By: Ilana Siyance
Some progress is being made by the New York Police Department’s Hate Crimes unit, in apprehending the parties responsible for the repeated attacks on identifiable Jews in Borough Park.
A teenager has been arrested in connection with a series of anti-Semitic attacks in Brooklyn’s black-hat neighborhood. As reported by VIN News, the arrested teenage boy, 16, turned himself to the police station on Friday morning. His name has not been released, as he is a juvenile, and it is not yet clear which of the at least three recent attacks he was involved in. The teen has been charged with two counts of aggravated harassment, which is a misdemeanor. The police are still looking for three other suspects in relation to these crimes.
The NYPD’s Hate Crimes unit tweeted news of the arrest, boasting, “APPREHENDED!!!
HCTF has made the first arrest in a series of Anti-Semitic incidents in #boropark @NYPD66Pct https://twitter.com/nypdhatecrimes/status/1191083841575936000 …”
Last weekend, four incidents were reportedly perpetrated. The Hate Crimes unit has been investigating the attacks dated November 1st and November 2nd , four of which were captured by surveillance cameras. Several men are seen on video jumping out of a car and chasing Hasidic men and boys. In one incident, the passengers pin a Hasidic man against a parked vehicle and punch him. Jewish Victims were also punched in two other incidents.
Further, in the seemingly endless persecution, this past Saturday night, some teenagers took to throwing eggs at several Jewish buildings and at some adult pedestrians who were identifiably Jewish and walking near the Jewish institutions, which included a synagogue, and a Jewish girls’ school.
There has been an alarming increase in unprovoked, random anti-Semitic attacks throughout the country in recent news. The Anti-Defamation League says its nationwide count of anti-Semitic incidents is close to record levels. The civil rights group counted 780 anti-Semitic incidents in the first six months of 2019, in comparison to 785 incidents during the same months of 2018. “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,” said the group’s CEO, Jonathan Greenblatt, in a statement. An ADL report references several intolerable anti-Semitic attacks perpetrated recently in the U.S: “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.”
