My family’s Yom Kippur went well. I managed to combine fasting with being a type II diabetic which is tricky and involves a lot more blood tests than I would usually do. Thankfully the fast ended a couple of millimoles before hypoglycemia became an issue (the L-rd moves in mysterious ways LOL).

We had a peaceful time of it although our shul was under highly visible police and hired security guard presence. The fact that we have to have police and professional security at a Yom Kippur service even though we are a rural-ish community is testament to how bad things have got for Jews in the UK.

Others elsewhere in the world were not so lucky.

In Canada there was a shootout between police and an assailant outside a synagogue near Ontario. The assailant and a police officer were injured. The Rabbi of the synagogue was extremely lucky in that the assailant arrived after the Rabbi had arrived and entered the building. If the assailant had been a few minutes early we might be looking at a murdered Rabbi.

The news outlet the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) has named the shooter as Shawn Ward aged 29 from a nearby city. The injured police officer has been named by the JTA as Constable Jeff Smith.

According to the JTA Ward pulled up in his truck and opened fire on the synagogue with a shotgun, a gun battle then ensued which resulted in both Constable Smith and Ward being injured.

Link

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

https://www.jta.org/2026/09/21/default/canadian-leaders-condemn-shooting-outside-ontario-synagogue-at-the-start-of-yom-kippur