Sofia synagogue attacked

The Great Synagogue in the centre of Bulgaria’s capital Sofia was attacked by a 35-year-old man who threw stones at the synagogue and smashed the building’s windows.

The assailant broke the windows of the Great Prayer Hall of the Sofia Central Synagogue on the capital’s Washington Street.

‘Shalom,’ the organisation of the Jewish community in Bulgaria and the country’s EJC affiliate, noted that the attack took place on the Shabbat and several days before International Holocaust Remembrance Day on January 27.

“The incident itself is extremely troublesome, but the complete lack of reaction by passersby on the street is even more worrying,” said Shalom Associate President Prof. Alexander Oscar.

“The safety of the community is at the moment the most important and we will work together with the police and the relevant institutions in the country to guarantee it. It was unacceptable that in Bulgaria, the language of hatred already had physical manifestations with direct attacks on Jewish communal property,” he said.

The Jewish community is also concerned about for the Lukov March, which will be held in Sofia on February 16.

The march is held annually in honour of General Hristo Lukov, a Bulgarian leader during World War Two who supported the passing of the Bulgarian version of the Nuremburg Laws and the deportation of Jewish citizens to Nazi death camps. The Lukov march draws hundreds of neo-Nazis every year.

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