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Jewish graves vandalised in Maitland
February 3, 2023 by Henry Benjamin
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Ten gravestones in the Jewish cemetery in the NSW town of Maitland have been daubed with swastikas and splashed with white paint.
Swastika stencilled on a Jewish grave in Maitland Photo: Courtesy ABC Newcastle/Bridget Murphy
ABC News in Newcastle reported that police said that stencil was used in daubing the headstones, which was discovered on Tuesday.
The cemetery was established in 1846 and ceased operations in 1940. There was a burial carried out in around twenty years ago.
The NSW Jewish Board of Deputies CEO Darren Bark told J-Wire: “Vandalised Jewish gravestones were occurrences we witnessed in the Nazi era. To see these vile displays on headstones and commemorations of loved ones that have passed is deeply distressing and concerning.
White cleaning substance is being used to help remove the daubing at Maitland Cemetery. Photo: ABC Newcastle: Bridget Murphy)
“There is no place in our society for this terrible symbol. It is our collective responsibility to speak up against and call out this hate, wherever it appears.
“Those that commit such cowardly acts should expect the full force of the law to come down on them.”
Rabbi Yossi Rodal, spiritual leader of the Newcastle Synagogue, told us: “I have visited the cemetery, and it was an emotional and surreal experience. It’s surrounded by paddocks on all four sides. Peaceful. Quiet. Horses grazing. Maitland is only half an hour from Newcastle.
It’s very disturbing, obviously, but we would like to turn it from being from playing the victim into something positive .. We want to reach out to the people who did it. We want to invite them to get educated. And as a community, we’ve had a lot of bonding together because of this.
We’re planning on going together to clean up the graves together as a community. We want to fight darkness with light.”
Graffiti at the Newcastle Synagogue
Rabbi Rodal said that there had been a daubing on the outside wall of the synagogue a month ago. He said: “We thought it was strangely funny. It said, ‘The goyim know. Oy vey’.”
The NSW Police stated: “Investigators are appealing for information after ten headstones were vandalised in a suspected hate crime.Officers from Port Stephens-Hunter Police District were called to a cemetery on Louth Park Road, South Maitland, last Tuesday (31 January 2023), and found 10 headstones had been spray-painted with a Nazi symbol.
A crime scene was established with a number of items seized. They will be forensically examined.”
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Leah Abadee was the last Jewish person buried in Maitland Cemetery in July 2010.
All her relatives are buried at Rookwood.