The believers in Rabbis Chaim Rottenberg's house were about to light the Hanukkah candles when their celebration of the Jewish Festival of Lights was brutally interrupted. "We saw him take a knife out of a box - it was the size of a broomstick," said Aron Kohn, one of the participants in the celebration, the New York Times. "He started attacking people as soon as he got in the door. We had no time to respond at all. I prayed for my life."
The act happened late Saturday evening. At the time, dozens of people were guests in the Rabbi's house. The attacker injured at least five people in Monsey, an hour's drive north of New York, and then fled. In the meantime, a suspect has been caught. "It's a big nightmare for our city," Monsey Mayor Michael Specht said of the fact.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo spoke of a "hideous and cowardly act" that is evidence of a "cancer of the state". It is an act of domestic terrorism, fueled by intolerance. "Let's call it what it is - these people are domestic terrorists," Cuomo said of the attacker and some other anti-Semitic attacks in the area in recent weeks. "Here intolerance meets illegality."
Stricter security measures in New York
"Anti-Semitism and fanaticism of all kinds contradict our values of inclusion and diversity and we have absolutely no tolerance for such hate acts." The New York State Secretary of Justice, Letitia James, was deeply distraught and pledged solidarity to the Jewish community.
Anti-Semitic violence has repeatedly occurred in New York and neighboring regions in recent weeks. In mid-December, six people died when two men targeted a Jewish shop in Jersey City.
Security measures had recently been tightened in the metropolis of New York after there had been around half a dozen anti-Semitic attacks during the Hanukkah celebrations. Every year, with the Festival of Lights lasting several days, Jews commemorate the new consecration of the temple in Jerusalem in 165 before the Christian era.