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World Trade Center Architect Will Refurbish Tree of Life Synagogue Two Years After Mass Shooting

Daniel Libeskind has reportedly been tasked with making the Pittsburgh synagogue a functioning place of worship again as well as a memorial site.

Daniel Libeskind—the architect who designed the new World Trade Center site after the Sept. 11 attacks—has reportedly been chosen to refurbish the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, where 11 people were killed in an antisemitic mass shooting in 2018. Libeskind’s appointment was reported by The New York Times on Tuesday; it states that he has been tasked with making it a functioning place of worship again as well as a memorial site. Rabbi Hazzan Jeffrey Myers said: “The most critical thing is not that people stand there with their jaws literally hanging on the ground as they look at it... But that they can be able to say, ‘Well look what the Tree of Life has accomplished. In the wake of what happened to them, that they could be at this incredible moment.’... We think Daniel Libeskind’s the one to be able to deliver that.” Andrea Wedner, who was wounded and lost her 97-year-old mom in the shooting, told the Times: “I am looking forward to entering a new Tree of Life building... without fear or hesitation.”