Vandals on Sunday night broke into a synagogue located in a public bomb shelter on Bat Yam's David Remez Street, throwing a Torah scroll on the floor and stepping on it.
The vandals used electric tools to saw open the Holy Ark, apparently with the knowledge that the noise would not be heard outside, since the synagogue was in a bomb shelter.
The scene was discovered early on Monday morning, by worshipers arriving at the synagogue for prayers. Police were called in, and according to the worshipers, the officers who arrived at the scene displayed indifference and left within a short time, saying that anyone bothered could file a complaint at the police station.
Avichai Shalom, one of the worshipers, said that the vandalism had been nationalist in nature, since, "No Jew would invest so much time in breaking into the Holy Ark only in order to desecrate the Torah scroll."
He added that the synagogue had recently been renovated, and that the workers had been Arab.
"The scene at the synagogue was horrific," he added. "A Torah scroll was thrown on the floor and its leaves of parchment were torn. The additional arks in the synagogue were broken into, but other than the two charity boxes, nothing was stolen."
He noted that the synagogue was located in a bomb shelter in order to render it useful and renovate it for the benefit of the neighborhood residents, who used it often over the course of the war, every time a siren sounded in the city.
The sextons are now waiting for the forensic investigators to arrive at the scene, and said that they will fix up the synagogue and return to holding prayers there.
