 min read

A Jewish community leader said learning the identities of the 11 worshipers killed at the Tree of Life Synagogue Saturday in Pittsburgh made the loss from the massacre even more acute.

“This is an awful, awful hearing for our Jewish community, and especially the families that have been affected,” said Jeff Finkelstein, president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh during a news conference where authorities released that information. “It’s real once you hear the names. We’re going to do everything we can to help the families.”

Officials held the briefing Sunday, the morning after families received news their loved ones were among those who’d been murdered. Investigators said the accused gunman brought a military-style assault rifle and three sidearms to use in the slaughter, which was almost without question motivated by an indiscriminate hatred for members of the victims’ religion.

The oldest victim was Rose Mallinger, 97, who was from Squirrel Hill – the historically Jewish neighborhood where the temple is located – as were brothers Cecil and David Rosenthal, 59 and 54, Daniel Stein, 71, and Melvin Wax, 88. Other victims from neighborhoods in the city were Joyce Fienberg, 75, of Oakland, and Irving Younger, 69, of Mt. Washington.

Jerry Rabinowitz, 66, was from Edgewood, a borough that abuts Pittsburgh. Husband and wife Bernice and Sylvan Simon, 84 and 86, were from neighboring Wilkinsburg. Richard Gottfried, 65, was from Ross Township, in the North Hills of Allegheny County.

A total of six other people were wounded.

The suspect, 46-year-old Robert Bowers of Baldwin, allegedly fired on congregants with an AR-15 assault rifle and several .357 handguns, and kept shooting later during his confrontation with police – four of whom were wounded – from the third floor of the building before he surrendered, according to an affidavit outlining criminal charges the FBI filed against him.

“During the course of his deadly assault on people at the Synagogue, and simultaneously with his gunfight with responding officers, Bowers made statements evincing an animus towards people of the Jewish faith,” an FBI official wrote in the affidavit. “For example, Bowers commented to one law enforcement officer, in substance, ‘they’re committing genocide to my people. I just want to kill Jews.’ Bowers repeated comments regarding genocide, his desire to kill Jewish people, and that Jewish people needed to die.”

U.S. Attorney Scott Brady – the ranking Department of Justice official in the Western District of Pennsylvania – said the assault was “even more heinous” because it took place during a religious service.

“A place of worship is a sacred place,” Brady said. “It’s a place of peace, and a place of grace. It’s a place where community comes together to celebrate what they hold most dear and most sacred.”

The comments attributed to Bowers in court papers appear to jibe with his social media presence. An account under his name on the website Gab – a social-media platform popular with neo-Fascists, anti-Semites and other far-right fellow travelers – included posts that accused a refugee-assistance organization HIAS of “lik(ing) to bring in hostile invaders to dwell among us,” according to one post, which was archived as a screenshot.

The website of the nonprofit HIAS, formerly known as the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, says the group was founded in 1881 to help Jews who were “fleeing pogroms in Russia and Eastern Europe.” In the more than century since, it has established itself as a relief organization with a global presence.

In another of his posts, Bowers called President Trump “a globalist, not a nationalist.”

“There is no #MAGA as long as there is a kinfestation,” he said, using an acronym for Trump’s campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again.”

The last public message on the account came just before police learned of the mid-morning shooting: “I can’t sit by and watch my people get slaughtered. Screw your optics, I’m going in.”

By the time the gunfire was over, six people were wounded. Four were city police officers, three of whom had gunshot wounds.

Authorities said at this stage of the investigation they believe the reputed shooter was acting alone, and are treating the case as a hate crime, but not domestic terrorism.

“The distinction between a hate crime and domestic terrorism is – a hate crime is where an individual is animated by a hatred or a certain animus of a certain ethnicity or religious faith,” he added. “And it becomes domestic terrorism where there is an ideology that that person is trying to propagate through violence.”

Officials said Bowers remained at Pittsburgh’s Allegheny General Hospital in fair condition with multiple gunshot wounds.

Three officers suffered gunshot wounds. Another was believed to have been struck by an airborne glass or bullet fragment.

One had been released from the hospital by the following morning, and another was expected to be discharged later that day.

Bowers faces federal criminal charges, including 11 counts each of using a firearm to commit murder and obstruction of exercise of religious beliefs resulting in death, a hate crime. The rest are obstruction of exercise of religious beliefs resulting in bodily injury to a public safety officer, another hate crime.

He could receive the death penalty if convicted.

Pittsburgh detectives filed homicide, ethnic intimidation and aggravated assault charges against Bowers in state court.