Vandalized graves in Victoria
Vandalized graves in VictoriaIsrael news photo: Chek/Globaltv.bc

Desecration of Jewish graves has spread to the capital of British Columbia, Canada, where swastikas were scrawled on gravestones in Victoria’s historic Emanu-El Jewish Cemetery.

Police said the attack is disturbing and that “It seems like it’s more of a targeted thing, where it’s placed and what’s said,” Victoria police officer Mike Russell told the city’s Time-Colonist newspaper.

“We’re really appealing to the public for any information they may have” because there were no videos of the vandalism, he added. He said that the vandalism was reported Saturday night and occurred the same day because a caretaker had been there a day before.

Rabbi Harry Brechner wrote an open letter calling on the vandals to confess and to “come clean the gravesites, and when you are through take a tour with me around the cemetery and meet some of the people who lived through Nazism.”

Both the cemetery and the Emanu-El synagogue date back to the 1860s, and the cemetery is the oldest Jewish burial ground in western Canada. The synagogue is Canada’s oldest Jewish house of worship in continuous use, according to the Victoria newspaper.