Denver, CO, June 12, 2017…The Anti-Defamation League on Monday condemned an apparent act of vandalism that occurred over the weekend at Chabad Lubavitch of Southern Colorado in Colorado Springs.

According to media and police reports, the incident took place early Saturday morning, June 10. Surveillance cameras recorded two men walk up to the synagogue and place a bumper sticker on the front door that read, “Fight terror, Nuke Israel.” One of the suspects reportedly took a photograph of the sticker on the door.

The Colorado Springs Police Department is investigating the incident as a potential bias-motivated crime. No arrests have been made yet and the incident remains under investigation.

ScottL. Levin, ADL Mountain States Regional Director, issued the following statement:

The Anti-Defamation League is disturbed that Chabad Lubavitch of Southern Colorado was targeted with this hateful message. We fully support free speech, but an incident of this nature crosses a line from ugly rhetoric to a crime.

This incident gives us pause because we are seeing an increased number of bias-motivated incidents, including acts of anti-Semitism, in Colorado and across the country. We commend the Colorado Springs Police Department for investigating this incident as a hate crime.

ADL’s recent annual Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents showed that the number of anti-Semitic incidents reported in Colorado more than doubled in 2016 from the previous year. ADL recorded 45 incidents in Colorado in 2016 compared to 18 incidents in 2015. In addition, there has been a marked increase in the harassment of Jewish individuals and vandalism of Jewish institutions in the last six months with more than 20 anti-Semitic incidents in Colorado recorded in 2017.

 

The Anti-Defamation League, founded in 1913, is the world’s leading organization fighting anti-Semitism through programs and services that counteract hatred, prejudice and bigotry.

 

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