The number of hate crimes against Jews in New York City has risen significantly over the first nine months of this year. The New York Police Department (NYPD) has reported 311 total hate crimes through September, as opposed to 250 reported through the same period in 2018, according to Mark Molinari, who heads the department’s Hate Crimes Task Force.
NEW YORK—On the eve of Yom Kippur, Jewish leaders in New York have demanded that more police patrol their communities following an increase of anti-Semitic hate crimes, The New York Post reported.
“Enough is enough,” City Democratic Councilman Chaim Deutsch, who represents southern Brooklyn, including the heavily Orthodox Jewish neighborhood of Midwood, was quoted as saying.
“If they have to bring in 200 cops to patrol our streets to show their visibility, that’s what has to be done,” he said.
The number of hate crimes against Jews in New York City has risen significantly over the first nine months of this year. The New York Police Department (NYPD) has reported 311 total hate crimes through September, as opposed to 250 reported through the same period in 2018, according to Mark Molinari, who heads the department’s Hate Crimes Task Force.
Last week, two people were caught on camera in broad daylight tossing a milk crate and metal mailbox at a Williamsburg, Brooklyn, synagogue, smashing a window.
Then someone yanked a Jewish woman’s headscarf and wig off as she walked with her children in the borough’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood, community leaders say. That attack also was caught on surveillance video.
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio vowed on Twitter, “We will find the perpetrators and hold them responsible.”
Police increase their presence at places of worship during religious holidays.
“During the High Holy Days, there will continue to be an increased police presence — both seen and unseen — around synagogues and Jewish cultural centers to ensure individuals can practice their faith safely, freely and openly,” a spokesperson for the NYPD.
According to Mark Molinari, 87 percent of the anti-Semitic hate crimes this year have been what he called “criminal mischief,” generally vandalism involving the drawing of swastikas. The remaining 13 percent were person-to-person crimes, such as assaults. In order to be classified as a hate crime, an anti-Semitic incident needs to be an actual crime, as opposed to someone yelling an offensive phrase.