A disgraced former journalist was charged on Friday with making a wave of bomb threats to Jewish organizations while posing as an ex-girlfriend in retaliation for breaking up with him. Juan Thompson, 31, was arrested in St. Louis, the first case to emerge from a federal investigation into a surge of threats against Jewish Community Centers and schools that has rattled American Jews. U.S. authorities are examining more than 100 threats made against JCCs by phone this year, which appear unrelated to the Thompson allegations. In a criminal complaint filed in federal court in Manhattan, authorities accused Thompson of making at least eight threats, mostly by email. Prosecutors said Thompson made the threats in an effort to harass a former girlfriend by telling the Jewish groups she was the person behind the alleged bombs. Jewish community centers and schools in the United States have received five waves of hoax bomb threats this year. Federal law enforcement agencies are currently investigating 122 such threats made in recent weeks. According to the criminal complaint, Thompson began by threatening to the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York from an email account designed to direct investigators to his former girlfriend. He then proceeded to make a bomb threat against the Anti-Defamation League's headquarters in New York and a number of Jewish schools in Michigan, among other institutions. Based on Thompson's Twitter account, which provided some of the evidence cited in the criminal complaint, the defendant appears to be a former reporter for The Intercept, a news website focused on national security. Thompson was fired from the website last year for allegedly fabricating quotes and sources, The Intercept said in February 2016. U.S. President Donald Trump, Israeli officials and Jewish groups have all condemned the surge in intimidation, as well as cases of vandalism targeting Jewish cemeteries. Police said last weekend that about 100 headstones were toppled at a Jewish cemetery in Philadelphia, about a week after a Jewish cemetery in St. Louis was vandalized. Some Jewish groups see the vandalism and threats as a sign that anti-Semitic groups have been emboldened by Trump's election. His campaign last year drew the support of white supremacists and other right-wing groups, despite Trump's disavowals of them. Meanwhile, Algemeiner opinion writer Seth Frantzman asked, "Is the media misleading us through fear-mongering about anti-Semitism in the United States-" on Thursday. According to Frantzman, although anti-Semitic assaults nearly doubled during former U.S. President Barack Obama's presidency, "the 7,000 anti-Semitic instances" recorded were "largely ignored." According to Frantzman, 84 anti-Semitic incidents took place each month of Obama's presidency, on average, compared to the 95 incidents that took place under President Donald Trump between January and February of 2017. A 10% increase, Frantzman noted in the piece, does not constitute a "pandemic" of anti-Semitism sweeping the United States, despite media claims. As further proof, Frantzman noted that the former head of the ADL, Abe Foxman, used that same word to describe American anti-Semitism in 2009.
