PITTSBURGH (AP) — Funerals will be held Wednesday for three of the victims killed in the massacre at a Pittsburgh synagogue, a day after President Donald Trump encountered hundreds of protesters when he quietly paid his respects.
Melvin Wax, Irving Younger and Joyce Fienberg will be laid to rest. They were among 11 people who died in the shooting rampage Saturday at the Tree of Life synagogue. Robert Gregory Bowers, a 46-year-old truck driver who authorities say raged against Jews, was arrested on federal hate-crime charges that could bring the death penalty.
Pittsburgh began burying the dead on Tuesday, with funerals for a beloved family doctor, a pillar of the congregation, and two 50-something brothers known as the Rosenthal “boys.” Thousands of mourners jammed a synagogue, a Jewish community center and a third, undisclosed site for the first in a weeklong series of funerals for victims of the deadliest anti-Semitic attack in U.S. history.
Trump, meanwhile, arrived to shouting, chanting protesters with signs such as “It’s your fault” and “Words matter,” alleging that bigots are being emboldened by his bellicose language. Pennsylvania’s governor and the mayor of Pittsburgh declined to join him during the visit.
With Tree of Life still cordoned off as a crime scene, more than 1,000 people poured into Rodef Shalom, one of the city’s oldest and largest synagogues, to mourn Cecil and David Rosenthal, ages 59 and 54.
The two intellectually disabled men were “beautiful souls” who had “not an ounce of hate in them — something we’re terribly missing today,” Rabbi Jeffrey Myers, a survivor of the massacre, said at their funeral.
“The entire world is sharing its grief with you, so you don’t walk alone,” Myers, his voice quivering, told the Rosenthals’ parents and other family members.
The brothers were widely known as “the boys,” the Rosenthals’ sister, Diane Hirt, noted. “They were innocent like boys, not hardened like men,” she said.
She said Cecil — a gregarious man with a booming voice who was lightheartedly known as the mayor of Squirrel Hall and the “town crier” for the gossip he managed to gather — would have especially enjoyed the media attention this week, a thought that brought laughter from the congregation.
Dr. Jerry Rabinowitz’s funeral was held at the Jewish Community Center in the city’s Squirrel Hill section, the historic Jewish neighborhood where the rampage took place. Two police vehicles were posted at a side door and two at the main entrance.
A line stretched around the block as mourners — some in white medical coats, others wearing yarmulkes, black hats or head scarves — passed beneath blue Romanesque arches into the brick building.
The 66-year-old Rabinowitz was a go-to doctor for HIV patients in the epidemic’s early and desperate days, a physician who always hugged his patients as they left his office.
“A lot of people are feeling really angry about this. A lot of rage built up inside about this, because of it being a hate crime. Don’t get me wrong; I do. But I’m so overwhelmed with sadness right now that I can’t even be angry right now,” said Robin Faulkner, whose family had seen Rabinowitz for 30 years and counted him as a dear friend. “It’s just such a loss. Just tragic.”
A private funeral was also held for Daniel Stein, the 71-year-old men’s club president at Tree of Life.
Trump and first lady Melania Trump landed in Pittsburgh after the day’s services and lit candles at Tree of Life for the victims. Outside, they laid white roses as well as stones for each of the dead, a Jewish burial tradition. The president and first lady later went to a hospital to visit with survivors.
They were joined by Trump’s daughter Ivanka and her husband, Jared Kushner, as well as Myers, the Tree of Life rabbi, and Israeli Ambassador Ron Dermer.
Hundreds of protesters gathered near the synagogue and the hospital.
“He didn’t pull the trigger, but his verbiage and actions don’t help,” said Squirrel Hill resident Paul Carberry, 55, wearing anti-Trump patches on his hat and jacket.
Another Squirrel Hill resident, Shayna Marcus, hoped to catch the presidential motorcade with her young sons but just missed it. She said the anger at Trump is misplaced.
“I don’t think focusing on Trump is the answer, or on politics,” said Marcus, a 34-year-old nurse and Trump supporter.
Democratic Mayor Bill Peduto had asked Trump not to come while the city was burying its dead. He and Gov. Tom Wolf, a fellow Democrat, said they would skip the president’s visit.
“Community leaders expressed to the governor that they did not feel it was appropriate for Trump to come, so the governor made a decision not to join him on his visit out of respect for the families and the community,” said Beth Melena, Wolf’s campaign spokeswoman.
Among the mourners at the Rosenthal brothers’ funeral was Dr. Abe Friedman, who typically sat in the back row of Tree of Life with the two men but was late to synagogue on Saturday and was not there when the gunman opened fire.
As he stood in line at the funeral, Friedman wondered why he had been spared.
“Why did things fall into place for me?” he asked. “I usually sit in the back row. In the last row, everyone got killed.”
