Last update - 00:00 26/11/2006
Vienna Jewish leaders: School vandalism is worst anti-Semitic incident in 20 years
By News Agencies
Police arrested a man suspected of causing widespread damage by smashing windows and other glass surfaces at a Jewish school in Vienna early Sunday using an iron rod, a spokesman said.
The man's motive was not immediately clear. He was refusing to answer questions and was largely silent, police spokesman Herbert Hutter said.
In addition to broken windows, glass and other objects were damaged in the school's restrooms, Hutter said.
Images on the Web site of Austrian broadcaster ORF showed the building's hallways littered with glass. Doors and glass display cases were also damaged, ORF reported.
Muzicant later said that some 100 glass panes had been destroyed and the school was being cleaned up so that classes could take place as planned Monday.
"We're now in the process of putting everything in order," he said.
The Austria Press Agency cited Jacob Biderman, head of the school's administration, as saying that the man told the police officers who arrested him that his name was Adolf Hitler.
Hutter could not confirm that the man had said this, saying he had no such information.
The school, which has 360 pupils from kindergarten to high school-age, was unoccupied and unguarded in Sunday's early hours. A police spokesman said the man was detained at the scene after residents nearby called in noise complaints to police.
Jewish community leaders denounced the vandalism of a Jewish school as the worst anti-Semitic incident in Austria for two decades and showed reporters a trail of destruction on all three floors of the Lauder Chabad School in the capital Vienna.
Jewish community leader Ariel Muzicant said the incident could not be likened to arson attacks on synagogues in France in recent years or the 1938 "Kristallnacht" (Night of Shattering Glass) pogrom against Jews in Nazi Germany.
"I don't want to create the impression that Jews face once again being beaten on the streets of Austria," he said amidst heaps of glass shards including from a display case whose sports trophies lay on the floor, misshapen from heavy blows.
"This is an act of vandalism, it's not a tragedy. Nothing was burned down, no one was hurt. We don't know whether this was the act of a mentally ill person or an (organized) political act. We must avoid making generalisations," he told reporters.
"However, it is no doubt an anti-Semitic act, done out of rage and hatred. It's very disturbing. But we will not be intimidated," Muzicant added, saying he hoped the incident would spur efforts to improve public education against bigotry.
School board member Jacob Biberman said classes would resume on Monday after a cleanup.
Colorful paintings and drawings by schoolchildren were left untouched, and no swastikas or anti-Semitic graffiti were found.
Muzicant said the last serious anti-Semitic attack in Austria was in the mid-1980s when a number of gravestones were desecrated by neo-Nazis.
The man, who has not been identified, was arrested Sunday around 2:20 A.M. GMT at the school after residents alerted police because of the noise, police spokesman Herbert Hutter said.
The man's motive was not immediately clear. So far, he has refused to make a statement, police said.
In addition to broken windows, glass and other objects were damaged in the school's restrooms, Hutter said.
Austrian radio reported that the man told police he was Croatian. Hutter confirmed that he had said this but noted that police were still checking.
Austria's small Jewish community leads a generally well integrated life, although its schools in Vienna have police guards when classes are in session.
There are two small, far-right parties in Austria's parliament who deny periodic accusations that some members harbor neo-Nazi sympathies.
Former Freedom Party leader Joerg Haider drew international condemnation for praising Nazi Germany's employment policies and Hitler's Waffen SS elite force, but later apologized.