12 July 2007
Vandals have damaged a Holocaust memorial and burnt an Israeli flag in Berlin. The incident happened at the Grunewald train station, from where the first transport of Jews to concentration camps took place. "They knocked over several memorial candles and set fire to a small Israeli flag" at the so-called Platform 17 memorial at the station, police said. The Nazis began deporting Jews to concentration camps from the Grunewald station in October 1941. Israel’s prime minister Ehud Olmert visited the Grunewald memorial last year to pay his respects to the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis.
Jewish memorials and cemeteries are frequently vandalized in Germany, where political support for the far-right has increased in recent years. German chancellor Angela Merkel has vowed to combat right-wing extremism but critics say the US$ 25 million a year spent on campaigns to draw young people away from radical ideologies were insufficient.
