FBI’s new tactic to reach Jewish community? Yiddish ads
A seal at the FBI’s headquarters in Washington, D.C. Image by ERIC BARADAT/AFP via Getty Images
By David Ian Klein April 12, 2021
The FBI has released new ads in both Yiddish and Hebrew, calling on members of marginalized groups to report hate crimes committed against them.
“Did you know many hate crimes are not reported? The FBI wants to help, but we need to hear from you. If you believe you’re the victim of or a witness to a hate crime, contact your local police department, call 1-800-CALL-FBI, or go to tips.fbi.gov,” reads the English translation of the ad.
Kudos to the @NewYorkFBI for once again demonstrating what community outreach is all about, encouraging Jewish hate crime victims/witnesses to report what happened in the languages that are most familiar to them. Now that’s what we call #culturalsensitivity. pic.twitter.com/8YsobaLJTY
— Rabbi Abe Friedman (@RabbiAFriedman) April 8, 2021
The FBI released a report last year which found that, in 2019, Jews were the targets of more than 60% of religious based hate crimes in the United States, despite only accounting for 2% of the national population.
One particular target were visibly Orthodox Jews, who make up the vast majority of Yiddish speakers in the U.S. and were likely the intended demographic for the ad.
In 2019 alone, Orthodox Jews were the targets of the Jersey City Kosher Supermarket shooting and a stabbing attack at a Hanukkah party in Monsey, New York.
According to the Jewish Virtual Library, 2019 saw a 7% increase in hate crimes against Jews compared to 2018.
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