Kew Garden Hills, Queens, NY – An antisemite harassed multiple Orthodox Jewish people in Kew Garden Hills, Queens, on Shabbos afternoon, prompting a call to the NYPD.
The first incident occurred shortly after a middle-aged Orthodox Jewish couple left Shabbos morning davening and were walking home on 77th Avenue. A young man purportedly in his 20s began unprovokedly yelling and harassing the couple.
Several minutes later, the same individual approached two Orthodox Jewish men at the corner of 77th Avenue and 137th Street and deliberately stood directly in their path, refusing to let them pass and yelling that they should “show him respect.”
The men refused to be baited and simply walked around him, but each time would run ahead and plant himself directly in their path again, continuously demanding “respect” and threatening them not to touch him.
Eventually, after several minutes of this borderline insane and unnerving behavior, the individual spat on the two men and walked away.
A non-Jewish pedestrian who happened to be in the area at the time of the second incident called 911 and provided the operator with a description of the perpetrator, but there was no immediate response from the NYPD.
The anti-Semite continued walking up 78th Avenue toward Vleigh Place before disappearing. He was seen yet again Sunday morning in a gray sedan near Rabbi Bergman’s shul on 137th Street, though no new incidents have been reported today.
