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By Anna Rahmanan
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The bill for securing Jewish communal life in the United States has crossed $1.015 billion a year just as Rosh Hashanah begins at sundown on September 11, tying the High Holidays to the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and sharpening a question: who pays when worship itself has to be protected?
The Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA) said on September 3 that Jewish communal security spending is up 33 percent from a 2024 estimate of $765 million and averages roughly $225,000 across more than 4,500 institutions, including synagogues, Jewish community centers, schools, summer camps and other nonprofits.
The group said the figure excludes privately owned Jewish businesses, such as kosher restaurants, markets and Judaica shops, which means the full cost of Jewish public security is likely higher than the nonprofit tally.
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The $1 billion figure is more than a security estimate; it puts a price on a condition now built into Jewish communal life in the United States: before a congregation can pray or a child can attend Hebrew school, many institutions must first pay to make the space safe enough to enter.
No legislature imposed that cost, but it functions like a tax on Jewish life, diverting money from education, elder care and social services into guards, cameras, security directors, building hardening and training. Simply put, it's a tax to be a practicing Jew in the U.S.
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A Security Cost Built Into Prayer
Eric D. Fingerhut, JFNA’s president and CEO, told Newsweek that Jewish institutions are now spending “enormous sums simply to ensure that people can worship, educate their children and gather as a community without fear of violence.”
“This is not something we should accept as the new normal,” Fingerhut said.
The opportunity cost is the heart of the “tax” frame: JFNA estimates the current security spend could send 44,000 children to Jewish day school, cover every child attending Jewish summer camp or fund every Birthright trip to Israel for a decade. Fingerhut put the trade-off in institutional terms: “Every dollar our community spends on guards and cameras is a dollar not spent on Jewish education, on caring for our elderly, on taking care of those in need.”
For the High Holidays, the trade-off becomes visible because JFNA says more Jews gather in synagogues than at any other time of year.
“Jewish Americans should be able to walk into a synagogue on the High Holidays thinking about prayer and community, not whether the building is secure,” Fingerhut said.
The 9/11 Anniversary Overlap
The overlap between Rosh Hashanah and the 25th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks gives this year’s High Holidays a sharper public meaning. September 11 changed how Americans think about security, terrorism and vulnerable public spaces. A quarter-century later, that burden is no longer confined to airports, federal buildings, or government agencies; it has become part of the operating cost of synagogues, Jewish schools, camps, and community centers.
The post-9/11 homeland security system now reaches deeply into private religious life, including through the federal Nonprofit Security Grant Program, which helps at-risk nonprofits pay for security upgrades. Jewish institutions don’t ask themselves whether they need protection but how much of that cost they must carry themselves.
The timing also complicates the politics of the issue. Supporters of more federal funding argue that protecting synagogues is part of protecting religious freedom and public safety, not a narrow communal benefit. In fact, the same grant program also serves churches, mosques and other nonprofits facing threats.
The concern is not limited to the United States. In Britain, King Charles III accepted the role of patron of the Community Security Trust, which protects Jewish communities, while the British government funds Jewish communal security through a Home Office grant managed by CST. The comparison does not erase the American debate over federal spending, but it shows that Jewish security has become a public responsibility question in more than one democracy.
The counterargument is that a major expansion would move more of the cost from private donors and community budgets onto taxpayers. But the new Jewish Federations data makes clear why Jewish leaders are pressing the case now: when security becomes a prerequisite for worship, education and community life, it changes what religious freedom costs in practice.
Congress Becomes the Test of Who Pays
The next question is who should carry the cost. Jewish groups are pushing Congress to expand the Nonprofit Security Grant Program, which is listed at $300 million in program funding for fiscal 2026, toward the $1 billion level sought in the Jewish American Security Act. The Senate version of the bill would authorize $1 billion a year from fiscal years 2027 through 2031.
That would mark a major shift in how the country pays for the protection of vulnerable religious and nonprofit institutions. Supporters argue that synagogue security is part of religious freedom and public safety, not a narrow Jewish communal benefit. Fingerhut said the grant program serves “communities of every faith,” including “churches, mosques and other vulnerable nonprofits.”
But where does public responsibility end? Expanding the program would move more of the burden from donors, dues, tuition-paying families and community budgets onto taxpayers. Lawmakers would also have to decide how much federal money should pay for recurring costs, such as guards and security personnel, rather than one-time upgrades such as cameras, gates or reinforced doors.
That is why Congress is the next test of the billion-dollar “tax” on Jewish life. If lawmakers expand the program, more of the cost of protecting worship and communal life will be treated as a public obligation. If they do not, the burden will remain within Jewish budgets, where security spending competes with other social services and community needs.
This High Holiday season, as the memory of 9/11 returns on the same day Jews begin a new year, the question is no longer whether Jewish institutions must prepare for danger, but whether the cost of that preparation will remain theirs alone.
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