France – Five teens accused of vandalizing a Jewish cemetery faced preliminary charges Wednesday after the prosecutor said an “anti-Semitic motive” in the destruction seemed clear.
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Prosecutor Philippe Vannier described the group as having been overcome by a sort of “collective frenzy” when they desecrated about 250 graves and a Holocaust memorial at the cemetery in Sarre-Union, in France’s Alsace region. He said they called out anti-Semitic epithets and proffered Nazi salutes during the incident.
Vannier said all had admitted a role in the destruction, discovered Sunday, and recommended preliminary charges against them.
The vandalism comes amid deep unease among French Jews after the deadly attacks last month on a kosher market in Paris and last week at a synagogue in Copenhagen. Many have heeded Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s call for a mass immigration, and France’s president vowed at Sarre-Union to protect the community and all who feel under threat because of their religious or ethnic identity.
Following the desecration at Sarre-Union, two other French cemeteries — neither of them Jewish — were also vandalized to a far lesser extent. France’s Interior Ministry said crucifixes were overturned and gravesites disturbed in Tracy-sur-Mer, a tiny town next to the D-Day landing beaches, and in Saint-Beat, in southwest France. Swastikas were found in two other widely separated towns, the ministry said Wednesday.
There have been no arrests in the other cases.
Lock up these little french punks for a long time.