(JTA) – About 20 gravestones in a cemetery in southern France were vandalized with swastikas and the words “Death to Jews” and “Death to the French.” The graffiti was discovered in the Gruissan municipal cemetery in the Aude region on July 12. The gravestones appear to have been chosen at random and were not broken or toppled, France 3 television reported. The cemetery has been closed to the public. No suspects have been identified in the attack. The National Bureau for Vigilance Against Antisemitism, or BNVCA, in a statement condemned the desecration of the cemetery. The statement noted that the town of Gruissan is “usually rather calm, rather peaceful, and this aggression surprises and scandalizes us.”

Main Photo: French Interior Minister Christophe Castaner, center, followed by Strasbourg Chief Rabbi Harold Abraham Weill, second right, walk amid vandalized tombs in the Jewish cemetery of Westhoffen, west of the city of Strasbourg, eastern France, December 4, 2019. (Jean-Francois Badias/AP)