Dan Uzan, the Danish security guard who was killed while guarding a synagogue in Copenhagen yesterday, was described by Danish Chief Rabbi Jair Melchior as “irreplaceable.” In a profile of the Uzan reported today by the Associated Press, Melchior also described Uzan as “a person who was always willing to help. An amazing, amazing guy.”

Uzan’s family is active in Copenhagen’s Jewish community, Melchior said, and Uzan attended Jewish school and joined the community’s security efforts from a young age. The slain guard was a talented basketball player, received a degree in politics, lived in Israel for a while and learned to speak Hebrew fluently, Melchior said.

Uzan wanted younger community members to replace him in the security detail, Melchior said, but the community pressed him to remain at his post.

According to the AP, the Danish Jewish community, which is estimated to be between 6,000 and 7,000 people, “operates its own security patrol that coordinates with police to protect Jewish institutions.”

In a statement made in front of the synagogue (embedded below), Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt said that Denmark “‘will do everything it can to protect the Jewish community in the country.”

Following the terror attacks in Paris targeting the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and the Hyper Cacher kosher supermarket, a Danish Jewish organization asked for police protection outside their institution, according to a report last month from Agence France-Presse.

[Photo: The Telegraph / YouTube ]