MHC: Two North Miami Beach synagogues and two businesses that serve the Jewish community were spray-painted with anti-Semitic graffiti early Sunday, prompting North Miami Beach police to launch an investigation and a search for the perpetrators.Four people were seen late Sunday near one of the crime scenes. Witnesses and police said the group had begun spray-painting a swastika on a wall behind the two adjacent businesses. Police said three of the four fled on foot when approached, but one juvenile was arrested.

Police did not immediately identify him.

The incidents come at a time when Jewish communities across the nation and around the world are on edge because of the ongoing Israeli-Hezbollah fighting. Security at many sites has been tightened, especially after Friday’s attack when a Muslim man allegedly opened fire in the office of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, killing one woman and wounding five others.

Authorities in South Florida did not connect the North Miami Beach incidents to the Mideast crisis, and such actions have occurred here before, but the conflict has placed any anti-Jewish crime under intense scrutiny.

”This is a significant attempt to harass and intimidate the Jewish community,” said Art Teitelbaum, Southern area director of the Anti-Defamation League. “It’s an anti-Semitic incident, but it’s a challenge for everyone.”

Owners and congregants of the four targeted locales, all within a nine-block radius, found swastikas and ”KKK” sprayed in red across walls of the synagogues and businesses. In addition, ”You’re next” was scrawled across the two synagogues’ exteriors.

Hit were Congregation Shaaray Tefilah and Young Israel of Greater Miami along with Kosher World and Judaica Enterprises. Kosher World sells glatt kosher food and Judaica Enterprises specializes in traditional products for Jewish holidays and rites.

”We think it was a random act, but we take it very, very seriously any time someone singles out a group of people and takes action against them,” said Warren Hardison, spokesman for North Miami Beach Police.

Hardison said his agency doesn’t believe an anti-Semitic group was behind the attacks. But some members of the local Jewish community aren’t convinced.

”I don’t believe it was kids,” said Yitzie Spalter, owner of Kosher World. “They were too organized to come to two temples in the neighborhood and two Jewish stores.”

Anti-Semitic hate crimes are not new in South Florida. In April, the Anti-Defamation League reported that hate crimes targeting Jews increased statewide from 173 in 2004 to 199 in 2005. But Sunday’s incidents were the first in South Florida since hostilities flared between Israel and Hezbollah on July 12.

Under Florida’s House of Worship Protection Act, the vandals — if caught — will face third-degree felony charges in connection with the attacks on the synagogues, according to Teitelbaum.

”If you put a swastika on a 7-Eleven, it might be criminal mischief,” Teitelbaum said. “You put it on a temple or a mosque or a church, and it’s a third-degree felony.”

Other charges would also be reclassified in accordance with Florida’s Hate Crimes act — for example, a first-degree misdemeanor would become a third-degree felony, he said.

”If you commit one of these crimes in Florida, you can get hammered under the law, and we like it that way,” Teitelbaum said.

Alan Sakowitz, a member of Congregation Shaaray Tefilah and head of the North Miami Beach Task Force on Crime, said the incidents follow a crime wave that has plagued the neighborhood in recent months.

The area is home to approximately 800 Orthodox Jewish families.

”They’re shocked, and they’re devasted,” he said.

Sakowitz said the number of carjackings, muggings and burglaries in recent months has pushed some in the neighborhood to carry guns when walking to services, and others to consider leaving.

”I don’t know if the two are related or if it’s just open season,” he said.

Rabbi David Lehrfield, who heads one of the two targeted synagogues, Young Israel of Greater Miami, doesn’t believe there is a connection between the crime wave and Sunday’s attacks. He was mugged at gunpoint outside his North Miami Beach home in March.

”It’s too coincidental with the problems going on in the Middle East that this should happen at this particular time,” he said.