Plaque on a building in Belfast marking the spot where Chaim Herzog, a president of Israel, was born. (photo credit: Wikimedia Commons CC A 3.0/Keresaspa)
A marker commemorating the Belfast birthplace of the late Israeli president Chaim Herzog was removed following several anti-Semitic attacks.
The blue plaque honoring Herzog, Israel’s president from 1983 to 1993, was taken down in the Irish capital out of concern for the safety of those living nearby, the Belfast Telegraph reported.
“Attacks have included the scrawling of anti-Israeli graffiti on the building and items being thrown at the plaque and the house,” Brian Kingston, a local official, told the Telegraph.
“Recently some youths were stopped in the process of trying to remove the plaque with a crowbar.”
Chaim Herzog, Israel’s sixth president, was born and raised in Dublin. (Photo credit: Ilan Arbel via Wikipedia)
The removal of the plaque, which was mounted in 1998, came a month after a north Belfast synagogue was vandalized.
Get The Times of Israel's Daily Editionby email and never miss our top stories
Born in 1918, Herzog immigrated to British Mandate Palestine in 1935 and served in the Haganah, later fighting in Israel’s War of Independence.
He also fought in the British army during Word War II.
Before being elected president, he served as Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations and as a Knesset member.
Advertisement
He died in 1997.
Discover Israel's most beloved poet
She died more than four decades ago, but Leah Goldberg remains a magnetic and enigmatic figure: Israel’s most beloved poet, a powerful woman who lived with her mother and never married, who reinvented herself from the ashes of World War I through her magical writing.
You can screen 'The Five Houses of Leah Goldberg' June 4-11. Join The Times of Israel Community today to support our work and watch this and other outstanding documentary films in our DocuNation series.
We’re really pleased that you’ve read X Times of Israel articles in the past month.
That’s why we started the Times of Israel - to provide discerning readers like you with must-read coverage of Israel and the Jewish world.
So now we have a request. Unlike other news outlets, we haven’t put up a paywall. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community.
For as little as $6 a month you can help support our quality journalism while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.
Thank you, David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel
