On Saturday, another community was stunned by an attack on a house of worship.
This time, the place was Poway, a quiet, shaded suburb north of San Diego, where a gunman opened fire at a synagogue during a service on the last day of Passover.
A 60-year-old woman was killed. A rabbi was shot in the hand, and two other people were left with shrapnel wounds.
Mayor Steve Vaus of Poway told me he saw the timing of the shooting, a little more than a week after leaders hosted an interfaith event aimed at building strength across the city’s religious communities, as “a bit of a twisted irony.”
I reached Vaus by phone in the midst of a flurry of interviews in which he said the shooting was a hate crime — a description echoed by President Donald Trump.
Vaus emphasized that Poway is an “idyllic” place where neighbors have helped one another fend off wildfire flames with garden hoses. Its residents, he said, wouldn’t be “bowed by hatred.”
As for the gunman? “I’m anxious for the suspect to feel the full force of the law,” he said.
What happened?
Police say a 19-year-old man armed with an AR-15-style gun stormed into the Chabad of Poway synagogue a little before noon Saturday, yelling anti-Semitic slurs. The synagogue was more full than usual since it was a holiday.
The congregation’s rabbi, Yisroel Goldstein, tried talking to the man after he opened fire, but he fired again.
Lori Gilbert Kaye died after jumping in front of the rabbi to protect him. The rabbi was hit in both hands.
The gunman left the building, potentially after his weapon malfunctioned, and surrendered to police a short time later. He was charged with one count of murder and three counts of attempted murder Sunday morning. Officials said they were investigating whether he posted an anti-Semitic manifesto online before the attack.
Does this fit into any broader patterns?
In a word, yes. Experts said the shooting appeared to fit at the intersection of two troubling trends: growing anti-Semitism in the United States and a rise in violence both fueled by and partially carried out for the internet.
The shooting put religious leaders on edge and reignited conversations about securing churches, mosques, synagogues and other sacred spaces.
Nevertheless, Goldstein said he continued his sermon even as he waited for authorities to arrive at the synagogue, because “it was just 70 years ago during the Holocaust we were gunned down like this, and I just want to let my fellow Americans know that we’re not going to let this happen,” he said.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.