Albany JCC Evacuated After Bomb Threats Sent To 18 Jewish Centers

Edited by: TJVNews.com

The Albany Jewish Community Center was evacuated and searched Sunday morning after it and several other centers around the country received anonymous emails with vague threats that mentioned a bomb, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said.

Cuomo went to the Albany center after police evacuated about 100 people, searched the building with dogs and declared it safe.

Similar vague threats were emailed to about 18 Jewish Community Centers around the country, according to Cuomo’s office. The centers provide educational, fitness and social programs for children and adults. Cuomo’s office had no further details about the nature of the threats nor whether police searched other locations.

Cuomo said the FBI is investigating where the threats originated. State Director of Emergency Management Michael Kopy said the emails were sent to people with Jewish Community Center accounts, but he declined to specify which centers were targeted.

“These types of situations are so ugly and so unfortunate,” Cuomo said. “What’s worse is we’re seeing more and more of them. We’ve had about 42 incidents of anti-Semitism in this state this past couple of months so it’s not getting better. It’s only getting worse.”

When asked if there were other JCCs threatened, Cuomo said, “Yes. There were about 18.”

A spokesperson for the office of the New York governor later clarified that not all 19 occurred in New York but would not say how many occurred in the state versus in others.

“It is not just anti-Semitism,” Cuomo said. “There is a contagion of hate all across this country. The number of anti- African American attacks is up, the number of KKK groups and activity is up. The number of incidents against the LGBTQ community are up, so it’s a virus all across this nation.”

The New York governor then drew a comparison between the “contagion of hate” to the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus, which has killed at least 2,360 people and infected nearly 80,000 others, mainly in China. There have been 35 reported cases of the coronavirus in 8 states in the US; none have been reported in the state of New York.

“People are worried about the Coronavirus, which we’re watching in this state – there’s also a virus of hate, and it’s spreading and it’s spreading quickly. And unfortunately, this state has also been infected, as hard as that is to believe, because New York, we’re all about diversity, right?”

“When you threaten a JCC, these are, it’s not just an anti-Semitic attack. You have children who go to the JCC,” Cuomo said. “You have gym facilities here. So, you are really threatening children. It is one of the most heinous things you can do. And again, it is fear and it is terror. That is all it is – terror,” adding there were about 100 people in the Albany location that had to be evacuated because of the threat. (AP)