Letter | My brother died alone. Why are hundreds attending these funerals?
APRIL 19: A casket is placed into a van outside of a funeral home in the heavily Orthodox Borough Park neighborhood of Brooklyn which has scene a large number of deaths due to the coronavirus on April 19, 2020 in New York City. Hospitals in New York City, which have been especially hard hit by the coronavirus, are just beginning to see a slowdown of COVID-19 cases. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images) Image by Getty Images
Dear Editor,
I am a committed Jew. My brother died last week and was buried virtually alone due to regulations about crowds and social isolation. It made me very sad.
Now, we read that in certain areas of the Orthodox community, rules of social isolation are ignored and people are going to home minyans or funerals or weddings. These people are fools.
Instead of righteous indignation, chastise those who think it is alright to sacrifice the needs of the community in order to satisfy their own selfish needs. I’m no fan of the mayor, but in this case, Bill de Blasio is correct!
Sincerely,
Mel Young
Boca Raton, Fla.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
2X match on all Passover gifts!
Dive In
-
Opinion In Qatargate fiasco, Netanyahu’s ‘witch hunt’ narrative takes cues from Trump
-
Opinion Marine Le Pen may be headed to prison — antisemitism and xenophobia still roam freely
-
Opinion In Trump’s war against campus antisemitism, hate the tactics but don’t ignore the problem
-
Opinion Think every Palestinian in Gaza is Hamas? This week’s protests prove you’re wrong
Most Popular
- 1
News A Jewish Republican and Muslim Democrat are suddenly in a tight race for a special seat in Congress
- 2
Fast Forward The NCAA men’s Final Four has 3 Jewish coaches
- 3
Film & TV What Gal Gadot has said about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- 4
Fast Forward Cory Booker proclaims, ‘Hineni’ — I am here — 19 hours into anti-Trump Senate speech
In Case You Missed It
-
News Who would protect New York Jews better? Cuomo and Lander trade attacks on the campaign trail
-
News Rabbis revolt over LGBTQ+ club, exposing fight over queer acceptance at Yeshiva University
-
Opinion In Qatargate fiasco, Netanyahu’s ‘witch hunt’ narrative takes cues from Trump
-
Yiddish די הגדה ווי אַ לעבעדיקער דענקמאָל פֿון אַשכּנזישער פּאָעזיעThe Haggadah as a living monument to Ashkenazi poetry
אַמאָל זענען די פּייטנים, מיסטישע דיכטער־וויזיאָנערן, געווען אויבן־אָן בײַ די פֿראַנצויזישע און דײַטשישע ייִדן.
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
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 comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag 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.