(JTA) — Some 19 swastikas were spray painted on the walls of a Jewish Community Center in Virginia.
The vandalism was discovered on Saturday morning at the Jewish Community Center of Northern Virginia, in Fairfax, Va. Surveillance video shows a man wearing dark clothes spraying the building at about 4:30 a.m., Fairfax police told the Washington Post.
“As many of us recognize, these acts do not represent the community around the J or the community in Northern Virginia,” Fairfax JCC Executive Director Jeff Dannick and JCC Board President David Yaffe, said in a statement.
“The J as a whole, and particularly through the focused efforts of our Committee for a Just and Caring Community, will continue to participate as a positive force in both the Jewish and wider communities,” they also said.
It is the second suspected hate crime against the Fairfax JCC in the last 18 months. In April 2017 “Hitler was right,” swastikas and the SS symbol were found spray-painted on the exterior of the JCC building. A nearby church also was vandalized. Dylan M. Mahone, 20, was arrested and charged with hate-related offenses in the incident.
Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Virginia, said in a tweet showing a photo of the vandalized JCC that “An insidious rise in hateful actions and anti-Semitism is happening in Virginia and across the country. We must meet it with fierce condemnation and an over-abundance of love and unity. We cannot allow hate to fester.”
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