An explosive object was tossed into the Lake Hiawatha Jewish Center Friday evening as 200 delegates were attending a weekend area convention of the United Synagogue Youth, it was reported today to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency by Rabbi Herman Savitz, spiritual leader of this suburban community in the Morris County section of New Jersey, some 70 miles west of New York City.
According to Rabbi Savitz, police arrived a few minutes after the explosion but could not determine the nature of the object because nothing of it was left intact. He said a window was blown out by the object and that flying glass injured slightly several of the girls present. The incident did not prevent the convention from continuing. Rabbi Savitz stated.
He told the JTA that the Jewish Center, which also houses a synagogue for a congregation of 400 families, has recently been smeared by hand-painted swastikas and anti Jewish obscenities. Rabbi Savitz said that neither he nor the police have been able to identify either the vandals nor those who tossed the object into the Jewish Center Friday. There has been no-organized anti-Semitism activity in the community and. therefore, he added, he wasn’t sure whether these incidents were the work of teenage pranksters or anti-Semites.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.