Widow and Mother of Toulouse Victims Issues Heartfelt Call for Light

Eva Sandler, the French widow and mother who lost her husband and two of their children in the Monday’s attack outside the Ozar Hatorah high school in Toulouse, implored people around the world to carry on the victims’ memories by doing good deeds and recommitting themselves to Torah study.

Of particular value to Sandler, she said, and to the souls of Rabbi Jonathan Sandler, Aryeh Sandler and Gavriel Sandler, was the lighting of this week’s Sabbath candles.

“There are no ways for me to be able to express the great and all-consuming pain resulting from the murder of my dear husband and sons,” Sandler announced Thursday night in a statement released by Judaism website Chabad.org. But “because so many of you, my cherished brothers and sisters in France and around the world, are asking what you can do on my behalf, on behalf of my daughter Liora, and on behalf of the souls of my dear husband and children, I feel that, difficult though it may be, it is incumbent upon me to answer your entreaties.

“Please bring more light into the world by kindling the Sabbath candles this and every Friday night,” she continued. “Please do so a bit earlier than the published times as a way to add holiness to our world.”

Thankful for the short time she was granted to spend with her family on this physical Earth, she asked parents everywhere to kiss their children.

“Tell them how much you love them,” she requested, “and how dear it is to your heart that they be living examples of our Torah, imbued with the fear of Heaven and with love of their fellow man.”

Sandler, who extended condolences to the family of seven-year-old Miriam Monsonego, also asked that individuals increase their study of Torah, and that they help others who find such study difficult. Turning to the approaching holiday of Passover, she implored households to invite one other person to their Seders.

“No man can extinguish the spirit of the Jewish people or destroy its connection with Torah and its commandments,” she said. “May it be G-d’s will that from this moment on, we will all only know happiness.”

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