Chicago Synagogues, Jewish Businesses and Schools Vandalized

Hate crime charges were filed Tuesday against thirty nine-year-old Shahid Hussain after he was arrested after allegedly breaking windows to a synagogue, spray painting anti-Semitic remarks including swastikas, and vandalizing a school according to U.S. News.

The first synagogue to be targeted was believed to have occurred on Saturday, when the front glass doors were broken at 2800 West North Shore Avenue. Windows were also broken early Sunday morning at another synagogue on the 3600 block of West Devon in the Lincolnwood neighborhood.

Later that day around 4:30 pm, swastikas were spray painted on the back of the F.R.E.E Synagogue and Hanna Sacks Bais Yaakov High School on West Devon Avenue.

Rabbi Levi Notik of the F.R.E.E. Synagogue said one man was physically and verbally assaulted on the way to evening services. Rabbi Notik says racial epithets were also yelled at the man and he received help and is at home recovering.

A grocery store, Kol Tuv Kosher Foods, and a bakery, Tel Aviv Bakery also had their windows shattered, with swastikas spray painted on cargo containers nearby.

Hussain was initially detained Sunday after a 911 caller reported hearing a suspicious person yelling anti-semitic slurs and threats in the 6300 block of North Sacramento in West Rogers Park. Although not initially detained because of the property damage, police are putting the full story together using security cameras.

Rabbi Notik has said “We are going to stand strong” and that “We will get through this. We will overcome this as a community, but we have to eradicate hate with love.”

Hussain was charged Tuesday with two each of a hate crime against a church or synagogue, a hate crime against a school, defacing a school, and criminal damage of a school.