Report: Anti-Semitic Incidents In U.S. Doubles In Two-year Span

The number of anti-Semitic incidents in the United States in 2017 was more than double that of two years ago, according to a new report by the Anti-Defamation League. The watchdog group said that 1,986 anti-Jewish acts—almost all of them constituting either harassment, which includes 160 bomb threats, or vandalism—were perpetrated last year in America, compared to 1,267 in 2016 and 942 in 2015. Notably, the number of anti-Semitic incidents in schools or on college campuses doubled in 2017 for the second year in a row; whereas the number of physical assaults against Jews decreased by nearly 50 percent from 2016 to 19 such occurrences. The audit attributed the overall rise in part to an increase in the number of people reporting anti-Semitic acts, while also partly blaming President Donald Trump’s purported contribution to “the divisive state of [the U.S.] national discourse.” The 2017 figure represents the highest-ever year-over-year jump in the number of anti-Semitic incidents recorded by the ADL, and the second-highest total in any year since the organization began documenting the phenomenon nearly four decades ago.