A pro-Israel group behind a public transit advertisement that refers to Muslims killing Jews plans to sue the Metropolitan Transportation Authority after the agency rejected the ad. The authority said the ad would be seen as a call to violence against Jews amid turmoil in the Middle East and security concerns in New York.

The group, the American Freedom Defense Initiative, proposed an ad that included the quote, “Killing Jews is Worship that draws us close to Allah,” attributed to “Hamas MTV.” The ad, which pictures a man wearing a kaffiyeh wrapped around his face, also says: “That’s his Jihad. What’s yours?”

In a statement issued on Friday, the authority said that the ad violated its “viewpoint-neutral” advertising standards. The agency said it was “reasonably foreseeable” that displaying the ad on the back of city buses “would imminently incite or provoke violence or other immediate breach of the peace, and so harm, disrupt or interfere with safe, efficient and orderly transportation operations.”

The statement said the authority did not decide whether to allow an ad to run based on viewpoint, or whether the viewpoint might be controversial — a change made after the American Freedom Defense Initiative successfully sued the transit agency three years ago when another ad was rejected.