A Holocaust memorial in Warsaw, honoring the over 300,000 victims sent to the Nazis’ Treblinka extermination camp, has been defaced with graffiti comparing the Holocaust to the ongoing war in Gaza, The New York Post reported Tuesday.
The defacement occurred at the Umschlagplatz monument, marking the latest in a series of attacks on Holocaust memorials in the Polish capital.
Local media outlet TVN 24 reported that red graffiti reading “Warsaw 1943 = Gaza 2025” was found sprayed on the walls of the memorial last week.
The Umschlagplatz is located along the former railway line used by the Nazis from 1942 to 1943 to deport Jews and others from the Warsaw Ghetto to Treblinka. Today, the site serves as a solemn tribute to Holocaust victims, with the names of those forcibly taken from the ghetto inscribed on its walls.
Yacov Livne, Israel’s ambassador to Poland, denounced the vandalism in a post on X.
“Shameful vandalism at Warsaw’s memorial for 300,000 (!) Jews deported to Treblinka. Poland has a special responsibility to protect Jewish & Holocaust sites,” the ambassador wrote.
Warsaw police stated they were alerted to the incident on January 3 but no arrests have been made so far.
The vandalism at the Umschlagplatz is part of a troubling trend since the outbreak of the war in Gaza on October 7, 2023.
In November, vandals desecrated the monument to the heroes of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, located near the Jewish Museum in the Polish capital.
The vandals threw red paint on the monument which symbolizes Jewish heroism during the Holocaust.