In the wake of the election, hate crimes against numerous religious, racial and gender groups have surged — with Muslim-Americans often facing the biggest brunt of the rise.

“Hate crimes have been steadily increasing as the political rhetoric has turned to divisive speech in the election,” said Afaf Nasher, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a civil rights group which monitors hate against Muslims.

In the first 10 days following the election, nearly 900 incidents of hate were reported to the Southern Poverty Law Center, a civil rights nonprofit.

In November, the FBI released its annual hate crimes report — the most thorough and widespread compilation of hate crimes nationwide — which noted a 6 percent increase in hate crimes in 2015.

While attacks on Jews made up the largest number of crimes based on religion, attacks on Muslims surged 67 percent, the largest increase over the one-year period.

The report gives context, but provides an incomplete picture as local agencies are not always reporting their hate crimes to the FBI, said Madihha Ahussain, a staff attorney at Oakland-based Muslim Advocates, which assists victims of anti-Muslim acts in understanding their legal rights.

“Law enforcement at the local level are actually not mandated to report — it’s all volunteer reporting,” Ahussain said. “And there’s a number of cities that choose not to report, or they will report zero. It’s hard to believe that as many cities that report zero actually had zero hate crimes.”

New York City may be a multicultural melting pot with residents coming from all corners of the world, but it hasn’t been immune from attacks on Muslims.

One day after the election, New York University had the Muslim prayer room in the engineering building vandalized with the words “Trump.”

Bay Ridge, Brooklyn resident Zainab Ismail believes her appearance as a hijab-wearing Muslim resulted in harassment on the part of NYPD officers in her neighborhood on Nov. 11.

Ismail claims she was parked in her car when she got out to walk to the gym and noticed that two police cars were double-parked two spaces behind her car.

“Then I saw a police officer, talking into his walkie talkie, stare right at me,” Ismail said. Two officers approached Ismail and asked if they could speak with her.

Ismail was informed that someone had called 911 and reported her as a “suspicious person” getting in-and-out of her car. Ismail was incredulous — she had gotten out of her car just once to make sure her vehicle wasn’t blocking a driveway, she told them.

Over the following several minutes, Ismail said she was asked to provide multiple forms of identification, asked for old utility bills to prove she lived where she said she lived and was informed by the officers that they had doubts about parts of her story before they let her go.

After reaching out to Council on American-Islamic Relations-NY, Ismail chose to file a complaint with the Civilian Complaint Review Board, which is tasked with investigating complaints about the New York City police.

“I did not record audio or video of my incident, so it’s really going to come down to my word against theirs’,” Ismail said. “However, with a full investigation, it will still leave a statistic.”

Though national data on hate crimes indicates an upward trend in recent months, Nasher believes the statistics represent only a small fraction of what actually occurs.

“When I go to do educational workshops,” she said, “almost always, I’ll will have a line of people who will talk to me after the workshop is done. And one-by-one, I’ll start hearing stories: ‘Do you know what happened to me? Do you know what happened to my kid?’

“And every single time, I’ll ask, ‘Did you report it?” Nasher said. “And the answer is, probably, 80 percent ‘no.’

“It’s really a two-way battle,” Nasher said. “There’s this severe underreporting within the community, which is something we are pushing to change; and then, there’s also the other side of it, and that is, in order to be categorized as a hate crime, it has to meet a certain criteria.”

Because of the high legal bar to clear for a successful prosecution under the federal hate crime law, Ahussain said the most typical successful prosecution generally involves vandalism, for instance, anti-semitic graffiti on a synagogue.

Muslim-Americans will have to be proactive in trying to break stereotypes about their community, Nasher said.

“I think it’s time for Muslim parents to wake up and understand what is going on around them and how it affects an entire generation of young people who were born after 9/11,”she said. “For a long time, African-American parents always had discussions — especially with their young, black, male youth — about walking down the wrong street while being black. I don’t want to make a parallel, because the African-American experience and what shaped it, is very unique.”

Nashar has a message for all children, be careful and be proud.

“Don’t let outside belittle you in a way that’s going to make you less observant in your faith, less true to who you are,” she said.”

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Life after a wrongful conviction from Pavement Pieces on Vimeo.

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Dyker Heights by Jennifer Cohen from Pavement Pieces on Vimeo.

The Christmas lights in Dyker Heights, Brooklyn, are as bright as Times Square without the billboards.

“I love taking people to see these lights, everybody’s happy and they become a kid again,” said Angela Christianson, Tour Guide for A Slice of Brooklyn Bus Tours, which charges $50 for a tour of the spectacle.

The predominantly Italian-American neighborhood has become a mainstream holiday tourist attraction with thousands treking from Manhattan to Brooklyn each year to see a handful of houses that spend thousands on Christmas decorations. Front lawns are covered in decorations from a 15-foot tall Santa, to carousels, to snowmen, angels, toy soldiers, reindeer, and hundreds of lights in green, red, and white.

“We joke around Rockefeller Center? FUHGETTABOUDIT, but when you come here to Brooklyn you’re seeing what homeowners are doing whether they are doing it themselves or getting companies to pay,” said Tony Muia owner of A Slice of Brooklyn Bus Tours. “Its sort of like a different feeling than being rushed on those sidewalks of Manhattan to see something Christmas related whether it’s the windows or the tree.”

Many homes participate in the neighborhood Christmas decorating tradition, but some take it over the top.

The Karounos home sits on 84th Street between 11th and 12th Avenue in the heart of the neighborhood. Their two family home is decorated with a blow up Santa, nativity scene, and the words Merry Christmas written in green and red. The family has been living in the neighborhood for seven years. They had different decorations two years ago that fell apart, so they switched it up by adding the inflatable decorations.

“It’s always been going on and my Dad and us eventually did it too,” said Elias Karounos, 13. “We love it, we help decorate, and it’s really fun. Everyone comes down the block and it’s all happy.”

Two doors down from the Karounos’ lives the woman who is believed to have started the whole tradition in the area, Lucy Spata. During the tour Christianson, told the story of Spata and how she moved to Dyker Heights in 1986 and began her Christmas tradition by putting up 40 angels in honor of her mother.

Christianson said many neighbors complained about Spata’s bright decorations and wanted her to take them down, but she would just say to them, ‘If you don’t like them well then move.”

No one moved and Spata, in spite, began putting up even more decorations, Christianson said. Eventually more neighbors started putting up decorations and created competition.

“Someone started with one Santa then somebody came out with Santa and reindeers then the other came out with Santa, reindeers, and frosty,” said Joe Igneri, 62, of Dyker Heights.

Today Spata’s home is completely covered, head to toe with Santa’s, angels, bright colored lights, toy soldiers, and snowmen. It is so bright it takes a minute for onlooker’s eyes to adjust. There is a gentleman’s agreement and the lights go off at 1 a.m. so neighbors can sleep.

Lucy Spata’s home in Dyker Heights, is completely covered in Christmas decorations. Spata started the Christmas tradition in the neighborhood in 1986 with just 40 angels. Photo by Jennifer Cohen

“She does this for joy, she’s done this all her life,” said Joe Spatola, a friend of Spata who helps her decorate. “Even if nobody came she would still do it.”

It takes a lot of time to turn Dyker Heights into Christmas Town.

“I spent $5500 on my decorations,” said Angelo Branciforte.

Branciforte hired B&R Christmas Decorators. The company has worked on over 80 homes in the area already this season and it takes them around 30 hours to finish a large home.

Angelo Branciforte’s home in Dyker Heights was decorated by B & R Christmas Decorators for $5500. Photo by Jennifer Cohen

Some of the homes in the area are worth millions of dollars and tourists love to gawk at the Christmas bling.

“We were reading on the Internet and saw the lights,” said Laura Romera, of Madrid, Spain. “It’s very different and it’s very nice too.”

Some neighbors like the tours.

“It brings a little satisfaction to them when they see that people come to the neighborhood,” said Tony Muia, owner of A Slice of Brooklyn Bus Tours.

But others find it chaotic.

“Just talking about the lights, we really like that people come, but sometimes it’s just really hectic,” said Noel Girgenti, 22. “You get the attention but then you have to deal with it, to pull out of the driveway is the hardest part.”

The Girgenti’s put up their decorations on their home by themselves compared to other houses in the neighborhood. Photo by Jennifer Cohen

The Girgenti family, who have lived in the area for 50 years, do their own decorating. They have seen more and more people venture to Dyker Heights each December. But as more people come there is more traffic and parking spaces have been taken away for home owners and replaced by tour buses at night.

But not all the homeowners fill the need to join the display.

“My wife and I she feels like inside is better than outside,” said Igneri. “I’m not here to show off or anything. It’s a more personal thing than a more elaborate thing.”

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College March Empowers First Generation Students from Pavement Pieces on Vimeo.

Every year, on the second Friday in December, high school seniors from across the country march their application materials through their communities to a local post office or mail truck. The College March began in 2011 at NYC Outward Bound’s network school, the Washington Heights Expeditionary Learning School (WHEELS). In one year, participation spread throughout the network and continues to grow annually. It is a day that allows students to enthusiastically approach the college application process, rather than feel intimidated.

This year, over 2,700 seniors will march at 35 schools across 12 cities.

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The snow has fallen, the Christmas trees have gone up, and the lights have been strung. The Holiday season is here. New York City is known for going out all out with decorations. It is also known for being home to over 62,000 homeless people, for whom the holidays may have a different tone. For those who call the streets their home, the holidays may be a reminder of the things they don’t have like a Christmas tree, someone to celebrate with or even being able to be inside for a week.

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