A man accused of assaulting a Jewish man in Times Square in an antisemitic attack told jailers that he would "do it again," The New York Post reported on Saturday night.
Waseem Awawdeh, 23, was arrested on Friday for attacking 29-year-old Joseph Borgen on Thursday, shortly after rival pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian demonstrations were held in midtown Manhattan over the fighting in Gaza, which ended in a ceasefire hours later. The demonstrations resulted in 26 arrests.
A number of other suspects are being sought by police for involvement in the attack.
“If I could do it again, I would do it again,” Awawdeh said to one of his jailers, prosecutors said during the suspect's arraignment in Manhattan Criminal Court on Saturday. Prosecutors said the attack was unprovoked and that Awawdeh called Borgen a "dirty Jew" and said "F#%k Israel, Hamas is going to kill all of you," according to the newspaper.
Borgen told the Post that he is rethinking whether to wear a kippah in public in the future.
Friends of the suspect claimed that Awawdeh was attacked first because he was on crutches.
Awawdeh faces charges of second-degree hate crime assault, a second-degree gang assault, menacing and criminal possession of a weapon.
"The victim was approached by a group of five or six males who knocked him to the ground [and] assaulted him while making antisemitic statements," Sgt. Jessica McRorie, a police spokeswoman, said by phone. "They punched, kicked, pepper-sprayed and hit him with some crutches during the assault."New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said in a statement that he was dispatching the State Police Hate Crimes Task Force to assist.
The Task Force said it was investigating the assault.
Cuomo and several other elected officials, including Mayor Bill de Blasio and US Representative Jerry Nadler, whose district includes the Times Square area, condemned what Cuomo called "antisemitic violent gang harassment and intimidation."
Reuters contributed to this report.