Desecration of Jewish cemetery in Russia filmed

Youths caught on tape desecrating grave, Holocaust monument at ancient Jewish cemetery in Russia. Community shocked
Yael Branovsky

Russian TV aired a video showing youths disrupting the peace at a Jewish cemetery in Nizhny Novgorod, and attempting to dislodge fences surrounding the graves. The local police have launched an investigation in to the matter following the release of the movie.

Movie of cemetery desecration, broadcast by Russian TV

The youths can be seen running through the cemetery, at one point bending over, apparently to spit on one of the graves. They have also been accused of desecrating the grave of the city's chief rabbi and a Holocaust memorial monument.

Menahem Rabinowitz, envoy of the Jewish Agency in Nizhny Novgorod, told Ynet that the Jewish community in the city, which includes over 15,000 people, had been shocked by the affair. He said the cemetery was the oldest one in the area, and that the grave and the monument hold much significance for the community.

Rabinowitz said that although anti-Semitic tendencies had not been prevalent in the city, guards were placed at every event and the Jews living there refrained from wearing Jewish symbols. He also recounted an event that had happened some months ago, during which youths had entered a synagogue and overturned the tables. Only one of them had been caught. In the current incident, the perpetrators are also yet to be caught.