At Least Ten NYC Synagogues Threatened for New Year's

Jan 1 2011
Manhattan, NY - frightening letter was sent to an Upper West Side synagogue threatening to blow it up on New Year's Eve, (as first reported on Vos Iz Neias), -- and the rabbi there says as many as a dozen other local synagogues received similar sinister missives...

The note was discovered at 5 p.m. Thursday at the Congregation Ohab Zedek synagogue on 95th Street near Columbus Avenue, said Rabbi Allen Schwartz.

“We have reasons to believe someone wants to spread fear,” Schwartz told The Post.

“It was a letter sent to 10 or 12 [other] synagogues,” he added.

He declined to elaborate, citing a police investigation.

One wonders what it said, eh? Or what language it was written in? Who they are protecting?

The bomb threat to Ohab Zedek was made the same day a report was released by the state Division of Criminal Justice Services showing that hate crimes across the state had jumped 14 percent in 2009.

In the city, hate crimes rose 6 percent in the same period, with Manhattan having the second-highest number of incidents at 70.

Look at those stats:

Fredric U. Dicker for the New York Post, December 31 (thanks to Ken):

ALBANY -- Hate crimes across New York state jumped 14 percent in 2009, led by an increase in attacks on Jews and Jewish institutions, state records released yesterday show.

There were 683 hate crimes reported to police authorities across the state in 2009 compared with 599 in 2008, according to a report released by the state Division of Criminal Justice Services. [...]

Anti-Semitic incidents, which made up 37 percent of the reported hate crimes, were up 15 percent in one year, from 219 in 2008 to 251 in 2009. [...]

Crimes motivated by anti-Muslim sentiment rose from eight to 11....