Suspect In Connection With Synagogue Fire

Surveillance footage has been released of the moments before a man set Mississippi’s largest synagogue ablaze in an antisemitic attack.

Stephen Pittman, 19, was charged with maliciously damaging or destroying a building by means of fire or an explosive.

In footage shot in the middle of the night, Pittman can be seen emptying a can of gasoline all over the hallway to the synagogue, ensuring that any fire would spread with ferocity once ignited.

In the building’s lobby, Pittman is seen pouring liquid over a couch and the floor while wearing a mask and a hood. The fire tore through the Beth Israel Congregation in Jackson shortly after Pittman was done with dousing the interior just after 3 am on Saturday.

No congregants or firefighters were injured in the fire. Firefighters arrived to find flames billowing out of windows and all doors to the synagogue locked, the chief of investigations for the Jackson Fire Department, Charles D. Felton Jr., said.

Local and federal officials, including those from the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, arrested Pittman for investigation of arson at a hospital where he had non-life-threatening burns.

The teen suspect confessed to lighting a fire inside the building, which he referred to as ‘the synagogue of Satan,’ according to an FBI affidavit filed in US District Court in Mississippi on Monday.

Pittman, who participated via video conference call from a hospital bed, was assigned a public lawyer for his first appearance hearing in federal court on Monday. There were obvious bandages on both of his hands.

He told the judge that he was a high school graduate with three semesters of college completed.

Prosecutors said he could face five to 20 years in prison if convicted. When the judge read him his rights, Pittman said, ‘Jesus Christ is Lord.’

Pittman is scheduled to appear in court for a preliminary and detention hearing on January 20.

Images showed the charred remains of an administrative office and synagogue library, where several Torahs were destroyed or damaged.

Attorney General Pam Bondi said she has instructed prosecutors to seek ‘severe penalties,’ according to a statement provided by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Mississippi.

The suspect’s father contacted the FBI and said his son had confessed to setting the building on fire. Pittman had texted his father a photo of the rear of the synagogue before the fire, with the message, ‘There’s a furnace in the back.’ 

His father had pleaded with his son to return home, but ‘Pittman replied back by saying he was due for a homerun and ‘I did my research,’ the affidavit said.

During an interview with investigators, Pittman said he had stopped at a gas station on his way to the synagogue to purchase the gas used in the fire. He also took the license plate off his vehicle at the gas station. 

He used an axe to break out a window of the synagogue, poured gas inside and used a torch lighter to start the fire, the FBI affidavit said.

Later, the FBI seized a hand torch that a congregant had discovered and retrieved a charred mobile that was thought to be Pittman’s.

Yellow police tape on Monday blocked off the entrances to the synagogue building, which was surrounded by broken glass and soot. Bouquets were laid on the ground at the building’s entrance – including one with a note that said, ‘I’m so very sorry.’

Local and national officials, religious figures and activists condemned the fire at the 160-year-old synagogue, the largest in Mississippi and the only one in Jackson.

It was the site of a Ku Klux Klan bombing in 1967 – a response to the congregation’s role in civil rights activities, according to the Institute of Southern Jewish Life, which also houses its office in the building.

The home of the synagogue’s rabbi, an outspoken critic of racial segregation, was also bombed two months later by the same group.

‘That history reminds us that attacks on houses of worship, whatever their cause, strike at the heart of our shared moral life,’ CJ Rhodes, a prominent black Baptist pastor in Jackson, said in a Facebook post.

The arson underscores the importance of interfaith solidarity in standing up to hate and bigotry, said Jim Berk, CEO of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, a Los Angeles-based organisation focused on combating antisemitism.

‘It was an assault on the heart of Jewish life in the South, and on a legacy shaped in partnership with the Black community through the long, unfinished struggle for civil rights,’ Berk said in a statement. 

‘This attack is not only an act of antisemitism, it is an assault on that legacy, testing whether the lessons of that era still hold.’

‘That it has been attacked again, amid a surge of antisemitic incidents across the US, is a stark reminder: antisemitic violence is escalating, and it demands total condemnation and swift action from everyone,’ Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of The Anti-Defamation League, said in a statement.

‘This news puts a face and name to this tragedy, but does not change our resolve to proudly – even defiantly – continue Jewish life in Jackson in the face of hatred,’ the Beth Israel Congregation wrote in a statement. 

The congregation is assessing damage but will continue its regular worship programs and services for Shabbat, the weekly Jewish Sabbath, likely at one of the local churches that reached out, said Michele Schipper, CEO of the Institute of Southern Jewish Life and a past president of the congregation.

‘We are a resilient people,’ said Beth Israel Congregation President Zach Shemper. ‘With support from our community, we will rebuild.’

One Torah that survived the Holocaust was behind glass and was not damaged in the fire, Schipper said.

Five Torahs – the sacred scrolls with the text of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible – inside the sanctuary are being assessed for smoke damage. Two Torahs inside the library, where the most severe damage was done, were destroyed, according to a synagogue representative.

The floors, walls and ceiling of the sanctuary were covered in soot, and the synagogue will have to replace upholstery and carpeting.

With just several hundred people in the community, it has never been especially easy being Jewish in Mississippi’s capital city. Still, members of Beth Israel have taken particular pride in keeping their traditions alive in the heart of the Deep South.

Virtually every facet of Jewish life in Jackson could be found under Beth Israel’s roof.

The midcentury modern building not only accommodated the congregation but also the Jewish Federation, a nonprofit provider of social services and philanthropy that is the epicentre of Jewish society in most US cities. 

The building is home to the Institute of Southern Jewish Life, which provides resources to Jewish communities in 13 southern states. A Holocaust memorial was outdoors behind the synagogue building.

Because Jewish children throughout the South have attended summer camp for decades in Utica, Mississippi, about 30 miles southwest of Jackson, many retain a fond connection to the state and its Jewish community.

‘Jackson is the capital city, and that synagogue is the capital synagogue in Mississippi,’ said Rabbi Gary Zola, a historian of American Jewry who taught at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati. 

‘I would call it the flagship, though when we talk about places like New York and Los Angeles, it probably seems like Hicksville.’

Beth Israel, as a congregation, was established in 1860 and acquired its first property, where it built Mississippi’s first synagogue, after the Civil War. 

But wait a moment, when was the last time Israel destroyed a mosque, yes, a place of worship!

On 19th October 2023, an Israeli airstrike struck the Church of Saint Porphyrius, where 500 people were sheltering, and then on 8th November 2023, Israel attacked and destroyed the Khalid bin al-Walid Mosque, so it is no surprise that they are avenging.

At least sixty mosques had been obliterated by Israeli bombs. Not only that, but they have also hit hospitals and schools.

I know, I know, I’m going to be called antisemitic, and I am expecting that, but I am in no way antisemitic. I just don’t agree with war, any kind of war, because it takes lives along with it. Call a ceasefire, try to agree on something and get along with each other. You know what they say, ‘an eye for an eye, everyone goes blind.’