With six weeks to go before the new year, New York City has already recorded a sharp rise in hate crimes over 2005, including a 28 percent increase in anti-Semitic acts.
The NYPD’s Bias Crime Task Force investigated 95 incidents directed against Jews through Nov. 5, up sharply from 74 in all of last year. Overall, there were 230 attacks based on race, religion, national origin or sexual orientation, up from 214 last year, according to figures released by the NYPD in response to an inquiry by the New York Post. Attacks on gays also rose sharply.
A police spokesman, Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne, noted that the overall number of bias crimes is still down in each of the past five years since 2001.
Joel Levy, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, said his organization’s statistics showed fewer anti-Semitic incidents (criminal or otherwise) across the state at this time of the year compared to the final months of 2005. "We’re still crunching numbers, but overall the numbers seem down," Levy said.
