Congregation Beth Israel "House of Israel" is an Orthodox synagogue located at 10 Dexter Street in Malden, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1904 by Jewish immigrants from Lithuania.Facing demographic decline in the early 2000s, the congregation undertook a number of efforts to attract Orthodox Jews to Malden and its synagogue. In 2012 Beth Israel had roughly 100 member families and held services three times daily.Beth Israel's first rabbi was Dov Ber Boruchoff, who served the congregation from 1906 to 1939. Yitzchak Zev Rabinowitz joined as rabbi in 1997., Rabinowitz was the rabbi.HistoryThe congregation was founded in 1904 as Beth Israel Anshe Litte . Their first home was a former Methodist church on Lombard Court in Malden.In 1906, Beth Israel hired its first rabbi, Dov Ber Boruchoff, who would stay on for 33 years until his death on Passover in 1939.Beth Israel's second-longest-serving rabbi, Charles Weinberg, was a national leader in the Orthodox movement. He served as President of the Rabbinical Council of America, one of the world's largest organizations of Orthodox rabbis, from 1960-62.In 1993, the synagogue was targeted by a neo-Nazi group calling itself the Aryan War Council who threatened adverse consequences if an investigation into a recent desecration of a nearby Jewish cemetery was continued. In 1997, Yitchak Zev Rabinowitz joined as rabbi. Before joining Beth Israel, Rabinowitz had studied at the Talmudical Yeshiva of Philadelphia, the Beth Medrash Govoha in Lakewood, New Jersey, the Mir Yeshiva in Jerusalem, and had spent five years at the Kollel of Greater Boston.
