A survivor of the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre said Wednesday that she saw her right arm "get blown open in two places" by a gunman and cried "Mommy" after realizing her 97-year-old mother had been shot and killed by her side in the nation's deadliest attack on Jewish people.

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Andrea Wedner was the government's last witness as prosecutors wrapped up their case against Robert Bowers, who burst into the Tree of Life synagogue building with a military-style rifle and other weaponry and opened fire, shooting anyone he could find.

Bowers killed 11 worshippers and injured seven other people, including five police officers, in the 2018 attack. The 50-year-old truck driver is charged with 63 criminal counts, including hate crimes resulting in death and the obstruction of the free exercise of religion resulting in death.

Bowers' attorneys did not put on a defense after the prosecution rested, setting the stage for closing arguments and jury deliberations on Thursday.

Assuming the jury returns a conviction, the trial would enter what's expected to be a lengthy penalty phase, with the same jurors deciding Bowers' sentence: Life in prison or the death penalty. Bowers' attorneys, who have acknowledged he was the gunman, have focused their efforts on trying to save his life. Federal prosecutors ended their case against Bowers on Wednesday with some of the most harrowing and heartbreaking testimony of the trial so far.

Wedner told jurors that Sabbath services had started five or 10 minutes earlier when she heard a crashing sound in the building's lobby, followed by gunfire. She said her mother, Rose Mallinger, asked her, "What do we do?"

Wedner said she had a "clear memory" of the gunman and his rifle. "We were filled with terror – it was indescribable. We thought we were going to die," she said.

Wedner called 911 and was on the line when she and her mother were shot. She testified that she checked her mother's pulse and realized, "I knew she wouldn't survive." As SWAT officers entered the synagogue, Wedner said, she kissed her fingers and touched them to her dead mother, cried "Mommy," and stepped over another victim on her way out. She said she was the sole survivor in that section of the synagogue.

Her account capped a prosecution case in which other survivors also testified about the terror they felt that day, police officers recounted how they exchanged gunfire with Bowers and finally neutralized him, and jurors heard about Bowers' toxic online presence in which he praised Hitler, espoused white supremacy and ranted incessantly against Jews.

The defense has suggested Bowers acted not out of religious hatred but rather a delusional belief that Jews were enabling genocide by helping immigrants settle in the United States.

Also testifying Wednesday was Pittsburgh SWAT Officer Timothy Matson, who was critically wounded while responding to the rampage. He told jurors that he and another officer broke down the door to the darkened room where Bowers had holed up and was immediately knocked off his feet by blasts from Bowers' gun. Matson, who stands 6 foot 4 and weighed 310 pounds at the time of the shooting, said he made his way to the stairs and was placed on a stretcher, and remembers thinking, "I must be in bad shape."

Matson was shot seven times, including in the head, knee, shin, and elbow, and has endured 25 surgeries to repair the damage, but he testified he would go through the door again.

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The attack on the Beth Israel Synagogue in Colleyville, TX on Saturday comes amid a growing sense of fear among Jewish communities in the US.

"Thank God it ended well, but it could have also ended very badly," Chairman of the Executive of the World Zionist Organization Yaakov Hagoel told Israel Hayom. According to Hagoel, who is also the de facto chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel, "We have had our concerns for many years, and although synagogues have long been a potential target, this has been more evident in recent years."

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Hagoel further said, "We see antisemitism getting stronger, and antisemitic incidents have increased around the world; social media has been fueling radicals who want to hurt Jews." He lamented that "one can go on social media and get guides on how to perpetrate an attack."

Antisemitic attacks against Jewish institutions, not a new phenomenon in Europe, have gradually become more common in the US as well due to social media. The 2018 massacre in Pittsburgh and the deadly shooting in Poway have shown just how bad things have become. The Jewish Federations of North America have recently launched a campaign to raise $54 million to provide security to Jewish synagogues and institutions.

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The perpetrator of a deadly antisemitic attack near San Diego in 2019 was sentenced to life in prison on Thursday, without the possibility of parole.

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John Earnest, 22, a former nursing student, pleaded guilty for the shooting attack on the Chabad Synagogue in Poway.

A 60-year-old member of the congregation, Lori Gilbert-Kaye, was killed and three others were wounded in the attack, including the rabbi, who was shot in the hand and lost an index finger.

Several dozen people were inside the synagogue at that time.

"I'm just trying to defend my nation from the Jewish people," Earnest said, according to court documents.

Earnest also pleaded guilty to setting a mosque on fire in March 2019, an act he described in a racist and anti-Semitic pamphlet posted online hours before the attack on the synagogue.

Earnest faced the death penalty, which, while still in force in California, has been suspended until further notice since 2006.

The attack, on the last day of Passover celebrations, came exactly six months after an attack on a synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 2018 that left 11 people dead.

Earnest was inspired by the massacre, and purchased a semi-automatic rifle the day before the shooting, a federal affidavit said.

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The Anti-Defamation League also counted at least 50 incidents in which white supremacists are accused of targeting Jewish institutions' property since a gunman killed 11 worshippers at the Tree of Life synagogue on Oct. 27, 2018. Those incidents include 12 cases of vandalism involving white supremacist symbols and 35 cases in which white supremacist propaganda was distributed.

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The ADL said its nationwide count of anti-Semitic incidents remains near record levels. It has counted 780 anti-Semitic incidents in the first six months of 2019, compared to 785 incidents during the same period in 2018.

The ADL's tally of 12 arrests for white supremacist plots, threats, and attacks against Jewish institutions includes the April 2019 capture of John T. Earnest, who is charged with killing one person and wounding three others in a shooting at a synagogue in Poway, California. The group said many of the cases it counted, including the Poway shooting, were inspired by previous white supremacist attacks. In online posts, Earnest said he was inspired by the deadly attacks in Pittsburgh and on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, where a gunman killed 51 people in March.

The ADL also counted three additional 2019 cases in which individuals were arrested for targeting Jews but weren't deemed to be white supremacists. Two were motivated by Islamist extremist ideology, the organization said.

The ADL said its Center on Extremism provided "critical intelligence" to law enforcement in at least three of the 12 cases it counted.

Last December, authorities in Monroe, Washington, arrested a white supremacist after the ADL notified law enforcement about suspicions he threatened on Facebook to kill Jews in a synagogue. The ADL said it also helped authorities in Lehighton, Pennsylvania, identify a white supremacist accused of using aliases to post threatening messages, including a digital image of himself pointing an AR-15 rifle at a group of praying Jewish men.

In August, an FBI-led anti-terrorism task force arrested a Las Vegas man accused of plotting to firebomb a synagogue or other targets, including a bar catering to LGTBQ customers and the ADL's Las Vegas office. The ADL said it warned law enforcement officials about the man's online threats.

"We cannot and will not rest easy knowing the threat posed by white supremacists and other extremists against the Jewish community is clear and present," the group's CEO, Jonathan Greenblatt, said in a statement.

The ADL said it counted at least 30 additional incidents in which people with an "unknown ideology" targeted Jewish institutions with acts of arson, vandalism or propaganda distribution that the group deemed to be anti-Semitic or "generally hateful," but not explicitly white supremacist.

"These incidents include the shooting of an elderly man outside a synagogue in Miami, fires set at multiple Jewish institutions in New York and Massachusetts, Molotov cocktails thrown at synagogue windows in Chicago, damaged menorahs in Georgia and New Jersey, as well as a wide range of anti-Semitic graffiti," an ADL report said.

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A criminal complaint alleges Mustafa Mousab Alowemer planned to bomb an unidentified church on Pittsburgh's north side, and purchased materials he thought were necessary to build a bomb. He also allegedly provided plans and a map to an undercover FBI agent who he thought was a fellow Islamic State supporter.

"Targeting places of worship is beyond the pale, no matter what the motivation," Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Demers said in a statement. "The defendant is alleged to have plotted just such an attack on a church in Pittsburgh in the name of ISIS."

The 21-year-old Alowemer, a Pittsburgh resident, is charged with one count of attempting to provide material support to ISIS and two counts of distributing information relating to an explosive device or weapons of mass destruction.

Alowemer was born in Syria and came to the US as a refugee in 2016, according to the FBI.

According to the criminal complaint, Alowemer met several times between April and June with the undercover FBI agent and an FBI source. During one of the meetings, Alowemer allegedly provided plot details, bomb materials he'd purchased and printed copies of Google satellite maps with markings showing the exact location of the church plus possible arrival and escape routes.

Alowemer planned to carry out the bombing next month by delivering the explosives in a backpack, according to the complaint.

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The Culture Ministry said Monday it had selected Jeff Finkelstein, the president of the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh, to light a torch on behalf of the Jewish Diaspora as part of the government's May 8 Independence Day festivities. It noted Finkelstein's work to lead "the Jewish community's efforts to cope and rebuild" after the Oct. 28 shooting, the deadliest attack against Jews in U.S. history.

In a statement, Culture Minister Miri Regev praised Finkelstein's embodiment of the "spirit of greatness and social cohesion among our people."

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Robert Bowers, 46,  entered pleas of not guilty to all 44 counts against him, as the city's Jewish community buried three more of its dead.

Bowers, who was wounded in a gunfight with police, made his initial court appearance on Monday shackled to a wheelchair. On Thursday, he walked into the courtroom upright and without assistance, wearing a red jumpsuit and a bandage on his left arm.

He spoke little, other than to say he understood the charges and that some of them could lead to the death penalty, then entered his pleas. He also requested a jury trial.

He appeared sure of foot and confident, answering questions put to him by U.S. District Judge Robert Mitchell in a clear voice and signing papers with a steady hand.

The indictment filed against him on Wednesday includes 11 counts of obstructing free exercise of religion resulting in death, and 11 counts of using a firearm to commit murder.

A former truck driver who frequently posted anti-Semitic slurs and conspiracy theories online, Bowers is accused of bursting into the Tree of Life Synagogue last Saturday with a semi-automatic rifle and three pistols and opening fire while shouting, "All Jews must die."

In addition to the 11 congregants killed, two more were wounded, as were four police officers, before Bowers was shot by police and surrendered.

The rampage was the deadliest attack targeting Jews in U.S. history. Prosecutors have said they will seek the death penalty.

Following a spate of explosives packages that were mailed to prominent U.S. Democrats, the shooting heightened national tensions ahead of the Nov. 6 midterm elections, which will decide whether U.S. President Donald Trump will lose the Republican majority he enjoys in both houses of Congress.

The massacre also fueled a debate over Trump's inflammatory political rhetoric and his self-identification as a "nationalist," which critics say has fomented a surge in right-wing extremism.

In light of Bowers' support for Trump, the Trump administration has rejected suggestions that the president has encouraged white nationalists and neo-Nazis who have embraced him, insisting he is trying to unify the U.S. even as he continues to disparage the media as an "enemy of the people."

Shrugging off protests that he was unwelcome, Trump made a brief, low-key visit to Pittsburgh on Tuesday to pay his respects, as funerals were held for the first four victims.

Three more funerals were held on Wednesday, followed on Thursday by three more: Sylvan Simon, 86, and his wife of over 60 years, Bernice, 84, and dentist Dr. Richard Gottfried, 65.

Augie Siriano, a custodian at the synagogue, said the Simons often brought him chocolate chip cookies, and that Sylvan Simon, a retired accountant, liked to talk about the Pittsburgh Steelers professional football team. His wife was a retired nurse.

"They were just wonderful, graceful people," Siriano said.

Dr. Jane Segal, a dentist who graduated from the University of Pittsburgh a year ahead of Gottfried, remembered him as a "wonderful man and a wonderful dentist."

"You couldn't find anyone finer," she said.

Bowers also has been charged in state court with 11 counts of criminal homicide and 13 counts of ethnic intimidation, though authorities have said prosecution of the federal case will take precedence.

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