Australian police investigate car fire and anti-Semitic graffiti in Sydney

Australian authorities said Wednesday they would apply the “full weight of the law” to those responsible for setting a car on fire and spraying “anti-Semitic” graffiti in eastern Sydney, just days after an arson attack on a synagogue in Melbourne was investigated as “terrorist.”

New South Wales police said in a statement that emergency services and firefighters responded at around 01 a.m. local time (00 p.m. GMT Tuesday) to a call reporting a vehicle fire in the suburb of Woollahra, which was extinguished.

In addition to the burnt-out vehicle, believed to have been stolen, the attackers sprayed graffiti on two properties and a footpath in Woollahra, the statement added.

According to images released by the media, one of the walls of a house in Woollahra reads “Kill Israel (sic)”, among other offensive slogans.

Following the act of vandalism, the police are looking for two young men for questioning and - if found guilty - they will face "the full weight of the law", as promised this morning by the head of the government of New South Wales, Chris Minns, in a message on X.

“The images of this anti-Semitic attack in Woollahra this morning are counterproductive. This is not the Sydney we want. These racist attempts to divide our city will not work,” he said.

For his part, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said that this was “an outrage and another anti-Semitic attack,” and expressed his solidarity with the Jewish community and “unequivocally” condemned this act, according to a message on X.

The incident comes after the Australian Federal Police (AFP) announced on Monday the creation of a special force to combat anti-Semitism, created following the arson attack on the Adass Israel synagogue in south-east Melbourne.

The attack on the synagogue, which caused significant damage to the building and two injuries, none of them seriously, is being investigated as a possible “terrorist act.”

Since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in October last year, there have been reports of attacks against Jewish Australians, a community that represents 0,4% of the population of more than 26 million people.

In July, a fire broke out at the Melbourne office of Jewish lawmaker Josh Burns, while last month a man was charged with setting fire to and damaging cars and spray-painting anti-Semitic messages on the walls of several properties in Sydney's east, which has a significant concentration of Jews.

The Canberra government has repeatedly expressed concern about the division created in Australian society following the war in Gaza, and has even created two special posts to combat growing anti-Semitism and Islamophobia in the southern nation. EFE