{"id":1007677,"date":"2026-08-18T01:50:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T01:50:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1007677\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T01:50:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T01:50:15","slug":"nyc-synagogue-attack-witness-blasts-new-york-times-as-downplaying-rampage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1007677\/","title":{"rendered":"NYC synagogue attack witness blasts New York Times as downplaying rampage"},"content":{"rendered":"

An outraged witness ripped the New York Times for downplaying Friday night\u2019s attack on Central Synagogue<\/a>, \u201cperverting the reality that an extremely violent and frightening incident\u201d took place inside a place of worship, and \u201cdiluting the true story and subtext.\u201d<\/p>\n

Harry Zimmerman fired off a lengthy Facebook screed condemning the Gray Lady\u2019s reporting of the violent attack on the high-profile synagogue that left one congregant with gruesome wounds and a security guard assaulted.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI saw what happened Friday night,\u201d wrote Zimmerman, 70, who was sitting in the sixth row of the \u201cpacked\u201d synagogue on Lexington Avenue and East 55th Street.<\/p>\n

Larry Montes was taken into custody after his alleged Friday rampage inside Central Synagogue. Central Synagogue<\/p>\n

\u201cI cannot emotionally consolidate \u2026 the difference between what I witnessed from a few feet away and how The New York Times decided to describe the event,\u201d the shaken witness continued, noting that the hateful perp \u2013 Larry Montes, who reportedly seethed, \u201cf\u2013k the Jews\u201d<\/a> \u2013 was charged with a hate crime.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Times article<\/a>, which described the violent, unhinged attack as \u201cinterrupt[ing]\u201d worshippers and \u201crattl[ing] New Yorkers,\u201d deceptively downplayed the actual event, according to Zimmerman.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have heard for years that the Times is unfairly critical and biased in its coverage of Israel and issues affecting the Jewish community. People can debate that if they like. What was different this time was that I did not need anyone else\u2019s interpretation. I was there. I saw it happen,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

The hateful attacker \u201cviolently disrupted\u201d the Shabbat services attended by hundreds of worshipers, according to Zimmerman, who found it \u201cdifficult to reconcile\u201d the Times description of the unprovoked attack with the reality he saw right before him.<\/p>\n

Central Synagogue is seen in Midtown Manhattan on Sunday. Luiz C. Ribeiro for NY Post<\/p>\n

Zimmerman laced into the Times for whitewashing the actions of Montes, 46, whom the paper described as \u201cagitated\u201d and \u201cstruggled\u201d as he \u201chit\u201d 63-year-old Michele Anenbeg-Poma<\/a>, who was seen with a busted lip and a bloody gash on her right forearm.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I witnessed was very different,\u201d wrote Zimmerman, who described a deranged Montes as \u201csuddenly screaming at the top of his lungs,\u201d moving through the aisle \u201cwith his arms swinging, while congregants sat only inches away.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Zimmerman said he was \u201conly feet away\u201d and insisted \u201cthis did not occur as part of a struggle,\u201d adding that the attack happened before security restrained the suspect. Montes zeroed in on Anenberg-Poma, who was positioned near the aisle, according to Zimmerman, \u201cand struck her in the face fist closed full force. She flew backward immediately.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Times\u2019 reporting that Montes \u201cknocked over a set of candlesticks\u201d suggested collateral damage during the melee and \u201cdoes not fully capture what took place,\u201d according to Zimmerman.<\/p>\n

Michele Anenberg-Poma was injured in an attack on Central Synagogue in Manhattan on Friday night. Michele Anenberg-Poma \/ Instagram<\/p>\n

\u201cI saw him intentionally grab and destroy them, much in the way Germans and the [Poles] went into synagogues in [1938] and destroy[ed] Torahs,\u201d fumed Zimmerman.<\/p>\n

He asserted that the Times \u201cwould describe\u201d the World War II-era desecration \u201cas destroying history books\u201d \u2013 a reference to the paper\u2019s notorious downplaying of pre-Holocaust Europe<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The congregant elaborated on his frustration with the misleading reporting.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere I experienced a violent disruption inside a packed sanctuary during Shabbat services, the phrasing in the article \u2014 particularly words like \u2018agitated\u2019 and \u2018temple\u2019s interior\u2019 \u2014 feels less immediate and less specific to the setting and severity of what unfolded,\u201d the congregant said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd certainly dilutes the true story and subtext.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zimmerman, a digital creator, added that \u201cresponsible language and media framing are what\u00a0news reporting is supposed to be doing.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Times article, which described the violent, unhinged attack as \u201cinterrupt[ing]\u201d worshippers and \u201crattl[ing] New Yorkers,\u201d deceptively downplayed the actual event, according to Zimmerman. nytimes.com<\/p>\n

Pro-Israel demonstrators protest a New York Times op-ed in front of the New York Times headquarters in New York City on Jan. 19. Michael Nagle for NY Post<\/p>\n

He penned his own account on Facebook \u2013 which he noted the site initially deleted \u2013 to juxtapose with the Times piece, urging readers to \u201cdecide for themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor years I have heard concerns raised about how The New York Times frames stories involving the Jewish community. Until Friday night, my perspective on that debate was necessarily secondhand,\u201d wrote Zimmerman. \u201cBut not anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

The influence that journalists wield carries \u201cresponsibility,\u201d Zimmerman asserted, admonishing the Times for its watered-down account.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Larry Montes reportedly seethed \u201cF\u2013k the Jews\u201d during his tirade in the synagogue. Facebook\/Larry Montes<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen reporting on violence in a religious space \u2013 particularly violence that may be motivated by hate \u2013 precision and clarity in language are especially important.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Expressions of support poured in on Zimmerman\u2019s Facebook page on Monday, with one post thanking the witness \u201cfor pointing out the shoddy journalism of the New York Times.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Manhattan district attorney\u2019s office charged Montes \u2013 who reportedly later called Jews \u201cswine\u201d \u2013 with two counts of assault as a hate crime, two counts of aggravated harassment and one count of criminal mischief as a hate crime.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for the Times defended its coverage. a statement to The Post defending its coverage.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOur reporting presented facts to readers about an event that threatened congregants and disrupted a religious gathering,\u201d they told The Post in an email. \u201cOur article states plainly that the assailant struck a person in the synagogue and frightened others gathered for prayer.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An outraged witness ripped the New York Times for downplaying Friday night\u2019s attack on Central Synagogue, \u201cperverting the…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1007678,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,12648,64,401166,43556,398,5248,405,403,6985,5226,5225,5228,5227,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":["post-1007677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-america","tag-antisemitism","tag-business","tag-central-synagogue","tag-hate-crimes","tag-media","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-times","tag-newyork","tag-newyorkcity","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117114007032923446","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1007677","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1007677"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1007677\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1007678"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1007677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1007677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1007677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}