The rabbi who oversaw Ivanka Trump’s conversion to Judaism criticized her father’s response to Charlottesville in a letter to his congregation.
In the letter, which was obtained by CNN, Rabbi Emeritus Haskel Lookstein, along with Rabbis Chaim Steinmetz and Elie Weinstock, slammed President Donald Trump’s response, saying they are “deeply troubled” by his comments.
“While we always avoid politics, we are deeply troubled by the moral equivalency and equivocation President Trump has offered in his response to this act of violence,” they wrote in the letter to members of Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun, a Modern Orthodox synagogue on New York’s Upper East Side.
They also wrote they condemned the “monstrous act of murder” that killed Heather Heyer.
“We are appalled by this resurgence of bigotry and antisemitism, and the renewed vigor of the neo-Nazis, KKK and alt-right,” they wrote.
New York Magazine first reported the letter.
Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, have not publicly addressed the President’s comments on Charlottesville, in which he has blamed “both sides” for inciting violence.
But Ivanka Trump did condemn the hate groups present in Charlottesville over the weekend, tweeting: “There should be no place in society for racism, white supremacy and neo-nazis.”
She continued: “2:2 We must all come together as Americans — and be one country UNITED. #Charlottesville”
The President’s eldest daughter converted to Judaism ahead of her 2009 wedding to Kushner, and previously visited Jerusalem in 2010. She and her husband are practicing Modern Orthodox Jews.
Lookstein was invited to speak at the Republican National Convention in 2016 but pulled out before the event.
“In the interest of bringing our community together, I have asked to be relieved of my commitment to deliver the invocation,” Lookstein wrote at the time. “My request has been honored with the same love and respect in which it was first offered and intended.”
