From Colleyville to Zionism, there is no shortage of sobering stats emerging from the 2022 Audit of Antisemitic Incidents report, released by the ADL March 22. 

Out of the gate, the most glaring issue is the one we all expected: Incidents of antisemitism continued to increase, year-over-year, at an extremely alarming rate. More than 3,600 incidents were reported in the United States in 2022 — an increase of more than 36% compared to 2021. It’s also the single biggest year-over-year increase since the ADL first began tracking in 1979 — the increase between 2020 and 2021 was 34%. 

In a nutshell, as the ADL explained, that’s an average of 10 antisemitic incidents every single day.

Over the last several years, Jews have been the most-targeted ethnic group in the United States for hate crimes, and the data indicates that this trend is not only continuing — it’s accelerating. In aggregate, according to the report, “the states with the highest number of incidents are New York (580), California (518), New Jersey (408), Florida (269) and Texas (211). Combined, these five states account for 54 % of the total incidents.”

Additionally, it’s clear that antisemitism is an issue in every state of the union — regardless of whether that state skews Blue or Red.

I took the data provided by the Cook Report Partisan Voting Index and overlaid it on the data provided by the ADL and a couple interesting things jumped out. For one: 8 of the top 10 states reporting antisemitic incidents are blue states (as expected, Florida will always Florida. Additionally, Colorado landed in 10th).

Don’t start patting yourselves on the back yet, GOP. When I sort to states with the greatest increases in antisemitic incidents between 2021–2022 per capita, only 5 of top 20 are Blue states.

It’s also important to note that this data alone is correlative — not causal. For one thing, the ADL report doesn’t drill down to district level in each state, so it’s entirely possible that incidents reported in Blue states occurred in Red districts, and vice-versa (For example, we don’t know how many incidents were reported in Lauren Boebert’s 3rd District in Colorado).

(Buried in all the bad news, however is one glimmer of optimism: Here in the Centennial State, the number of antisemitic incidents between 2021–2022 actually decreased by almost 23% — it’s unclear as to whether the efforts of The Shomer and the Colorado Times Recorder had any direct impact).

For another, in the list of the top 10 states reporting antisemitic incidents in 2022, the Jewish population there reflects a little more than 70% of the total Jewish population in the United States. It stands to reason that more incidents will occur in places with greater Jewish populations. 

This conclusion becomes even more plausible when we look at the types of incidents the ADL report lists.  “Jewish institutions, including Jewish schools, community centers and synagogues, were targeted by 589 antisemitic incidents in 2022,” the report explains. “In total, this represents a 12% increase from the 525 incidents recorded in 2021 that targeted Jewish institutions. Synagogues were the most targeted Jewish institution and experienced 50% (296 out of 589 incidents) of all incidents impacting Jewish institutions in 2022.”

Shiva.com, a nationwide resource for Jews in mourning, lists a total of two synagogues in North Dakota, which, at last count, was home to less than 500 Jews. Meanwhile, there are more than 1,000 synagogues in New York, which is home to around 1.8 million Jews. 

While we’re on the subject, let’s talk more about the types of antisemitic incidents the audit reported: Harassment, Vandalism, and Assault:

Between 2021 and 2022:

  • Reports of assaults increased by 26%
  • Reports of vandalism increased by 51%
  • Reports of harassment increased by 29%

This includes a record number of bomb threats made against Jewish institutions (community centers and Synagogues, mostly) in 2022, due in great part to an organized terror campaign earlier in the year — 91 bomb threats were reported in total. In 2021, that number was just 8. 

While pinpointing any one specific reason for the overall continued spike in antisemitic incidents is a much longer discussion for another time, one thing does stand out: The avalanche of antisemitic propaganda being distributed in 2022 by groups such as the cowards referring to themselves as the Goyim Defense League, known for sneaking around in the dead of night to paper random neighborhoods with nonsensical leaflets blaming every social ill they can think of on Jews. In 2022, antisemitic propaganda distribution was up more than 96% as compared to 2021. 

And let’s not forget Kanye “Ye” West’s antisemitic campaign that launched in October of 2022 that resulted in 59 antisemitic incidents reported that referenced him directly. According to the audit: “The impact of Ye’s comments was felt on the ground across the country. Fifty-nine antisemitic incidents from October 11 through the end of 2022 directly referenced Ye, including 44 cases of harassment, 13 cases of vandalism and two cases of assault.”

I urge every person reading this column to read the full audit from the ADL, which includes a detailed break-down of myriad individual incidents, including assaults, stabbings and murders of people simply because of the Jewish blood coursing through their veins. 

The wildfire of antisemitism that ignited during the Trump era has only continued to burn brighter. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: If you’ve ever wondered what you might have done in the years that led up to the Holocaust…

… You’re doing it right now.