A swastika scratched into the hood of a parked car on the Upper East Side has the NYPD’s Hate Crime Unit hunting for a vandal — and police suspect an Israeli flag inside the vehicle may have been what drew the attack.
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The car’s owner, a 56-year-old woman, discovered the symbol etched into her Tesla on Friday morning near the corner of East 85th Street and First Avenue, police said. She had left the car parked at the spot around 10:30 a.m. the previous Tuesday and returned roughly three days later to find the Nazi symbol gouged into the paint.An Israeli flag was displayed in the back seat of the car — a detail police believe may be connected to the vandalism. The incident was reported to the 19th Precinct, and the NYPD’s Hate Crime Unit is investigating. No arrests had been made as of the weekend, and police had not released images of a suspect.
The vandalism drew sharp condemnation from City Hall. “The swastika carved into a car on the Upper East Side is a despicable act of antisemitism,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani wrote on X. “It is a hateful attack of intimidation on our Jewish neighbors and on the values that make our city what it is.” He added: “To every Jewish New Yorker: your city stands with you. We will confront acts of antisemitism wherever they appear with urgency and without exception.”
City Council Speaker Julie Menin, who represents the Upper East Side, said the case was part of a pattern. “This horrific, antisemitic symbol continues to appear across our city,” Menin wrote on X. “Sadly, this isn’t the first time it’s been discovered in my district.” She said the Council is in contact with the NYPD and that Jewish New Yorkers “refuse to let antisemitism be normalized.”
The episode lands amid a sharp rise in reported hate crimes citywide. In May, hate crimes jumped 74.4% compared with the same month a year earlier — from 39 to 68 — with more than 60% of last month’s incidents classified as anti-Jewish, according to NYPD figures.
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