Shalom Berntholz, the owner of the Alef Alef restaurant in central Vienna, the area where the terrorist attack took place on Monday evening, said that that the fact that he wasn’t at his restaurant during the attack was only due to a neis as his restaurant is almost always open at that time.

The terrorist began his shooting attack right in front of the closed kosher restaurant, killing a waitress in a nearby restaurant.

“Perhaps he saw there was nothing on our side and fired his gun opposite and killed that poor waitress,” Berntholz told AFP. “You might think he was targeting the Jewish community but in truth we’ll never know.”

R’ Bernholtz, who is one of the heads of the local Jewish community in Vienna, told Kikar H’Shabbos: “I should have been there, my restaurant is always open. It was only due to a neis that I chose to close my restaurant early that night as the new month-long lockdown approached. If I was there it could have ended differently. We made a sheva brachos for a Chareidi businessman from Jerusalem on Sunday – by total chance – it could have been on Monday.”

“The attack was at the center of the Jewish community next to the Stadttempel [City Temple on Seitenstettengasse 4 – the main shul for the Viennese Jewish community of about 7,000]. This is our community center complex and is always secured by security guards and police officers throughout the year. We have events here all the time – always under heavy security.”

“The Muslims decided to go crazy because of what’s happening in France. Several days ago, they entered a church and started destroying everything in sight, and a day or two later they ransacked a much larger church. On Monday, it was time to come for the Jews.”

An interesting fact about the Stadttempel (or Viena City Temple), which was constructed in the 1800s, is that it was the only shul that survived the brutal Nazi pogrom in the city in November 1938, when 93 shuls were destroyed as well as hundreds of Jewish businesses and public institutions.

Ironically, the shul was saved due to an edict issued by Emperor Joseph II that only Roman Catholic places of worship were allowed to be built with facades fronting directly on public streets. Due to the edict, the shul was constructed into a block of houses and hidden from street view and could not be set on fire without endangering the attached buildings.

Although the shul has not been the target of any recent terror attacks, it was attacked decades ago, once in 1979 and again in 1981. The 1979 attack caused only minor damage – a one-pound bomb comprised of plastic explosives exploded in the shul’s courtyard, causing damage to the building.

Unfortunately, the 1981 incident was a brutal attack during a bar mitzva by Palestinian Arab terrorists bearing machine guns and hand grenades, leaving 2 dead and 30 injured.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)