Why rabbis are attending Magen Am’s LA intensive safety camp

Chutz-POW!

A number of rabbis not too long ago participated in a five-day “summer season camp” that includes intensive firearms coaching as Jewish leaders from throughout the US ready for the Excessive Holidays.

The pilot program, run by Los Angeles-based Jewish safety group Magen Am USA, introduced collectively 20 Chabad Hasidic rabbis from 12 states for an intensive crash course designed to assist them reply to potential threats at their synagogues and of their communities.

This system, which additionally included emergency drugs and safety coaching, befell in August in Los Angeles. It got here as Jewish communities throughout California and the nation grapple with heightened safety issues and rising fears about assaults on Jewish establishments.

For Rabbi Yossi Eilfort, the founding father of Magen Am, the reply isn’t merely placing extra weapons in non secular leaders’ palms.

“Numerous folks, a number of weapons, little coaching,” Eilfort informed the California Put up. “That may be dangerous for the neighborhood.”

Magen Am is a registered nonprofit and California-licensed safety firm whose acknowledged mission is to coach and empower Jewish communities to determine safety groups inside their very own establishments.

The Anti-Defamation League recorded 6,274 antisemitic incidents nationwide in 2025, together with assaults, harassment and vandalism.

California ranked second within the nation with 817 incidents, whereas the Los Angeles area recorded 419. Though the general variety of incidents in LA declined from 532 in 2024, assaults jumped 22% — the best quantity ever recorded domestically, based on the ADL.

Eilfort stated the group works with neighborhood members, authorities officers and regulation enforcement to construct safety packages, whereas additionally providing firearms training to members of the general public.

The rabbi-specific program was created after Jewish non secular leaders started approaching Eilfort for recommendation about firearms and safety at their homes of worship.

“We’re visibly Jewish and we stroll down the road and dozens of rabbis have folks yell issues at them,” Eilfort stated, including that rabbis have more and more been focused with hate speech and protests.

A donor who requested to stay nameless stepped ahead to fund the pilot so collaborating rabbis wouldn’t need to pay for the coaching. The response was instant.

Thirty-seven rabbis utilized for simply 20 spots, based on Magen Am.

Organizers prioritized candidates primarily based on their safety wants and the prevailing protections out there to their communities. Some members had by no means dealt with a gun earlier than. Others already owned firearms however didn’t really feel snug carrying them, whereas some have been skilled gun homeowners in search of extra coaching and steering.

The rabbis got here from states together with Alaska, Montana, Arizona, Florida, New York and Missouri, with California members stretching from San Diego to Santa Barbara.

The five-day pilot ran from morning by means of night, with Magen Am dealing with meals and hospitality in addition to the coaching itself.

The curriculum included accountable firearm possession, situational consciousness, emergency medical procedures and coordination with regulation enforcement.

Eilfort declined to say what particular regulation enforcement company was concerned within the coaching.

Contributors additionally acquired instruction on suspicious-activity studies and the way such studies are dealt with by fusion facilities.

“It’s not all in regards to the gun,” Eilfort stated. “It’s all about neighborhood security.”

The trainers themselves have been members of the Jewish neighborhood, with some who had served within the Israel Protection Forces (IDF) . Eilfort, who has a background as a rabbi, can also be a licensed and licensed firearms teacher and a former MMA fighter.

“I’m not a safety skilled who discovered the Jewish neighborhood,” he stated. “I’m a Jewish neighborhood member who realized we want extra safety in our neighborhood.”

For Eilfort, firearms present just one layer of protection.

He emphasised protected storage, insurance coverage, proficiency, licensing and compliance — and rejected the concept that this system was meant to encourage vigilante habits.

“I’m not calling for vigilantism,” he stated. “I consider in doing issues proper.”

One Los Angeles rabbi who participated within the pilot stated the organizers packed what would usually be weeks or months of instruction into simply 5 days.

The rabbi, who requested to not be recognized, stated members started their days with morning prayers and breakfast earlier than heading into lecture rooms or onto the taking pictures vary.

The schedule blended non secular life with intensive safety instruction, together with classes on stopping extreme bleeding.

On the vary, members discovered the best way to safely deal with and holster a firearm, draw it, intention and reply to totally different emergency conditions. They have been additionally taught what to do if a firearm malfunctioned, the rabbi stated.

“On daily basis they have been constructing on the day gone by’s studying,” he added.

The expertise was notably important as a result of it was the rabbi’s first time firing a gun.

“Some members have been excellent,” he stated. “They wished to grow to be glorious. After which there was somebody like me that by no means touched a gun.”

By the tip of this system, members had moved from classroom instruction to a “FBI-style,” sensible workouts at an indoor taking pictures vary, the place they confronted a check designed to demand a excessive stage of accuracy and firearm proficiency.

“It was a excessive stage of being correct and to know what you’re doing with a firearm,” the rabbi stated.

This system additionally seems to have tapped in to a rising urge for food amongst rabbis for this sort of preparation.

After the pilot ended, dozens extra rabbis utilized to hitch this system, with roughly 40 folks positioned on a waitlist, based on Eilfort.

Magen Am is now discussing extra funding and hopes to run one other 4 to 6 packages subsequent 12 months, probably increasing to as many as 10 to 12 packages the next 12 months.

The group has already begun increasing its broader safety operations, together with a brand new San Diego group.

However the greatest query for some rabbis is what function, if any, firearms ought to play of their non secular tasks.

For the Los Angeles rabbi, finishing this system didn’t instantly translate into a call to hold a gun.

He stated he’s nonetheless contemplating whether or not firearm possession is true for him and plans to bear extra coaching earlier than making that call.

“I’m nonetheless within the journey with it,” he stated. “My greatest takeaway is now I understand how to make use of a firearm. God forbid, if it’s a case of an emergency, as a rabbi, I’m ready.”

He additionally wrestled with the non secular implications of carrying a firearm.

However Jewish regulation, he stated, locations a transparent emphasis on defending human life.

“If it’s a matter of life and demise, you need to do all you can to save lots of a life,” he stated. “So this might save a life.”

His hope, in the end, is that the coaching by no means needs to be used.

“If we might all be capable to get alongside and respect one another’s variations, that can actually make a neighborhood and a metropolis and a rustic so lovely,” he stated.

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