WESTHOFFEN, France — The French government is creating a national anti-hate crime office, following the discovery of anti-Semitic graffiti at a Jewish cemetery in eastern France.
Interior Minister Christophe Castaner makes the announcement today in the town of Westhoffen, where vandals scrawled swastikas and other anti-Semitic inscriptions on 107 tombs yesterday.
Speaking alongside Jewish leaders, Castaner condemns the graffiti as a sign that “hate is on our national territory.”
“We must respect the right to believe,” he says.
A special police unit has begun investigating the incident, Castaner says, and the new national office will seek to fight hate crimes.
The graffiti marked the latest in a string of anti-Semitic acts in the Bas-Rhin region. Anti-Semitic graffiti was also discovered yesterday in the eastern French village of Schaffhouse-sur-Zorn, authorities say.
— AP
French Interior Minister Christophe Castaner, center, followed by Strasbourg chief Rabbi Harold Abraham Weill, second right, walk amid vandalized tombs in the Jewish cemetery of Westhoffen, west of the city of Strasbourg, eastern France, December 4, 2019. (AP Photo/Jean-Francois Badias)
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