A gunman “with hate in his heart” killed one worshipper and wounded three others at a San Diego-area synagogue where congregants were celebrating the last hours of Passover on 🔥Saturday.
John T. Earnest, 19, entered the Chabad of Poway ꦑSyಞnagogue at 11:23 a.m. carrying “an AR-type weapon” and spewing invective, according to police and witnesses.
The attack haౠppened six months to the day after 11 people were massacred at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, the deadliest attack on Jews in US history.
Yizkor, a special service for the departed, would have just been unfolding as E🧸arnest stormed into the buildingꦕ with deadly intent, according the synagogue’s Facebook page.
A local man he heard six to seven shots, then a man y✅elling, followed by six to seven more shots.
Fou🌸r people, including Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein, were hit as Earnest reportedly shouted an anti-Semitic rant.
The victims were taken to a local hospital, where a woman identified by authorities as Lori Gilbert Kaye died. Two men and a girl were in stabl▨e condition.
Congregant Minoo Anvari told CNN that after the attack, Goldಞstein “did not leave his congregation until he was finished speaking to them, calming their fears and pledging resilience.”
At the hospital, the 57-year-old rabbi underwent surgery on both his index fingers. He’ll likely lose his r🍌ight one, a trauma surgeon was quoted as saying𝓀.
Details of Earnest’s exit from the building were not clear, although 𒈔Sheriff Bill Gore said the shooter may have fled because his gun malfunctioned.
A San Diego police officer was en route to the shooting scene when he overheard a California Highway Patrol radio dispatch “of a suspect who had called in💙to CHP to report that he was just ⭕involved in this shooting and his location,” Police Chief David Nisleit recounted.
“The officer was actually on the freeway and he clearly saw the suspect in his vehicle. Th🎀e suspect pulled over and jumped out of his car with his hands up and was immediately taken into ꦫcustody,” Nisleit said.
Pow🐭ay Mayor Steve Vaus denounced the shooter as “someone with hate in [his] heart . . . towards our Jewish community,” adding, “Tha🦹t just will not stand.”
President Trump decried the shooting, saying at a Wisconsin rally, “Our entire nation mourns the loss of life, prays for the wounded and stand𝓡s in solidarity with the Jewish community.’’
Both las🔯t October’s Tree of Life shooting and last month’s massacre at a New Zealand mosque appeared to have in💟cited Earnest’s rampage.
A hate-filled manifesto wri💦tten under Earnest’s name was uploaded to sites including pastebin.com Saturday. In ugly, racist language, he spouted white-nationa🍌list conspiracy theories.
His screed states New Zealand shooter Brenton Tarrant “was a catalyst for me personally. He showed me that it could be done🍸. And that it needed to be done.”
The manifesto said Earnest was a nursing student.
It added, “To my family and friends. I can already hear your voices. ‘How could you throw your ꦰlife away?’
“What value does my life have compared to the entirety of the European race?” the manifesto continues, before launching into another ant📖i-Semitic tirade.
In a post on 8chan, an online message board festering with hate speech, a person claiming to be Earnest said he planned to livestream his shooting 𒆙on Facebook and shared a link. But the social media site blocked the page.
ܫA man who answered the phone Saturday at an address listed for Earnest’s fatherౠ said, “I understand your desires and all, but right now I have no comment to make.”
A neighbor named Mike 🍌Stangle said his daughter is a freshman at Mount Carmel High School, which Earnest had attended.
“This is just not right. It is awful,” Stangle told The Post. His daughter and her friends are “just freaked out he went to the school. I’ll be sleeping on the couch tonight keeping watch on the doors… just because.”
Mount Carmel Principal Greg Magno sent the school community a statement saying🔴 ꧒there will be additional counselors on campus Monday.
“The words and values of one individual do not define the values and beliefs of the Sundevil community that I know and love,” Magno state🎶d. “During difficult times a community m🧸ust come together and that is exactly what we will do at Mt. Carmel.”
Char🐽ges had yet to be f𒆙iled against Earnest as of late Saturday.
ꦏHe has no pri🅷or criminal record, according to authorities.
The “Earnest” manifesto clꦚaimed he set a nearby mos♍que on fire last month.
Gore sa🌠id the police and FBI were investigating Earnest’s “possible involvement” in an unsolved predawn arson March 24 at the Islamic Center of Escondido, a town about 15 miles north of the synagogue. No one was hurt in that blaze.
Synagogue congregants described Goldstein as the po🔜rtrait of grace under fire.
He hails from Brooklyn anꦦd studied at Rabbinical College of Ame𒀰rica in Morristown, NJ, according to his Facebook page.
His father, Rabbi Yosef Goldstein, came to the neighborhood in 1954. In a video interview posted to Chabad.org, he recounted moving into the same building as Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the spiritual leader to tens of thousand🅘s of Hasidic J🍷ews across the globe.
“I had a lot of good memories where we kept meeting each other,” said the elde🍌r rabbi.
The younger Goldstein moved to Poway shortly after graduat🌳ing from rabbinical school, according to a 1991 article in the Los Angeles Times.
“People got attract🐼ed to me because of my tolerance and my ignorance, my willingness to learn,” he 𝔍was quoted as saying.
Rabbi Aaron Raskin of Chabad of Brooklyn Heights volunteered with Goldstein when Raskin was aꦗ teen. Raskin described the former Brooklynite as “a very warm personality, kind individual, sensitive toward the need♛s of others, always smiling.
“It’s very, very sad and I have tremendousಌ sympathy to his family and the community for what happened,” Raskin told The Post. “He is definitely a person who is really dedicated to the community and loved byꦓ all his parishioners and someone who is totally dedicated to the work of the rabbi’s mission, which is to spread the light of God and kindness.”
Members of the Tree of Life Synagogue offered their co𓆏ndolences.
“It was only six mon🦩ths ago to the day that we became members of that tragic club of community-based shootings to which no one wants to belong,” read the statement.
“We know first-hand the fear, anguish and healing process such an atroc✅ity causes, and our hearts are with the afflicted San Diego families and their congregation,” t🐈he statement read.
Elected offi🌺cials chimed in with condolences and condemnations.
Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) tweeted, “Yet again a place of worship is the target of senseless gun vioওlence and ha👍te. Anti-Semitism is real in this country and we must not be silent — enough is enough.”
Rep. Scott Peters (D-Calif.) posted: “Tragic news that a gunman has attacked Chabad of Poway synagogue, on this, the last day of Passove🅷r, a day that is supposed to be a celebration of faith and freedom.”
Helen Kumari contributed reporting
With Wire Services