South San Jose synagogue burns on Wednesday.
A South San Jose synagogue went up in flames early Wednesday morning, ravaging the building and leaving community members devastated, according to reporting by KNTV.
The Chabad House near Branham and Almaden Expressway caught fire sometime Tuesday night, stretching into the morning until a garbage truck spotted the flames and called it in, the station reported.
Authorities are looking into the cause of the fire. Surveillance video given to the San Jose Fire Department shows someone hiding in the building's carport at about 2 a.m.
"We don't know what happened. We'll leave that up to law enforcement to figure out what happened and how it happened," Rabbi Mendel Weinfeld told the station in an interview on Wednesday.
The synagogue had only been in this location for the past three months, he told the station.
"Our home, for so many, has brought so much light. We just came from the holiday of Hannukah," Weinfeld said.
Despite the wreckage, four Torah scrolls were saved from the blaze. Weinfeld told the station that the synagogue is going to continue despite the destruction.
"We're going to rebuild stronger and better. We're going to do Torah and Mitzvahs. We'll do goodness and kindness. Taking the flame. The flame of goodness that will last much longer than the flames that burned down our building," he said.
The San Jose Fire Department did not respond to KCBS Radio's request for comment at the time of publication.
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