Two swastikas were discovered spray-painted on buildings in a Paris suburb that once housed a World War II transit camp for approximately 63,000 Jews deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau, reported France24.
The Drancy internment camp served as the primary departure point for Jewish deportees from France to Nazi death camps between August 1941 and August 1944.
The two swastikas were painted on two different buildings. One measured a few centimeters across, while the other was nearly one meter in diameter, according to France24.
The swastikas were first spotted by a candidate in the upcoming municipal elections during his campaign on Wednesday. He promptly notified memorial associations of the vandalism.
Three local Communist Party lawmakers have filed a report with judicial authorities regarding the incident.
A memorial near the housing estate where the swastikas were painted was also vandalized in March 2024.
France is home to Western Europe's largest Jewish population, which is approximately half a million people, along with a significant Muslim community.
Members of France's Jewish community have reported a sharp rise in antisemitic acts following the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and Israel's military response.
Just this week, an elderly Jewish woman living in Paris’s 19th arrondissement was the target of antisemitic abuse by political activists during a leaflet distribution campaign ahead of the upcoming Paris mayoral elections.
Just two days prior, the façade of the Cocorico restaurant in the 17th arrondissement was vandalized with acid thrown across the floor and into the dining areas, causing extensive damage to dishes and furniture.
Earlier this month, three Jewish men were accosted by an individual armed with a knife in a suspected antisemitic incident near the Trocadéro, located across the Seine from the Eiffel Tower in Paris’s 16th arrondissement.
A week prior, a Jewish primary school in eastern Paris was vandalized when its windows were smashed and a CCTV camera was torn off.