Danes form human ring outside Copenhagen synagogue
Thousands attend interfaith event at site where Jewish security guard was killed in a February terror attack
COPENHAGEN, Denmark — People of different faiths formed a human ring Saturday outside the synagogue in Copenhagen where a Jewish security guard was fatally shot last month.
Organizer Niddal El-Jabr said the idea behind the show of unity was to “send a powerful statement” that “Jews should able to have their religion in peace.”
Attendance was reported by The Associated Press to be in the “thousands.”
A similar event held in Oslo in the days following the attack had involved over a thousand people, but were later found to have been exaggerated.
Saturday’s gathering was inspired by similar symbolic events in Scandinavia in recent weeks. On February 27, Copenhagen’s mayor joined a “ring of peace” in the nearby City Hall square. Police had banned any events outside the synagogue at the time, citing security.
On February 15, Omar el-Hussein killed Dan Uzan, the guard and Danish filmmaker Finn Noergaard, who was attending a free speech event at a cultural center in Copenhagen, several kilometers away.
The attacks, which occurred just weeks after jihadist gunmen killed 17 people in Paris, raised fears of heightened tension between religious communities in Nordic countries.
Hannah Bentow, whose bat mitzvah celebration Uzan was protecting, marked her coming of age in Jerusalem this week.
AFP contributed to this report.
The Times of Israel Community.