Jewish man stabbed by attacker shouting ‘Free Palestine’ and antisemitic slurs in NYC

A young Jewish man was stabbed early Saturday morning near the Chabad Headquarters in Crown Heights by a man who yelled “Free Palestine” and shouted antisemitic slurs, according to witnesses.

The knifeman allegedly approached the victim around 2 a.m. near the Eastern Parkway and Kingston Avenue and shouted “Free Palestine” and “Do you want to die?” before stabbing the victim, according to Yaacov Behrman, a spokesperson for Chabad-Lubavitch.

The man and his attacker allegedly exchanged words before the victim was stab eventually stabbed, Behrman wrote on X.

The victim, a young adult Jewish man, was taken to the hospital and is expected to recover, Behrman added.

The victim was slashed in the stomach, the NYPD told The Post on Sunday. 

Bystanders were able to detain the attacker until police arrived to make an arrest, Behrman said.

Police arrested Vincent Sumpter, 22, from Brooklyn. He was charged with assault and criminal possession of a weapon. 

It was not immediately clear what condition the victim, who has “long-standing ties to the community,” was in following the stabbing.

Video shared to X by Shmira Public Safety shows the confrontation unfolding in front of a group of about four other Jewish men who were walking together on the sidewalk. The Post has reached out to Shmira Public Safety for additional information.

A witness said that the attacker came out of the subway “looking for trouble.” 

“He was provoking the Jews walking, yelling antisemitic slurs and ‘Free Palestine’ and stuff like that and they ignored him and he was looking for other people — he was looking for trouble basically — and he continued harassing other people passing by and physically threatened another group, yelling ‘ You wanna die’ and ‘Free Palestine’,” the witness said. 

Moments later he withdrew a knife and stabbed one of the men, who he believed to be between 18 and 20 years old, the witness added. 

The attacker then tried to stab another person before he was detained by Shmira, which is the neighborhood patrol, the witness said. 

Elchonon Schagalov, 55, ran outside the nearby temple when he heard the attack unfolding outside, he told The Post on Sunday. 

“He’s local. He’s originally from Israel. I see him all the time. He’s a nice kid. He has 2 brothers,” Schagalov said of the victim. “He’s not a provoking kid. He doesn’t speak extremely good English. English is his third or fourth language.” 

Schagalov said the group of young men had just finished Shabbat dinner and were chatting outside when the attacker approached them talking about Palestinians, but none of them understood what he was saying since English is not their first language. 

“They thought he was just joking. They didn’t think he was malicious. They weren’t expecting it,” Schagalov said. 

The victim then allegedly asked the suspect “What do you want from us?” and he started yelling at them about Palestine before asking, “Do you want to die?” and slashing the victim in the stomach, Schagalov said. 

“This pissed off a lot of people. That someone would come into our community just to provoke,” he added. “It’s definitely made the community more alert.”

Mark Treyger, the CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York, slammed the “abhorrent and abominable attack on a young Jewish person in Brooklyn,” noting the attack “cannot” be seen as an isolated incident. 

“This is a dangerous escalation of the current climate we are in and it should outrage every New Yorker because it is an attack on every New Yorker,” he wrote on X.

“We need ACCOUNTABILITY and ACTION NOW!”