The Protone project team would like to express solidarity with the Jewish community of Cothen. Over 40 Jewish graves were desecrated in the Jewish section of a cemetery near Cothen, Germany. This reprehensible act occurred sometime between September 15 and 19, 2023, as reported in a joint statement by the police and prosecutors in Dessau-Rosslau and the state of Saxony-Anhalt. The majority of the damage to the graves involved them being pushed over. The cemetery served as the final resting place for the community in the 400 years of recorded history of Jews in the village. The estimated cost of the damage is approximately 20,000 euros.
In recent years, Germany has unfortunately witnessed a resurgence of anti-Semitic acts reminiscent of the dark days of National Socialism. In 2022 alone, Germany recorded 2,480 documented anti-Semitic incidents, including nine cases of extreme violence, marking an all-time high since data collection began in 2017, according to the Federal Association of Research and Information Centres on Anti-Semitism (RIAS).
Attacks on individuals exercising their fundamental rights to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion in places of worship such as synagogues, churches, mosques, and other religious institutions continue to occur with alarming frequency across Europe and around the world.
INA FASSBENDER / AFP, «Un cimetière juif, à Ahrweiler, dans l'ouest de l'Allemagne», I24 News, 20 septembre 2023, https://shorturl.at/afJQ8.
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