Posted on 05/08/2004 3:18:41 PM PDT by MegaSilver
PARIS - France, struggling with a resurgence of anti-Semitic crime, said on Saturday it had thwarted an attack on a synagogue in a Paris suburb overnight after discovering a homemade bomb in its grounds.
The French Interior Ministry said the amateur bomb, found in the garden of a synagogue in the Paris suburb of Villiers-le-Bel overnight on Friday, came a day after an attack on a monument to Jewish soldiers who died at Verdun in World War I.
The incidents followed the desecration of 127 tombs in the Jewish cemetery of Herrlisheim in Alsace earlier this month.
Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin vehemently condemned what he called "these intolerable acts" in a statement and reiterated orders to police to make surveillance at places of worship a priority.
A police source told Reuters the bomb weighed only about 800 grams and said it was not clear whether it was an explosive or an incendiary device.
Later, a Ministry source said the device -- daubed with a swastika and an anti-Jewish slogan -- was found in a bush, suggesting it may have been thrown from the street.
Meanwhile, 300 to 400 people took part in a silent march at Herrlisheim, close to the Alsatian city of Colmar, to protest against intolerance and support the Jewish community.
"You have to take part, it's that simple," a marcher told France 2 television.
The increased anti-Semitic violence in France is believed to be caused mostly by Muslim youths angry about the situation in the Middle East. France is home to Europe's largest Muslim minority of five million people and its largest Jewish community, which numbers about 600,000.
Nice try...
5M muslims and 600k Jews.
Incendiary device, indeed.
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