An Irvine, California, synagogue was hit with anti-Semitic graffiti on Wednesday, just days after a mass shooting at a synagogue in Pittsburgh killed 11 people. The vandalism is part of a growing trend of hate crimes in Orange County.
Irvine police are investigating the vandalism of a synagogue that was discovered Wednesday, just four days after 11 people were killed and seven more injured by a gunman at a synagogue in Pittsburgh.
ABC7 reports that the anti-Semitic graffiti was spray-painted onto an exterior wall of Congregation Beth Jacob, and that police are seeking anyone with knowledge of the perpetrator.
The Orange Counter Register reports that members of the Irvine synagogue held a prayer vigil Monday evening for the victims of the Pittsburgh shooting.
“I just feel very sad that in America, in 2018, we still have to worry about anti-Semitism,” temple board president Allen Berezovsky said, according to the OC Register.
NBC Los Angeles reports that police believe the vandalism occurred overnight, and that this latest act of vandalism is part of a trend of rising hate crimes in Orange County that began in 2015.
