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Rabbi Gavriel (L) and Rivkah Holtzberg were killed in one of the worst terrorist attacks in Indian history. On the picture, they're seen attending the wedding of a local Jewish couple.
Photo: COL
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NEW YORK (EJP)---The director of the Chabad House in Mumbai and his wife were killed in the attack on their center, the New York-based Chabad-Lubavitch movement announced Friday.
"With profound sadness and deep sorrow, we received the definitive news, just a short while ago, confirming the brutal murder of two of our finest who served their community with love and devotion," it said.
Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg, 29,who was born in Israel and moved to New York as a
child, and his Israeli 28-year-old wife, Rivka, were killed in the attacks by Islamic terrorists.
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Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg, his wife Rivka and 2-year-old son Moishe who was rescued from the attack by their nanny.
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The couple's son Moishe, who turns two on Saturday, was rescued from the attack by their nanny.
"Gabi and Rivky Holtzberg made the ultimate sacrifice," said Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, who works for the educational arm of Chabad-Lubavitch, based in Brooklyn, New York.
"As emissaries to Mumbai, Gabi and Rivky gave up the comforts of the West in order to spread Jewish pride in a corner of the world that was a frequent stop for throngs of Israeli tourists."
Kotlarsky said the Holtzberg family had been in Mumbai for five years.
The Chabad-Lubavitch statement said the rabbi's last known phone call was to the Israeli consulate to report there were gunmen in his house. While he was on the phone, the line went dead.
Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky, chairman of the Chabad-Lubavitch's educational and social services arm, said in New York that the slain couple lived a "selfless life."
He called on Jewish women to light traditional candles 18 minutes before sunset marking the start of the Jewish Sabbath Friday to "brighten the darkness the world is witnessing."
"A word to our emissaries around the world. You know how to face adversity and challenges. You've been doing it all these years. Keep strong and continue," Krinsky said in a press conference carried live on CNN.
The Chabad-Lubavitch movement said "words are inadequate to express our outrage and deep pain, at this tragic act of cold-blooded murder of innocent men, women and children, fueled by causeless hatred."
"The targeting by terrorists of foreign nationals, underscores the need for governments to work collectively to fight terrorism resolutely and effectively, so that the hands of those seeking to destroy life and disrupt peace will no longer reach their targets."
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Beit Chabad (Chabad House) in Mumbai
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Indian officials said at least 124 people have been killed in the two-day wave of terrorist attacks by Islamist gunmen seeking Westerners.
Chabad-Lubavitch is a major Hasidic movement and runs thousands of centers around the world to promote Judaism.
There are today 4,000 full-time Chabad emissary families in 73 countries around the world.
The movement emerged 250 years ago in Russia ago as a branch of Hasidism.
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg denounced the couple's killing as a "tragic loss for the Lubavitch community, and for our entire city."
However he praised the nanny's "heroic" rescue of the son and said that "during a time of terrible sadness, her courage re-affirms our faith in the capacity of good to triumph over evil."