The New York City Police Department’s Hate Crimes Task Force has launched an investigation after a Holocaust memorial in Brooklyn was defaced with graffiti and vulgar words written in Russian.
The words and other drawings were discovered over the weekend at Holocaust Memorial Park in the Sheepshead Bay neighborhood, where there is a large Russian population.
"The offense here is that someone would desecrate, deface a monument that is dedicated to making sure that never again do we see the violence in the Holocaust repeated," New York State Assemblyman William Colton told reporters.
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Colton also said the vandalism was not anti-Semitic, according to Fox 5 NY.
"What society has allowed somebody to say ‘I see a memorial there, it’s lovely, I’m going to take out my pen, my marker, my spray paint and write what I want’?" added Kalman Yeger, a New York City Council member.
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The NYPD is investigating the incident and as of Tuesday, has not yet made any arrests.
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"Upon arrival officers were informed by a 74-year-old female an unidentified individual wrote on the Holocaust Memorial (permanent marker- wrote in Russian)," an NYPD spokesperson told Fox News Digital. "NYPD’s Hate Crimes Task Force was notified."
The vandalism comes after someone sprayed graffiti last Wednesday, August 17, on the side of the Congregation Beth Shalom synagogue about a mile away from the memorial, according to Fox 5 NY.