New York – An early morning walk near the scenic Hudson River Greenway ended with a trip to the hospital for New York City’s most senior chaplain, who was attacked Sunday morning on Riverside Drive.
Join our WhatsApp groupSubscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
80 year old Rabbi Alvin Kass, chief chaplain for the NYPD, was walking near 83rd Street when an unidentified individual pushed him from behind before fleeing the scene. Police said that Rabbi Kass, who was taken to New York Presbyterian Cornell Medical Center with a minor laceration to his face, did not see his attacker.
Rabbi Kass, the longest serving chaplain in NYPD history, began serving with New York’s Finest in 1966 and was promoted to chief chaplain in 2002.
The first chaplain to become an assistant chief with the NYPD as reported by the Wall Street Journal, Rabbi Kass is instrumental in ensuring that Orthodox Jews can become police officers without having to compromise on their Sabbath observance.
Among his other responsibilities counseling officers, Rabbi Kass was pressed into service as a hostage negotiator in a 1981 when a Jewish gunman held a woman hostage overnight in a Manhattan office building, using two pastrami sandwiches from the Carnegie Deli to convince the man to surrender his two guns. He also hosted former police commissioner Ray Kelly for Pesach Sedarim on several occasions, telling the Wall Street Journal that Kelly sang along enthusiastically to both Dayeinu and Chad Gadya.
Refuah shlama