BY MOSHE HILL OPINION COLUMNS JUNE 11 2025
A string of attacks on Jewish-owned businesses in the Five Towns has left a community rattled. While the crimes are not being labeled as anti-Semitic in nature and are currently being considered personal vendettas—not attacks on the Jewish community as a whole—it is understandable that nerves are frayed and conclusions are jumped to. High-profile attacks on Jews worldwide are reaching a breaking point as more people fall into the Palestinian trap.
The attack that garnered the most attention (yet not nearly the coverage it would have received had it occurred to any other minority group) was the firebombing in Boulder, Colorado. A “Run for Their Lives” walk on Pearl Street Mall supporting Israeli hostages was attacked by Mohamed Sabry Soliman. Using a makeshift flamethrower and Molotov cocktails, he injured 12 people—eight hospitalized with burns—while shouting “Free Palestine.” Soliman is an illegal immigrant who overstayed his visa and is part of a large group of people who came to this country and seek to destroy America, her allies, and Western civilization as a whole. The first target of their ire is, of course, Jews.
This follows the shooting in Washington, D.C., from a week earlier, where two Israeli embassy staffers were shot and killed in a targeted attack. Elias Rodriguez, a 31-year-old from Chicago, fatally shot Yaron Lischinsky, 30, and Sarah Lynn Milgrim, 26—two Israeli embassy staffers—outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. The couple, about to be engaged, was leaving a Young Diplomats Reception hosted by the American Jewish Committee when Rodriguez opened fire with a 9mm handgun, firing 21 rounds. He shouted “Free Palestine” during his arrest and told police, “I did it for Palestine, I did it for Gaza,” per court documents.
These are the attacks that garnered some media coverage, though obviously not enough. Other attacks that went largely unreported included one in New York City’s Upper East Side. A 72-year-old Jewish man was attacked while walking to a synagogue on East 67th Street. The assailant, 33-year-old Vincent Sumpter, punched the victim in the face and shouted anti-Semitic slurs, causing minor injuries but no hospitalization. Sumpter was arrested and charged with assault as a hate crime; he pleaded not guilty and was held on $25,000 bail.
Of course, this has been happening for a while. In Dearborn, Michigan, Hassan Chokr, a 38-year-old man, pled guilty to a federal gun charge after threatening to kill Jewish preschoolers at Temple Beth El’s daycare. On November 24, 2024, Chokr harassed families, yelled anti-Semitic slurs, and later attempted to illegally purchase firearms to “deliver G-d’s wrath.” No casualties occurred, and he faces up to seven years in prison, with sentencing pending.
This is not limited to the United States. On May 26, at Hampstead Underground Station in London, UK, three Jewish teenage boys were assaulted in an anti-Semitic attack by six to seven male suspects who threatened them with a knife and committed a robbery. One victim was hospitalized with minor injuries and later discharged. The British Transport Police classified the incident as a “racially aggravated assault and robbery” and launched an investigation, appealing for witnesses. No arrests have been reported.
Conferences have been canceled over the increased security risks in even holding Jewish events. In Dallas, Texas, the Israel Summit—a pro-Israel conference expecting 1,000 attendees and featuring former U.S. Ambassador David Friedman—was canceled due to escalating terror threats from pro-Hamas groups. Originally scheduled for June 9–11, the event changed venues after being flagged as high-risk, but the new location, Kenneth Copeland’s facilities near Newark, was exposed by activists, leading to intense pressure and threats.
In Toronto, Canada, Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy, who is Jewish, was filming a “One Bite Pizza Review” outside Terrazza restaurant when a passerby shouted “[Expletive] the Jews.” No physical assault or casualties occurred, but Portnoy confronted nearby youths who laughed, and the incident, captured on video, became just another example of how prevalent Jew-hatred has become.
There are figures on the Right who share a lot of the blame for the demonization of Jews worldwide. They raise the political temperature when they unjustly focus on mistakes by Israel from decades ago, pretending that it is part of a larger pattern. Candace Owens is certainly guilty of this, touting the attack on the USS Liberty from 1967 as evidence that Israel is actually an enemy of America, not an ally.
During the Six-Day War, the Israelis mistakenly identified an American naval ship, the USS Liberty, as an Egyptian ship. They attacked, killing dozens of Americans and wounding hundreds more. The attack was a travesty and was fully investigated by both America and Israel, in which Israel paid reparations to the United States decades ago.
That doesn’t stop online personalities like Owens, Tucker Carlson, Jack Posobiec, and others from pushing the USS Liberty issue as the definitive issue in the U.S.–Israel relationship. As Owens said on X, “There is perhaps no story that can more enlighten you to the deceitful and despicable nature of the modern state of Israel—and its stranglehold on the American government.”
Of course, these personalities never commemorate when other nations have attacked U.S. military forces in friendly fire or mistaken identity incidents during the fog of war, which occurred in nearly every war from World War II to the war in Iraq. Nor do they acknowledge when the United States has done the same to our allies. They also conveniently ignore three-quarters of a century of economic, military, and intelligence cooperation between the United States and Israel, aside from our shared social and political philosophies and history. All of that is irrelevant, because the Jews must be blamed for every bad thing to ever exist.
No wonder the Jewish community is on edge. When a tow truck at Avi’s Auto Repair in Hewlett was set on fire, the window of ASAP Restoration in Woodmere—which displayed an Israeli flag—was smashed, and a banner reading “50K Dead Gazan Kids” was tied to the front gate of the Israel Chesed Center, everyone assumed the worst.
We are nearing a breaking point—where violence is spilling out onto the streets of Los Angeles over immigration policy, yet people are wearing keffiyehs and waving Palestinian flags. Where a socialist anti-Semite who said he would arrest the Prime Minister of Israel could become the next mayor of New York City. Where the Israeli government issues warnings to its citizens not to visit Canada. We cannot be silent in the face of these threats, and we must demand that everyone who attacks Jews knows that they will not be safe from justice.