Second ‘price tag’ attack against Arabs in last week in Jerusalem

Police have opened an investigation into the vandalism in Beit Safafa and have sent a forensics teams to analyze evidence at the scene.

By DANIEL K. EISENBUD
Updated: JUNE 11, 2017 00:52
At least 20 vehicles found vandalized in east Jerusalem, May 9, 2017. Translation: "Administrative Price Tag" (photo credit: POLICE SPOKESPERSON'S UNIT)
At least 20 vehicles found vandalized in east Jerusalem, May 9, 2017. Translation: "Administrative Price Tag"
(photo credit: POLICE SPOKESPERSON'S UNIT)
For the second time in the span of a week, vandals targeted Arab vehicles and property in Jerusalem early Friday morning in what appears to be a nationalistically motivated attack.
According to police, the tires of several cars were slashed and the words “Kahane was right” and “Price Tag” were spray-painted in blue on a nearby wall in the Arab neighborhood of Beit Safafa.
Kahane was the controversial founder of the Jewish Defense League, who was assassinated in New York City in 1990 by an Arab assailant two years after his radical Kach Party was outlawed in Israel for inciting racism.
“Price-tag attacks” are acts of vandalism or arson generally associated with Jewish fundamentalist settler youth that target Palestinians, Israeli Arabs, left-wing Israeli Jews, or Israeli security forces who obstruct settlement activity.
Police have opened an investigation into the vandalism in Beit Safafa and have sent a forensics teams to analyze evidence at the scene.
Earlier in the week, on Monday, at least five vehicles in the French Hill neighborhood were vandalized and spray-painted with anti-Arab graffiti.
“Death to Arabs” and “Revenge” were written in green paint across the side of two of the cars in the predominantly Jewish community situated near the flashpoint east Jerusalem neighborhoods of Shuafat and Isawiya.
French Hill is also home to many Hebrew University of Jerusalem students and faculty from the Mount Scopus campus.
On May 9, more than two dozen vehicles and homes in Arab enclaves of east Jerusalem and the northern Galilee were also targeted in a spate of nationalistically motivated vandalism.
According to police, approximately 20 vehicles had their tires slashed and were spray-painted with graffiti along the border separating the ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo and the Arab neighborhood of Shuafat.