Dozens of graves at a Protestant cemetery in Jerusalem have been vandalized, local Christian leaders said on Wednesday, expressing their “dismay”. Israeli police said they have opened an investigation.
Overturned crosses and damaged graves have been discovered in the Mount Zion Protestant Cemetery, adjacent to the Old City of Jerusalem and where Jesus ate his last meal with the apostles according to Christian tradition.
“We discovered more than 30 broken tombstones and crosses,” said Hossam Naoum, an Anglican bishop in Jerusalem.
An act of vandalism filmed
CCTV footage posted on social media and local media shows two men dressed in traditional Orthodox Jewish attire throwing stones and tearing down memorials.
“These criminal acts were motivated by intolerance and anti-Christian hatred,” the Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem said in a statement, also citing surveillance footage.
“We are not only shocked but also very saddened,” Hossam Naoum said, adding that the cemetery dates from the mid-19th century and includes the graves of various clergymen, scientists and politicians. Some of them “are very important people who have contributed to the history of Jerusalem and the lives of the people here,” he added.
“An Affront to Religion”
Israel’s Foreign Ministry said on Twitter that “this immoral act is an affront to religion.”
Mount Zion, site of the Last Supper according to Christian tradition, is also important to Jews who believe King David is buried there.
In December 2021, Jerusalem Church leaders claimed that Christians had “become the target of repeated attacks by radical and fringe groups” in Jerusalem and elsewhere in the Holy Land. They had denounced the inaction of the authorities, accusations that Israeli diplomacy later considered “unfounded”.
Source: BFM TV
