A swastika defacing a grave in northeastern Poland is the third such desecration in the area this year.
The swastika in Suwalki was discovered last week in the town’s Jewish cemetery.
“We notified the prosecutor’s office, and the local authorities are not dealing with it since the cemetery just last month came under the ownership of the Jewish community in Poland,” Monika Krawczyk of the Foundation for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage in Poland told JTA. “We are not going to clean it up since it testifies to attitudes of some local residents today.”
Earlier this year in Augustow and Bialystok, swastikas and the expression “Jude Raus,” meaning “Jews Out” in German, were found on gravestones in Jewish cemeteries.
Krawczyk added, however, that she was hopeful as thousands of non-Jewish Polish students had recently participated in cleaning up cemeteries across Poland.
