A synagogue in Liège, Belgium, was damaged by an explosion in the early hours of Monday morning in what the country’s interior minister called “an antisemitic act.”
The blast caused no injuries but blew out the windows of buildings across the street from the synagogue, the police said in a statement. Footage aired on local TV channels also showed damage to the door of the synagogue.
The mayor of Liège, Willy Demeyer, described the explosion as “an extremely violent act of antisemitism.”
“There can be no question of importing external conflicts into our city,” he said in a statement.
Belgium’s interior minister, Bernard Quintin, called the incident “an abject antisemitic act that directly targeted Belgium’s Jewish community” in a post on social media.
The blast hit at around 4 a.m. on the street in front of the synagogue, according to the police. The Belgian Federal Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement that it had started an investigation because there were “possible indications of a terrorist offense” but noted that the exact circumstances of the incident were as yet unclear.
The street, to the southeast of the city’s center, will be closed off for the duration of the investigation, the police said.
The explosion comes at a time when issues around identity and religion have again boiled to the surface across Europe, with the Israel-Hamas war and the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran contributing to the rising tensions.
In a statement, the Belgian section of the European Jewish Congress called the blast “part of a worrying surge in antisemitic acts committed in Belgium” and urged the authorities to strengthen security for Jewish places of worship and other institutions.
In his social media post, Mr. Quintin, the country’s interior minister, added that protective measures around sites like the synagogue would be reinforced.
Bart De Wever, the country’s prime minister, expressed solidarity with the Jewish community in Liège and across Belgium in a social media post.
“Antisemitism is an attack on our values and our society, and we must fight it unequivocally,” he wrote.
The terrorism threat in Belgium has been set at Level 3, or “serious,” for several years. There are four levels in total. The setting was last raised after a 45-year-old man shot dead two Swedish nationals in Brussels in October 2023.
March 22 will be the 10th anniversary of the Brussels terrorist attacks, when bombings at an airport and a subway station in 2016 killed 32 people and wounded hundreds more.
Belgium has also seen attacks targeting the Jewish community. In May 2014, a gunman opened fire at the Jewish Museum in Brussels, killing four people.
Koba Ryckewaert is a reporter and researcher for The Times based in Brussels.
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