Virginia Jews 'shocked' by Teitel case

Nov 2, 2009 23:36

Members of the Orthodox community of Virginia Beach, which once included a man recently arrested on terror charges, expressed shock and condemnation Monday over his alleged crimes.

Israeli authorities announced on Sunday that they had arrested American-born Ya'acov Teitel for carrying out a series of deadly terrorist shootings and bombings over a dozen years, in which two Palestinians were killed and left-wing academic Prof. Ze'ev Sternhell was wounded.

"The community is in shock," Rabbi Chaim Silver told The Jerusalem Post. "Obviously, as Orthodox and Torah-observant Jews, violence is not something we at all support."

Silver pointed out that the Teitel family had moved to Israel several years earlier, and that few if any of the 150 families in the Orthodox community there kept in touch with them.

One member of the community who had known the family described them as "seemingly normal" and said he would never have predicted Teitel's involvement in the acts detailed by Israeli authorities.

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