Six days after Kristallnacht , Beth El 's members convened in a special meeting . Benedict Weil , Beth El 's president , proposed that Beth El hire Rabbi Hugo B. Schiff of Karlsruhe , Germany , as its permanent rabbi . Schiff had been known in Northern Virginia for his work with Rabbi Ulrich Steur of Fredericksburg , Virginia 's reform congregation . A graduate of the Jewish Theological Seminary of Breslau and Erlangen University , Schiff had been the spiritual leader of a congregation of 1,000 members in Germany and a member of the Great Synagogue Council of Baden . Rabbi Schiff had been imprisoned at the Dachau Concentration Camp . Because Schiff would enter the United States on a religious visa , the visa would be relatively simple to obtain , and otherwise restrictive visa quotas would not apply
Kristallnacht
Kristallnacht
Beth El Hebrew Congregation