Only In America

Posted on September 16, 2008 In Blog

Today, at One Police Plaza, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly and Queens District Attorney Brown returned all eight stolen Torah scrolls to the Jewish Center of Kew Gardens Hills.

The quick police work that recovered the Torahs is laudable. It is the first time in a hundred years all Torahs stolen from a synagogue were each recovered.

But what was amazing – and unique in the prism of Jewish history – is that at Police Headquarters the Torahs were carried by the NYPD’s Honor Guard and returned to the synagogue as a shehechiyanu blessing was recited by the NYPD chaplain, Rabbi Alvin Kass.

As Yogi Berra would say, only in America.