Synagogue Hostage Survivor Delivers Impassioned Rebuke of Anti-Semitic Rhetoric: ‘They Play on People’s Fears’

One of the four people taken hostage at a Texas synagogue has a message on Tuesday in what was a rebuke of anti-Semitic rhetoric.

Jeffrey Cohen and three others were taken hostage by a gunman at Congregation Beth Israel in Colleyville, TX in what was an 11-hour standoff. After several hours one of the hostages was freed and, a few hours later, the remaining hostages escaped to freedom as the FBI raided the synagogue, where the suspect, Malike Faisal Akram, died. It is unknown how Akram died. The FBI said he died in what was a “shooting incident.”

On MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle Reports, Chris Jansing, filling in for Ruhle, asked Cohen “what your feeling is about this man. Angry? Do you hate him? Do you forgive him?”

Cohen responded:

I don’t know and I’m not one of these people who can just, you know, forgive. So I can’t say that I forgive him, but I do recognize – first of all, he was mentally ill, his brother has said so and it’s very – the way he behaved makes me believe that.

He bought into these tropes. He was not your typical attacker who came in and I just want to kill all the Jews. That was not him. He came to the Jews because he bought into these very dangerous stories that the Jews control the world, and the Jews control the government, and the banks, and the media. And we as good people and we as patriotic Americans we need to challenge those things when we hear them.

Because these words do have consequences. They play on people’s ears, they play on people’s fears and it leads to actions like this where people believe that if they want to accomplish a political act, terror to one group or another, and in this case to Jews, is not just capable, it will be successful. And it’s acceptable.

“Words matter,” said Jansing. “And words have consequences.”

Watch above, via MSNBC.

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