Spike In Hate Crimes Continues To Plague NYC

NEW YORK — Anti-Semitism has continued to fuel a spike in hate crimes around New York City this year, officials say.

Some 49 hate crimes had been reported in 2019 as of Tuesday, an 81 percent increase from the same period last year, NYPD Chief of Patrol Rodney Harrison said Thursday. Nearly two thirds of those crimes were anti-Semitic, Harrison said.

That points to a continuing trend — Jews were the targets of more than half the 352 hate crimes reported in 2018 as of late December.

"Something is wrong and it must be addressed," Mayor Bill de Blasio said Thursday at a city-sponsored rally against anti-Semitism. "It must be addressed in every part of our society. In our schools, in our neighborhoods, in our homes, we have to make sure that everyone hears a message of mutual respect and that voices of hate are confronted."

The city has seen a sustained rise in hate crimes over the last three years since around the time of President Donald Trump's election. Crimes targeting Jewish, black, Asian and white people all increased last year, though anti-Muslim incidents fell sharply.

A rash of anti-Semitic incidents emerged in the months after the late October massacre of 11 people at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh. A Prospect Heights synagogue was vandalized just days after the shooting, and two Hasidic people were attacked in Williamsburg one week in late November.

Harrison and De Blasio, a Democrat, delivered a tough-on-hate-crime message Thursday at the Brooklyn rally, warning bigoted offenders that they will be arrested, prosecuted and locked up.

"To anyone who has hatred in their heart, and they’re thinking of going out and scrawling something on a subway or a front door, they’re thinking of attacking an individual because of what they’re wearing or because of the language they speak — if you do that, we will find you, we will arrest you and you will go to prison, period," he said.

The mayor — who has not ruled out running for president — also made a strong statement in support of Israel amid allegations of anti-Semitism against one of his fellow Democrats.

The nation remains a necessary haven for Jewish people at a time when anti-Semitism is a strong force around the globe, he said.

De Blasio also condemned the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, or BDS, movement protesting Israel's treatment of Palestinians. One of the movement's supporters, U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota), came under fire this week for suggesting that money from a pro-Israel lobbying group influences Republican backing for the country. Omar later apologized.

"Maybe some people don’t realize it, but when they support the BDS movement, they are affronting the right of Israel to exist and that is unacceptable," de Blasio said.

(Lead image: Mayor Bill de Blasio speaks at a rally in Brooklyn on Thursday. Photo by Ed Reed and Paige Polk/Mayoral Photography Office)