Manchester’s Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation has been lauded by the Chief Rabbi as “a community or heroes” nearly one year after the Yom Kippur terrorist attack, which claimed the life of two of its members.
Melvin Cravitz, 66, was murdered outside the shul by terrorist Jihad Al-Shamie and Adrian Daulby, 53, was killed in the crossfire as he, along with other shul members and the police, tried to stop Al-Shamie from entering the building.
Speaking at a memorial service for the two men at the synagogue on Monday night, the Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis recalled a visit to the congregation with his wife, Valerie, the day after the terrorist attack. He said they would “never forget the day we spent with all of you”.
The Chief Rabbi (Photo: Gaby Wine)[Missing Credit]
Meeting Heaton Park members in a neighbouring synagogue, he said the room “was filled with love, with concern, with empathy. [People were asking each other:] ‘How’s this one?’ How’s that one?’ ‘How are they doing?’ Everybody not thinking about themselves but thinking about others. And therefore, Heaton Park will not only be a symbol of humankind at its lowest ebb, but rather...hopefully far more so, as one of humankind in its most glorious form.”
He said that when he went to visit the three men who were injured in the attack in hospital – Yoni Finlay, Andrew Franks and a security guard called Bernard – “in the midst of their physical pain and their emotional trauma from what had transpired the day before, they were positively minded, full of tikva, of genuine hope”.
He told the Heaton Park community: “Confronted by evil, you have responded with virtue. Confronted by a terrorist with hatred in his heart, you have responded with love. Confronted by somebody to glorify death, you have responded by sanctifying life.”
He paid particular tribute to the shul’s Rabbi Daniel Walker, who, he said, broke his fast late “because [he felt] the burden of this responsibility of each of every one of the members of the congregation on [his] shoulders… An extraordinary insight into a truly remarkable leader.”
Rabbi Daniel Walker (Photo: Gaby Wine)[Missing Credit]
Recalling Melvin and Adrian, Rabbi Walker described them as “very different in character….Melvin with his trademark wide smile and Adrian with his quieter smile. If you didn’t know Melvin, you probably aren’t from Manchester. On the other hand, only a few of us had the privilege of knowing Adrian. I consider that one of the great privileges of being a rabbi here is that I got to know Adrian. His quiet humility.”
Pointing to the front row, Rabbi Walker said Adrian was always the first in shul. “[He] would be sitting here in his seat, where he had sat for years and where his family had sat for generations.”
Adrian Daulby (Photo: Gaby Wine)[Missing Credit]
The rabbi, who said that a new Sefer Torah was soon due to be completed in their memory, added: “What was similar about them…was their ability to show care and affection to everybody from all walks of life, both of them always giving… Very different men, but very united in their ability and determination to be part of the community and to make this world a better place.”
Melvin Cravitz (Photo: Gaby Wine)[Missing Credit]
The rabbi said that Melvin was killed as he was “rushing to shul to daven” and Adrian had gone to help keep the door closed to prevent the terrorist from entering. “It was through that act of heroism that Adrian lost his life.”
He said “one of the many things that hurt” was returning to shul shortly afterwards and finding the machzorium (prayer books used on High Holy Days) left open as people evacuated the building. “I looked around this room that felt lonely and desolate and violated, and it strengthened me in ways that I have never given voice to…the determination that had begun that morning..to make sure that the place of the Lord, to make sure that the call of prayer, the voice of joy, the righteousness, the righteous would never be stilled, that this shul wouldn’t remain empty, desolate and violated.”
On a Friday night soon after the attack, some 1100 people came to the service, “and we davened and we sang and, most importantly, we danced. And we did that because the only possible response to evil is …more righteousness, more happiness”.
Giving a tearful address, Sherelle Dresner, Melvin’s stepdaughter, said: “For me, it is hard to remember a life or world prior to Yom Kippur 2025. This new world is lonely uncertain and overwhelming.”
Sherelle Dresner (Photo: Gaby Wine)[Missing Credit]
She revealed that since Melvin’s murder, she had received messages from strangers “feeling the need to explain to me that the blame for Melvyn’s brutal murder lies at the feet of all Jewish people and as a result of world politics. For me, all this achieves is to remind me of what Melvin’s crime was – being born Jewish, something that he never would have apologised for, something he was proud of being.”
Sherelle said that August 30 would have been Melvin and her mother’s 17th wedding anniversary, “a particularly had day for her. It is clear to us now that [Melvin was] her hero. For Melvin, connecting with others…mattering to other people was all that he really wanted, and I hope he can see now just how much he mattered..and I am going to try my best to make sure he continues to matter.”
Survivor Yoni Finlay, who was injured as he held the door shut, said: “My life changed forever on Yom Kippur 5786, the day a rabid Jew-hater chose to try to destroy my shul, my community, my friends.
“My life also changed because I realised no matter what happened, we are capable of anything, …When I was lying in the foyer…with four of my organs badly damaged by a bullet that had gone through me, as I looked up and saw the complete devastation and shock that no father should ever see on their son’s face, I made myself a promise that I would not die. This was not when my life was going to end. I still had so much to.”
Yoni FInlay (Photo: Gaby Wine)[Missing Credit]
While there had been “difficult days”, in the past year, he had met so many inspirational people, “some that have also gone through the darkest of tragedy…people who inspire me every single day to keep going. Yes, we are all different to how to we were before Yom Kippur, but I think we are also better people.”
Chair of trustees Alan Levy said that Adrian and Melvin “passed in acts of profound courage”.
He recalled Melvin as “ a kind and caring man, who would do anything to help anyone. He would regularly help the shul out by delivering shiva chairs and prayer books to members’ houses who had lost a loved one.
“Adrian was a quiet man who was generally the first to arrive here every Shabbos and Yom Tov morning. Adrian ran from his seat the whole length of this [room] to help hold the door closed. Tragically, he lost his life in the chaotic crossfire as the emergency services arrived to act to stop the attacker getting inside. I look to my right and I see the seat where he used to sit.”
The memorial service (Photo: Gaby Wine)[Missing Credit]
He said their loss was “personal to all of us at Heaton Park. They were friends, familiar faces, but most of all they were just good men. They came to shul seeing to observe the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. That should have been the safest place they could have been.”
Levy called on the country’s leaders to “have the moral courage to say what is right, even when it isn’t easy and unpopular and even when the voices of hatred are loud. Principled leadership will only strengthen the values that bind our country together.”
In the meantime, he said that rather than destroy the community, since the terrorist attack, the community had “pulled together, prayed together and celebrated together. We continue to celebrate festivals and to live proudly as Mancunian and British Jews. That resilience and defiance is born of faith and of the values that both Malvin and Adrian embodied.”
Angeal Rayner (Photo: Gaby Wine)[Missing Credit]
Angela Rayner, secretary of state for housing, communities and local government, pledged to fight antisemitism, saying that “any attack on Jews is an attack on us all…These acts are a crisis for us all – they reflect the increase we’ve seen in obsessive, intense hated of Jews.”
She said antisemitism was “a hated we must stand robustly against and root out from its very foundations” by “taking on extremists and bearing down on those who seek to divide our communities… we will never rest until every Jewish person is safe.”
Chief Constable Sir Stephen Watson QPM of Greater Manchester Police, who was given a warm welcome by the congregation, described antisemitism as “a moral stain that needs to be ruthlessly expunged” and that he “could well understand how vulnerable and isolated” the Jewish community felt.
But recalling the minute silences held in football stadium’s following the attack, he said: "That was the roar of the silent majority and the true voice of our country.”
Chief Constable Sir Stephen Watson QPM[Missing Credit]
Other speakers included Hilary Foxler, president of Hebrew Park Congregation and Mark Adlestone, chair of the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester and Region.
Rabbi Amir Ellituv, senior rabbi of the S&P Sephardi community read out a psalm and Chazan Yehuda Marx, from Heaton Park Shul, recited the memorial prayer, Kel Male Rachamin. Alex Daulby and Brent David said Kaddish.
Raphi Bloom chaired the event.
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