The Campus Antifascist Network mourns the brutal killing of eleven at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh. Many of those killed were in fact older people in their 70s and 80s. They had grown up in a world still reeling from the effects of fascism, and anti-semitism. Yet that did not prevent them from working earnestly to help Muslim refugees. And for that they were killed by a man filled with the racism, fascism, and bigotry that is a common feature of our national and international landscapes.

CAN opposes antisemitism, racism, and Islamophobia. We condemn the viral anti-Jewish hatred of the Pittsburgh shooter, as well as his contempt for Muslims. In taking 11 Jewish lives the killer sought to destroy not just the Jewish community in Pittsburgh but the deeply felt solidarity Jews and Muslims have expressed throughout history and that the Tree of Life believers embodied in their actions.

We call on CAN chapters across the U.S. and Canada to join us in condemning this massacre. Now is the time to bring members of campus communities together to talk about healing. But we also need to help people understand how these killings reflect the rise of fascist ideas in the United States. We must remember that these terrible killings took place very same week Donald Trump announced he was a “nationalist,” and continued to spread the lie that the Migrant Caravan of Latin American refugees was filled with Muslims. These events sparked the killer’s actions. We must educate, agitate and organize so there are No More Pittsburghs.

75 years ago Jews in the Warsaw ghettoes rose up in resistance against the fascist oppressors. We must remember and learn from their brave historical example as we confront fascism in our time.