Jewish community centers in the eastern US were targeted with bomb threats Monday, the latest in a series of incidents that has raised fears of anti-Semitism in the country.
Threats were called in to JCCs in Davie, Florida, outside Miami; Asheville, North Carolina; Birmingham, Alabama; York and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Tarrytown, New York, and Wilmington, Delaware.
Those inside the buildings were evacuated and law enforcement was called in to investigate the threats. All clears were given in a number of cases.
The director of the Birmingham JCC, which has been targeted three times, told local media the threats were “very difficult, very challenging, very fearful.”
K-9 units finished searching building, nothing found. People are being allowed back into Jewish Community Center. pic.twitter.com/nJkBv2KMr9
— Sarah Killian (@SarahWVTM13) February 27, 2017
K-9 unit is here and working around the building. #cbs21 pic.twitter.com/rtbOGjc9Hk
— Colin Powell (@CPowellCBS21) February 27, 2017
On Monday a week ago, 11 JCCs across the country received bomb threats from callers, the fourth such wave of threats in five weeks. In all, several dozen JCCs have received bomb threats, some multiple times.
The calls came as cleanup crews continued to work to replace headstones at a Philadelphia cemetery where some 100 burial markers were vandalized, in the second such incident in a week.
Jewish groups and others have raised alarms over the bomb threats and cemetery attacks, pointing to an uptick in anti-Semitic incidents in the wake of the 2016 presidential election.
Earlier Monday, Israeli opposition leader Isaac Herzog urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to establish an “emergency national program” to prepare for a “waves” of Jewish immigration following a series of anti-Semitic incidents in the United States and France.
