New York City authorities arrested a suspect accused of throwing Molotov cocktails at two churches in Queens on Wednesday evening.
The New York City Police Department apprehended the man after saying he threw a homemade bomb at the Iglesia Bautista “El Mesias” church at 97-44 75th Street and another Molototov cocktail at a second church, known as the Kingdom Hall of Jehovah’s Witnesses at 78th Street, about half a mile away.
The buildings did not sustain any serious damage from the explosions, and there were no injuries, according to police, as firefighters quickly put out both blazes.
The 36-year-old suspect had two additional Molotov cocktails in his bag when he was arrested at a nearby deli, according to the New York Post, which reported that investigators believe he may be tied to multiple similar incidents.
Charges are pending after he was taken into custody. Investigators are still working to determine why the two locations were targeted.
The attacks on the two churches come after crimes against other religious institutions, particularly Jewish houses of worship, have been on the rise in New York City.
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Authorities thwarted what they described as a terrorist attack at a prominent synagogue in May. Multiple synagogues, Jewish homes, and a car in Queens were vandalized with swastikas and other antisemitic graffiti in the same month.
The incidents came after a man was arrested on charges of repeatedly ramming his car into the Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters in Brooklyn in January, the same month a local man was arrested on charges of attacking a Queens rabbi on Holocaust Remembrance Day.
