Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Historic Manhattan Yeshiva Vandalized With Graffiti

(JTA) — Graffiti was painted on the exterior of a historic yeshiva on Manhattan’s Lower East Side.

The Mesivta Tiferes Yerushalayim building was vandalized between Friday afternoon and Saturday evening, possibly while students were inside.

The graffiti included what looks like a clown face, the word “evil,” and a series of letters and numbers meant to look like a racial slur, police told the local media. The New York Police Department’s Hate Crimes Unit is investigating the graffiti as a “possible bias incident,” Mayor Bill deBlasio said in a tweet.

Police are looking at security camera footage, according to the Yeshiva World News website, which first reported the incident.

Mesivta Tiferes Yerushalayim is among the oldest existent yeshivas in the city and is renowned for being the institution once led by Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, who is regarded among the Modern Orthodox as one of the most important Jewish legal authorities. The rabbi’s son, Rabbi Dovid Feinstein, now leads the yeshiva.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.