(JTA) — A Jewish teacher from Paris told police that three men assaulted and cursed him in Arabic before drawing a swastika on his chest.
The attack in northern Paris occurred on Thursday night, according to a report by the Drancy-based Bureau for National Vigilance Against Anti-Semitism, a watchdog group known as BNVCA.
“They pressed him to the wall and hit his face, around the eyes and on his chest,” the report said, noting that the blows broke the victim’s nose.
“One of the perpetrators opened the victim’s shirt and with a black marker drew a swastika on the man’s bare chest,” BNVCA President Sammy Ghozlan wrote in the BNVCA report.
The victim, who was wearing a kippah, was identified as K. Richard. He was treated for a broken nose and lacerations on his face.
He told police that the three men who attacked him appeared to be of North African descent and were in their 20s. They cornered him as he was exiting a kosher restaurant on Manin Street, near the Gare du Nord train station, he said.
They shouted “death to the Jews” and called him “dirty Jew” in French, and also shouted insults in Arabic that Richard did not understand, the BNVCA report said.
Richard’s cries for help drew the attention of a passer-by. The perpetrators fled as he approached, the report read.
BNVCA has recorded a spate of anti-Semitic incidents in France in recent weeks.
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