NYPD opens hate crime investigation after car rams into Chabad headquarters building

By Karina Tsui, Sarah Dewberry, John Miller, CNN

(CNN) — A driver rammed a car repeatedly into the Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters building in Brooklyn, New York, Wednesday, prompting a hate crime investigation and additional security at places of worship throughout the city, officials said.

The driver was quickly arrested and there were no reported injuries, New York Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said at a news conference.

Shortly before 9 p.m., a grey Honda sedan entered the driveway of the Hasidic Jewish site in the Crown Heights neighborhood, crashed into the doorway, backed up and crashed into it again several times, a law enforcement official told CNN.

There is a fixed police post assigned to the building, and officers there took the driver into custody.

The driver, who has not been identified, has been cooperating with police and told officers it was not an attack, the official said.

The NYPD bomb squad did a sweep of the vehicle and no explosive devices were found, Tisch said. She added that she wasn’t aware of any weapons recovered at the scene.

The car ramming comes amid a succession of attacks on members of the Jewish community–– in Brooklyn and across the world.

In December, a man was charged with a hate crime after police said he made antisemitic remarks and stabbed a man in Crown Heights, CNN affiliate WABC reported. And earlier this month, two teenagers were arrested for allegedly spray painting swastikas at a playground in Brooklyn.

The incidents in predominantly Jewish areas of New York came after 15 people were killed in a mass shooting at Sydney’s Bondi Beach during a celebration of the first night of Hanukkah in December.

The Chabad-Lubavitch headquarters was established in 1940 and is considered one of the most well-known Jewish buildings in the world, according to Chabad.org. Replicas of the red-brick synagogue with its distinctive facade can be found across the world.

Wednesday marked the 75th anniversary of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson being chosen as the leader of the faith.

“Today is a significant day on the Chabad calendar, with thousands of young rabbinical students in the neighborhood,” Yaacov Behrman, head of public relations at the headquarters, told CNN over email.

“We believe that it was not a coincidence that he chose today to drive his car into the synagogue,” Behrman said.

“I am relieved that no one was injured in this horrifying incident. This is deeply alarming especially given the deep meaning and history of the institution to so many in New York and around the world,” New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said at the news conference.

“Any threat to a Jewish institution or place of worship must be taken seriously,” Mamdani added. “Antisemitism has no place in our city.”

New York Attorney General Letitia James, who was also at the news conference, said her office will be working with NYPD to investigate the incident.

Police mobilized additional crowd control as members of the Chabad community gathered on the scene, and have enhanced security at places of worship across all five boroughs, Tisch said.

This story has been updated with additional information.

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