Eli Leidner, 26, was walking at the corner of Bedford Avenue and Taylor Street in Williamsburg at 10:40 PM Sunday, when he was knocked down by a woman. according to the NY post, he was not badly hurt.
The majority of the 10 or so victims in the city so far have been attacked in Jewish neighborhoods and were themselves Jews.
A relative told the Post that Leidner has no doubt he was targeted because of his religion.
New York State Assemblyman Dov Hikind told CBS 880 that a pattern has emerged in these cases, but would not go on the record as saying the Jewish community is being targeted in these attacks.
“It seems clear that overwhelmingly here in New York the victims have been Jewish, there’s no question about that,” Hikind told CBS Radio. “You have New Yorkers who are afraid to walk the streets, afraid to let their kids walk the in streets because you don’t know who the next victim is going to be.”
Despite the fact that there have been no critical injuries or fatalities so far, thank God, Hikind said there is a growing fear of future attacks.
“What kind of human being would just walk over to somebody and punch them, and that excites them,” Hikind asked. “I walk the streets with my wife. I find myself looking in front of me, in back of me. You know, who’s the person.”
He said the attacks are so random that he’s not sure how to stop them, but something has to be done.
Is this the time to start asking if there’s a correlation between the NYPD being ordered to stop “profiling” potential criminals and the fact that at least ten African Americans have attacked at least ten innocent pedestrians in Jewish neighborhoods?
The wave of attacks began in Crown Heights in October, and Police have increased patrols in communities where those incidents have taken place—but are they permitted to arrest suspects without the fear of being second guessed?
It’s also telling that the image used by the NY Post to illustrate the story is of a white person’s clenched fist in motion. No profiling there…
Retired NYPD lieutenant William F. Dement wrote in the American Thinker recently: “In New York City, the Perfect Storm is Building… There are signals that crime is slowly on the uptick. The recent wanton assaults of the ‘Knockout Game’ come to mind.”
He says cops “are tired of years of escalating ticket, arrest, and Stop and Frisk quotas… They see Detroit when they think about New York… Detroit fell. Chicago is next. The city that Rudy Giuliani called the ‘Capitol of the World,’ is being primed to fall.” (cite off a Village Voice article).
And yet, the NYPD has not to date declared these “games” hate crimes. Perhaps that, too, would be profilish…