A 51-year-old man stabbed two people in broad daylight in the vicinity of Central Park on Manhattan’s Upper West Side on Thursday afternoon before being taken into custody, the police said.

The assailant, identified as Raul Morales, attacked the two men in separate incidents on Central Park West and Amsterdam Avenue at around 1:30 p.m., leaving both injured on the street, the police said.

Mr. Morales first walked up to a 57-year-old man on West 84th and Central Park West and stabbed him in the back with a knife, according to a spokesman for the Police Department. He then went to West 86th Street and Amsterdam, the spokesman said, where he approached another man, this time stabbing him in the torso with a screwdriver.

The first victim was identified as Chok Sung, 57, according to a law enforcement official with knowledge of the matter. The second victim was Moshe Yezhak Grunhaus, 50, the official said.

Both men were taken by emergency medical workers to Mount Sinai’s Morningside location, where they are expected to survive, the police said.

It was not immediately clear what led to the midday attack in the heart of the Upper West Side, a wealthy residential neighborhood with low crime rates. But on Thursday, Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said that Mr. Morales had yelled “Allahu Akbar” as he attacked both men, according to accounts from the victims and witnesses.

Ms. Tisch said that the department was evaluating whether the stabbings had been intended as hate crimes and that detectives were still investigating Mr. Morales’s motive. She added that while Mr. Morales did not have a history of mental health issues documented with the Police Department, it appeared that his mental state might have played a role in the attacks.

After the stabbings, Mr. Morales walked to his home on Amsterdam Avenue, according to a second law enforcement official with knowledge of the matter. The man went inside his apartment on the 11th floor, and was later followed by officers in the Emergency Service Unit, who took him into custody.

Ms. Tisch said that a person had led officers to the building.

Marianna Ellenberg, who works as a professor, said she was taking her father to a doctor’s appointment in the neighborhood on Thursday afternoon when she came across the aftermath of the stabbing. As their car turned from 84th Street onto Central Park West, Ms. Ellenberg said looked out the window to see a man “standing still like a statue” with something sticking out his body.

Stella Raine Chu contributed reporting.