For many Johnson Countians, the killing Wednesday of Shawnee Mission East alum Sarah Milgrim, 26, along with her boyfriend Yaron Lischinsky, 30, in Washington, D.C., was deeply personal and shocking.
The pair were shot dead outside an event hosted by the American Jewish Committee at a museum blocks away from the White House and U.S. Capitol by a man whom authorities later said chanted “Free, free Palestine.”
The grief sparked by the killings, then, came freighted also with the weighty tensions of geopolitics.
On Thursday, local Jewish organizations, elected officials and community leaders spoke out not only in support of Milgrim’s family and in honor of her memory but also against what many portrayed as a troubling rise in antisemitism.
“Everyone is mourning”
Neta Meltzer, the executive director of Jewish Community Relations Bureau | American Jewish Community, told the Post in a Thursday interview that the feeling inside her organization on Thursday morning was one of devastation.
“It’s communities all the way from Kansas City to D.C. to Tel Aviv to Paris, everyone is mourning these individuals who were so interconnected here locally, but also to AJC,” Meltzer said.
JCRB | AJC works to prevent antisemitism, and Meltzer said Wednesday night’s shooting was an act of antisemitism against a young couple leaving a Jewish event.
Meltzer said people outside of the Jewish community need to stand up against antisemitism to effect change.
Meltzer said today, that as Jewish communities mourn Milgrim and Lischinsky, people outside of the Jewish community should reach out.
“The thing that means the most is checking in on your Jewish friends and neighbors and of course, standing up and saying this type of violence, this is not what we want in our society,” Meltzer said.
A “hard day” for the Jewish community
Jay Lewis, the president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Kansas City, told the Post on Thursday that “it’s a hard day” for the local Jewish community.
Lewis said he knew Milgrim through her family, which he described as “warm, compassionate people” who are involved in their community. They were proud of the 26-year-old’s professional and personal accomplishments, he said.
News that Milgrim’s boyfriend, Lischinsky, was planning to propose in the coming weeks shows that “this horrible act didn’t just end her career, it impacted a life and generations to come,” Lewis said.
Lewis said hatred against people for who they are, like their religion or race, cannot be normalized.
“That’s what this murder was,” Lewis said. “It’s one thing when you see that from afar, but when you see that happen to a 26-year-old woman who grew up in Kansas City, went to Shawnee Mission East and went to KU, and was murdered because of her religion and her connection to Israel.”
“We hope it’s not just the Jewish community that’s standing up and saying that’s not okay,” Lewis added.
“Completely unacceptable”
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, also issued a statement on Thursday condemning the deadly shooting, calling it “political violence” that is “completely unacceptable.”
The organization said “millions of Americans feel extreme frustration at the sight of the Israeli government slaughtering Palestinian men, women and children on a daily basis with weapons paid for with our taxpayer dollars,” but that political violence was not the answer.
“Such violence only undermines the pursuit of justice,” CAIR said in its statement. “Peaceful protest, civil disobedience and political engagement are the only appropriate and acceptable tools to advocate for policy change in our nation, including an end to U.S. support for the Israeli government’s genocide in Gaza.”
Elected officials weigh in
In Topeka, Kansas Senate leaders in a statement condemned “the murder of two Israeli diplomats,” calling Wednesday night’s act “antisemitic and anti-American terrorism that cannot be tolerated.”
“This vile act underscores why we must continue to be vigilant in our fight against antisemitism at every turn and why this past session, we passed legislation to define antisemitism and declare any form of it will not be tolerated in Kansas,” the state senate leadership statement reads.
Gov. Laura Kelly in a Thursday statement said she is mourning the loss of Milgrim and Lischinsky, and will “continue to call out antisemitism and be active in pushing back against it.”
In a statement to the Post, U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids said she is “heartbroken and horrified by the tragic loss of” Milgrin and Lischinsky “in the antisemitic attack.”
“This type of hatred and bigotry must have no place in our communities,” Davids said, adding that everyone needs to “stand up against the troubling rise in antisemitic violence” nationwide.
Kansas Secretary of State Scott Schwab of Johnson County, who is running for the Republican nomination for governor in 2026, put out a statement directly linking Wednesday’s shooting to “extremism on college campuses” that he said is “boiling over into the streets,” an apparent reference to protests on college campuses that have occurred since Israel invaded Gaza following Hamas’s terrorist attacks on Oct. 7, 2023.
Schwab called the shooting Wednesday “nothing short of terrorism and needs to be addressed as such.”
“I’ll be praying for comfort for the victims’ families,” Schwab said, adding, “Pray for Israel.”
