City to demolish Brooklyn's oldest Black synagogue
One of the city’s oldest Black synagogues is being demolished.
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For decades, the B'nai Adath Kol Beth Yisrael Synagogue felt like home for many people in Bed-Stuy and beyond.
The mostly Black congregation was born in Harlem 70 years ago and moved into the historic building on Greene Avenue in the late 1960s.
The building had been crumbling since a massive fire tore through the synagogue in 2017, leaving the building so damaged that the congregation was never able to go back in. Last week, after years of disrepair, the Department of Buildings ordered its demolition.
"What stood there and what will stand there again, is a place of refuge, a place where you can come in and get the solace of how we understand god to be, no matter how you believe in god," said Rabbi Baruch Yehudah.
The congregation now meets in Queens and broadcasts its service online. They still hope to one day rebuild a new permanent home.
