Interfaith Worship Should Be a Sign of Peace, but Leftist Agitators Brought Terror

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Interfaith Worship Should Be a Sign of Peace, but Leftist Agitators Brought Terror

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Liat Cohen-Reeis is the founder and director of The Christian & Jewish Alliance in San Diego and the Director of the Antisemitism Task Force at StandWithUs. Ms. Cohen-Reeis is a client of First Liberty Institute, the largest legal organization in the nation dedicated exclusively to defending religious liberty for all Americans.

I never imagined that an interfaith worship service would require courage to attend. But on Sept. 7 what was meant to be a sacred gathering of Jews and Christians praying side by side turned into an ordeal showing how antisemitism looks in America today: loud, aggressive, and terrifying.

We planned the service carefully and respectfully. Multiple synagogues and churches agreed to come together at the Legacy International Center, a Christian venue known for hosting worship and standing with Israel.

Rabbis and pastors prepared prayers. We sang in Hebrew and English, accompanied by a church praise band and an African American gospel choir. We didn’t advertise publicly; we invited only our distribution list. Nearly 500 people registered. I believed we had chosen a safe space.

Then, just before the doors opened, a staff member pulled me aside and said, “They’re here.”

Outside, agitators dressed in black and wearing face masks had gathered on the sidewalk, waving Palestinian flags. They laid dolls across the driveway so that guests had to drive over them while agitators screamed “baby killers” at them through megaphones. This wasn’t protest. It was intimidation, and it was aimed squarely at people coming to worship.

My friend Ruth and her husband experienced it immediately. As they drove in, sirens blared and chants echoed through bullhorns. Disruptors swarmed the driveway, some holding signs with swastikas, others blocking cars with their bodies. When Ruth stopped, a masked woman jumped onto the hood of her car, banging on the windshield and screaming.

Ruth was genuinely afraid for her life.

Stephanie’s experience was no better. Her car was surrounded. An agitator announced her arrival and called her “super racist” and “super hateful” over a bullhorn. Another screamed at her to get out and fight. Someone struck her window and tried to shove a sign inside her car. The hostility was so overwhelming that many guests drove away altogether. Over 100 guests who registered did not attend.

Marca tried to ask the agitators to leave private property. Instead, four or five people surrounded her, jammed bullhorns inches from her face, and filmed her aggressively. She escaped only because a friend physically intervened to shield her. The police did nothing to stop it.

Even inside the worship venue, we were not spared.

Drums pounded and sirens wailed throughout the service, intentionally attempting to drown out prayers and sermons. People left with ringing ears that lasted for days. When my friend Jake politely asked the agitators to quiet down so we could worship, they surrounded him, forced him toward a busy street, and followed him screaming, “Go back to Israel!” and “You’re a Nazi, you’re a baby killer!”

The actions of those who harassed, trespassed, and sought to drown out our speech and religious liberty went far beyond anything protected by the First Amendment. The First Amendment offers no protection to those physically interfering with religious worship or intimidating religious worshipers by seeking to drown out beliefs they despise.

Afterward, the harassment continued online. The agitators targeted guests on Instagram for being Jewish, posting photos and trying to reveal their identities. Disruptors used CodePink channels to threaten us, promising, “we will not give them a moment of peace.”  

This is what antisemitism looks like today. It is not confined to history books or distant places. It is rampant in San Diego and across the country, often masquerading as political activism while using the oldest tools of hatred: intimidation, dehumanization, inversion, and collective blame.

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism, adopted by the U.S. government in 2019, describes exactly what we experienced: hatred expressed through rhetoric and physical acts, directed at Jewish individuals and religious institutions, and at those who stand with them. Our free exercise of religion was deliberately obstructed. Our Christian allies were targeted too, punished for their solidarity.

The consequences have been devastating. Since that day, our Alliance has been unable to hold another event. People are afraid to attend. Our membership list has been compromised. Churches that once stood ready to partner with us now fear for their congregations.

We are now seeking legal protection through a federal lawsuit, for the simple right to gather, pray, and worship without fear. I have also testified before President Donald Trump’s Religious Liberty Commission in the hope that I can help raise more awareness to the hatred we face.

No one in America should have to run a gauntlet of hate to attend a religious service. If we accept this as normal, we signal that intimidation works and that our Jewish communities—and those who stand with them—are fair game.

I refuse to accept that.

Interfaith worship should be a sign of hope, not a trigger for terror. Standing together today is how we ensure that people of faith, of all faiths, can worship in peace tomorrow.

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal.

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