In the predawn hours of the Sabbath, fire ripped through Beth Israel Congregation in Jackson, Mississippi, leaving the state’s largest synagogue in ruins. Investigators have ruled the blaze an act of arson, and federal authorities quickly moved in alongside local fire officials to arrest a suspect. The synagogue’s library and administrative offices were destroyed, and several Torah scrolls—sacred to Jewish worship—were damaged or lost. That this attack occurred during Shabbat, when God’s covenant people gather to worship, only deepens the weight of the moment.

While no one was physically injured, the spiritual and cultural wounds are immense. Beth Israel is Jackson’s only synagogue, and now its doors are closed indefinitely. One Torah that survived the Holocaust remained untouched, sealed behind glass—a quiet but powerful reminder that the Jewish people have endured hatred and persecution for centuries, yet have never been extinguished. The attack has drawn solidarity from churches and other houses of worship, but it also exposes a darker truth: antisemitism is no longer hiding in the shadows. It is burning in the open.

Scripture warns that hatred of the Jewish people will intensify as the world moves closer to the final days (Zechariah 12:2–3; Matthew 24:9). Israel—and by extension the Jewish people worldwide—has always been the target of spiritual and ideological warfare. Attacks like this are not random acts of vandalism; they are manifestations of an ancient hatred that will climax during the Tribulation. Yet even now, God is preserving His people, just as He preserved that Holocaust-era Torah. Watchmen should take note: the fire against Israel is being stoked, but God’s covenant still stands.

SOURCE: Mississippi Today