Long Island Plagued By Antisemitic Incidents In 2022, Hate Map Shows

LONG ISLAND, NY — Antisemitic incidents plagued Long Island last year, as the nation continues to see record high numbers of incidents. That's according to a recent Anti-Defamation League report, which said New York tallied the highest number of incidents in the nation at 580.

The report, published in March, said New York recorded 240 incidents of harassment in 2022, 268 incidents of vandalism, and 72 incidents of assault. That total of 580 represented a 39 percent increase over 2021, and a 72 percent increase over 2020.

In 2022, the ADL tabulated 3,697 antisemitic incidents across the United States — a 36 percent increase over 2021 and the highest number on record since the group started tracking antisemitic incidents in 1979.

"This is the third time in the past five years that the year-end total has been the highest number ever recorded," the organization wrote in its executive summary of the findings.

Visibly Orthodox Jews, the authors said, were targeted in more than half of the assault incidents nationally.

On Long Island, dozens of incidents were recorded of antisemitic vandalism and harassment, as well as white supremacist propaganda.

In Nassau County, such cases included swastikas spray-painted on a jungle gym set in a Massapequa park, propaganda that said "race-mixing is white genocide," and a Rabbi in Old Westbury receiving an antisemitic text with the message: "Burn in hell k---." In Flower Hill, a Jewish person was attacked in June 2022 and the recipient of antisemitic slurs, according to ADL data.

In Suffolk County, cases included a swastika found near Port Jefferson Station, "Obergruppenfuhrer" and SS bolts drawn on a beach ball during a free speech event at Stony Brook University, and a swastika found drawn in the sand at a school in Lindenhurst.

Below are all the antisemitic incidents logged in New York tracked by the ADL.

The ADL said called the nationwide increase in antisemitic incidents "dramatic," and noted that the spike "in nearly all categories cannot be attributed to any one cause or ideology."

"Significant surges in incidents include high volume increases in organized white supremacist propaganda activity (102% increase to 852 incidents), K-12 schools (49% increase to 494 incidents) and college campuses (41% increase to 219 incidents), as well as deeply troubling percentage increases in attacks on Orthodox Jews (69% increase to 59 Incidents) and bomb threats toward Jewish institutions (an increase from eight to 91 incidents)," the ADL said.

Furthermore, the increase in antisemitic incidents coincides with decades-high levels of antisemitic attitudes: one in five Americans believe six or more antisemitic tropes, according to the organization's 2023 report Antisemitic Attitudes in America. In 2019, that number was 11 percent.

"Although a causal link between antisemitic attitudes and antisemitic activity has not been proven, it would not be surprising if some antisemites have become emboldened to act on their hatred in the current environment," the ADL report said.