After antisemitic attacks in Colorado surged to historic levels last year, rabbis and faith leaders say Jewish hate continues to rise at a dangerous pace, instilling fear among Jewish Coloradans at home, work and school.
“The amount of security we’ve had to add to our daily routines is unprecedented in my 38 years as a rabbi,” said Rabbi Joe Black at Temple Emanuel in Denver, the oldest synagogue in the Rocky Mountain region. The congregation of nearly 6,000 is one of many around the state that has poured money into stronger security measures, using funds raised by the congregation and grants.
“I have people in my office in tears of fear,” Black said this week, as his community observed Passover, the weeklong celebration of Jewish people’s liberation from slavery in Egypt that began Monday. “The resurgence of antisemitism certainly pushes buttons in all of us.”
Antisemitic attacks reported in Colorado in 2023 reached their highest levels in more than four decades and outpaced a nationwide spike, according to data released last week by the Anti-Defamation League. The number of antisemitic incidents soared by 199% in Colorado, New Mexico and Wyoming with 242 incidents compared with 81 in 2022.
In Colorado, there were 198 incidents last year compared with 71 in 2022, the report said.
Before the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel, antisemitic incidents in Colorado were already on pace to hit historic levels, the ADL said, but the war only compounded targeted hate toward the Jewish community.
During the last three months of 2023, there were 111 anti-Jewish incidents in Colorado, surpassing the previous annual record of 92 incidents reported in 2021, the report said.
“The lack of tolerance, the rise in hate speech, the fear that is promoted by political candidates and politicians, coupled with those who are using Hamas’ horrific attack on the state of Israel to justify antisemitic and historically inaccurate claims — that becomes a toxic soup,” Black said.
Black added that there is “nothing inherently wrong” with criticizing Israel or its policies.
“But when you question the legitimacy of the state of Israel, or when you rewrite history to promote a narrative that is blatantly antisemitic, that crosses the line,” he said.
Colorado ranked 13th among states for the number of reported antisemitic incidents in 2023, according to the report. Nationwide, 8,873 anti-Jewish attacks were reported, marking a 140% increase from 2022 and the highest level recorded since ADL began tracking data in 1979.
Attacks in Colorado ranged from students being physically assaulted by classmates to antisemitic tropes and slurs. At least eight Jewish institutions were targets of antisemitic bomb threats last year, according to the report. A rabbi, who was leaving a city council meeting where a resolution in support of Israel was being considered, was heckled with threatening statements, like “We all know where you live, rabbi.” Pork products were glued to a Jewish student’s door at the University of Denver, while mezuzahs — small decorative cases containing paper inscribed with Hebrew verses from the Torah — were ripped from students’ doorframes.
The FBI has repeatedly warned of increased threats against Jewish and Muslim Americans since the start of the Israel-Hamas war Oct. 7. The number of anti-Jewish hate crime investigations opened by the FBI has at least tripled since the start of the war, compared with the four months before Oct. 7, Director Christopher Wray said in a news conference last week.
Earlier this year, Colorado allocated $1 million in emergency funding to support nonprofits — notably churches, mosques, and synagogues — in response to the rapid rise of hate crimes across the state.
Scott Levin, the regional director for ADL’s mountain states, called the staggering increase in incidents alarming, but said numbers tell only part of the story.
“Behind each reported incident is a Jewish individual who was personally targeted with harm because of their identity or a Jewish institution that was targeted because it is a place where Jewish people congregate and pray,” Levin said. “Whether it is a middle school child who had a swastika drawn on her arm or a synagogue that received a bomb threat while people were gathered for a funeral service, the harm to Jewish individuals and institutions is real.
“These stories must not be forgotten or overlooked.”
“No ability to hide in our bubbles”
In Steamboat Springs, a small mountain town tucked in the Yampa Valley, antisemitism feels different than in the big city, said Kolby Morris-Dahary, rabbi of Har Mischpacha.
“These are the people that are at the grocery store with you. These are the people that you see at the bank every day or on the street,” Morris-Dahary said. “And so we have no ability to hide in our bubbles and not confront this head on.”
Morris-Dahary, who started as the town’s first full-time rabbi in 2022, witnessed antisemitism shortly after she moved to town, when a group of high school students vandalized another student’s car with a swastika.
The vandalism hit a peak last fall — before Oct. 7 — when there were five swastikas found in public spaces in one month, some near the high school, she said. In the past few months, two swastikas were found at a Steamboat Springs elementary school.
In the last two years, there have been two active shooter trainings, led by a former FBI agent, for the town’s Jewish community. It was the same training a Texas rabbi said helped him when an armed man held him and three congregants hostage for 11 hours inside a synagogue, Morris-Dahary said.
The hate propelled her to create the group, Steamboat Team to Disrupt Antisemitism and Discrimination, or STAND, which hosts public meetings to teach the community how to stand up to hate against the Jewish community and other marginalized groups.
Morris-Dahary also talks with teachers and school faculty in Routt County about the issues students face. The group’s advisory board, which includes the district’s superintendent and Steamboat Springs police chief, meet to talk about discrimination and hate in the community and what can be done to combat it.
Since Oct. 7, she feels safety for the Jewish community has “disintegrated,” noting the fear felt by many of her congregants with children in college. But on a local level, there’s a sense of comfort that has come from binding together in the face of hate.
“I’m feeling like our community feels like they can share things that, before the creation of STAND, would have been swept under the rug,” she said. “That was really the culture around here for a very long time.”
Her work as a rabbi, director of STAND and community member is focused on raising the voice of the silent majority who, Morris-Dahary said, knows that hate and discrimination are not OK.
“The work that we’re doing at STAND is really powerful and taking advantage of the fact that kindness is really at the heart of who we are as a town,” she said. “It’s just about bringing that out and giving people the courage to stand up to hate.”
Amid the hate, both rabbis say they are seeing a rise of people asking to learn more about Judaism and a growth in membership.
“There are so many Jews that are coming out in Routt County that are wanting to connect,” Morris-Dahary said. “So even though there is this growing threat against our lives and against the Jewish people that’s happening all over the world, we still feel really proud to be Jewish.”