Members of the the Congregation Machane Chodosh flanking swastika graffiti that was sprayed on the building on Sunday, May 3, 2026. Photo: Screenshot

Jewish residents of the Queens borough of New York City were outraged on Monday following an overnight spree of vandalism which left at least four Jewish properties — private homes and synagogues — marked with the swastika and other antisemitic graffiti.

The incidents were discovered as the New York City Police Department (NYPD) released its latest figures showing that Jews continued to be the target of the majority of all hate crimes across the five boroughs last month, despite comprising a small fraction of the total population.

The perpetrators of the latest wave of vandalism struck the Rego Park Jewish Center, the Congregation Machane Chodosh, as well as two private homes late Sunday night, according to local lawmakers and Jewish leaders. Police are still searching for the suspects. At least one lead has surfaced so far in the form of surveillance footage taken by the Rego Park Jewish Center near the site of one of the crimes.

The suspects allegedly responsible for drawing swastikas outside of the Rego Park Jewish Center. pic.twitter.com/VJBGzI4EgZ

— Dean_Moses (@Dean_Moses) May 4, 2026

Meanwhile, the graffiti remains a scourge on the buildings — appearing in one case next to a memorial to German Jews who survived Kristallnacht, a November 1938 pogrom when Nazi paramilitary forces launched a coordinated nationwide attack on the German Jewish community. The vandals left no doubt regarding their allusion to that period, graffitiing  “Heil Hitler” at the Rego Park location.

“When rabbis and congregants arrived to pray this morning, they expected to be met with their usual loving community. When a family woke up, they were prepared to begin an otherwise normal week. Instead, they were me with terrifying signals of hatred and threats of violence,” New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin said in a social media post which addressed the incidents. “With antisemitism on the rise here and across the globe, we will always stand up for our Jewish community and fight back against hate.”

Multiple synagogues and private homes in Queens were vandalized overnight with swastikas and other antisemitic graffiti. @Lynn4NYC, @PhilWongNYC and I are at one of the sites, Congregation Machane Chodosh, in Forest Hills now.

When rabbis and congregants arrived to pray this… pic.twitter.com/s38TXvFHQt

— Speaker Julie Menin (@SpeakerMenin) May 4, 2026

Mark Treyger, CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York, noted on social media that one of the targeted sites houses a pre-K program for young children.

“This is not normal, and we need city leaders to act NOW,” he posted.

The vandalism was discovered as the New York City Police Department (NYPD) reported on Monday the surge in antisemitic hate crimes across the city had continued unabated.

According to the newly released data, Jews were targeted in 60 percent of all confirmed hate crimes last month, despite making up just 10 percent of the city’s population.

In April, the police confirmed 30 antisemitic incidents out of 50 total hate crimes in the city. As for all reported/suspected hate crimes, 38 out of the total of 65 targeted Jews.

The NYPD had previously reported suspected, but unconfirmed, hate crime incidents. In February, the police began reporting confirmed incidents instead. And then after receiving scrutiny, the department began reporting both suspected and confirmed hate crimes in March.

Regardless of the methodology, the majority of all hate crimes in New York City this year have targeted Jews, especially the Orthodox community, continuing a surge in antisemitism that has swept the city after the start of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza in October 2023.

In just eight days between the end of October and the beginning of November 2024, for example, three Hasidim, including children, were brutally assaulted in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn. In one instance, an Orthodox man was accosted by two assailants, one masked, who “chased and beat him” after he refused to surrender his cellphone in compliance with what appeared to have been an attempted robbery. In another incident, an African American male smacked a 13-year-old Jewish boy who was commuting to school on his bike in the heavily Jewish neighborhood. Less than a week earlier, an assailant slashed a visibly Jewish man in the face as he was walking in Brooklyn.

In November, just days after the election of Zohran Mamdani as mayor of New York City, hundreds of people amassed outside a prominent synagogue and clamored for violence against Jews.

“We don’t want no Zionists here!” the group chanted in intervals while waving the Palestinian flag outside the Park East Synagogue in the Upper East Side section of the borough of Manhattan. “Resistance, you make us proud, take another settler out.”

Mamdani has dismantled key parts of the civil rights architecture his predecessor built to combat antisemitism in the city. Former Mayor Eric Adams adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, enforced a ban on awarding government money to adherents of the movement to boycott Israel, and established as a governing principle the idea that Zionism is central to Jewish peoplehood even as it remains a target of antisemitic activism.

“The connection between Jewish identity and the Land of Israel is not political preference but religious and cultural foundation extending back millennia,” Adams said in one of his final communications as mayor. “The practical consequence of anti-Zionist rhetoric is the dehumanization of Zionists (the vast majority of Jewish people) and the dehumanization of all Jewish people. When Zionism itself is characterized as racist or illegitimate, Jewish people become targets for hostility and violence. This dynamic helps explain why attacks on Israel’s legitimacy correlate with increased antisemitic incidents in the diaspora, targeting all Jewish people regardless of their politics.”

The change in New York City’s climate since Mamdani’s election is palpable, Jewish advocacy groups have said. One his first day in office in January, he voided the city government’s adoption of the IHRA definition, lifted the ban on contracts with companies boycotting Israel, and modified key provisions of an executive order directing law enforcement to monitor anti-Israel protests held near synagogues.

“Mayor Mamdani pledged to build an inclusive New York and combat all forms of hate, including antisemitism,” a coalition of leading Jewish groups said in a statement addressing the new administration. “But when the new administration hit reset on many of Mayor Adams’ executive orders, it reversed … significant protections against antisemitism.”

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.