An LAPD vehicle. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

A man has been arrested in Los Angeles after allegedly attempting to run over two Jews near a synagogue in the city on Friday night in what police are investigating as a potential hate crime.

Mohamed Mohamed, 32, is being held on $55,000 bail and has been charged with assault with a deadly weapon with a vehicle.

The incident took place on North La Brea Avenue in the Hancock Park neighborhood of Los Angeles.

One of the Jews targeted told CBSLA that he and his friend “both scrambled in different directions so he [the drive] slammed on his brakes and missed us thank God.”

Security footage shows that the suspect then reversed and tried to hit them again.

“He clearly was going at us and it was even more clear on round two,” the intended victim said.

The driver missed them again and subsequently crashed after running a stop sign.

“Why he chose us? Probably because of the yarmulkes on our heads,” the intended victim added. “This guy had a thirst for blood on his fingers. You could clearly see in his face that he wanted to do something.”

“There definitely was a God watching us,” he said.

Some people in a Hancock Park neighborhood said a driver targeted them because they are Jewish. Now police are investigating the incident as a possible hate crime. Joy Benedict reports. pic.twitter.com/cu04OmMRQ9

— CBS Los Angeles (@CBSLA) November 26, 2018

Earlier this month, 33-year-old Steven Szwet was arrested over a string of incidents in the North Hollywood-Valley Glen area in which three Orthodox Jewish women had their wigs ripped from their heads in public.