Jews almost eight times likelier than Muslims and Arabs to be targets of hate crimes in Seattle area since 2023

Since 2023, the year in which the Oct. 7 attacks took place, Seattle has recorded 384 hate crimes, 35 of which (9.1%) have targeted Jews. Jews make up about 1% of those who live in the Seattle metro area, according to the Pew Research Center’s 2023-24 Religious Landscape Study.

Although Muslims make up twice that number, 2% of the Seattle area, Arabs and Muslims were targets of nine hate crimes, or 2.3% of the total, since 2023, according to official Seattle Police Department data.

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That means that a Jew in the Seattle area was about 7.78 times likelier to be a target of a hate crime since 2023 than an Arab or a Muslim was, according to city data, which is current as of Jan. 31. (JNS asked the city for data since January.)

“The numbers are absolutely alarming, but alarm doesn’t help,” Randy Kessler, executive director of StandWithUs Northwest, told JNS.

“We need to be active in standing up for our right to live openly and proudly as Jews,” Kessler said. “That means speaking up, taking action and demanding fair treatment.”

Jews also have to report incidents, file complaints and work with political and nonprofit leaders “and occasionally taking legal action,” according to Kessler.

The Seattle Police Department reports three kinds of hate-related incidents. “Hate crimes,” which it previously called “malicious harassment,” involve attackers motivated by beliefs about the victim’s faith, or other protected categories.

“Bias element” crimes involve hateful remarks about a protected group that seem a secondary motivation in the crime, and “biased incidents” don’t involve crimes but are hate speech about a protected group that is protected under the First Amendment, per the department.

‘Traditionally under-reported’

Jillian Williamson, bias crimes coordinator for the police department, told JNS that “hate crimes are traditionally under-reported for many reasons such as access—not knowing how to report—language barriers, fear of police, fear of retaliation for reporting, belief that nothing will happen if they do report and more.”

Since 2023, Seattle has recorded 1,454 “bias elements” crimes—36 (2.5%) targeting Jews and 35 (2.4%) Muslims and Arabs—and 896 biased incidents, of which 58 (6.5%) targeted Jews and 20 (2.2%) Muslims and Arabs.

That data suggests that Jews in the Seattle area have been a little bit more than twice as likely as Arabs and Muslims to be targeted in “bias elements” crimes and about 5.8 times likelier to experience biased incidents than have been Arabs and Muslims since 2023.

In January 2026, Seattle recorded 68 hate-related incidents, 13 hate crimes, 28 crimes with “bias elements” and 27 biased incidents. Four (5.9%) of the incidents targeted Jews—all four of them hate crimes.

Muslims and Arabs were targets of five incidents (7.4%), a hate crime, two “biased elements” crimes and two biased incidents.

Jews were targeted in 12 times as many hate crimes and about 125% as many incidents overall as Arabs and Muslims were in the Seattle area in 2025. Of 919 such incidents—126 hate crimes, 495 crimes with “bias elements” and 298 bias incidents—50 (5.4%) targeted Jews, including 12 hate crimes, 17 crimes with “biased elements” and 21 biased incidents.

The 22 incidents (2.4%) that targeted Arabs and Muslims in 2025 included one hate crime, 11 crimes with “biased elements” and 10 biased incidents.

Jews, Arabs and Muslims were less targeted in 2024, but the 28 anti-Jewish incidents still represented 3.3% of the 839 incidents in the city—116 hate crimes, 434 “biased elements” crimes and 289 biased incidents. Seven hate crimes, five “biased element” crimes and 16 biased incidents targeted Jews, while Arabs and Muslims were targets of 15 incidents (1.8%), including three hate crimes, eight “biased elements” crimes and four biased incidents.

In 2023, Seattle recorded 908 incidents, 129 hate crimes, 497 “biased element” crimes and 282 “biased incidents.” Of those, 47 (5.2%) targeted Jews—12 hate crimes, 14 “bias elements” and 21 biased incidents—and 22 (2.4%) targeted Arabs and Muslims, including four hate crimes, 14 “biased elements” and four biased incidents.

Of 880 incidents in 2022—the last year with data before the Oct. 7 terror attacks—122 were hate crimes, 454 “biased elements” and 304 biased incidents

Jews were targets of 31 (3.5%)—seven hate crimes, 14 “bias elements” crimes and 10 bias incidents—while Arabs and Muslims were targeted in 21 (2.4%) incidents, or two hate crimes, seven “bias elements” and seven biased incidents.

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