The woman who stabbed a rabbi with a syringe in Manhattan’s Diamond District was arrested on Saturday.
Anna Mochalova (32) was wanted by the police after she stabbed the rabbi and attacked another Jewish man just a few minutes later last week.
– Mayor Mamdani, this is your fault
Here, NBC News shows the attack as captured by a CCTV camera.
Moshe Spern, head of United Jewish Teachers, strongly criticised Mayor Zohran Mamdani, reports the New York Post. “Mayor Mamdani, this is your fault,” he wrote on X on Thursday morning. – Yet another Jew has been stabbed in broad daylight in Midtown.
Mochalova was arrested and charged with a number of offences, including a hate crime. The offences began when she stabbed a young rabbi in Midtown Manhattan, the prosecution stated during her first court hearing at Manhattan Criminal Court on Sunday.
Mochalova stalked Yosef, a 26-year-old rabbi, who can be seen in the CCTV footage wearing traditional Orthodox attire. She then stabbed him in the back with a syringe near West 47th Street and Fifth Avenue on Wednesday at 5.50 pm.
Yosef told New York Post that he believes he was attacked because he is visibly Jewish. “I’ve never met that person before,” he said. “She walks past other people. I’m visibly Jewish.
Photo: Manhattan Shomrim Safety Patrol.
Jewish man threatened in Russian
Five minutes later, according to the prosecution, Mochalova deliberately approached a 37-year-old Jewish man wearing a yarmulke on West 45th Street and Fifth Avenue.
The man told the authorities that he was repeatedly pushed from behind before feeling a sharp, stinging pain in his right forearm, which left him with a bleeding cut.
Fox News reports that when the victim turned round, he saw Mochalova, who threatened him in Russian, saying: ‘Get out of here, I’ve got a gun, I’m going to shoot you.’
She then put her hand inside her jacket as if to pull out a firearm, which, according to the police report, caused the victim to fear for his life.
The man was later treated for cuts.
Apologised to a Muslim
Mochalova then approached another man nearby and asked him in English: ‘Are you Jewish?’ When the man replied that he was Muslim, Mochalova apologised and walked away.
Screenshot from X: Crime in NYC
The attacks took place a few weeks after the NYPD revealed that hate crime had risen by almost 13 per cent in the first nine months of the year compared with the same period last year, reports The Post. Anti-Semitic incidents accounted for more than half of the cases.
Face severe punishment
Both attacks were investigated as anti-Semitic hate crimes by the NYPD’s special hate crimes unit, according to the police.
“She chose both victims because she believed they were Jewish,” said the prosecution.
The defendant faces serious charges, said Assistant District Attorney Emily Hong during Mochalova’s first court hearing on Sunday evening. Judge Capitti also added that Mochalova could face a severe sentence if convicted.
Mochalova’s lawyer, Lila Carpenter, told the court, however, that her client had no previous arrests and that she had a steady job. She also claimed that there may be an identification issue in the police’s case against her client.
Mochalova is due to appear in court again on 29 October.
The attack did not cause Yosef to give up. He told The Post that he returned to the scene the following day to continue his outreach work. He cited his grandparents’ resilience after they survived the Holocaust.
“They built themselves a Jewish home after the Holocaust,” he said. “If they could survive, I must go back to spread the light,” he said.
The news report features interviews with witnesses to the attacks and the woman’s neighbours in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn, an area with a large Russian-speaking population.
