FadeTheButcher
07-19-2004, 05:43 AM
http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,10179286%255E2761,00.html
RACIST graffiti sprayed across a Perth synagogue had devastated the city's Jewish community, a rabbi said yesterday.
Graffiti was daubed across the Hebrew Congregation Jewish synagogue and a suburban police station and medical offices.
The sites were also plastered with posters promoting the right-wing extremist group, the Australian Nationalist Movement, once headed by well-known neo-Nazi Jack van Tongeren.
Police said there was no proof the movement was responsible for yesterday's attacks. However, there was little doubt the attacks were carried out by the same person or group.
"They were anti-Jewish, anti-African, anti-everything, and everywhere that was hit was attacked with a similar nature," a police spokesman said.
"They appear to be linked by the style of graffiti, the paint used, the posters that were glued onto the windows of the places that have been targeted."
The chief rabbi at the Hebrew Congregation Jewish church in Menora said members of the Jewish community had been deeply upset by the attacks.
"Many relations of holocaust survivors were subjected to seeing it and it had a terrible effect on them," Rabbi David Freilich (Freilich) said.
He said he had promoted a message of tolerance at his weekend services.
"My general reaction was obviously disappointment and bewilderment at how anyone could do such a thing because it is so un-Australian," Rabbi Freilich said.
"But I told the community that we should not and cannot let this affect our faith."
He estimated a few hundred people saw the graffiti and posters before they were examined by police and then removed by local government authorities.
"It is so unfortunate that there are some malevolent crackpots out there that would want to do this because they obviously have no humanity or respect for other people," the rabbi said.
"I do not think that any sort of racial attack, whether it is against our community, Asians, Muslims or any other race, is tolerable."
Police have stressed there is no proof of Australian Nationalist Movement involvement, despite the posters found at the sites.
In the 1980s, members of the movement carried out firebomb attacks on Chinese restaurants in Perth. Mr van Tongeren, at the time a leader of the group, was jailed for the arson attacks. Since his release from prison in 2002, after serving 12 years of an 18-year term, he has been associated with a new group, the Australian Nationalist Workers Union.
RACIST graffiti sprayed across a Perth synagogue had devastated the city's Jewish community, a rabbi said yesterday.
Graffiti was daubed across the Hebrew Congregation Jewish synagogue and a suburban police station and medical offices.
The sites were also plastered with posters promoting the right-wing extremist group, the Australian Nationalist Movement, once headed by well-known neo-Nazi Jack van Tongeren.
Police said there was no proof the movement was responsible for yesterday's attacks. However, there was little doubt the attacks were carried out by the same person or group.
"They were anti-Jewish, anti-African, anti-everything, and everywhere that was hit was attacked with a similar nature," a police spokesman said.
"They appear to be linked by the style of graffiti, the paint used, the posters that were glued onto the windows of the places that have been targeted."
The chief rabbi at the Hebrew Congregation Jewish church in Menora said members of the Jewish community had been deeply upset by the attacks.
"Many relations of holocaust survivors were subjected to seeing it and it had a terrible effect on them," Rabbi David Freilich (Freilich) said.
He said he had promoted a message of tolerance at his weekend services.
"My general reaction was obviously disappointment and bewilderment at how anyone could do such a thing because it is so un-Australian," Rabbi Freilich said.
"But I told the community that we should not and cannot let this affect our faith."
He estimated a few hundred people saw the graffiti and posters before they were examined by police and then removed by local government authorities.
"It is so unfortunate that there are some malevolent crackpots out there that would want to do this because they obviously have no humanity or respect for other people," the rabbi said.
"I do not think that any sort of racial attack, whether it is against our community, Asians, Muslims or any other race, is tolerable."
Police have stressed there is no proof of Australian Nationalist Movement involvement, despite the posters found at the sites.
In the 1980s, members of the movement carried out firebomb attacks on Chinese restaurants in Perth. Mr van Tongeren, at the time a leader of the group, was jailed for the arson attacks. Since his release from prison in 2002, after serving 12 years of an 18-year term, he has been associated with a new group, the Australian Nationalist Workers Union.