The man suspected of a knife attack at a New York rabbi’s home on Saturday night made references to Jews and antisemitism in journals found at his home.

Federal prosecutors have now filed hate crime charges against Grafton Thomas in addition to earlier charges of attempted murder and burglary.

Five people were wounded during the incident in Monsey, a village with a large Jewish population around 55 kilometres northwest of New York City. One of the five victims remains critically ill.

The filing says the journals included references to Adolf Hitler and “Nazi Culture” on the same page as drawings of the Star of David and a Swastika, as well as comments such as “why ppl [people] mourned for anti-Semitism when there is Semitic genocide”.

He also stated that “Hebrew Israelites” took from the “powerful ppl [people] (ebinoid Israelites)”.

The documents state ‘ebinoid Israelites’ is a reference to the Black Hebrew Movement.

It says Mr Thomas used his phone to search “why did Hitler hate the Jews” on four separate occasions in November and December this year.

He also searched for “German Jewish Temples near me”, “Zionist Temples in Elizabeth NJ”, “Zionist Temples of Staten Island” and “prominent companies founded by Jews in America”.

Mr Thomas’s lawyer Michael Sussman told a press conference on Monday: “We were able this morning to... review scores of papers which frankly show the ramblings of a disturbed individual, but there is no suggestion in any of those ramblings... of an anti-Semitic motive.”