RICHMOND, Va. -- The Richmond Jewish community gathered Monday to honor the memories of those who died in the October 7 terror attacks in Israel one year ago and to stand in solidarity with all those impacted.
Sharing messages of hope, resilience, and strength, the day began with a solemn ceremony outside the Weinstein Jewish Community Center, where the names of 1,200 victims were read aloud.
Services continued into the evening, where hundreds gathered for a 6 p.m. vigil to remember lives lost and pray for peace in a region ravaged by war.
“Many of us in this room have lost family,” said Rob Slotnick, chair of the Richmond Jewish Community Relations Council. “Many in this room have children fighting in the Israeli Defense Forces.”
During the two-hour ceremony, attended by lawmakers, rabbinical leaders, and many in the Jewish community, Governor Glenn Youngkin (R - Virginia) issued a proclamation recognizing October 7, 2024, as a day of remembrance for the victims of the Hamas attacks on Israel.
The governor included a special tribute to Hersh Goldberg-Polin, a former Richmond resident taken hostage for nearly 11 months until his body was recovered in a tunnel in the Gaza Strip on August 31.
Dr. Limor Glazer, a family friend of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, said his loss has caused deep grief for many in the Richmond community who held out hope for months that he would be found alive.
“It’s been gut-wrenching,” Glazer said. “I wore his bracelet every day for months, as did so many in Richmond who prayed every single day for his safety. It’s just gut-wrenching.”
Glazer said many never imagined that life could change so drastically for loved ones living overseas and for those experiencing antisemitism on American soil. Guest speakers echoed similar sentiments.
“For a year now, a black cloud has been hanging over our heads like a red flag in a stormy sea that warns, do not enter the water. But we’re already inside, and life is turbulent,” said a visiting Israeli speaker.
Despite the great loss, faith leaders urged the community to hold onto hope and pray for peace in the face of adversity.
Vigils, protests around the world commemorate the anniversary of Hamas attack on Israel
Other commemorations and protests unfolded across the world on Monday to mark the anniversary of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel, an assault that sparked a war that has devastated the Hamas-ruled Gaza strip, fueled bloodshed in other Mideast lands and stirred protests and divisions far away.
Those divisions were visible in New York, where a crowd gathered for an evening remembrance ceremony in Central Park even as pro-Palestinian protesters converged on a corner of the park less than a mile away.
Hamas militants' surprise cross-border attack last year killed about 1,200 people. Another 250 were taken hostage; around 100 remain in captivity, with many of them feared dead. The attack, on a major Jewish holiday, shattered Israelis’ sense of security and left the world facing the prospect of a major conflict in the Middle East.
“The unfathomable horrors I experienced that morning have transformed me, along with every single Israeli and every single Jew,” Natalie Sanandaji, a survivor from a music festival where the attackers killed hundreds, told the audience in Central Park.
Israel responded to the Oct. 7 attack by waging a war against Hamas in Gaza, where the fighting has killed over 41,000 people and displaced around 1.9 million.
The conflict has spread in the region, where Israel also is fighting Hezbollah militants in Lebanon, facing escalating threats from Yemen's Houthi rebels and contending with a mounting conflict with Iran, which backs Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis.
In New York, protesters spread a large Palestinian flag on a street near the New York Stock Exchange early Monday afternoon, while a smaller group of counterprotesters held an Israeli flag. The pro-Palestinian group grew to a blocks-long column as it marched through Manhattan streets, at one point holding a banner that read “war begets war” on the steps of the New York Public Library.
Associated Press journalists saw several people being taken into police custody at various points in the march. Police said multiple arrests were made; no further information was immediately available.
While the protesters paused to conduct a Muslim evening prayer at the southwestern corner of Central Park, the parents of American-Israeli hostage Omer Neutra shared their anguish from the park's SummerStage venue.
“We would never have imagined we would still be standing here a whole year later, with no news of him," his mother, Orna Neutra, told hundreds of people at an event that drew New York’s governor, mayor, U.S. senators and other elected officials. Her son, a New York-born Israeli soldier, turns 23 next week.
At Philadelphia's Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History, a New Jersey high school group viewed an exhibition about the Tribe of Nova music festival in Re’im, Israel, where over 360 people were killed.
“I feel like that really could have been me there,” said student Ellie Solomon. Many festivalgoers were close to her age, she noted.
“It’s important for us to remember them and honor them because they didn’t deserve anything that happened to them," she added.
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, also toured the exhibition and emerged hoping that it gave people “an understanding of what really happened" and made them more tolerant “and more committed to finding peace in our society and peace across the globe.”
In an echo of campus protests across the U.S. last spring, activists gathered again at colleges Monday. About 200 pro-Palestinian protesters chanted and held banners and flags at the University of California, Los Angeles, while a few other demonstrators held Israeli flags.
Six months after counterprotesters attacked a pro-Palestinian encampment at UCLA, some people wore helmets to Monday's demonstration in case of violence. The protest was peaceful.
Hundreds of members of the Argentine Jewish community, the largest in Latin America, held a ceremony in Buenos Aires in memory of the victims of the Oct. 7 attack. A similar ceremony took place in Santiago, Chile.
Others took part in protests in support of the Palestinians in Lima, Peru; Bogota, Colombia and Mexico City, demanding an end to the conflict.
In Europe, where countries have sought to tamp down antisemitic and anti-Muslim sentiment, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said in Hamburg that “we stand beside” Israelis, and he also pointed to the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza.
The chancellery in Berlin was adorned with a yellow ribbon commemorating Israeli hostages, and the names of people killed and kidnapped were read out at the Brandenburg Gate.
French President Emmanuel Macron met in Paris with relatives of hostages and of the dead. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot attended a memorial service at the Nova festival site.
The Vatican took up a collection for the people of Gaza and published a letter expressing Pope Francis' solidarity.
In the Polish capital of Warsaw, the Jewish community paid tribute to Alex Dancyg, a Polish-born Holocaust educator who was abducted from the Nir Oz kibbutz on Oct. 7. Israel believes he died in captivity.
In Australia, thousands of people attended vigils in Sydney and Melbourne, with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese joining the latter event. A day after thousands of pro-Palestinian demonstrators rallied across Australia's cities, hundreds gathered amid a heavy police presence at Sydney town hall to remember Palestinians killed in the conflict.
In Pakistan's largest city, Karachi, schoolchildren took part in a pro-Palestinian rally organized by the Pakistan Markazi Muslim League party.
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Vejpongsa reported from Philadelphia and Spike from Budapest, Hungary. Contributing were Associated Press journalists Jennifer Peltz, John Minchillo and Ted Shaffrey in New York, Jaimie Ding in Los Angeles, Geir Moulson in Berlin, Diane Jeantet in Paris, Nicole Winfield in Rome, Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo, Vanessa Gera in Warsaw and Charlotte Graham-McLay in Wellington, New Zealand.
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