US antisemitic incidents rise since Israel-Hamas war began, report says

The Empire State Building and Manhattan skyline are pictured from the Summit at One Vanderbilt observatory in Manhattan in New York City on April 14, 2023 | File photo by Mike Segar/Reuters

Antisemitic incidents in the United States rose by about 400 percent in slightly over two weeks since war broke out in the Middle East after Palestinian Islamist group Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, advocacy group Anti-Defamation League (ADL) said Wednesday.

The take

The advocacy group’s data—which showed a 388 percent rise in antisemitic incidents in the US between Oct. 7 and 23 over the prior year—comes amid monitoring by American authorities of domestic threats due to the conflict.

The numbers

The ADL Center on Extremism said preliminary data showed 312 reported US antisemitic incidents from Oct. 7 to 23, including harassment, vandalism. and assault.

About 190 of those were directly linked to the war between Israel and Hamas.

Among examples cited by ADL were alleged physical assault; violent online messages, especially on messaging platform Telegram; and rallies where “ADL found explicit or strong implicit support for Hamas and/or violence against Jews in Israel.”

In the same period of 2022, ADL recorded 64 US antisemitic incidents, of which four were linked to Israel.

Antisemitism was already rising in the US before the war. Nearly 3,700 antisemitic incidents were recorded in 2022, more than in any year since ADL began tracking the issue in 1979.

Key quote

“When conflict erupts in Israel, antisemitic incidents soon follow in the US and globally,” said ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, urging authorities to provide security and support to Jewish communities.

Context

The US Justice Department has said it is monitoring rising threats against Jews and Muslims amid the conflict. President Joe Biden has condemned antisemitism and Islamophobia.

Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack killed over 1,400 people and Israel’s air strikes on Gaza have since killed over 5,700 Palestinians as of Tuesday, according to Gaza officials.