Swastika graffiti alarms members of local Jewish community
By Lethbridge Herald on January 7, 2025.
Submitted photo - A swastika was discovered painted in the snow along a city trail earlier this week.Alexandra Noad – LETHBRIDGE HERALD – Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
A pair of painted swastikas that appeared recently on the city’s westside have rattled some members of the local Jewish community.
One resident whose father spent time in a concentration camp during the Second World War, found a swastika painted in the snow on a walk earlier this week. Another was discovered on a post in a westside park.
The woman, who asked not to be identified for fear of reprisal, says she was in disbelief at the sight of the symbol closely associated with Nazism.
“My initial reaction was disbelief because I’m from Holland and the antisemitism is really bad there right now,” she says. “I didn’t think it would reach Lethbridge, but I guess it’s here.”
While it’s unknown who painted the symbols, one member of the larger Lethbridge Jewish community, who also asked for anonymity, believes it may be have been painted by kids. That said, he adds they would have had to learn the hate from somewhere.
“I think this incident might be just kids trying to get attention, but wherever they did, they heard it at home somewhere or from someone.”
He added the act was a “disgusting display” especially given the war ended 80 years ago, and that the Jewish community deserves more respect.
“We’re a proud people,” he says. “We’re proud of what we have given to the world in terms of everything from physics to chemistry to health care.”
The resident who found the swastika in the snow posted on Facebook and received words of support from many other community members showing their disgust for the symbol.
While the swastika found in the snow was destroyed, the other one was later painted over as a flower with the saying “Love conquers hate.”
12-11
No surprise since anti-semitism is at an all time high in Canada, with people burning Canadian flags calling for genocide of the Jews and Canadians who are funding by terrorist organizations, and even CUPE leadership back east applauding the rape, dismemberment, and burning of civilian men, women and children/babies in the Oct. 7th attack on Israel, no surprise.
Terrorist and criminal code violations were never acted on and the hate continued to grow! Some of the terrorist groups now have found new recruits on post secondary campuses from these events which also included:
#Revolt4Rafah, the Gaza Solidarity Encampment at McGill launched the Revolutionary Youth Summer Program.
The post went on to say “We pledge to educate the youth of montreal and redefine McGill’s “elite” institutional legacy by transforming its space into one of revolutionary education. The daily schedule will include physical activity, Arabic language instruction, cultural crafts, political discussions, historical and revolutionary lessons.”
The line was crossed many times, but nothing was done! I believe in free speech and freedom, but this goes far past what I believe and what the law states! When we allow this type of hate, which calls for death to the Jews, which is genocide, to be allowed, it spreads and hate blossoms in many areas. Canada has often sent its troops into conflict areas as peacekeepers where it was allowed to grow until civil war destroyed those countries.
We need to wake up! The Israeli’s are in an existential war which they didn’t ask for and we need to understand this! Iran has been pushing their Imam’s to call for genocide of the Jews for the last 2 decades and Iran has openly stated multiple times they will annihilate the Jews. Their proxies in Gaza, Lebanon, Yemen, Syria and Iraq have been killing innocent men, women and children in Israel of the last 25 years and Oct 7th caused Israel to take every measure to protect itself from another such attack.
Too many people blindly follow the propaganda spewed in the news and fail to dig deeper for the truth!
Time is ripe for our mayor and council, our two MLAs and our local MP to speak out.
“an early warning of danger
Canary in a Coal Mine. When we say something is a canary in a coal mine, it means it is an early warning of danger. Not surprisingly, the origin of the expression is literal – canaries were historically used to test for carbon monoxide and other toxic gasses in underground mines.”
Indeed! as this danger is now. It is within our borders as a sovereign nation, it has insinuated itself into the administration-in-waiting south of the border, and is a growing menace in Europe.
https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2024/12/30/leading-german-politicians-compare-elon-musk-to-vladimir-putin-over-afd-endorsement
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/musk-europe-uk-social-media-accusations-1.7424791