The British-born rabbi killed in the attack on a synagogue in Jerusalem on Tuesday was a tolerant man who never imposed his religious beliefs on others, his cousin has said.
Avraham Shmuel Goldberg, 68, left the UK more than two decades ago and lived with his wife and six children in Jerusalem, Michelle Hirschfield told the Guardian.
He was killed along with three American-born rabbis – Moshe Twersky, 59; Aryeh Kupinsky, 43 and Kalman Ze’ev Levine, 55 – when two Palestinian men rushed into the synagogue with knives and a gun during morning prayers. An Israeli policeman was also killed. Thousands of people attended the funerals of the victims in Jerusalem later on Tuesday.
“We are completely devastated,” said Hirschfield, 63, from London. “He was just a tolerant, good man … I was due to see him in a couple of weeks when he was going to be in London.”
Hirschfield said she and Goldberg, who holds dual British-Israeli citizenship, had been raised in Liverpool and later moved to Golders Green in north London.
“This has brought it all home to us,” she said. “This was a man who was simply praying in the morning at his usual synagogue, just going about his daily life, not trying to impose his views on anyone.”
Goldberg, an only child, was well educated and had worked as a chemical engineer, Hirschfield said.
His friend, David Osborne, who narrowly missed being in the synagogue at the time of the attack, told the British website Jewishnews: “Avraham prayed there most days for the last 10 years or so, he was a devout Jew with no political agenda. All he wanted was to live a peaceful life. His family are the nicest people you could meet. They had lots of children and several grandchildren.”
According to people in Golders Green, Goldberg had been a member of the Beth Hamedrash synagogue there until he left the UK in the early 1990s.
Members of the congregation said the community had been shocked by the attack. “It was early morning and these people had just left their families,” said Mark, a 23-year-old student, speaking outside the synagogue. “To do this in what is obviously a sacred place … People here are deeply upset.”
Vicki Belovski, the rebbetzin of the nearby Golders Green synagogue, said: “The fact that someone can just barge into a synagogue and attack people with knives and guns is ghastly.”
In a statement Goldberg’s family told Jewishnews that it “accepts the divine decree with love”, adding that they would not be giving further statements to the press.
In Jerusalem, thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews swayed in prayer at the funeral of Twersky, a descendant of two rabbinical dynasties. He was the head of an English-speaking religious college in Jerusalem, the son of Isadore Twersky, the founder of Harvard University’s Centre for Jewish Studies, and the grandson of a founder of the Modern Orthodox movement.
Twersky, who had five children, migrated from Boston to Israel in 1990. Family, friends and admirers expressed disbelief as they addressed the crowd of mourners through loudspeakers at a seminary in West Jerusalem were the funeral was held.
“We are so shocked. He was one of the world’s most amazing people,” said Esther Greenwald, a friend of Twersky’s widow, Miriam, who was immersed in prayer for much of the service.
“It’s an unbelievable loss for us,” said a student at one of two religious seminaries where Twersky played a leading role.
Followers described Twersky as a rare rabbi in that he managed to bridge two worlds, being a descendant of a Hasidic dynasty that traces its roots to 18th century Ukraine, while being an heir to a modern Orthodox Jewish leader in the US, an advocate of a different form of Judaism.
Meshulam Twersky, the rabbi’s eldest son, hailed him as someone “you could always pour your heart out to”, adding that his only solace was that his father had died in prayer.
Separate funeral services were held for Goldberg, Levine and Kupinsky.
