MADRID Dec. 6 () –
One person was injured in the early hours of this Friday during what the Australian Police have described as a deliberate fire of a synagogue in a municipality near Melbourne, in the southeast of the country.
The Victoria State Police are searching for the alleged perpetrators, two masked people who were seen by some of the worshipers of the Adass Israel synagogue in Ripponlea, when they threw fuel at the building, before setting it on fire.
Witnesses notified fire crews, who arrived at the scene of the tragedy shortly after 4:00 a.m. (local time) and found the large fire, which injured one person and caused significant damage to the temple. 17 devices and 60 fire department personnel were needed to control the flames.
“There was a knock on a door and liquid was thrown inside, which set it on fire; the few people inside the synagogue ran out the back door, and one of them was burned,” said Benjamin Klein, a member of the board of directors of the damaged synagogue.
Investigators believe this was a deliberate act. “We believe it was intentional. What we don’t know is why, and we will get to the why,” said Police Inspector Chris Murray in statements reported by ABC News.
When confronted by a member of the community, Murray assured that the Police are taking the incident seriously and will increase patrols in the area.
“All I can say is that we are going to come out, we are going to be visible and we are going to investigate this with all the resources we can commit,” he declared.
For his part, the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, has issued a statement expressing his dismay and condemning the fire that was “clearly aimed at creating fear in the” Jewish community.
“This is clearly an act of anti-Semitism. It is an attack on a place of worship, so by definition it is an act of hate. This is an outrage. Violence, intimidation and the destruction of a place of worship is something we should never see in Australia,” he said.
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