ADL Audit Finds PA Fourth Highest In Antisemitic Incidents
Just days after the state’s Jewish governor was the target of a Passover night arson attack, a new report shows Pennsylvania had the nation’s fourth-highest number of antisemitic incidents in 2024.
The audit, conducted by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and released Tuesday, reported 9,354 antisemitic incidents recorded in the U.S. last year. It’s the highest number recorded since 1979, when the ADL first began collecting data.
Also noteworthy: It’s the first time most of the incidents (58 percent) were related to Israel or Zionism.
That appears to be the case with the attack on the governor’s mansion on the first night of Passover, as Gov. Josh Shapiro and his family slept upstairs. The alleged attacker, Cody Balmer, told police that Shapiro — an outspoken supporter of Israel — “needs to know that he ‘will not take part in his plans for what he wants to do to the Palestinian people.’”
Antisemitic incidents in Pennsylvania
Jason Holtzman, chief of the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, told DV Journal that while the current rise of antisemitism is “disappointing,” he’s not surprised. He’d seen “the writing on the wall.”
The ADL reports four years in a row of increased antisemitic incidents. They include assault, harassment and vandalism. The 2024 numbers are five percent higher than 2023 and up 893 percent over the last 10 years.
Holtzman, the grandson of Holocaust survivors, said some members of the Jewish community have stopped wearing stars of David, yarmulkes, or speaking Hebrew in public. At the same time, attendance at synagogues and various Jewish events is up.
Many of the antisemitic instances were related to the Hamas terror attack on Israel and the subsequent war in Gaza. College campuses have been a hotbed of anti-Israel protests, with 1,694 antisemitic incidents, up 84 percent. Many participants in the various campus encampments chanted anti-Israel slogans, including at local universities like UPenn and Temple, and smaller colleges such as Haverford and Swarthmore.
“This pervasive antisemitism has transformed American higher education from a space of learning and growth into one where many Jewish students face hostility, exclusion, and sometimes physical danger because of their identity or their beliefs,” the report states.
In Pennsylvania, there were 465 antisemitic incidents in 2024, up 18 percent from 2023 and a 308 percent jump from 2022, the ADL said. Of the incidents reported, 72 percent involved harassment and vandalism, which comprised 25 percent. Two percent were physical assaults.
“Since I joined ADL three years ago, we have tracked a continuous rise in antisemitic incidents, and the data continues to astound me,” said Andrew Goretsky, ADL Philadelphia’s regional director. “In 2023, Pennsylvania saw five assaults, all of which involved schoolchildren. A year later, Pennsylvania saw twelve assaults, one of which included a weapon.
“The Jewish community is being harassed, threatened, and attacked. From synagogues to college campuses and everywhere in between, we must unequivocally stand united against antisemitism and all forms of hate.”
Areas with the largest Jewish populations saw the most antisemitic incidents. New York (1,437 incidents), California (1,344), and New Jersey (719) had the most.
Along with pro-Palestinian incidents, white supremacist groups were also involved in some of the antisemitic actions, the ADL said. And, nationwide antisemitic occurrences in public K-12 schools were down 26 percent from 2023, and incidents at Jewish institutions fell 14 percent from “2023’s unprecedented surge.”
Asked what Jewish children or grandchildren should be told about this surge in antisemitism, Holtzman said, “It’s another chapter in Jewish history. We’re a strong people. We, unfortunately, have had these terrible experiences throughout the world with antisemitism.”
Young people must “stay strong and keep living a Jewish life and embracing our Jewish identities. As difficult as the world is around us, we have to continue doing that,” Holtzman said. “We have to reach out to our neighbors, sharing with them who we are as Jews, what our community stands for, and we can’t back down from living a Jewish life.”
“That’s what our enemies want,” said Holtzman. “That’s what our foes want. They want us to be sitting inside in our basements, scared to come out, scared to identify as Jewish. We can’t let them win.”
