3 Jewish Headstones Vandalized in New Zealand Cemetery
Three headstones were vandalized in the Jewish section of a cemetery in Dunedin, New Zealand.
A swastika was painted on one headstone and two others were broken, the Otago Daily Times reported. The vandalism was reported to police on Saturday.
“I would prefer to think that it wasn’t [a racially motivated attack], and that it was just a childish act … but it is a fairly nasty incident,” police constable Greg Marsden told the newspaper.
Dunedin is the second largest city on the South Island of New Zealand with a population of over 124,000.
On Sunday, several hundred gravestones were vandalized in a Jewish cemetery in northeastern France and swastikas were drawn on the entrance to a Jewish cemetery in Oldenburg, Germany.
“We find this type of vandalism not only to be ignorant and stupid, but also state that the underlying menace behind it is disturbing and worrying,” said Andrew Spiegel, a member of the Dunedin Jewish Congregation.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
