Four Israeli Synagogues Vandalized
Four synagogues in the northern Israeli town of Safed have been vandalized, with assailants spray painting "death to Jews" on the structures, Israeli police told Agence France Presse on Wednesday.
The incident came after an attack last week on an Arab-Israeli mosque, and police said they were looking at whether Tuesday night's incident was a revenge attack.
"Israeli police launched an investigation, and are looking into last night's incident," police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said, adding a vehicle was also vandalized.
He said no arrests had been made yet, but that police were examining the possibility that the attack was retribution for an October 3 attack on a mosque in the Bedouin town of Tuba Zangaria.
In that incident, attackers set fire to the mosque, causing significant damage including to holy books, and scrawled both "tag" and "revenge" on the mosque walls.
Police said that attack appeared to be a so-called "price tag" attack, the name given to acts of vengeance by extremist Jews against Palestinians or Arabs.
Two Jewish suspects have been arrested on suspicion of involvement.
Tuba Zangaria lies seven kilometers (four miles) from Safed, a town which hit the headlines last year after its rabbi called on Jews to avoid renting or selling their property to Arabs.
The incidents come after a spate of attacks targeting Arab and Palestinian property.
On Saturday, Jaffa residents discovered 26 graves had been daubed with anti-Arab graffiti reading "Death to Arabs" and "price tag" -- 22 of them in a Muslim cemetery and four in a nearby Christian burial site.
On Monday in Bat Yam, just south of Jaffa, the words: "Death to Arabs" and "Rabbi (Meir) Kahane was right" were daubed on the walls of two residential building, referring to a far-right activist who routinely called for Arabs to be expelled from Israel.
Vandals also scrawled "Maccabi Haifa does not want Arabs on the team," referring to a popular Israeli football team and fuelling suspicions that football hooligans could be behind the incident.
Source: Agence France Presse
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