A New York State student is to be brought to justice on Wednesday for online murder threats against his Jewish classmates, amid fears of a rise in anti-Semitic and racist crimes with the war in the Middle East. East.
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Several American officials have denounced anti-Semitic and Islamophobic acts in the United States since the Hamas attacks against Israel on October 7 and then Israel’s bombings on Gaza.
Patrick Dai, 21, a student at Cornell University in New York, was arrested Tuesday, accused of posting online “threats to kill or harm” Jewish people, American judicial authorities announced Tuesday in a statement.
The man, who faces up to five years in prison, must be presented to judges on Wednesday, they added.
He is notably accused of having threatened to “bring an assault rifle to campus and slaughter all the Jewish pigs”, in particular by “shooting” at a kosher refectory, 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 the Middle East.
Cornell University said Sunday that police were investigating anti-Semitic threats posted online.
On 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 in the most prestigious American universities, such as Harvard, where around thirty student organizations have 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 Hamas Health Ministry announced on Wednesday that 8,796 people, mainly civilians, including 3,648 children, were killed in the Gaza Strip, relentlessly bombarded by Israel.