Sorrow Over the Murder of Young Israeli Diplomats

Katartismos Global, and I personally, mourn the loss of two young Israeli diplomats, Sarah Milgrim, 26, and Yaron Lischinsky, 30, murdered on Wednesday night in Washington, DC. The couple was leaving the AJC’s Access Young Diplomats reception when they were gunned down by terrorist Elias Rodriguez.

Sarah and Yaron were both on the staff of the Embassy of Israel. I had been greeted by them at Embassy events that I have attended, both with beautiful smiles that lit up the room.

Mark Pritchett of the American Christian Trust, a prayer ministry house that has a close relationship to the Embassy, shared how deeply the Trust would feel the loss of Sarah Milgrim, who was the Civil Society Affairs Coordinator at the Embassy.

Pritchett mourned, “Sarah Milgrim was a bright light that was snuffed out at the prime of her life. . . She spent her time focused on making the world a better place. . . Sarah represented all that is good and beautiful about the Jewish community. She always had a smile on her face. . . ”

Yaron Lischinsky, born in Germany with a Jewish father and Christian mother, moved to Israel when he was 16. According to his friend, David Boskey in an interview with The Forward, “he found a spiritual home in Melech Ha’Mlachim — “King of Kings” in English — a Messianic congregation near Jerusalem’s bustling Mahane Yehuda market.” In a post on X, Boskey also said of Lischinsky, “You could not have met a kinder soul. . . He was a man of conviction, of humility, of warmth, and of profound integrity. A man of whom the world was not worthy.”

There will be more shared in the press and on social media in the days to come. But the Body of Christ, the Christian Church that began with 11 Jewish men and other Jewish disciples — empowered by Holy Spirit — had better, as one, condemn this latest act of hatred and anti-Semitism.

We are praying comfort for Sarah and Yaron’s families, as well as for Ambassador Leiter and all the Embassy staff, and Yaron’s Messianic community in Jerusalem. And of course, we pray for all Israelis and all Jewish people all over the world — particularly in America — who feel even less safe today than they did on Wednesday. This was a demonic attack.

There must be justice, but it’s not enough to cry for justice. We the Church need to cry out to the Lord who loves Israel with an everlasting love. This is a time when the fires of revival are beginning all over the nation and all over the world at the same time that the hateful fires of antisemitism are being globally stoked..

The enemy of God’s kingdom will do everything he can to keep that revival from transforming the world both by trying to destroy Israel and the Jewish people, and by bringing confusion and division in the Church. Antisemitism has taken a diabolical hold in some quarters of the Church — particularly amongst young Gen Z Christians and new believers who have been indoctrinated in many ways.

St. (aka Rabbi) Paul declared to the Church in Ephesus: “For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility.” Pray for such a reality today to take place and be more than we can ask, or think, or imagine, by the grace of God.