Police departments in the Los Angeles area are ramping up patrols around synagogues during Rosh Hashana this week — though authorities say they have not received any specific reports of threats or planned demonstrations.
The Beverly Hills Police Department has partnered with private security and increased patrols around synagogues and houses of worship “as a precautionary measure,” the agency wrote in a social media post.
The Los Angeles Police Department is also ramping up patrols in the Westside area, but isn’t aware of any planned protests, said LAPD Officer Charles Miller.
“We are not aware of any scheduled demonstrations of protests here on the Westside. There’s some information nationwide of some sort of organization sort of sponsoring an extended time period of protest or demonstration … So, we are prepared,” LAPD Commander Steve Lurie told KTLA.
Rosh Hashana, which began Wednesday at sunset and will conclude at sundown Friday, is one of the the High Holy Days in Judaism and marks the Jewish new year.
Protests have taken place across Southern California and the U.S. since the beginning of the war in Gaza, which was sparked by Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack in southern Israel that killed about 1,200 people. More than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed, according to Gaza health officials.
A protest outside the Adas Torah synagogue in the predominantly Jewish Pico-Robertson neighborhood over the summer turned violent, with clashes between pro-Palestinian demonstrators and pro-Israeli counter-protesters.
Politicians and Jewish community groups condemned the protest as an act of antisemitism. Pro-Palestinian supporters, however, said the protest wasn’t antisemitic and was instead spurred by a real estate event being held at the synagogue that advertised “housing projects in all the best Anglo neighborhoods in Israel.”