The Jewish community in Toronto was the largest victim of hate crimes in 2014, according to a periodic report released by Toronto police on Wednesday. According to statistics presented in the report, last year saw hate crimes jump from 131 in 2013 to 146 in 2014. Police arrested 22 suspects for committing a hate crime, as opposed to 17 arrests in 2013. The prime motivation cited in just under half of the hate crimes, 63 out of 146, was listed as religious belief, indicating the influence of racist religious indoctrination as a key factor. Of the crimes, 93 involved damage to property, 23 consisted of actual physical assault, and 10 were defined as harassment. Around 30% of the hate crimes, 44 out of 146, targeted the Jewish community, making it the most hard-hit of the various minority communities. The black community was targeted in 27 of the cases, and 16 crimes were committed against the Muslim community. The police report noted that the figures do not necessarily give a full scope of the phenomenon, given that not all victims of hate crimes report the incidents to the authorities. Anti-Semitic violence was found to have shot up significantly world-wide following the events of last summer, when the IDF launched a counter-terror operation in Gaza after Hamas began to let loose with a barrage of thousands of rockets on Israeli population centers. In response to the operation, and the negative coverage seen in much of mainstream media regarding the IDF's defensive actions in Gaza which was cynically manipulated by the terrorists , high levels of anti-Jewish hatred were seen in massive protests and marches around the globe.
