Anti-Israel activists have defaced a statue of Anne Frank near the Frank family’s war-time home in Amsterdam, scrawling, “Gaza,” in big red letters across the base of the monument. Police have been notified of the vandalism on Franks statue at the Merwede Square in Amsterdam.Frank, known for her holocaust-era Diary of Anne Frank, lived with her family at Merwede Square 37-2 after moving to Amsterdam from Nazi Germany in 1938, until she went into hiding in 1942. .Center for Information and Documentation Israel (CIDI) condemned the act on social media as a display of “more anti-Zionism.”Gert-Jan Jimmink, a local bookseller who launched the initiative to build the statue in the early 2000s, told local news station AT5 that given the rise in antisemitism since the October 7 Hamas terror attack on Israel, the city should install cameras and street lighting to prevent it from getting damaged. The statue “represents the 14,000 Jews from this neighborhood who were murdered, ”said Jimmink. “It has nothing to do with current events.”District chairman Bart Vink told the channel “these kinds of statements are misplaced and disrespectful.”“We’ll have it removed as quickly as possible.”In 2023 CIDI reported a 245% rise in antisemitic incidents compared to 2022, Jewish News Syndicate reported.“Jews in the Netherlands and the Jewish religion were often associated with the policies of the government in Israel, which caused Jews to become the target of antisemitic assaults,” said the report.
