The word “Palestine” was written on the Conservative Park Avenue Synagogue in New York City on Friday in an incident being investigated by the NYPD Hate Crimes Task Force.
The graffiti was discovered on the wall of the building on Manhattan’s Upper East Side under the biblical verse, “How great are your tents O Jacob, your dwelling places O Israel” (Numbers 24:5), and directly under the word “Israel.”
The New York City Police Department is investigating the innocent.
City Councilmember Julie Menin, a former congregant, described the vandalism in an X post on Friday as a “vile antisemitic act.”
“A house of worship is a sanctuary. Defacing it is an attack on all of us,” she wrote.
It posted to its Instagram account on Friday that its congregants are “disheartened” by the vandalism and are investigating, assuring that “the synagogue building is secure” and wishing everyone Shabbat Shalom.
The synagogue’s Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove said during services on Friday night, as quoted by Israel National News, “It’s actually with a heavy heart that we begin Shabbat services tonight. … The facility is OK, we are all safe, and it is shocking, and it is distressing.”
