ATHENS, Greece (JTA) — A memorial to the 13,000 Greek Jewish children murdered in the Holocaust was desecrated with Nazi images.
The memorial, which sits next to a playground erected in the children’s memory in central Athens, was defaced earlier this month with a Nazi swastika and Nazi SS signs, according to the Jewish Community of Athens.
“All that [the vandals] manage to do is unite us together against fascism, racism and intolerance,” the community said in a statement issued Sunday.
There have been several instances of vandalism over the last year in Jewish cemeteries and Holocaust memorials in Greece.
A recent Anti-Defamation League survey showed that Greece has Europe’s highest rate of anti-Semitic attitudes, with 69 percent of Greeks espousing anti-Semitic views. That is nearly twice the rate of the next highest country, France, with 37 percent.
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