A Jewish man was one of the two people seriously wounded in an unprovoked stabbing spree on the Upper West Side of Manhattan on Thursday afternoon.
According to media reports, the attacker first assaulted a 57-year-old Asian man near West 84th Street and Central Park West, stabbing him with a knife at around 1:30 p.m.
A short time later, a 50-year-old Jewish man wearing a kippah was stabbed with a screwdriver as he left the Jewish Center, a Modern Orthodox synagogue located at West 86th Street and Central Park West.
At around 2:45 p.m., the 51-year-old suspect, identified as Raul Morales, was arrested by police after barricading himself in an apartment on Amsterdam Avenue near West 88th Street.
Both victims were transported to Saint Luke’s Hospital, where they were listed in stable condition.
Morales shouted “Allahu akbar” (Arabic for “God is greatest”) during the rampage, New York City Police Department (NYPD) Commissioner Jessica Tisch said. Police were examining whether the attack was a hate crime.
The incident occurred as Jews across the globe marked Tisha B’Av, a fasting day mourning tragedies that have befallen the Jewish people over history, including the destruction of the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem.
It also came just two days after New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani drew widespread Jewish communal condemnation for a video message in which re-amplified libelous war crimes claims against Israel and condemned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the “architect of a horrific genocide against the Palestinian people” who was “not welcome in New York City.”
Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM) CEO Sacha Roytman stated, “A Jew being stabbed outside a New York City synagogue on Tisha B’av is the inevitable result of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s obsessive incitement campaign against the Jewish people and state. We have watched rhetoric normalizing hatred of Jews and Israel move from the fringes into the mainstream of New York City politics and governance. Words have consequences, and today we say them play out in blood on the streets of Manhattan.”
“We commend the NYPD for the swift apprehension of the attacker,” Roytman added. “But law enforcement response is not enough. The city’s top leadership must have an honest reckoning with the role that permissive rhetoric has played in emboldening this kind of violence. Jewish New Yorkers should not have to practice their faith while looking over their shoulders. CAM prays for the full recovery of the victims of this stabbing spree and will continue to demand that public officials be held accountable for the atmosphere they create.”
In a post on X, New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin called the attack “abhorrent.”
“The fear in the Jewish community is real,” she said. “Every New Yorker deserves to feel safe in their neighborhood, regardless of their faith or identity.”