This morning I received an email from Rabbi Capt. Sarah Schecter (or is that Capt. Rabbi?) of the LA Air Force Base, forwarding an article from Zaka Rescue and Recovery, an Israeli organization dedicated to search and rescue. In this case, volunteers from Zaka waded through waist-deep toxic floodwaters to rescue six Torah scrolls from Congregation Beth Israel, an Orthodox synagogue in New Orleans. A few of the Torah scrolls are believed to be more than 250 years old. Alas, out of six, only two are possibly restorable. The scrolls are blackened from the toxic water and severely damaged. The mail from Rabbi Schecter included some pictures, which don’t appear to be on the Zaka website, so I’m uploading one.
On the positive size, URJ has a link to an article from Channel 2 in Baton Rouge that notes that 25 Torahs were safely rescued from Jewish synagogues in New Orleans and Jefferson Parish. Rabbi Martha Bergadine, executive director of the Jewish Federation of Greater Baton Rouge, her husband, Rabbi Stan Zamek of Beth Shalom Synagogue, and a group of about 13 other volunteers from both Baton Rouge synagogues and the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans traveled in a six-car caravan for the recovery effort. The article notes that the rescue was attempted only after they were assured of the safety of storm victims in the area. In this story, the article were recovered from Shir Chadash Conservative Congregation, a Jewish day school in Metairie, Touro Synagogue and Temple Sinai Reform Congregation in New Orleans. Luckily, in this case, none of the torahs, including those that had survived the Holocaust, were damaged or destroyed. The article states that Rabbi David Saperstein of URJ noted that damage to the synagogues was minimal. However, the USCJ website notes that Shir Chadash in Metaire, La. was flooded with 5-10 inches of water; all the flooring is ruined and mold has started growing up the walls and the pews, and that the synagogue will need new siddurim, chumashim, and tallitot.
The Zaka website noted they were also going to be trying to rescue scrolls from a Chabad synagogue; I haven’t seen the results on that.
[Crossposted to weirdjews]
