TEL AVIV — Joseph Berg, a 43-year-old entrepreneur, sat brooding and alone on a bloodstained sidewalk Sunday, a few feet from the policeman blocking the stairwell to the basement crime scene.
Fifteen years ago, Berg first took refuge in that basement, then a newly established community center of the Tel Aviv Gay and Lesbian Assn. "I came here, found people to share myself with, to be who I was with others," he recalled. And so it had been for a generation of young gay men and women who came for company, counseling and courage to come out.
"This basement is our home," and the teens who had frequented it lately are "our kids," Berg said. "Last night someone came into our home and killed our kids."
An unidentified gunman's attack Saturday night in the basement sanctuary, which left two people dead and 11 others wounded, shattered the gay community's relative sense of security in freewheeling Tel Aviv, the Israeli city where it felt most accepted.
As hundreds of gay men and women gathered in mourning Sunday near the scene of the attack, Israel's bloodiest recorded assault on homosexuals, expressions of outrage came from national leaders, lawmakers across the political spectrum, and the Orthodox Jewish religious hierarchy. Some secular politicians called the shooting a hate crime and demanded an end to incitement against gays by elected officials, religious leaders and others.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned what he called a "horrific killing" and told his Cabinet, "We are a tolerant, democratic country governed by the rule of law, and we must respect each and every person."
Police said the masked gunman holstered his weapon and fled on foot into central Tel Aviv's busy streets. Limited by a court-imposed gag order, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld offered few details. He said the assailant used a pistol, not an automatic rifle as some witnesses first reported. And he said police had discarded the possibility that the gunman was a Palestinian militant.
"All indications point to a criminal incident and not a terror attack, which was most likely deliberately directed against the gay and lesbian community," Rosenfeld said.
The crime dominated Israeli headlines Sunday. People awoke to front-page photographs showing overturned furniture on the blood-streaked floor of the community center. Newspapers and websites ran guest columns by gay celebrities and articles on the two people killed.
