INTERNACIONAL
Security concerns around Olympic games lead to arrests with French authorities on high alert
France will provide elite police officers to safeguard Israeli athletes throughout the Olympic Games due to security concerns as the opening ceremony gets underway Friday.
«There are those who seek to undermine the celebratory nature of this joyous event,» Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz wrote in a letter to his French counterpart.
«We currently have assessments regarding the potential threat posed by Iranian terrorist proxies and other terrorist organizations who aim to carry out attacks against members of the Israeli delegation and Israeli tourists during the Olympics,» Katz added.
European authorities have remained on high alert as the Olympics bring an influx of threats and security concerns, especially with the presence of Israel. Some terrorist and radical groups want to see the country punished for its actions in the Gaza Strip.
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Tensions remain so high that a video of a fake Palestinian threat of attacks on France made the rounds on social media before a security source could tell the AFP that the video likely originated from «a Russian operation under a ‘false flag,’» pointing to «several clues» that betray the authenticity of the video.
French authorities have designated roughly 1,000 elite anti-terrorist officers to provide a «ring of steel» for the Israeli team amid anti-Israel protests, Reuters reported. Officials happily reported that the first competition involving Israeli athletes, a soccer match between Israel and Mali Wednesday, passed a security test.
Israel’s Shin Bet security agency will work with the French police to keep the area and Games safe for their athletes, but other criminal threats remain major concerns as the games get underway.
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Belgian police on Thursday detained seven people suspected of planning a terrorist attack, with authorities reporting that the individuals may have participated in «the activities of a terrorist group,» including financing and preparing for an attack.
The police explained that «the specific targets of the attack had not yet been determined,» but the threat had risen to the level of requiring police raids on 14 homes across Belgium, according to German outlet DW.
The timing of the raids — just one day before the Games begin — prompted questions of links between the attack and the competition, but Belgian and French authorities did not comment on whether there were any such links.
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The preparation and focus on more international tensions has also allowed other crimes to occur before the Games get underway. French prosecutors earlier this week opened an inquiry after an Australian woman reported that five men allegedly attacked and gang-raped her.
An investigative source told The Telegraph the woman was wandering around the northern Pigalle district in Paris over the weekend in an apparent state of distress and disarray. She then reportedly confronted one of her alleged attackers in a kebab shop, but he fled before police could arrive.
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CCTV footage captured the latter confrontation, but Paris prosecutors would not comment on the video while confirming a gang-rape investigation. No arrests have been made, nor have police released any descriptions of the alleged attackers.
INTERNACIONAL
Defaced Holocaust mural finds new home in Rome’s Shoah Museum
The Shoah Museum in Rome has acquired a piece by reserved contemporary pop artist aleXsandro Palombo after it was defaced in an apparent act of antisemitism.
The mural, which depicts Liliana Segre and Sami Modiano, the last two Italian survivors of Auschwitz, was defaced multiple times and even erased by vandals.
Segre and Modiano are shown in striped clothing under green bullet-proof vests with yellow Stars of David on them, and there are even representations of the serial numbers tattooed on them by the Nazis. The perpetrators vandalized Segre and Modiano’s faces, as well as the stars on their chests, but left the numbers on their arms untouched.
«They took away my face, my identity, they erased the yellow star, but they left the number tattooed on my arm,» Segre said.
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Palombo eventually reproduced the piece, and it is now part of the museum’s permanent collection.
«Art is the highest expression of freedom, and repeatedly attacking a work that portrays two survivors of Auschwitz highlights how the very value of democracy and all our freedoms is in danger,» Palombo said in a statement. «The gesture of courage and resistance of the Shoah Museum of Rome and the Italian Jewish community is a great and precious lesson in civilization for all of us, who responded to the antisemitic violence and hatred of these new forms of social and cultural terrorism with a powerful action of the Risorgimento.»
Palombo has made several pieces honoring the Holocaust, and his other works have not been spared from vandalism.
A piece entitled «Arbeit macht frei,» which shows Hungarian writer and Holocaust survivor Edith Bruck wrapped in an Israeli flag was also defaced, with much of the flag being erased. The title of this mural is the same phrase the Nazis put on the gates of Auschwitz, and it translates to «work makes you free.»
Bruck told Italian newspaper La Stampa that she was saddened but not surprised by the vandalism, saying that «antisemitism is a tsunami.»
The mural of Bruck has also been acquired by the Shoah Museum in Rome.
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Another one of Palombo’s pieces that was vandalized was entitled «Halt! Stoj!,» which depicted Segre, Modiano and Burk alongside Pope Francis, who is outfitted with a cross and a sign reading «antisemitism is everywhere.» The four are depicted as Simpsons characters, a common motif for Palombo. While the image of the pope was not damaged, vandals defaced the Stars of David on the three Holocaust survivors.
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Palombo, a contemporary pop artist and activist, used pop culture references in his artwork, including celebrities and cartoon characters from the Simpsons and Disney. One of his most iconic works is the «Simpsons deported to Auschwitz,» which shows Marge, Homer, Maggie, Bart and Lisa before and after the concentration camp, referencing the emaciated state of Holocaust survivors liberated from Nazi camps.
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