Kids Smash BK Synagogue Window In Rosh Hashanah Hate Crime: Cops

WILLIAMSBURG, BROOKLYN — A group of kids smashed a Brooklyn synagogue's windows during Rosh Hashanah in what has been deemed a hate crime, police said.

About five kids attacked the synagogue on Throop Avenue and Bartlett Street just before 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, when video shows them kicking its door and throwing a milk crate at a window, police said.

The kids can be seen running way only to return with another milk crate and a metal object which they hurl at the synagogue before sprinting off, police said.

The attack has gotten the attention of both the NYPD's Hate Crime Task Force and the state's hate crimes unit, which Gov. Andrew Cuomo asked to help find the suspects.

"I am disgusted an enraged by yet another anti-Semitic act of vandalism, the desecration of a synagogue in Williamsburg over Rosh Hashanah, one of the holiest days in the Jewish calendar," Cuomo said. "It is simply unconscionable."

The kids are wanted on criminal mischief charges.

The attack comes after state police boosted patrols at New York synagogues during the holidays after a spike in anti-Semitic crimes.

In Williamsburg, cops are also looking for a group of teens who harassed two Hasidic Jewish men last week. Four men also attacked a group of Jewish men in the neighborhood last month and, earlier this year, another synagogue had its windows smashed in during their Sabbath dinner.

The extra units were asked to beef up their presence during Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, which started Sunday and lasted until Tuesday evening, and Yom Kippur, a holy day of atonement, which lasts from the evening of Oct. 8 to the evening of Oct. 9.

Anyone with information in regards to this incident is asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782). The public can also submit their tips by logging onto the Crime stoppers website at WWW.NYPDCRIMESTOPPERS.COM. All calls are strictly confidential.