Updated 01/11/23 at 6:53 p.m.
A New York State student is to be brought to justice this Wednesday for online murder threats against his Jewish classmates, amid fears of rising anti-Semitic and racist crimes with the war in the Middle East. Several American officials have denounced anti-Semitic acts and Islamophobes to UNITED STATES since the Hamas attacks against Israel on October 7 then Israel’s bombings on Gaza.
Patrick Dai, aged 21, student at Cornell University in New York (north-east), was arrested Tuesday, accused of having published online “threats to kill or harm” Jewish people, American judicial authorities announced Tuesday in a press release. The man, who faces up to five years in prison, must be presented to judges on Wednesday, they added.
Anti-Semitic threats online
He is notably accused of having threatened to “bring an assault rifle to campus and slaughter all the Jewish pigs”, notably by “shooting” at a kosher dining hall, the press release said. The suspect also threatened to “stab and slit the throats of every Jewish man on campus, rape and throw off a cliff every Jewish woman, and decapitate every Jewish baby.”
American judicial authorities did not specify whether the student had made a direct reference to the war in Middle East. Cornell University said Sunday that police were investigating anti-Semitic threats posted on the Internet.
“Alarming increase in anti-Semitic incidents”
Monday, the White House warned of an “alarming increase in anti-Semitic incidents in schools and on university campuses”, without giving a precise figure.
The war between Israel and Hamas is causing strong tensions at the most prestigious American universities, such as Harvard, where around thirty student organizations designated “the Israeli regime entirely responsible for the violence”. The text provoked the indignation of several political leaders and public figures.
In Israel, more than 1,400 people were killed, mainly civilians, during the bloody Hamas attack on October 7, according to the authorities. The Ministry of Health of Hamas announced this Wednesday that 8,796 people, mainly civilians, including 3,648 children, were killed in the strip Gazabombarded relentlessly by Israel.
2023-11-01 17:53:55
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