Anti-Semitic graffiti found daubed throughout North London neighborhoods

Police say incident being treated as a hate crime; Board of Deputies of British Jews calls the vandalism ‘a reminder that anti-Semitism is still with us’

By ToI Staff 29 December 2019, 3:20 pm Edit
Anti-Semitic graffiti in the Hampstead neighborhood of northwest London, photographed on December 29, 2019. (Twitter screen capture)
Anti-Semitic graffiti in the Hampstead neighborhood of northwest London, photographed on December 29, 2019. (Twitter screen capture)

London police are investigating a rash of anti-Semitic graffiti found Sunday in the city’s Hampstead and Belsize Park neighborhoods.

The graffiti included Jewish stars of David and “911,” a reference to a conspiracy theory popular among anti-Semites that a Jewish conspiracy perpetrated the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.

The sites bearing the graffiti include a synagogue and a former Israeli style restaurant, according to Jewish groups and local news media, but other locations included craft shops and fashion stores, with no immediately discernible pattern.

Both Hampstead and Belsize Park are in areas of Northwest London where many Jews live.

“This is a reminder that antisemitism is still with us,” the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the community’s umbrella body, said in a post on Twitter.

“We hope action is taken to find & punish the perpetrators. Let’s all work to defeat antisemitism in 2020!”

There were no arrests reported as of Sunday afternoon, but London police said they were investigating the vandalism as “a racially motivated hate crime.”

Anti-Semitic graffiti in the Hampstead neighborhood of northwest London, photographed on December 29, 2019. (Twitter screen capture)

A local politician, Hampstead Councillor Oliver Cooper, was among the residents tweeting photos of the graffiti rampage in the area.

“We must move heaven and earth to eradicate this racist hatred, which was unimaginable just a few years ago,” Cooper said.

Workers were seen cleaning the vandalized store windows and bus stops on Sunday morning.

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