Lori Gilbert-Kaye, slain in Poway synagogue attack, mourned by Jewish groups

Lori Gilbert-Kaye was killed in the shooting at the Chabad of Poway shooting. (Courtesy of Ariella Lee) 

Ron Kampeas

(JTA) — Jewish groups mourned the death of their member, Lori Gilbert-Kaye, who was shot and killed in the attack at a Chabad synagogue in suburban San Diego.

“We mourn the loss of AIPAC member Lori Gilbert-Kaye, and pray for the recovery of Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein, 8-year-old Noya Dahan and her uncle, Almog Peretz,” the American Israel Public Affairs Committee said Monday on Twitter.

An alleged white supremacist opened fire at the Chabad of Poway on Saturday morning, the last day of Passover, killing Gilbert-Kaye and wounding the three people named by AIPAC.

Hadassah and Chabad also mourned Gilbert-Kaye.

Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America, said Gilbert-Kaye was a member of its Bat Harim group in the San Diego area.

“Learning that the woman who died in the horrendous shooting in San Diego was a Hadassah member doesn’t make this despicable act worse, but it does bring it closer to home,” the organization said Monday in a statement.

Chabad on its news website called her “a pillar of the Chabad of Poway community, which she joined in the early 1990s.”

“Kaye, a woman remembered for her kindness, sensitivity, enthusiasm and generosity, spent her last minutes on earth in the lobby of the synagogue and community center she had done so much to see into reality,” it said.