The number of antisemitic incidents in Pennsylvania in 2024 broke previous records following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, according to a new report from the Anti-Defamation League.

The 465 antisemitic incidents that were counted in the commonwealth last year represent an 18% increase over the 393 reported in 2023, and a 308% jump from the 2022 count, according to the audit compiled by the ADL, a 112-year-old nonprofit created to battle antisemitism and other forms of prejudice.

Nationwide, the more than 9,000 reported incidents in 2024 represent an 893% increase over the last 10 years, according to the audit. The ADL report says that in 2024, because of pro-Palestinian protests, "for the first time, a majority of all (nationwide) incidents ... were related to Israel." It added that the ADL took pains to exclude from the audit any Israel-related incidents that weren't antisemitic.

But even as experts agree antisemitism is on the rise, the new numbers reflect questions about the organization's methodology that are being asked nationwide in light of ongoing partisan debates over prejudice, free speech, and Zionism.

"I cannot trust their data," said Rebecca Alpert, professor of religion emerita at Temple University, and one of the first six women in Jewish history who were ordained as rabbis.

"I went through 9,000 points of their data (in the audit), said Ben Lorber, a senior analyst at Political Research Associates, a nonprofit think tank in Boston. Many incidents they call antisemitism are mischaracterized.

"The methodology is flawed."

The criticism is not new to Andrew Goretsky, regional director of the ADL's Philadelphia office. He said that many of the complaints about the audit come from people affiliated with Jewish Voice for Peace, which describes itself as the largest progressive Jewish anti-Zionist organization in the world. The ADL labels it as a "fringe radical anti-Israel group that distorts Jewish values and rituals."

Goretsky said that the ADL's audit methodology is "consistent, transparent, and carefully applied to every reported incident."

"The outright dismissal of the data as a whole shows that ... (critics) are not meaningfully engaging with the data or taking the issues seriously."

The debate over how to define antisemitism

Since the 2023 Hamas attack, the United States has been embroiled in a debate about antisemitism and the distinction between prejudice against Jewish people vs. criticism of the state of Israel, or opposition to its government.

Last spring, demonstrations erupted throughout the country, with pro-Palestinian encampments popping up on campuses nationwide, including a large encampment that took over a swath of the University of Pennsylvania's campus for months.

Accusations of antisemitism grew out of the demonstrations, many of which were seized upon by the Trump administration to justify deportations of students, and to penalize universities for allegedly failing to protect Jewish students, critics say.

Democrats accuse Trump of "weaponizing antisemitism" to further a broader conservative agenda against higher education. The administration has denied the charge.

When the administration warned more than 60 universities that they were being investigated for charges of antisemitism, it was using the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism, experts say.

This is the same definition used by the ADL, experts say: Criticism of Israel or Zionism constitutes antisemitism.

The IHRA and related issues are expected to be debated Wednesday on Capitol Hill, when the Senate is scheduled to take up the 2025 Antisemitism Awareness Act.

Critics still believe that the ADL continues to conflate criticism of Israel with antisemitism.

That position was articulated in 2022, when Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the ADL, said that opposition to Israel is akin to white supremacy as a source of antisemitism.

"Anti-Zionism is antisemitism," Greenblatt said in a speech to ADL leaders. He added that organizations such as Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace that "epitomize the radical left [are] the photo inverse of the extreme right that ADL long has tracked."

Goretsky, however, takes a more nuanced approach. He said in a recent interview that "criticizing the Israeli government or its policies is not antisemitic."

'Antisemitism in America has increased'

Experts on all sides of the issue stress that the increase in public antisemitism is troubling.

"Unequivocally, antisemitism in America has increased over the last 24 months," said Kevin Rachlin of the Nexus Project, a nonprofit that combats antisemitism. "You can see it, you can feel it."

But "to lump as antisemitic all people who don't believe in Zionism is just wrong," Rachlin said.

At the request of The Inquirer, the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia cataloged what it termed the "most egregious" incidents of antisemitism in the region in 2024:

1. Attempted arson and vandalism in October at Congregation Mikveh Israel synagogue in Old City, one of the oldest in the United States.

2. Physical assault of an Israeli student at Farrell Elementary School in Northeast Philadelphia because of his identity (described by the federation as an internal complaint).

3. Ethnic intimidation incident outside Northeast Philadelphia pool hall on Oct. 24, where three men were charged with threatening three Jewish men and hurling antisemitic slurs.

4. Swastika vandalism at Temple Beth Hillel-Beth El in Wynnewood on March 31, and at the Philadelphia Holocaust Memorial Plaza on Jan. 14.

5. Antisemitic bullying at Welsh Valley Middle School on Nov. 15, where a classmate of a Jewish student gave a Nazi salute, saying, "Donald Trump will kill all the Jews."

In his analysis of the ADL audit, Lorber from Political Research Associates said that some events didn't warrant being included in a list of antisemitic incidents.

For instance, during an anti-Israel rally in Dallas in November, people held signs that read, "Authentic rabbis always opposed Zionism and the state of Israel." The action was deemed antisemitic harassment by the ADL.

In another reported incident on Nov. 25 in Orlando, an anti-Israel "study-in" organized by Students for a Democratic Society and the UCF Divest Coalition took place at the University of Central Florida. Without detail, the ADL audit labeled it antisemitic harassment.

On April 13, the first night of Passover, an arsonist attacked Gov. Josh Shapiro's official residence after a family seder. The police arrested Cody Balmer, 38, for setting the fire.

Balmer's family said he struggles with mental health problems, and that he'd become "irritable and agitated" in recent weeks after he stopped taking his medication for bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

While Balmer's exact motives weren't clear, he told police dispatchers less than an hour after lighting the governor's mansion ablaze that he didn't want to participate in Shapiro's "plans for what he wants to do to the Palestinian people."

Rosetta Welsh, the mother of Balmer's two sons, said what Balmer did "wasn't political," and "wasn't religion-based."

Shapiro has been careful not to speculate whether he was attacked because he's Jewish. For his part, Goretsky said the ADL hasn't yet determined whether the incident should be classified as antisemitic.

"It was extremely concerning," he said. "We'll take it up in the next audit."

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