BOULDER, Colo. — One year after a man threw Molotov cocktails at a group of people peacefully demonstrating for the release of Israeli hostages along the Pearl Street Mall in Boulder, one survivor is looking ahead.
Rachelle Halpern was protesting for the release of Israeli hostages when the attack happened. 12 people hurt, and an 82-year-old woman died from her injuries weeks later.
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In the days following the attack, a chaplain asked Halpern a simple question: "What is your word for the day?"
"My word was transformation, because I realized that I cannot be the same person anymore," Halpern said.
Two weeks later, she was asked the same question. Her answer had changed.
"And that word came up courage," Halpern said. "Transformation happens, courage, courage, we need to practice."
That word — courage — is now written on her wrist. One year after the attack, it serves as a daily reminder of what the Jewish community needs for the days ahead.
"It takes courage not to be silent," Halpern said.
She is no stranger to hatred directed at the Jewish community. Her parents were Holocaust survivors, and she grew up in Poland.
Halpern calls the attack along the Pearl Street Mall "monstrous." She still remembers the face of the man who carried it out.
"The last face I remember, it was like a face that was really, really angry," Halpern said.
That anger is what the Jewish community is pushing back against, according to Rabbi Charna Rosenholtz, president of the Haver Boulder Council of Rabbis and Cantors.
"Love is what matters," Rosenholtz said.
Rosenholtz has been a rabbi for five and a half years, and she said her role is evolving in the current climate.
"There's a lot more anxiety, a lot more tension, and so there has to be pastoral care to go with that,to sit with people, to hold people, to try and bring comfort," Rosenholtz said.
When asked whether she feels safe being part of the Jewish community, Rosenholtz pointed to a collective resolve.
"The Jewish response as a whole is be educated, be prepared, live your life," Rosenholtz said.
That is the path forward for Halpern as well — finding courage every day to be open about her identity and her beliefs.
"There are so many people that I know that started hiding their Jewishness," Halpern said. "In this country, in this place, it's just totally unacceptable that we would have to do that."
Denver7 Investigates requested and obtained the victim impact statements submitted to the judge during last month’s sentencing of the attacker.
The words written by survivors and family members offer a vivid and painful glimpse into why, one year later, the effects of the Pearl Street Mall firebombing remain so profound.
Michelle Goldman, who was part of the demonstration that day, told Denver7 she’ll never forget the moment, as she put it, “all hell broke loose.”
Goldman wasn’t physically injured, but said she has lived ever since with heightened situational awareness, constantly scanning doors and security points, and the lasting image of her friend engulfed in flames.
One survivor described suffering “extensive second- and third-degree burns on both legs and a first-degree burn on the left arm” when the Molotov cocktails exploded in the crowd.
The statement recounted long months of painful recovery, and the ongoing impact those injuries have on daily life.
The family of 82-year-old Karen Diamond, who died three weeks after the attack, wrote that she had “severe burns to every part of her body” and “suffered indescribable pain for more than three weeks before finally succumbing to her injuries.”
They called her death an “utterly senseless tragedy” and urged the court to impose the maximum sentence.
Many statements spoke about trauma that remains, from nightmares and flashbacks to a persistent fear of being in public.
Others focused on the importance of forgiveness in order to move forward, even as they acknowledged the community’s loss of safety.
Together, these voices add depth to Rachelle Halpern’s message of transformation and courage, shed light on exactly what survivors endured, and why the Jewish community in Boulder continues to push back against hate, determined not to be silent.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and was partially converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
