(JTA) – Local officials said police provided protection to a synagogue during a far-right rally last weekend in Charlottesville, Virginia refuting a claim by a Jewish community leader that they had refused to do so. On Friday, August 18, Charlottesville City Manager Maurice Jones said it “is simply not the case that Congregation Beth Israel was left unguarded” during Saturday’s event, when neo-Nazis and white supremacists gathered in the city. The synagogue’s senior rabbi also seemed to confirm the police statement. Rabbi Tom Gutherz said he and Synagogue president Alan Zimmerman had met with the police on Wednesday and “officials reviewed with us the security provisions they made for the safety of our congregation during the protests. Based on our discussion, we are now confident that the steps they took were carefully considered to protect us and were effective. We note that we had also met with and spoken to the department prior to the rallies as part of our preparation.”

Zimmerman had written in a blog post earlier this week that “[t]he police department refused to provide us with an officer during morning services. “On Saturday morning, I stood outside our synagogue with the armed security guard we hired after the police department refused to provide us with an officer during morning services. (Even the police department’s limited promise of an observer near our building was not kept – and note, we did not ask for protection of our property, only our people as they worshipped).”

The synagogue did hire security guards for the first time in its history ahead of the far-right event at Emancipation Park, a short block from the synagogue. Zimmerman, like other eyewitnesses, described intimidation by rally participants or supporters. “Several times, parades of Nazis passed our building, shouting, ‘There’s the synagogue!’ followed by chants of Seig Heil and other anti-Semitic language,” he wrote. “Some carried flags with swastikas and other Nazi symbols.”