Lyft has terminated the contract of a driver following an altercation with an Orthodox Jewish passenger, Rabbi Menachem Shemtov. The incident, which occurred on Sunday shortly after the ride began, is currently not being treated as a hate crime by the police.
“Lyft unequivocally condemns this behavior,” a company spokesperson said on Monday. “Upon learning of this incident, we deactivated the driver and we’ve been in touch with the rider. We encourage riders and drivers to report harassment, discrimination, or safety concerns in the Lyft app.”
The conflict began when Rabbi Shemtov, who had just completed Shacharis at his father’s Chabad center in Washington D.C., requested the driver to lower the volume of the music playing in the car. According to Shemtov, the driver abruptly ordered him out of the vehicle, saying he didn’t like his “energy.” Shemtov, recounting the event to DC News, revealed that the driver was unable to provide a clear reason for his hostility, only referring to the rabbi’s “energy.”
In a video recorded by Shemtov, the confrontation escalated with the driver got upset over Shemtov allegedly slamming the car door. Footage then shows the driver physically attacking the rabbi.
Shemtov described how the driver knocked off his yarmulka and briefly prevented him from retrieving it. He further recounted attempting to photograph the driver’s license plate, which led to further physical aggression from the driver.
“This was definitely fueled by a lot of hate,” Shemtov added.
An eyewitness captured the assault on video, showing the driver delivering rapid blows to Shemtov, who tried to evade the attack. The assailant had a key protruding from his fist, causing cuts on Shemtov’s forehead and upper cheek.
“Thankfully it wasn’t an inch higher, otherwise it would have been my eye,” Shemtov noted.
“He told me to go out of the vehicle, I am very visibly a Jewish individual,” he told NBC. “I’m very proud of my Judaism, I wear my religious articles very visibly and proudly, and then more than that he then chases after me and physically assaults me.”
However, despite Shemtov’s complaint to the police, News 4 reported that “DC police say they are not investigating this as a hate crime,” though police say the investigation is still in its early stages.
(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)
Join the official YWN WhatsApp status
3 Responses
Now, imagine if you will, if the driver were white and the passenger black.
I am trying to find out what constitutes a hate crime in DC, all I seem to find is an article from 2019 that blames Trumps “ugly rhetoric” without saying what rhetoric there is, and white supremacists being the perp. So I guess the only way to get such a charge, is if the attacker was white, and went after the groups that the Washington Post think are the only victims?
“Jessie K. Liu, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, said in a statement Tuesday that her office takes hate crimes “very seriously” and recently added a second coordinator to prosecute them.”
Let us hope this is not a sign of things to come, but daven like it is.