Masked man in Palestinian keffiyeh seen throwing rocks through window of Jewish home with 'Seattle stands with Israel' sign

A masked man in a keffiyeh, which has become the symbol for anti-Israel sentiment, was caught on surveillance footage throwing rocks through the window of a Jewish home in broad daylight. The Jewish family in the home proudly had a sign reading "Seattle stands with Israel." To make matters worse, due to a lack of officers following the defunding of the department by local officials, Seattle police didn’t respond to the hate crime for over an hour, by which time the suspect was long gone.

The father of the family in the Greenlake neighborhood, who asked to remain anonymous, told The Ari Hoffman Show on Talk Radio 570 KVI that the incident on Monday at 11 am was caught by a neighbor’s security camera. “Our neighbors heard a loud ‘bang’ and came out of their houses to see a man standing on our lawn in our front yard and throwing pretty large rocks at our second-floor window, which did have that sign… unabashedly throwing it at that.”

“One of them apparently had bounced off, didn't make it through, so he picked up another one threw it and threw another, made it through the double pane window, and led to glass all over our house.”

“Thank goodness our family was not home and so no one was hit by the rock or any of the falling glass, but our entire upstairs was full of shattered glass," he said. “This individual in no particular rush turned and after his mission was accomplished, walked away.”

“Our neighbors were on the phone with 911 mentioning that there was a hate crime occurring and that they had eyes on the suspect who was walking away slowly from our house,” he continued, though the family wasn't home. “It took over an hour for Seattle PD to actually show up after multiple additional calls came in.” Since the Seattle City Council voted to defund the police in 2020, triggering a mass exodus, response times have gone up.

“It took four calls, two from neighbors and two from my wife who showed up on the scene about 20 minutes after it occurred. We got a text from our neighbor who let us know. It took two calls. And on that fourth call, they found me, her, and her friends, my wife, and her friends were standing in the driveway, saw the police officer coming down the hill, a full hour plus after the event, and by which point the suspect, not suspect, the culprit, had long made his way away from our neighborhood.”

“The word hate crime was used multiple times… our house was targeted in a neighborhood full of homes with signs in their windows, none of which have anything to do with Israel or Jewish stars.” Attempts to contact local politicians have been met with silence. The father believes that antisemites have been emboldened by a lack of repercussions for their actions and silence from elected leaders.

“I think about exactly what we just saw on the campus of the University of Washington. There were graffiti tags that quite literally said, ‘Kill your local Zionist.’ You replace the word ‘Zionist’ with any other minority, and for those out there that say there's a distinction between a ‘Zionist’ and a ‘Jew,’ it is one and the same and that is just a way to get around saying Jew in this world that we live in. You replace that word Zionist with any other minority or protected class, it is front-page news. And it is something that's being talked about and as you said, being condemned.”

“Meanwhile, the University of Washington decided to make an agreement with the students, the very students who wrote these vile things and physically blocked Jewish students from going to class, flashes of the 1920s in Europe. And we're seeing it here in the city of Seattle.”

The father said he reached out to Democratic Mayor Bruce Harrell and his City Council Member Cathy Moore but “Not a word, not a peep.” The mayor and councilmember’s offices also did not return The Post Millennial’s request for comment.

The father noted that despite the silence from politicians, “The most heartening thing is I've had my close friends, non-Jewish friends and Jewish friends alike reach out to me and say, ‘Can I have a sign like that?’ To me, that's the most powerful outcome of this whole thing to not have this, this terrorist tried to silence us, but the opposite happened. You're unifying us.”

“There's no place for violence. There's a place for disagreement. There's a place for us to not see eye to eye, but the minute you put my family's lives in danger, you're crossing a line. And so that is the plan. And I plan to find a way to further this message so that this, you know, person with low morals, understands that they're not going to silence us.”

According to Regina Sassoon Friedland, Regional Director for the Seattle chapter of the American Jewish Committee, "The Seattle Police Department is investigating the incident as a hate crime."

She said in a statement to The Post Millennial, "Rocks are being thrown through the windows of Jewish homes in Seattle. This and similar acts of violence and incitement must be unequivocally condemned by all Seattleites, regardless of race, religion, or ethnicity. AJC will continue to proudly stand with the family targeted, with the Jewish community, and with Israel. We will not be deterred by hate or intimidation from those who seek to harm Jews."