NYPD investigating possible threat to synagogues

The New York Police Department is investigating suspicious activity outside of two Brooklyn synagogues.

Unknown men took videos in front of two synagogues on Ocean Parkway, in the Borough Park neighborhood, on Saturday afternoon.

At the Safra Synagogue, they were driven off by a security guard, according to the New York Daily News. But the men later turned up at Beth Torah, a large Sephardic synagogue on the same block. One man attempted to enter either one or both synagogues, according to media reports, but was turned away.

The men drove away in a car with an expired Delaware license plate, the New York Daily News reported.

The NYPD has stepped up patrols at synagogues and Jewish institutions, according to the newspaper.

“I urge everyone to stay calm but remain cautious,” state Assemblyman Dov Hikind, a Borough Park Democrat, said at Beth Torah on Saturday night. “The NYPD’s anti-terrorism unit is taking this matter very seriously and doing everything that they should in light of a potential threat.”