Denmark: Over 80 graves vandalized in Jewish cemetery, say police

Over 80 graves were vandalized at a Jewish cemetery in the western Danish town of Randers, police said on November 10. The gravestones were daubed with green graffiti and some were overturned at the Ostre Kirkegard cemetery, according to a police statement. There were no words or symbols written on them added police spokesman Bo Christensen to a local news agency. A complaint has been registered by the Police following the incident.

Read: France Reopens Contested Jewish Tomb In East Jerusalem

PM Mette Frederiksen condemned the attack

In a Facebook message, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, said, "Anti-Semitism and racism have no place in our society. And this weekend's attack on a Jewish cemetery in Randers is both an attack on Danish Jews and all the rest of us. I am sorry to think about what it must be like to see the last resting place of your loved ones exposed to such vile vandalism. Like it is highly uncomfortable that a star of David is put on the mailbox of a Danish-Jewish family in Silkeborg. We must condemn it, and the authorities must do whatever they can to solve these crimes. Next year is the 75th year of the end of both the war and the Holocaust. It is a time that we must never forget, even though there are fewer and fewer witnesses left among us. Our Jewish fellow citizens must be respected. Don't live in fear. Not in their homes. Not when they walk on the street".

Read: FBI: Man Who Spoke Of Hating Jews Held In Temple Bomb Plot

Attacks on anniversary of 1938 Kristallnacht anti-Jewish attacks 

Members of the Jewish community said that there were many other antisemitic attacks in Denmark over the weekend including a Star of David painted onto the letterbox of a family in the western town of Silkeborg. A Jewish leader from the community said that the attacks were proof that the state of mind that led to the Holocaust still exists in 2019. The vandalized attacks fall on the anniversary of the 1938 Kristallnacht anti-Jewish attacks in Nazi Germany. The targeted cemetery was constructed in the early 19th century when the town's 200-strong Jewish community was Denmark's largest outside the capital Copenhagen, which is today home to most of the country's 6,000 Jews. 

Read: Israeli Jewish Man Gets Convicted In Duma Village Arson Attack

Several attacks on Jews in Denmark

Earlier in 2015, Copenhagen's Great Synagogue was targeted in a shooting that killed a security officer after an earlier attack on a conference on freedom of expression also left one person dead. A 22-year-old perpetrator named Omar El-Hussein who is a Danish citizen of Palestinian origin led to the twin attacks which also injured 5 police officials. Similar attacks were also registered in 2017 and 2018 in the country. In another part of the world in Nebraska, 75 headstones have been toppled and more than $50,000 in damage caused at a Jewish cemetery in Omaha on November 8, 2019.

Read: Germany Reassures The Concerns Of Jews After Attack On A Holy Day