Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Moscow Airport Bombing ‘A Horrifying Scene’ Say Chabad Emissaries

Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries who responded to the bombing at Moscow’s busiest airport described a “horrifying scene.”

In an e-mail to JTA, Rabbi Sheah Deitsch, one of a group of Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries who are first responders on behalf of the Moscow Chief Rabbinate, said that “families were screaming and wailing.”

“They asked to speak to the Jewish rabbis, and we tried to uplift their spirits and told them that we were there for them for whatever they needed,” he wrote.

Monday’s bombing at the the Domodedovo Airport killed at least 35 and injured 130.

“From the preliminary information we have, it was a terror attack,” Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said in a televised briefing, adding that those responsible would be “tracked down and punished.”

Moscow transportation services went on high alert following the attack. Israel canceled all flights to Moscow.

Deitsch said his group reviewed a list of the names of the dead and determined that it contained no Jews. The Chabad rabbis remained at the airport to comfort the families of the dead. They also arranged kosher food for passengers on an El Al flight bound for Tel Aviv that was not able to take off due to the attack.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry said it was not sure whether any of the victims were Israeli.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered his condolences to the Russian people and the families of those killed in the terror attack.

“Terror is international, and so the response to it must be international,” he said. “If we unite we will suppress the terrorists and thwart their plans.”

In March 2010, two female Chechen suicide bombers blew themselves up in the metro system, killing 40. In 2004, two suicide bombers boarded separate planes at the same airport and blew themselves up in midair, killing all 90 people aboard the two flights.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.