Israeli police: Hateful graffiti sprayed on Jerusalem church

Police in Israel are investigating an “assault on religious harmony” after anti-Christian graffiti was sprayed on the walls of the Catholic Benedictine Abbey of the Dormition in Jerusalem and the Greek Orthodox seminary next door.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, center, attends a weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem.

“Idols will be extirpated” – a line lifted from the Jewish prayer service – and “Christians Go to Hell” were among graffiti written on the Dormition Abbey with felt-tip pens.

The Jerusalem Post quoted a statement by the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem which described the Dormition Abbey as “a significant place for interreligious dialogue between Judaism and Christianity”. The perpetrators have not been identified but the graffiti suggests they were Jewish extremists, who have been behind a number of recent attacks on Christian sites. The so-called “price tag” attacks seek to exact a cost for Israeli steps seen as favoring the Palestinians.

Israel’s political elite criticized the attack.

Netanyahu noted that Israel is the only country in the Middle East where Christians are thriving, and the place itself allows Christians and members of other religions to freely practice their faith.

“We have zero tolerance for those who undercut our fundamental democratic principles and freedom of religion”, Erdan continued. It is located near a site believed to be the place of Jesus’ Last Supper and a tomb where King David was supposedly buried.

A year before that, Israeli extremists spray-painted “Jesus is a monkey” in Hebrew outside the church, and “Havat Maon”, the name of an illegal Israeli settler outpost that had been dismantled by the Israeli government just days before the attack, Israeli daily Haaretz reported at the time. The most prominent suspected Jewish extremist attack recently was the July firebombing of a Palestinian home in the West Bank that killed a toddler along with his mother and father. AP material published by LongIsland.com, isdone so with explicit permission. This includes the preparation of derivative works of, or the incorporation of such content intoother works.