Shaare Zion typically has an estimated 1,500 worshipers who attend its services Fridays and Saturdays for Shabbat making it one of the largest Sephardic synagogues in North America.
In its over fifty years of existence, the synagogue has hosted over ten thousand occasions including Brit milahs, Bar mitzvas, engagements and weddings.
The congregation was started in 1941 as a local minyan, led by several prominent Syrian Jewish families in home at 1756 Ocean Parkway in Brooklyn, New York.
[1] Attendance was usually around 75 people, but the High Holidays, this increased to 750, and services were held at a nearby hall called Aperion Manor at 815 Kings Highway.
[1] Feeling this would ruin the aesthetic appeal of the sanctuary, the congregation refused, based on assurances from the building engineers that the balcony's cantilevered design was more than sufficient to support its fully loaded weight.
On December 20, 2011, a plan to expand the facilities of the synagogue was voted down by Brooklyn's Community Board 15, as congregants and nearby residents strongly opposed the development.
[3] Representatives of the congregation's board came requesting approval for a bulk variance to allow the enlargement; which would have seen a new six-story, 62-foot (19 m)-tall tower in place of the Annex Building.
Hecht had served the Sephardic community for over fifty years: directing the large minyan of the main sanctuary, offering classes in Jewish Law, as well as scheduling and attending social receptions such as Bar Mitzvahs and Brit Milahs, along with officiating countless wedding ceremonies.
[9] Harari subsequently resigned his position for a different opportunity to lead the smaller Kol Israel congregation in Midwood, Brooklyn.
[10][11] Acting U.S. attorney Ralph J. Marra Jr. described the arrest during a news conference saying, clergy members "cloaked their extensive criminal activity behind a facade of rectitude.