New York Mayor Meets Jewish Leaders to Discuss How to Combat Wave of Antisemitic Hate Crimes in City

New York City Mayor Eric Adams convened a roundtable meeting with around 40 Jewish community leaders last Thursday to discuss how to combat a recent wave of antisemitic attacks.

The meeting took place less than 24 hours after graffiti reading “F— Jews” was spray-painted three times on an Israeli restaurant on Manhattan’s Upper West Side.

“He came out very, very strongly that he’s not going to tolerate this,” Rabbi David Niederman — head of the United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg and North Brooklyn — was quoted as saying of Adams.

.@NYCMayor hosts Jewish community leaders for a roundtable strategy meeting on combatting the rise of anti-Semitic hate crimes in New York City. pic.twitter.com/pbJPBDCgi0

— City of New York (@nycgov) February 17, 2022

On Feb. 6, after a spate of three hate crimes against Jews in Brooklyn in a single weekend, including two street assaults and the vandalism of yeshiva buses with swastikas, Adams tweeted, “Hatred won’t be tolerated in our city. Anti-Semitic acts of violence are an attack on every New Yorker and they will be met with the force of the entire city.”

Hatred won’t be tolerated in our city. Anti-Semitic acts of violence are an attack on every New Yorker and they will be met with the force of the entire city.

If you have any information on these attacks, please contact @NYPDNews immediately. https://t.co/8QkbU193wf

— Mayor Eric Adams (@NYCMayor) February 7, 2022

The wave of antisemitism continued the following weekend, with a Jewish man punched in the face in Brooklyn and a dentist’s office in Queens defaced with graffiti reading “F— Jews.”

New York City Police Department (NYPD) data showed a dramatic spike in anti-Jewish hate crimes from the start of January through the first week of February — 22 compared to eight in the same time period in 2021.

In recent years, Jews have been the most-targeted group for hate crimes in New York City, according to the NYPD, including a nearly 50% increase in 2021 from 2020.

In January 2020, around 25,000 people participated in the “No Hate, No Fear” rally in New York City after of previous wave of antisemitic violence in the city and surrounding area, including the deadly Monsey stabbing and Jersey City shooting attacks.