Police are investigating the robbery of a Rockland County pizzeria as a hate crime after the culprits left swastikas and spraypainted a threat against Jews in German.
The message, as seen on Cablevision’s News 12, means “We will kill all the Jews.”
While Ed Rudzin, the owner of Cassie’s Italian restaurant in Orangeburg, is Jewish, he said he did not know how the culprits might have known that. Rudzin, who lives in a nearby New Jersey town, told The Jewish Week on Tuesday he had faced no prior anti-Semitic incidents.
“I’ve had a broken window, but never an anti-Jewish hate crime,” he said. The incident occurred between closing time Sunday night and reopening on Memorial Day. Police are checking surveillance cameras from adjacent businesses for possible images of the culprits, who stole several thousand dollars and a slab of beef.
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