The intruder partly obscured his face with a scarf, but there was no mistaking his blind hatred as he began slashing with a machete at those gathered at the rabbi’s home for the lighting of the menorah on the seventh night of Hanukkah.
“Nobody is going anywhere!” the intruder was heard to announce.
Then one of the faithful began throwing furniture—a chair, an end table, a coat rack—with the fierceness of the Maccabees of ancient Israel, whose long-ago victory is celebrated with the eight-day Festival of Lights.
The intruder retreated, but not before he had slashed five of the gathering. He tried to enter the synagogue adjoining the residence of Rabbi Chaim L. Rottenberg in the upstate New York town of Monsey, but the door was barred. He fled to a silver 2015 Nissan Sentra parked nearby. Another modern Maccabee followed him and noted the license plate number, New York HPT5757. The time stamp on surveillance video shows that it was 9:55 p.m.