Editor’s note: This essay is part of Mississippi Today Ideas, a platform for thoughtful Mississippians to share fact-based ideas about our state’s past, present and future. You can read more about the section here.

It has been 25 years since I lived in Jackson, Mississippi, and whenever someone finds out I’m Jewish and from there, their first response is usually, Wait, there are Jews in Mississippi?

I am proud to always answer yes.

Beth Israel Congregation in Jackson, and the loving community that calls it home, shaped me into the person I am today.

My family has been part of that community for decades. My grandfather and father served as temple presidents; my mom grew up in the community and later served as sisterhood president.

I have vivid memories of my grandmother walking up and down the aisles during Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, asking people if they had somewhere to go and inviting dozens back to her house to make sure no one observed the holidays alone.

Beth Israel was where my parents were married. It was where my sister and I both became Bat Mitzvahs, where we formed our Jewish identity through religious school and participation in our small but mighty youth group. It was where my husband and I married.  

Last Saturday, Beth Israel Congregation was set on fire by someone who hates Jews simply for being Jews. Seeing the charred images of the library is painful. I have vivid memories of being in that library playing hide-and-seek, participating in classes and youth group meetings, getting ready for my wedding  and signing my ketubah in that room.

If I close my eyes, I can see the ark where the Torahs—now reduced to ash—once sat. I can see the books lining the walls that held our community’s history. I remember showing my children the plaques commemorating congregants’ milestones, including several from my own family, which have now been reduced to debris.

Growing up Jewish in Jackson made me a member of two diaspora communities – the Jewish one and the Mississippi one. In the aftermath of the fire, I have received messages from many people who are part of my Mississippi diaspora—some Jewish, mostly not—who have beautiful memories of visiting Beth Israel with me. 

For many of my friends, Beth Israel and my family were the only meaningful encounters with Jews they have ever had, and this fire has affected them in ways they did not expect.

This is not the first time Beth Israel has been targeted. In September 1967, the Ku Klux Klan firebombed the synagogue in retaliation for Rabbi Perry Nussbaum’s support of the Civil Rights movement. I grew up always knowing it was part of my community’s history.

What history books rarely emphasize is how that bombing brought the Jackson faith community together. In its aftermath, white and Black clergy were among the first to condemn the hatred, and members of the Jewish community played a significant role working secretly to help uncover the KKK bombings of the 1960s.

Last week’s fire was not an isolated incident. It is the most recent symptom of the dangerous rise in antisemitism facing Jewish communities across the country and around the world. Since the Hamas attacks on Oct. 7, 2023, the European Jewish Congress reports at least 20 attacks on synagogues across the globe. 

Jews make up less than 2% of the U.S. population, yet we are the targets of roughly 16% of all hate crimes and nearly 70% of religion-based hate crimes, according to the FBI. American Jewish Committee’s State of Antisemitism in America 2024 report found that 56% of American Jews have altered their behavior out of fear of antisemitism, and 1 in 3 has personally experienced it. Each one of these statistics is a person — a mom or dad, a brother, sister or child.

These troubling numbers highlight why antisemitism is not just a Jewish problem to solve. We need people to listen when we explain why antisemitic violence must be confronted clearly, forcefully and without hesitation. Our fear — rooted in generational trauma — of rising hateful rhetoric from all sides of the political spectrum is real and has consequences.  We need allies who refuse to look away and choose to stand up and take action.

That was apparent last May, when I was staffing an American Jewish Community event at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., in which Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky were murdered after leaving the event.

The event was devoted to how grassroots diplomacy can transform the Middle East through humanitarian aid and cross-cultural collaboration. Many of the more than 100 people there were not Jewish. But they came together in a time of need, unified in purpose and in hope. 

A few months later, a German journalist asked me how I can stay optimistic despite that horrible night. That wasn’t a question I have ever considered. Growing up Jewish in Mississippi has always meant that optimism is the only option.

Being a part of Beth Israel taught me many things, most importantly that community is an antidote to many of the problems of the world, that Jewish joy is always stronger than hate, and that showing up for people in their time of need is often the holiest thing you can do. Jews in Mississippi – and pretty much anywhere else, for that matter – need that help more than ever.

Bio: Alexis (Larkin) Schwartz, a native of Jackson, is the associate director at American Jewish Committee in Washington. She previously worked as a director at the Jewish Federations of North America.