Dozens Of Teens Attack Jewish Owned Brooklyn Deli: No Arrests As Hate Crimes Soar (Video)


Dozens of teens gathered in front of a deli in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn Saturday night before storming the Jewish owned market and tearing it apart. The incident was captured on video and shows the teen vandals to be violent and ruthless in their attack, slamming racks of product to the floor, throwing and knocking over anything they can reach, and menacing the store owners.

Neighborhood volunteers had noticed a large rampaging group of teens, numbering about 75, before they got to the deli, the Gourmet Butcher, reports CrownHeights.info.

While making their way through the neighborhood, the enormous band of teen hooligans also reportedly tried to release the brakes on two parked school buses and vandalized cars.

But soon enough, as seen in the video below, the unsavory group arrived at the Gourmet Butcher, located on the corner of Carroll and Troy Avenues. The deli’s owner, Yanki Klein, says the out of control teens are a common problem.

“(Very often) these kinds of kids come by my store and yell ‘heil hitler,’ or steal things that are on shelves near the door. I’ve asked the police to put an officer on my corner many times, but I feel like I am being ignored and these ‘minor’ problems keep happening. And now this, it is a miracle that they did not manage to get all the way into the store, otherwise I would have been dealing with much more damage or worse, heaven forbid.”

Klein told CBS New York that he and his family are still frightened following the violent invasion of their deli around 9 p.m. Saturday.

“They screamed, they yelled, they made noise, whatever,” Klein’s sister, Riva Hamburger, said. “It was very scary.”

Klein’s sister went on to note that their mother witnessed the whole terrifying ordeal from the Klein’s home computer, and was “scared”, “shocked”, and understandably “panicked.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tucRBnE2rF8

Not seen in the surveillance footage is Klein’s 23-year-old brother being assaulted while standing in the doorway of the deli as the teens stormed in.

“One of the guys that ran towards him, he punched him in his face,” said Klein.

“He came home very scared, very hurt,” said Hamburger.

“It’s not a joke,” said Klein. “You can’t just let it go.”

A customer finally ran the teens off by going after them with a broom stick.

That such incidents are motivated by an element of racism is also a concern. According to Klein, his being Jewish is likely part of why he and his deli are often targeted.

“It is scary. It is something to be worried about,” said Klein. “We’ve been hearing from people that they have also the fear.”

Police say no other assault or vandalism complaints were made that night in the neighborhood but also aren’t yet classifying the attack as a hate crime. All the suspects, meanwhile, are out continuing to roam the streets.

Another suspected attacker that jumped a Jewish man in a different incident has also avoided being arrested. The suspect, a member of a Palestinian group carrying a Palestinian flag, beat up Leonard Petlakh last week. Petlakh is head of the Brooklyn Young Men’s Hebrew Association and absorbed the beating in front of his kids after a basketball game outside Barclays Center. Petlakh reportedly suffered a broken nose and black eye.

“The individual who hit Leonard has been identified,” said Assemblyman Steven Cymbrowitz, D-Brooklyn, on Tuesday. “We know who he is. We know his name. We know his wherabouts. And he has not been picked up for questioning by the police. That’s my concern.”

Police claim Petlakh’s attacker is simply on the loose.

Brooklyn hate crime statistics paint an ugly picture, with more than 95 hate crimes reported in Brooklyn since January, which is a 30 percent jump up from last year.

Brooklyn community and religious leaders gathered Tuesday to denounce these two attacks, other ongoing attacks on members of the Jewish community, and the general feeling of divisiveness that is developing in the area. The common theme of the conference, whether African American, Muslim, or Jewish, was that the community would not “go backwards” to former times, like the 1991 Crown Heights riots, and that the recent attacks and elements of hate were unacceptable.

“Are we going back to the days where Crown Heights is divided?” asked one of the African American representatives, Eric Adams, Brooklyn Borough President. “I say no to that. We will not go backwards. The sun has already set on the environment of hatred.”

At the same time, in another interview outside that raises questions of accountability, Adams blamed the teen violence on a lack of resources for teens in the community, saying, “We’re asking what’s wrong with them (the violent teens) but no, we should be asking what’s wrong with us that we created an environment where our teens can’t find a place where they can gather.”

[Image and video via YouTube]

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