‘Thought it was end of my life,’ says Jewish man attacked near Los Angeles synagogue

A 32-year-old Jewish man, who was attacked on Monday evening near left Adas Torah, an Orthodox synagogue in Los Angeles, told JNS that his life flashed before his eyes.

“I don’t know if he said the words, ‘I want to kill you,’ but his facial expression and his attitude definitely gave that message,” said the victim, who spoke to JNS on the condition that he not be named. “I thought it was the end of my life.”

The victim, who said he is a Judaic studies teacher and “just a regular person,” told JNS that “I never would have thought such an incident would happen to me.”

After studying at Merkaz Hatorah Community Kollel, around the corner from the synagogue, on Monday evening, he walked home through an alleyway, as he has done for the past five years, and noticed a blue minivan following slowly beside him. He said he was wearing a kippah at the time.

He made a “Hey, how are you” facial expression toward the driver, whom he described as a black man. The driver made the same expression in response, the victim told JNS.

“All of a sudden, he just opens the door,” he said. “I don’t know what he was saying. He pounced me, immediately put his hands over my neck, shaking me back and forth, trying to choke me.”

The man used “a window breaker or window chiseler, I don’t know what you call it” as “a weapon as he was choking me against my neck,” the victim told JNS.