The mayor of Nogent-sur-Mzrne stressed that, until now, Nogent-sur-Marne had been spared by the upsurge in anti-Semitic acts observed nationwide.

A memorial garden dedicated to Sarah Halimi and Mireille Knoll, two Jewish women who were victims of gruesome anti-Semitic murders in Paris in 2017 and 2018, was the target of an antisemitic attack.

A swastika was discovered on the plaque of the garden, located in Nogent-sur-Marne.

The city mayor, Jacques Martin, strongly condemned the act, describing it as “vandalism” and stating that “hatred has no place in Nogent”. He immediately alerted police authorities to ensure that those responsible were identified and brought to justice.

The garden, inaugurated in November 2022, is of particular importance to the community.

Sarah Halimi, born in Nogent-sur-Marne in November 1951, spent some 30 years of her life there as a nursery director, before her tragic murder in Paris. The municipality quickly removed the anti-Semitic tag and made available to investigators the recordings from the CCTV cameras installed in the area.

The investigation is underway to find the perpetrator or perpetrators of this act. The mayor stressed that, until now, Nogent-sur-Marne had been spared by the upsurge in anti-Semitic acts seen nationwide in recent months.

He said he is determinated not to let such behavior take root in his city, declaring that ignorance and hatred would not be tolerated. In a symbolic gesture, the mayor affirmed the town’s determination to preserve the memory of Sarah Halimi and Mireille Knoll, refusing to see them “murdered a second time” by such acts of hatred.

Sarah Halimi was murdered in April 2017 and Mireille Knoll almost a year later, in March 2018.

Born in November 1951 in Nogent-sur-Marne, Sarah Halimi, a nursery director and Orthodox Jew, lived in the commune for almost 30 years.

In April 2021, the French Supreme Court ruled that her murderer was criminally irresponsible. 25,000 people gathered across France on April 25, 2021, at the call of citizens’ groups and representatives of the Jewish community, to protest the lack of a trial following the murder of Sarah Halimi.

Mrs. Halimi, 65, was beaten to death in her Paris apartment before being defenestrated by her 27-year-old neighbor, to cries of “Allah Akbar” (“God is the greatest” in Arabic).

Mireille Knoll, who had fled Paris in 1942 to escape the Vel d’Hiv roundup, was slashed with eleven stab wounds and her body burned.

Her two killers were convicted in 2021 – one was acquitted of murder but sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment for theft, and the other was sentenced to life imprisonment with a 22-year security period for murder, with the aggravating circumstance that the victim belonged to the Jewish community.