New Price Tag Attack: Christian Center Torched

Local Editor

A building belonging to the Greek Orthodox Church in al-Quds was set on fire and vandalized, in what appears to be a new hate crime attack.

Firefighters arrived at the scene and extinguished the flames. "Israeli" police said it was investigating whether the fire was deliberately set. The forces also found hate graffiti denigrating Jesus sprayed on one of the walls.

Furthermore, damage was done to parts of the building, but no one was hurt. Army forces and crime units were in the village, investigating the incident.

The structure used for religious studies is located near the Old City's Yafa Gate.
During the inspection, anti-Christian graffiti reading "Redemption of Zion" was found scrawled on the walls of the building, suggesting that "Israeli" right-wing settlers might be responsible for the incident.

In a similar incident, a day earlier, a mosque in a West Bank village near Bethlehem was also torched and also sprayed with hate graffiti on the building, including "we want the redemption of Zion," and "revenge" alongside a Star of David.

"The fire caused considerable damage to the mosque before it was put out by the local residents," the village council head Noman Hemdan declared.
"The settlers also sprayed racist phrases against Arabs and Muslims, including 'death to Arabs!' on the mosque's walls" he added.

Jabel Sahyoun, the area where the suspected attack occurred, was one of the more vulnerable areas concerning price tag attacks.

In the past two years, there had been dozens of various hate crimes, including the assault of Christian clergymen, graffiti, punctured tired, desecrated grave-sites, smashed gravestones and more.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team