Source: Suspect In Hanukkah Celebration Stabbings Arrested With ‘Blood All Over Him’

(CNN) — The suspect in a string of stabbings during a Hanukkah celebration at a rabbi’s Monsey, New York, home was found with “blood all over him,” a law enforcement source with direct knowledge of the case told CNN on Sunday.

Thomas Grafton was driving a Nissan Sentra across the George Washington Bridge into New York City when his car’s tag was captured by a license plate reader about 11:45 p.m. Saturday, authorities said.

Police apprehended Grafton without incident after midnight, a New York Police Department spokeswoman told CNN earlier Sunday.

Ramapo officers picked him up and transported him upstate, the spokeswoman said. Monsey is a hamlet within Ramapo.

Grafton, who is from Greenwood Lake, about a 40-minute drive northwest of Monsey, is being held at police headquarters and will be arraigned Sunday on five counts of attempted murder and one count of first-degree burglary, Ramapo Police Chief Brad Weidel told reporters.

Five people were taken to hospitals near the rabbi’s home after the suspect entered the Hanukkah celebration in the New York suburb and began stabbing people, according to police and witnesses.

The victims were Hasidic Jews, the Orthodox Jewish Public Affairs Council for the Hudson Valley Region said in a tweet. Two people are in critical condition, council co-founder Yossi Gestetner told CNN.

One of the victims was the son of Rabbi Chaim Rottenberg, at whose home the attack unfolded, and another victim suffered head wounds and is in serious conditions, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said. The rabbi’s son is recovering, he said.

The attacker pulled out a knife that was “almost like a broomstick,” said Aron Kohn, who attended the Hanukkah celebration.

There were at least 100 people in the home at the time, as the rabbi was “lighting the candle” on the seventh night of Hanukkah, Kohn said.

The suspect tried to run into a nearby synagogue, but someone closed the doors, Kohn added.

Rockland County — where the stabbing took place — has the largest Jewish population per capita of any US county, according to New York state. About 90,000 residents, almost a third of the county’s population, are Jewish, Weidel said.

A latest in a string of attacks

This is the second stabbing in Monsey since November. An Orthodox Jewish man was stabbed several times November 20 while walking to synagogue, officials said. He was taken to a hospital where he underwent surgery.

Saturday’s stabbing is the 13th act of anti-Semitism in the state in the last three weeks, Cuomo told reporters. That’s in addition to other hateful incidents targeting the black, Latino and LGBT communities, he said.

The attacks are symptoms of “an American cancer that is spreading in the body politic,” the governor said. He vowed to propose a law that would make New York the first state to treat these types of incidents as domestic terrorism.

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“They’re trying to inflict fear. They’re motivated by hate. They are doing mass attacks,” he said. “These are terrorists in our country perpetrating terrorism on other Americans, and that’s how we should treat it and that’s how I want the laws in this state to treat it.”

He directed the state’s Hate Crime Task Force to investigate the incident. The Anti-Defamation League of New York traveled to the scene to learn more and coordinate with law enforcement, the group said.

Evan Bernstein, the ADL’s director for the New York/New Jersey region, is dismayed by the rise in anti-Semitic attacks in New York and demanded solutions, which he said go beyond policing. Of particular concern, he said, is that many orthodox and ultra-orthodox communities aren’t using the types of technology that facilitates reporting and awareness of these types of crimes.

Last week, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said the city’s police department would boost its patrols after at least eight possible anti-Semitic incidents in a week.

Police will increase visits to houses of worship and “other critical areas in the community,” he said.

Israel’s President Reuven Rivlin was”shocked and outraged” by the stabbing, he said in a statement to CNN.

“The rise of anti-Semitism is not just a Jewish problem and certainly not just the State of Israel’s problem. We must work together to confront this evil, which is raising its head again and is a genuine threat around the world,” the statement said.

Israel will work with local authorities to deal with incidents of anti-Semitism, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.

“We will work together in every way with the local authorities in order to help eliminate this phenomena. We offer our help to all countries,” he said at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting.

‘We cannot overstate the fear people are feeling’

As authorities began investigating the stabbings, officials shared messages of solidarity and resilience.

There is “zero tolerance for acts of hate of any kind and we will continue to monitor this horrific situation,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a tweet “I stand with the Jewish community tonight and every night.”

Added de Blasio, “Many Jewish families in our city have close ties to Monsey. We cannot overstate the fear people are feeling right now.”

“We will NOT allow this to become the new normal,” the mayor tweeted. “We’ll use every tool we have to stop these attacks once and for all. The NYPD has deployed a visible and growing presence around Jewish houses of worship on the streets in communities like Williamsburg, Crown Heights and Boro Park.”

The ADL will be working with leaders in orthodox and Hassidic communities to improve their reporting mechanisms, Bernstein said.

“There’s a fear of reporting. There’s a fear of retaliation, or they just don’t have the understanding of how to report,” he told CNN. “So what happens is in a place like here in Rockland County, you maybe will only show a few or handful of incidents that have taken place … when in reality — we believe, based in our conversations with orthodox leadership — there’s far more of that happening.”

ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt said it is “heart-wrenching to see the holiday of Hanukkah violated yet again” following last week’s “hateful assaults.”

“We are outraged because the answer is clear: the Jewish community NEEDS greater protection,” Greenblatt tweeted, demanding more protection for Jewish communities and consequences for the perpetrators of the attacks. “Whether worshiping in synagogue, shopping in the supermarket or celebrating at home, Jews should be safe from violence.”