A Coral Springs man was arrested Friday on charges of criminal mischief with prejudice after authorities say he slashed a pro-Israel banner outside of a Miami Beach bagel shop in late October.
Nour Abaido, 24, did over $400 in damage to the banner displayed outside of Bagel Time Cafe in the 3900 block of Alton Road, according to Miami Beach Police.
Abaido arrived at the restaurant on Oct. 28, police said in a media release, stepping out of an orange Ford GT Mustang in the middle of the road. He first tried to remove the pro-Israel banner, but couldn’t. He then proceeded to slash the banner with a sharp object.
He then got back into the passenger seat of the car, which fled towards Julia Tuttle Causeway.
The Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office Hate Crimes Unit and the Broward County Sheriff’s Office’s Violent Intervention Proactive Enforcement Response (VIPER) Unit investigated the act, which authorities described as antisemitic and hateful.
“Acts of antisemitism in the United States and throughout the world are on a dramatic rise,” Miami Beach Mayor Steven Meiner said in the release. “This is a serious concern for the Jewish people worldwide and we are making a statement here in Miami Beach that acts of antisemitism will be enforced and prosecuted to the full extent of the law.”
Miami Beach Police Chief Wayne Jones called the act a “horrendous crime.”
“This act, fueled by hate, has no place in the City of Miami Beach,” he said in the release, “and I am immensely proud of our investigators for their diligence and meticulousness, which led to a successful apprehension.”
Criminal mischief, specifically vandalism, which targets religious groups is considered a third-degree felony, according to Florida law: “Any person who willfully and maliciously defaces, injures, or damages by any means any church, synagogue, mosque, or other place of worship, or any religious article contained therein, commits a felony of the third degree … if the damage to the property is greater than $200.”
A new bill which amended the same statute and added further penalties for bias-motivated crimes went into effect in July, designed to target a spate of antisemitic incidents in South Florida.
Those additions include the outlawing of projections onto buildings and charging minor crimes like littering as felonies “if the litter ‘contains a credible threat’” and is dumped onto private property “for the purpose of intimidating the owner.”
Abaido’s arrest comes close to two months after the Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel on Oct. 7. In the weeks and months following, authorities have seen an uptick in antisemitic incidents throughout South Florida and across the country, many of them documented on social media.
The arrest also comes amid debate over the definition of antisemitism; supporters of Palestine have often accused Israel’s supporters of conflating antisemitism with valid criticism of the country.
At the recent Mayors’ Summit Against Antisemitism in Fort Lauderdale, local officials talked with Jewish leaders about adopting a definition of antisemitism that includes certain kinds of anti-Israel language, something that law enforcement officials could use in determining what counts as a hate crime.