Hundreds of Jewish leaders convened in the nation’s capital June 25 and 26 to ask Congress and the Trump administration to act to protect Jewish Americans nationwide from violence.

The nearly 400 Jewish leaders from more than 100 major Jewish organizations across the country who participated in emergency meetings had one message: “Jewish security cannot wait.”

The Jewish Federations of North America and the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations led the United for Security Emergency Leadership Mission in response to the recent attacks targeting Jewish events in Washington, D.C., and Boulder, Colorado.

“We are facing an unprecedented situation in American Jewish history where every Jewish institution and event is a potential target for antisemitic violence,” Eric Fingerhut, JFNA’s CEO and president, said in the press release.

He added that the safety and security of the Jewish community must be elected officials’ top priority going forward.

“Whatever other issues the Jewish community may care about, whatever differing opinions we may hold on some of those issues, we are united for security,” Fingerhut said.

Throughout more than 200 meetings on Capitol Hill, advocates pushed for a six-point security policy plan for the Jewish community:

• Increase the Nonprofit Security Grant Program to $1 billion annually
• Provide federal support for security personnel costs for synagogues and Jewish institutions
• Expand FBI resources to fight the “domestic and global war on terror”
• Fund local law enforcement to protect Jewish institutions
• Regulate hate speech and “incitement to violence” on social media
• Enforce and prosecute existing hate crime legislation

Groups of advocates met with their local representatives, sharing personal experiences with antisemitism and their local Jewish communities’ concerns.

The $1 billion will provide Jewish institutions with “site hardening” and increased security personnel, according to Andrew Cushnir, the president and CEO of The Associated.

“After the three recent vicious antisemitic incidents, the attack on Governor [Josh] Shapiro’s home in Pennsylvania on Passover, the shooting in D.C. and firebombing of Jewish advocates in Colorado, the whole system of Jewish Federations realized that we needed government officials to make sure that the Jewish community wasn’t forced to manage its security without communal resources,” Cushnir said.

Cushnir said that The Associated is spending up to $2 million a year on security, and in meetings with Sen. Chris Van Hollen, Rep. Johnny Olszewski and a representative of Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, the Baltimore delegation was able to express urgently the massive amounts of money that the Jewish community has to spend on security.

He added that they told lawmakers that the security funding they’re currently setting aside is money that should be going to activities within their core mission like Jewish community engagement, caring for community members, supporting JCCs and more.

Howard Libit, the executive director of the Baltimore Jewish Council, said the Federation is seeking “to ease the financial burdens on Jewish institutions, synagogues, schools and federations by providing more security grants but also to help give more support to law enforcement to prosecute hate crimes.”

Cushnir said one of the key points the Associated leaders were looking to stress to lawmakers with these meetings was the fact that combating antisemitism has to be a national priority, not just a Jewish one.

He added that Jewish communities deserve to feel safe, and that it’s not solely the responsibility of Jewish people to make that a reality.

“Right now, every Jew in America is looking over their shoulder when they’re in a Jewish space out of concern, and that’s unacceptable in this country,” Cushnir said.

The emergency meetings come as American Jewish communities are increasingly fearful for their safety and concerned about the “escalating geopolitical tensions” between Israel and Iran, according to the press release.

Yechiel Leiter, Israel’s ambassador to the U.S., addressed the Jewish leaders in attendance about the current situation in the Middle East as the U.S. prepares to meet with Iran.

“The basis of any agreement pursued with Iran has to be: ‘There is no more attempt to annihilate the Jewish state, the Jewish people,’” Leiter said.

And for Jewish communities across America, they’re feeling the tension from the Israel-Iran war that comes amid an unprecedented rise in antisemitic incidents across the country since Oct. 7, 2023.

Cushnir said that The Associated, BJC and the entire Jewish Federation system is taking a stand for the Jewish communities they serve and working to get them whatever they need to both stay and feel safe.

“In this moment when our community is facing the fear of what is happening across the country with the rise in antisemitism, it was important to bring our forces together to make sure that our elected officials know that this is important, and also to remind our community that we are all in this together, and we are for damn sure going to make absolutely sure that we have the resources we need to keep our community safe,” Cushnir said.

bhamelin@midatlanticmdia.com