Moral Leadership Begins at Home — What Park East Must Teach New York

By Dr. Shmuel Legesse: Upcoming Author of Moral Diplomacy for a Broken World: Inspired by the Vision of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks

I am an Ethiopian-Israeli Jew, a Black man who served more than twenty years in New York’s public govement. Today, watching from Jerusalem, I feel both anger and heartbreak at what unfolded outside Park East Synagogue, the very place where I once prayed, blessed spiritual gatherings, and shared fellowship. My children attended Shabbat School there and loved their teacher deeply.

The sight of protesters shouting hatred at Jews outside a house of prayer in Manhattan the city that once symbolized coexistence and moral conscience should shock every New Yorker. Yet what shocks me even more is how familiar it feels. As a Black Jew who has lived through prejudice on both sides of history, I know that antisemitism, like racism, begins with words that the world excuses and ends with violence the world claims to regret.

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, of blessed memory, often warned that “the hate that begins with Jews never ends with Jews.” He taught that moral leadership demands both courage and restraint the refusal to let our anger become the mirror image of our enemy’s. My anger today is real, but it must become responsible. It must lead to renewal, not revenge. We, the Jews of New York and our allies must transform outrage into action that is principled, lawful, and public. Silence and retreat only embolden hate. Cameras and condemnations are not enough. The only effective answer to intimidation is presence proud, peaceful, lawful Jewish presence.

As someone who has walked in both worlds, I know that the moral destinies of Black and Jewish New Yorkers are intertwined. When one community is targeted, the other is tested. The Jews grandparents marched together for civil rights; our children must now march together for moral rights. If Park East is attacked, it is not only a Jewish crisis it is a civic one. The same city that rose for George Floyd must rise again for Jewish safety. And the Jewish community, in turn, must speak up when any group faces hatred. Rabbi Sacks reminded us that moral responsibility is never tribal. “The test of faith,” he wrote, “is whether we see the image of God in the face of a stranger.” We cannot fight antisemitism by isolating ourselves from the broader human struggle for dignity.

A Message to City Hall

Elected Mayor Zohran Mamdani and his NYC Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch have condemned antisemitism and pledged to stand steadfast with the Jewish community. Yet the city they lead needs more than sympathy, it needs strategy. Protection must extend beyond police barricades, with the help of the New York City Department of Education and the Committee on Higher Education, which has jurisdiction over the City University of New York, into classrooms, campuses, and digital spaces where hate is bred. Schools must teach the moral history of the Jewish people not as an elective, but as an essential part of New York’s story. Universities must distinguish between free speech and targeted harassment.

But government cannot carry this burden alone. Every community leader, every church, and every mosque must declare that hatred of Jews is hatred of America’s moral promise. As Rabbi Jonathan Sacks wrote, “The politics of anger must yield to the politics of hope.”

What We Must Do

The Jewish response must begin within. We must refuse to live as frightened guests in the city we helped build. Jews of every color, denomination, and background must reclaim public space with humility and strength. Our synagogues must not only pray; they must prepare. Our schools must teach not only survival, but solidarity. And our philanthropists must invest not only in security but in shared humanity partnerships with Black, Latino, Asian, and Muslim neighbors who understand that moral order cannot survive division.

Rabbi Sacks called this moral diplomacy influencing society not through power but through principle. He urged Jews to be “a light unto the nations” not by withdrawing from the world but by elevating it. That means showing up at protests, at city-hall hearings, at interfaith vigils as bearers of moral conscience. When hate stands in the streets, our absence is consent. Our lawful presence is resistance. The antidote to fear does not escape; it is engagement.

The Ethical Revolution New York Needs

What Park East exposed is not just antisemitism, it is moral fatigue. Too many New Yorkers treat hate as background noise. But moral order cannot be outsourced. It lives in the courage of individuals who stand when others sit. The city once called “a light to the nations” must again earn that name not through slogans, but through solidarity. Rabbi Sacks wrote, “We are not defined by the wrongs done to us, but by the responsibility we take for others.” If Jews respond to hate with moral clarity and Black New Yorkers respond with solidarity, we will have rekindled the city’s conscience.

I am angry, yes but it is a sacred anger, born of love for a city that gave me opportunity and now demands accountability. Park East must not become another headline to scroll past; it must become a turning point. We must replace fear with faith, division with dignity, and outrage with organized moral action. Let the next demonstration outside a synagogue be answered not with retreat but with revival with a thousand voices of faith standing together in lawful peace. Because the true test of any democracy is whether it protects its moral minorities and the true strength of any people is whether they defend not only their rights but their responsibilities.

The Jews of New York will not leave the city they helped create. They will lead it again not with anger, but with light.