Mayim Bialik Reflects on the Synagogue Shooting: 'My Grandparents Came Here to Escape This'
Mayim Bialik is mourning the lives lost in the tragic synagogue shooting that killed 11 people in Pittsburgh on Saturday.
“I am still trying to find ways to wrap my head around such a horrific act of anti-Semitism,” the Big Bang Theory actress, 42, wrote on her website GrokNation on Monday. “Even I have been surprised at how much this feels like it happened to my family.”
“If you are one of my many beloved gentile friends who reached out to me this weekend to express condolences, I thank you for your open heart and compassionate spirit,” continued Bialik, who is Jewish. “And if you are among the lucky who do not have any understanding of what it means to be a part of a minority … I hope that you can have compassion for the Jewish people right now.”
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Suspected shooter Robert Bowers killed worshipers during a Shabbat service at the Tree of Life synagogue in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood. The dead included siblings, a husband and wife and a 97-year-old woman. Four responding police officers were among the six people wounded.
Bowers has been charged with 29 federal crimes, most of which carry a maximum penalty of death, U.S. Attorney Scott Brady told reporters Sunday.
“Upon hearing the news, I felt like getting on a plane to Pittsburgh. I felt helpless. I felt scared. I felt let down by America. My grandparents came here to escape this,” said Bialik, whose family immigrated to the United States to escape Hitler. “Where is my home? Certainly I didn’t feel very at home this weekend. I felt like rushing to Israel, as bizarre as that sounds.”
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“I also thought about the attacker’s recent hatred for HIAS, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, an organization that helps refugees settle once they come to America. This brings me to tears. You see, whether you believe it or not, whether you like it or not, the Jewish cultural narrative is that we were slaves in Egypt,” she wrote. “We are never to forget that we, too, were strangers once. What those who hate us fail to grasp is that our story is stronger than their hatred. We will help refugees even if you don’t want us to. That’s what we do and who we are.”
“I am afraid to go to synagogue next Shabbos,” she admitted. “But I will and I must. Because the hatred of Jews does not only exist at synagogue. It’s everywhere. … And so we go on living. It’s the same for the other targeted minorities whose places of worship have been attacked. We go on. We must.”
Bialik noted that she “could not help but try to blame President Trump” but decided that “now is not the time.” She explained, “I know eventually I’ll need to talk about things like gun control, mental illness, hate speech and how this all played a part in what happened. But not now.”
“Yes, I feel protective,” she said. “Of my people. Of my identity, of my prayers, and of my people’s story. We have been through so much. We have conquered and survived. We have heroes among us, and we have some who do not always exemplify our best intentions. We are a people like every other. We want to live and thrive.”
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Bialik has long been open with fans about her devout faith. In 2015, she told Fox 411 that being religious is not popular in show business. “I think in general it’s never going to be trendy to be observant or religious in Hollywood circles,” she said.
“I’ve gotten a lot of negative attention for visiting Israel,” she said. “That’s what amazing. Simply by going to Israel this summer and saying nothing more than, ‘I’ve gone to Israel,’ I got the same amount of hatred and threats and anti-Semitism for actually making a statement trying to support people [who] whether I like it or not are serving in an army.”
