FadeTheButcher
08-07-2004, 10:37 PM
Honestly, this smells so much like a hoax. The same sort of incidents have been getting a lot of press in France and Australia at the moment.
http://www.fpp.co.uk/online/04/08/NZ_bigots_070804.html
PARLIAMENT is to be asked to formally condemn anti-Semitism following a second attack on a Jewish cemetery in Wellington.
A prayer house was set alight at Makara Cemetery and about 100 graves were desecrated.
Ethnic Affairs Minister Chris Carter says Australian federal and state parliaments have condemned anti-Semitism and New Zealand should too.
He says it is important for the Jewish community that Parliament sends out a message that they and all other New Zealanders should feel safe to practise their religion and culture.
Chris Carter says it would be an important public gesture from New Zealand's leaders.
One relative told the Herald how she felt after yesterday's attack.
Deborah Hart (picture below) said she was "very sad, really, really sad and then angry" after seeing her father's gravestone among the 95 pushed over in an attack in the Jewish section of the cemetery.
Ms Hart said the attack on the cemetery by vandals who also set fire to a prayer house and daubed a swastika on its wall was senseless.
It is the second time in three weeks that Jewish gravestones have been desecrated in a Wellington cemetery. The attack has been condemned by community leaders and politicians, and received coverage in internet news sites around the world.
Ms Hart is the daughter of photographer Ronald Woolf, who died at the age of 58 in a 1987 helicopter crash.
"He was a wonderful man. All he did in his lifetime was bring beauty to the world and I just thought he did not deserve that," said Ms Hart.
"And then I looked around and there were many other people's gravestones that I knew and none of them deserved it. They were good people."
New Zealand's Jewish community is horrified at the attack.
And the police officer leading the investigation says catching the offenders is the number one priority for the city's police this weekend.
Detective Sergeant Tim Leitch said it was likely the destruction was a "hate crime".
"It's an appalling crime. It's disturbed a great number of people," he said.
"I saw person after person arriving to check that their grandfather, father, mother, brother, their gravestone was not damaged."
Eighty-five-year-old Rae Regan, whose husband Robert is buried at the cemetery, said she was losing faith in New Zealand.
Although relieved her husband's gravestone was not attacked, she felt devastated by what occurred.
"I've lost such a lot of faith in this country that we came to. I still think it's wonderful but what's happening? I really am at a loss. "I never thought it was that bad ever but it certainly seems to be growing now ... I really can't face anybody today. I'm at a loss for words."
Members of Wellington's Jewish community are considering offering a reward for information on who was behind the attack.
It was discovered about 4am by a newspaper delivery worker who saw the fire.
Acting Prime Minister Michael Cullen said it was "ugly and unforgiveable" racism and particularly concerning after the attack three weeks ago on 16 Jewish headstones in the central city Bolton St Cemetery.
The city council said it would increase security patrols. Mayor Kerry Prendergast said attacking the dead was "cowardly and contemptible".
Jewish Council chairman David Zwartz (left) visited the cemetery yesterday morning. He said most of the 95 headstones were on the graves of people he had known.
"I just felt tremendously sad because it reminded me of the whole history of Jewish people and the attacks on them in so many countries. "So little seems to have been done to change the attitudes that the Jews are here to be killed, but I don't think it is a general attitude in New Zealand society."
Mr Zwartz said the fact there had been two attacks in the same region in a short space of time suggested it was more sinister than drunken youths on a rampage. When the Bolton St graves were desecrated, he said he thought it was linked to the jailing hours earlier of the suspected Israeli spies Eli Cara and Uriel Kelman for passport fraud and Prime Minister Helen Clark's criticism of Israel's refusal to apologise.
"I think it's a continuation of the same thing," he said yesterday, "possibly also linked with the extra talk about the proposed visit of David Irving, who's a notable anti-Jewish speaker."
The Wellington City Council has increased security at Makara and the Karori cemetery, which has even more Jewish graves.
In Auckland, a spokesman for Waikumete Cemetery said last night that security had been increased in the graveyard's Jewish section following the latest attack.
Mr Leitch said he would be reviewing the earlier grave desecration. "We can't discount a link," Mr Leitch said, but it was possibly a copycat crime.
He said he would also talk to colleagues investigating the June attacks. - HERALD STAFF and NEWSTALK ZB
http://www.fpp.co.uk/online/04/08/NZ_bigots_070804.html
PARLIAMENT is to be asked to formally condemn anti-Semitism following a second attack on a Jewish cemetery in Wellington.
A prayer house was set alight at Makara Cemetery and about 100 graves were desecrated.
Ethnic Affairs Minister Chris Carter says Australian federal and state parliaments have condemned anti-Semitism and New Zealand should too.
He says it is important for the Jewish community that Parliament sends out a message that they and all other New Zealanders should feel safe to practise their religion and culture.
Chris Carter says it would be an important public gesture from New Zealand's leaders.
One relative told the Herald how she felt after yesterday's attack.
Deborah Hart (picture below) said she was "very sad, really, really sad and then angry" after seeing her father's gravestone among the 95 pushed over in an attack in the Jewish section of the cemetery.
Ms Hart said the attack on the cemetery by vandals who also set fire to a prayer house and daubed a swastika on its wall was senseless.
It is the second time in three weeks that Jewish gravestones have been desecrated in a Wellington cemetery. The attack has been condemned by community leaders and politicians, and received coverage in internet news sites around the world.
Ms Hart is the daughter of photographer Ronald Woolf, who died at the age of 58 in a 1987 helicopter crash.
"He was a wonderful man. All he did in his lifetime was bring beauty to the world and I just thought he did not deserve that," said Ms Hart.
"And then I looked around and there were many other people's gravestones that I knew and none of them deserved it. They were good people."
New Zealand's Jewish community is horrified at the attack.
And the police officer leading the investigation says catching the offenders is the number one priority for the city's police this weekend.
Detective Sergeant Tim Leitch said it was likely the destruction was a "hate crime".
"It's an appalling crime. It's disturbed a great number of people," he said.
"I saw person after person arriving to check that their grandfather, father, mother, brother, their gravestone was not damaged."
Eighty-five-year-old Rae Regan, whose husband Robert is buried at the cemetery, said she was losing faith in New Zealand.
Although relieved her husband's gravestone was not attacked, she felt devastated by what occurred.
"I've lost such a lot of faith in this country that we came to. I still think it's wonderful but what's happening? I really am at a loss. "I never thought it was that bad ever but it certainly seems to be growing now ... I really can't face anybody today. I'm at a loss for words."
Members of Wellington's Jewish community are considering offering a reward for information on who was behind the attack.
It was discovered about 4am by a newspaper delivery worker who saw the fire.
Acting Prime Minister Michael Cullen said it was "ugly and unforgiveable" racism and particularly concerning after the attack three weeks ago on 16 Jewish headstones in the central city Bolton St Cemetery.
The city council said it would increase security patrols. Mayor Kerry Prendergast said attacking the dead was "cowardly and contemptible".
Jewish Council chairman David Zwartz (left) visited the cemetery yesterday morning. He said most of the 95 headstones were on the graves of people he had known.
"I just felt tremendously sad because it reminded me of the whole history of Jewish people and the attacks on them in so many countries. "So little seems to have been done to change the attitudes that the Jews are here to be killed, but I don't think it is a general attitude in New Zealand society."
Mr Zwartz said the fact there had been two attacks in the same region in a short space of time suggested it was more sinister than drunken youths on a rampage. When the Bolton St graves were desecrated, he said he thought it was linked to the jailing hours earlier of the suspected Israeli spies Eli Cara and Uriel Kelman for passport fraud and Prime Minister Helen Clark's criticism of Israel's refusal to apologise.
"I think it's a continuation of the same thing," he said yesterday, "possibly also linked with the extra talk about the proposed visit of David Irving, who's a notable anti-Jewish speaker."
The Wellington City Council has increased security at Makara and the Karori cemetery, which has even more Jewish graves.
In Auckland, a spokesman for Waikumete Cemetery said last night that security had been increased in the graveyard's Jewish section following the latest attack.
Mr Leitch said he would be reviewing the earlier grave desecration. "We can't discount a link," Mr Leitch said, but it was possibly a copycat crime.
He said he would also talk to colleagues investigating the June attacks. - HERALD STAFF and NEWSTALK ZB