The United States’ Federal Bureau of Investigation statistics for 2024 shows 11,679 hate crime incidents in 2024, compared to 11,862 in 2023 – welcome news after fears of a sustained surge in hate crimes driven by the atrocities in Palestine and Israel.
The table below, extracted from the FBI Crime Data Explorer, shows the five-year trend of hate crimes against the four communities that I’ve been covering in my annual analysis published in Scroll since 2021.
As I have cautioned before, the absolute numbers in of themselves may suffer underreporting and other flaws, but the numbers are very helpful in studying trends and comparing the vulnerability of different communities.
FBI hate crime statistics, bias incidents
| Bias type | 2020 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025, six month | 2025, total estimate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anti-Black or African American | 3,819 | 3,307 | 3,218 | 1,392 | 2,784 |
| Anti-Jewish | 794 | 2,001 | 2,082 | 715 | 1.430 |
| Anti-Hispanic or Latino | 664 | 874 | 853 | 497 | 994 |
| Anti-Asian | 330 | 441 | 402 | 171 | 342 |
| Anti-Sikh | 93 | 163 | 143 | 105 | 210 |
| Anti-Islamic (Muslim) | 126 | 283 | 261 | 109 | 218 |
| Anti-Hindu | 11 | 32 | 26 | 13 | 26 |
| Anti-Buddhist | 16 | 24 | 28 | 24 | 48 |
| Total hate crimes | 8,263 | 11,862 | 11,679 | 11,000 | |
| As % of all US crime | 15% | 22.5% | 23.5% |
There was a significant spike in hate crimes against Jews and Muslims in October-November 2023, presumably driven by the Hamas attack on Israel. However, the numbers came down rapidly in subsequent months, despite the genocide in Gaza.
However, anti-Jewish hate crimes have not come down to the pre-October 23 levels. Hate crimes against Sikhs and Hindus seem unaffected by the Gaza situation.
The surprising take-away for me is that every community that I’ve been writing about showed only a marginal increase/decrease in annual hate crimes against them: anti-Jewish, up from 2,001 to 2,082; anti-Islamic, down from 283 to 26; anti-Sikh, down from 163 to 143; and anti-Hindu, down from 32 to 26 (Row 7).
That said, the sharp upward trajectory of hate crimes from 2020 to 2024 should be of great concern to every American: anti-Jewish hate crimes shot up by 262%; anti-Islamic hate crimes by 207% and anti-Sikh hate crimes by 154%.
This does not bode well for American democracy, which is already under great duress from the very top.
Anti-Zionism is not antisemitic
It’s interesting that the FBI labels its bias categories as “anti-Jewish”, “anti-Islamic” and “anti-Hindu”, avoiding terms such as “antisemitism”, “Islamophobia” and “Hinduphobia”, which do not have clear and consistent definitions. However, there has been a sustained effort by pro-Israel Zionists to expand the definition of antisemitism, which raises a critical question: are anti-Israeli and anti-Zionist statements in and of themselves antisemitic?
Yes, say the Zionists, whose persistence over the years led in 2016 to a “non-legally binding working definition of antisemitism” being adopted by International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance. According to that definition, manifestations of antisemitism might include “the targeting of the state of Israel; accusing Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel than to the interests of their own nations; claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor; and applying double standards by requiring of it [Israel] a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation”.
The alliance’s definition is hugely troubling as it muddies a painful historic human rights issue by dragging it into partisan politics. As several Israeli scholars, teachers and activists have pointed out, this would have a chilling effect on academic freedom by censoring any legitimate criticism of Israel and Zionism. Journalist Mehdi Hasan has elaborated on this. It’s notable that, Kenneth Stern, the creator of the alliance’s definition, has himself critiqued it as “creating harm”.
Regrettably, several influential Zionist groups, such as the American Jewish Committee, have embraced the IHRA definition in their work. The US State Department also appears to have adopted IHRA’s definition.
In my view, by calling its definition “non-legally binding”, the IHRA seeks to side-step legal scrutiny and achieve by other means what would surely be unconstitutional in law: i.e. preferential treatment of one religion and one foreign country over all others. As a result, anyone who is critical of Zionism or Israel could be “non-legally” smeared with being antisemitic, resulting in disastrous personal consequences for them.
Despite the wide criticism of the IHRA definition, California recently passed into law AB 715, which purportedly aims at protecting K-12 Jewish students from antisemitic attacks, but legitimises the IHRA’s expanded definition. Now, even innocent comments by non-Jewish students about Israel or Gaza might be deemed antisemitic.
AB 715 was opposed by a vast coalition of education groups, from teachers unions to school boards, civil rights advocates and Muslim community organisations, who feared censorship of pro-Palestinian voices and infringement upon academic freedom. David Goldberg, a Jewish father of three children and President of the California Teachers Association, which led the opposition, argued that “Jews are most safe when democracy flourishes, when pluralism flourishes, not when rights are taken away.”
If the FBI changes its definition of anti-Jewish hate crimes to comply with the IHRA definition, there is no question that the new numbers will include purely anti-Zionist and anti-Israel encounters, which will make the FBI a partisan purveyor of data.
Hindutva efforts
In the meantime, Hindutva organisations have been closely watching the IHRA’s work, for they too have been aggressively trying to expand the definition of anti-Hindu hate incidents to include any criticism of Hindutva or Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rule in India. They would like to relabel such gestures as “Hinduphobia” in an effort to position them on par with antisemitism – despite the glaring fact that Jews are 50 times more likely to face hate crimes than Hindus (adjusted for their populations).
Not surprisingly, they blame the FBI for undercounting their hate incidents.
Earlier this year, Representative Shri Thanedar of Michigan, introduced H. Res 69 titled, “Celebrating Hindu Americans, condemning attacks on Hindu places of worship, Hinduphobia, and anti-Hindu bigotry, and for other purposes”, citing a “substantial increase” in attacks on Hinduism.
The resolution was deeply flawed. Thanedar’s claim of a “substantial increase” in attacks on Hinduism had no factual basis. On the contrary, anti-Hindu hate crimes have been consistently ranked at the bottom of over 30 communities tracked by the FBI, and their numbers have remained steady during 2023-2025.
The resolution closely echoes Hindutva ideology by ignoring non-Hindu Indian-Americans, who have made valuable contributions to America too.
For the US Congress to selectively endorse one part of the Indian-American community to the exclusion of others is dangerous and unacceptable. Thankfully, the resolution seems to be on hiatus.
But now, the entire Indian-American community is facing an existential crisis with the emergence of a wave of anti-Indian hate, initially triggered by Republican politician Vivek Ramaswamy’s support for H1B temporary work visas. As the debate gets uglier, MAGA opponents of H1B visas are gaining ground, as the Donald Trump government adds major restrictions to the visa and several corporations pledge not to hire H1B workers.
It would seem that Hindu-Americans can no more take for granted that they are least likely to face religious-based hate speech and hate crimes than other Indian-Americans: the unprecedented official patronage that Diwali has received this year has unleashed a wave of ugly attacks on Hinduism and Hindu-Americans from the Evangelist Christian Right and others, including direct attacks on Hindus in the Trump administration.
Hindutva groups in the US now face a Hobson’s choice. They could change direction to join forces with Indian-Americans of all faiths – some of whom have been the primary targets of their hate campaigns – to resist the new threats. Or they could continue to focus exclusively on their Hinduphobia narrative, which will expose their narrow sectarian/supremacist DNA to all Americans.
The latest resolution in the House of Representatives apparently endorsed by the Hindu American Foundation, H.R. 819, appears on the surface to have taken the first option and pivoted from its past positions, which should be welcomed. Still, the resolution continues to make a comparison between anti-Hindu crimes and anti-Sikh crimes, even though Sikhs are 15-20 times more likely to face hate crimes than Hindus, after normalising for their populations.
Unchartered waters
I started to track FBI’s hate crimes statistics in 2021, mainly to check on claims of widespread hate against Hindu-Americans and to compare their vulnerability relative to other communities.
I was also trying to drive home the point that all immigrant and minority communities face a common adversary in supremacist ideologies, which are ruling in the US, Israel and India. We can’t successfully resist them unless we all work together. The sudden emergence of hate against Indian-Americans, many of whom voted for Trump and have been courting the MAGA Right, underscores this reality.
Unfortunately, tracking and addressing hate crimes at the micro level now seems futile, when democratically elected national leaders are themselves committing the largest-ever hate crime: a genocide.
But I do see signs of hope for civil society from across the world to work together as never before
There is a seismic shift in the attitude of Americans towards Israel, with many more people now willing to hear the stories of Palestinians. Forty percent of American Jews believe that the Israeli government has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, with 61% believing Israel committed war crimes. Meanwhile, almost 60% of Americans support US recognition of a Palestinian state.
The world must take advantage of these opening to end the suffering of Palestinians once and for all, and ensuring that a Palestinian state alongside Israel becomes a reality. That’s the only hope to stop the authoritarians from normalising hate.
First published in Scroll.in.
