Antisemitic assaults in the United States reached a record high in 2025 even as overall incidents fell by a third, according to a new Anti-Defamation League audit showing violence against Jews continued to escalate even as broader incidents declined nationwide.
The ADL’s annual audit, released Wednesday, recorded 203 antisemitic assaults in 2025 — a four percent increase from 196 in 2024 and the highest number since the organization began tracking incidents in 1979.
Assaults involving a deadly weapon surged 39 percent, rising from 23 in 2024 to 32 in 2025, while at least 300 people were victimized in violent attacks, according to the report.
Three people were murdered in antisemitic attacks in 2025 — the first year since 2019 in which Jewish people were killed in antisemitic attacks in the United States.
The killings included two Jewish victims shot to death outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, DC, last May, and another victim who later died from injuries sustained in the Boulder, Colorado, firebombing attack targeting a “Run for Their Lives” event in support of Israeli hostages.
Other major antisemitic attacks included the firebombing of Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s (D) residence and the stabbing of an Orthodox Jewish man leaving synagogue in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.
“Our 2025 Audit, which shows it was one of the most violent years for American Jews on record, is a reminder of how dramatically the threat landscape has shifted,” Greenblatt said. “Numbers that would have shocked us five years ago are now our floor.”
“People are being murdered because of antisemitism on American soil, and thousands more are threatened,” he added.
Overall, the ADL recorded 6,274 antisemitic incidents of assault, harassment, and vandalism in 2025 — down 33 percent from the record 9,354 incidents reported in 2024, but still the third-highest total since the organization began its audit.
The figure amounts to an average of 17 antisemitic incidents per day across the country.
The report counted 4,003 incidents of harassment, a 39 percent decrease from 2024, and 2,068 incidents of vandalism, a 21 percent decrease.
New York recorded the highest number of antisemitic incidents in the country, with 1,160, followed by California with 817, New Jersey with 687, Florida with 319, and Pennsylvania with 281.
New York also accounted for a disproportionate share of violent attacks, with 90 assaults, while Orthodox Jews were targeted in 38 percent of antisemitic assaults nationally, according to the audit.
The ADL attributed much of the overall decline to a steep drop in campus-related incidents, which fell 66 percent from 1,694 in 2024 to 583 in 2025, as the anti-Israel encampment movement that fueled the prior year’s spike faded and universities came under mounting pressure to address antisemitism.
Incidents tied to anti-Israel protests on college campuses fell 83 percent, while incidents related to Israel or Zionism made up 45 percent of all antisemitic incidents in 2025, down from 58 percent in 2024.
The decline follows increased pressure on universities from President Donald Trump’s administration, which moved aggressively against schools accused of failing to protect Jewish students.
In May of last year, World Jewish Congress President Ronald Lauder praised President Donald Trump for slashing federal funding to universities accused of tolerating antisemitism, declaring Trump was “the only president with the courage to do this.”
Months later, in August of last year, Greenblatt himself said the Trump administration had “leaned in in ways that have been constructive,” arguing federal pressure had helped force universities that previously resisted change to begin addressing antisemitism more seriously.
The Trump administration has continued pressing schools and universities over antisemitism allegations, with the Department of Education late last month opening an investigation into New York City schools over allegations of discrimination against Jewish students and the activities of “NYC Educators for Palestine.”
“No child should be taught by his or her teachers to hate their peers,” Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey said, adding that the Trump administration would not “turn a blind eye to antisemitic harassment.”
The new ADL audit comes one day after Trump, in a Jewish American Heritage Month proclamation issued Tuesday, said his administration is “aggressively fighting the violence against Jewish Americans,” including by “working to end the scourge of antisemitism throughout our institutions, especially on college campuses.”
Oren Segal, ADL senior vice president for counter-extremism and intelligence, warned that the drop in overall incidents should not obscure the growing threat posed by violent antisemitism.
“Behind every one of these incidents is a real person: a family threatened at their synagogue, a rabbi attacked on the street, a student harassed on campus,” Segal said.
“2025 brought some of the most violent antisemitic attacks in recent memory,” he added. “Even as overall incidents declined, the surge in physical assaults is a stark reminder that a historically high level of antisemitism puts Jewish lives at risk.”
Joshua Klein is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @JoshuaKlein.
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