Brussels, Belgium – 5 October 2020
Yesterday, in the city of Hamburg, Germany, a twenty-six year old Jewish student wearing a kippah, was attacked and seriously injured by a twenty-nine year old man wearing army military combat uniform who is reported to have been carrying a piece of paper with a swastika inscribed on it, in his pocket.
The attack took place at a synagogue in Hamburg as celebrations took place for the Jewish festival of Sukkot. The twenty-six year old victim was attacked with a shovel, suffering grave head wounds and consequently being taken to a nearby hospital, according to local police reports.
The attack comes just under one year after the 2019 Halle synagogue attack, in which a far-right extremist attempted to enter a synagogue during services for Yom Kippur and on failing to enter, killed two local passers-by.
Since yesterday’s attack, which came in the same week as another antisemitic incident took place at a kosher restaurant in the outskirts of Paris, EUJS continues to call on governments and international institutions and civil society to oppose antisemitism in all its forms, to take deceisive steps against far-right extremism, to facilitate greater protection and to increase the security of national Jewish communities.
At EUJS, our thoughts are with the attacked student. We stand in solidarity with the Jewish community in Hamburg and commit to continue our work, from a grassroots-level to an international-institutional level, in fighting against antisemitism.
