2 Men Arrested in Threats to New York Jewish Community, Police Say – NYDN
New Yorks Jewish community has been the target of a series of hate crimes, including harassment, arson and vandalism, which have been reported since the deadly terrorist attacks in San Bernardino, Calif., last month. The Anti-Defamation League, meanwhile, reports that the uptick in anti-Semitic incidents was already underway in the first week of June.
In response to the recent wave of attacks, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the creation of an Anti-Semitism Task Force aimed at investigating and combating the problem.
While there has been a spike in anti-Semitic incidents throughout the city, we need to do a better job of investigating those incidents and making sure that hate isnt normalized in our society, de Blasio wrote in a letter to the community. If we dont stop hate in its tracks once and for all, then we will be living in a city where that doesnt happen.
But as the Times reported this week, the Anti-Defamation League has not received any formal applications for its Anti-Hate program. And there is still no definition for what anti-Semitism means, according to the ADL, which has launched a number of different groups to address the problem.
In late March, the ADL launched a program called the Center on Extremism, a center with the stated mission to study, research, and disseminate information about radical Islamist extremism, its global reach, the role of extremist propaganda in radicalizing people, and the impact of such terror attacks on American and global public opinion.
The center will serve as a resource for the Jewish community, including the New York Police Department, the Anti-Defamation League, and the Anti-Defamation Leagues International Center.
Meanwhile, one of the members of the Anti-Defamation Leagues task force, Steven Schwartz, said that the task force is focused on the problem of anti-Semitism in our country, but we don