The 16-year-old girl was on a southbound 5 train approaching the Union Square subway station about 9 a.m. when a male assailant sat next to her and began yelling at her and pulling on her hijab, an NYPD spokesperson told Patch.
The man yelled “you’re a terrorist, you don’t belong here,” before pulling on her hijab, NBC New York first reported.
Another female passenger intervened to help the girl, a police source with direct knowledge of the investigation said. The man ran off and police are still searching for him.
Patch quoting the NYPD Hate Crimes dashboard reported that from Jan. 1 to Sept. 30, there have been 375 hate crime incidents and 213 arrests. That’s down more than 61 percent from 983 incidents, which led to 517 arrests, this time last year.
The NYPD has reported an uptick in bias crimes against both Muslim and Jewish New Yorkers, with the NYPD reporting 161 anti-Jewish motivated complaints in 2023 before the Oct. 8 assault on Israelis by Hamas, according to NBC New York. Following the attack, another 35 complaints have been reported. Seven anti-Muslim complaints were reported before the attack this year; five more were reported since Oct. 8.
Mayor Eric Adams took to X, formerly Twitter, to declare that there was no place for Islamophobia or any other kind of hatred in the city.
Islamophobia, nor any other kind of hatred, is what “doesn’t belong here.”
To this young person, her family and our Muslim community: this is your city and we will keep you safe.
If you have any information on this attack, please reach out to the @NYPDHateCrimes Unit. https://t.co/VsK51cRVSU
— Mayor Eric Adams (@NYCMayor) October 24, 2023
Mainstream media’s one-sided reporting one Israel-Hamas war has created an environment of fear in communities with Muslim minority population across the country. Emgage, a family of Muslim organizations dedicated to building political power for Muslim Americans, blamed the Islomophobic rhetoric of the country’s leadership which is leading to “bigoted acts like this”
This is a hate crime. Islamophobic rhetoric by our leaders is directly leading to bigoted acts like this. All elected officials must roundly condemn all instances of anti-Muslim language and action. https://t.co/QDHDGR8tPs
— Emgage Action (@EmgageAction) October 24, 2023