Cry Wolf: FBI’s Crime Data for 2023-25 Debunks Claims of Widespread ‘Anti-Hindu’ Hate in the U.S.
The FBI recently released hate crimes statistics for 2024, compiled from data submitted by law enforcement agencies across the country. The aggregate data shows 11,679 hate crime incidents in 2024, compared to 11,862 in 2023 — welcome news after fears of a sustained increase in hate crimes driven by the atrocities in Palestine/Israel.
The Numbers and the Trends
The table in Figure 1 above, 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 since 2021. As I have cautioned before, the absolute numbers in of themselves may not be consistently accurate due to underreporting and other anomalies, but the numbers are very helpful in studying trends and comparing the relative vulnerability of different communities.
In all, 23.5% of hate crimes in 2024 were motivated by the victim’s faith, only a marginal increase from 22.5% in 2023. The largest numbers of victims of religion-based hate crimes continue to be Jews, Muslims, and Sikhs.
The graphs in Figure 2 below show that there was a significant spike in hate crimes against Jews and Muslims in Oct-Nov 2023, immediately following the October 7th Hamas attack on Israel. However, the numbers came down rapidly in subsequent months, despite the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Anti-Jewish hate crimes, however, haven’t come down all the way to the pre-Oct 23 levels. Hate crimes against Sikhs and Hindus seem unaffected by the situation in Israel/Gaza.
The surprising take-away for me is that every community that I’ve been writing about since 2012 showed only a marginal increase/decrease in annual hate crimes against them: anti-Jewish, up from 2,001 to 2,082 (Row 2); anti-Islamic, down from 283 to 261 (Row 6); anti-Sikh, down from 163 to 143 (Row 5); and anti-Hindu, down from 32 to 26 (Row 7).
In conclusion, other than the short-live spikes in Oct-Nov 2023, there was no sustained surge in hate crimes against Jews and Muslims in 2024-25, as feared.
That said, the sharp upward trajectory of hate crimes from year 2020 to year 2024 (Columns C to H), 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,” “anti-Hindu,” etc., and avoids terms like “antisemitism,” “Islamophobia,” “Hinduphobia,” etc., which do not have clear and consistent definitions and have taken on political undertones. Notwithstanding, 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 of themselves antisemitic?
Rep. 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.
Yes, say the Zionists, whose persistence over the years led in 2016 to a “Non-legally binding working definition of antisemitism,” adopted by International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). Per 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.”
IHRA’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 elaborates. It’s notable that, Kenneth Stern, the creator of the IHRC definition, has himself critiqued it as “creating harm”
Regrettably, several influential Zionist groups, such as the American Jewish Committee (AJC), have embraced the IHRA definition in their work: e.g. AJC’s recent survey of American Jews on antisemitism. Several universities as well as the US State Department also appear to have adopted IHRA’s definition.
The AJC also survey found that 78% of perceived antisemitic experiences were not reported to law enforcement, with nearly half of them not considering them serious enough. Should the FBI adopt the IHRA definition, many of these experiences would be reportable to FBI, artificially inflating anti-Jewish “hate crimes” in relation to other victim communities. That would be the beginning of the end of FBI’s role as a non-partisan purveyor of data.
In my view, IHRA seeks to side-step legal scrutiny by calling its definition “Non-legally binding,” aimed at achieving 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’s critical of Zionism or Israel could now be “non-legally” smeared with the antisemite label, resulting in disastrous personal consequences for them.
For example, Gabriel Kahn, a Jewish teacher in Oakland is being investigated by his school district after challenging the content of an antisemitic training last year. He fears prosecution for voicing the need to distinguish between antisemitism and criticism of Israel.
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 legitimizes IHRA’s expanded definition. Now, even innocent comments by non-Jewish kids about Israel or Gaza might be deemed antisemitic. This is insane!
AB 715 was opposed by “a vast coalition of education groups, from teachers unions to school boards, civil rights advocates and Muslim community organizations, 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 (CTA), which led the opposition, argued that “Jews are most safe when democracy flourishes, when pluralism flourishes, not when rights are taken away.”
The renewed student protests at George Mason University, which is now censoring student views based on the IHRA definition of antisemitism, underscore that this issue is not going away anytime soon.
In sum, legitimizing IHRA’s seriously flawed, political, and fungible definition of antisemitism is a serious mistake and is bound to fuel antisemitism instead of curtailing it.
In the meantime, Hindutva (Hindu nationalist/supremacist) organizations have been closely watching IHRA, for they too have been aggressively trying to expand the definition of anti-Hindu hate crimes to include any criticism of Hindutva or Prime Minister Modi’s rule in India. They would love to relabel them all as “Hinduphobia” in an effort to position it on par with antisemitism – despite the glaring fact that Jews are fifty times more likely to face hate crimes than Hindus (adjusted for their populations). Not surprisingly, they blame the FBI for undercounting anti-Hindu hate incidents.
Lawmakers in the service of Zionism and Hindutva
Earlier this year, Hindutva’s man in the House, Rep. 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 on two counts: 1. Rep. 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 (see Figure 1); and 2. The resolution closely echoed Hindutva ideology by “othering” non-Hindu Indian-Americans. This amounts to the US congress selectively endorsing one part of the Indian-American community to the exclusion of others, which sets a dangerous precedent. Thankfully, the resolution is on hold.
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 Vivek Ramaswamy’s support for H1B visas. As the debate gets uglier, MAGA opponents of H1B are gaining ground, forcing the government to add major restrictions to the visa. Some of the current/past employers of H1B visas have pledged to stop hiring H1B workers.
These developments have shifted the ground from under Hindutva groups and they now face a Hobson’s Choice: 1. Continue to focus on their faux Hinduphobia victim narrative, which will sooner or later be exposed just as Zionism has been exposed in recent months; or 2. Change direction to genuinely speak up for Indian-Americans of all faiths, who have been targets of the vicious hate campaigns by MAGA and the Christian Right.
For instance, the Hindu American Foundation (HAF) applauded the introduction of H.R. 819, a House bill which would recognize the “contributions made to the United States by the Indian American diaspora and condemning recent acts of racism against Indian Americans,” which on the surface seemed like they were pivoting away from attacking other Indian-Americans groups and scholars. However, their strident objection to a recent Rutgers University webinar on the dangers of Hindutva belies any such hope.
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/minority communities face a common adversary in supremacist ideologies, which are ruling in the US, Israel, and India, and that 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.
However, 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 several hopeful openings for civil society from across the world to work together to end the suffering of the Palestinians: 1. Seismic shift in the attitude of Americans towards Israel, with many more people now willing to hear the stories of Palestinians; 2. 40% of American Jews believe that the Israeli government has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, with 61% believing Israel has committed war crimes; 3. 59% of Americans support US recognition of a Palestinian state; 4. Over 400 Jewish intellectuals are demanding that the West take sterner action against Israel, including sanctions, and 5. The U.N. and the ICC have shown uncommon courage in solidarity with the Palestinians.
It would be a pity if we didn’t take advantage of these openings to bring all those responsible for the Gaza genocide are brought to justice and to ensure that a Palestinian state alongside Israel becomes a reality.
These are my personal views and not those of HfHR. This article was originally published by scroll.in. This is a modified version to include more recent events.
Raju Rajagopal is co-founder of Hindus for Human Rights, whose mission is to oppose all forms of supremacy — Hindutva, caste, racism and Zionism – and to speak up for civil and human rights of minorities.