De Blasio: NYPD on 'High Alert' After Jersey City 'Hate Crime'

The New York City Police Department is on high alert and focused on the city's Jewish community in the wake of Tuesday's deadly shooting in nearby Jersey City, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said Wednesday, while calling the violence a "hate crime."

"We have a police officer who was assassinated," de Blasio told MSNBC's "Morning Joe." "We have clearly a hate crime, a very violent hate crime. There's more we need to know. It's early in the investigation, but we take this very seriously."

De Blasio said the high alert is focused on protecting New York's Jewish community, given the proximity of Jersey City.

"This is our neighbor," he said. "We did send officers to support, helicopters, etc., to support Jersey City, but now we see this kind of hate right on our doorstep, and these violent anti-Semitic attacks have been happening around the country, so I take it very, very seriously."

Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop stopped short of calling the shootings an ant-Semitic attack Wednesday, but de Blasio said that based on what is known, he thinks the incident was a hate crime.

"This is too close to home and too serious," said de Blasio. "We cannot take it lightly."

There is not enough information about the shooters to put the pieces all together, he added, but "again, we believe this was a chosen target and specifically an act of violent hate."

De Blasio said there has been an uptick in threats against New York City's Jewish community in recent years, added to an increase in hate crimes overall in the nation.

"Some of them have been violent but never of course to the level of what we're talking about in Jersey City or, you know, Pittsburgh or California," said de Blasio. "This is the city that has the largest Jewish population literally of any city on Earth ... including Jerusalem and Tel Aviv."

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