Swastika spray painted on busy Australian road

A large Nazi swastika was drawn onto a busy road in Victoria, Australia, according to a Friday press release from the Anti-Defamation Commission (ADC).

According to the release, the swastika was painted on a road between the towns of Dunolly and Maryborough earlier this week.

The hate symbol was initially reported to the ADC by a Jewish woman in her 60’s along with her son.

A few days later, tar was used to cover up the swastika.

Statement from ADC

“What was unthinkable five years ago has become a terrifying reality. The epidemic of unbridled bigotry that has defiled Victoria continues to spiral out of control and is reaching fever pitch,” the Anti-Defamation Commission’s chair, Dr. Dvir Abramovich, asserted in a statement. “It may be an uncomfortable truth for some, but the runaway problem of unvarnished racism has taken a firm hold and is becoming part of our daily life. Drawing this ultimate emblem of evil, which represents Hitler’s machinery and the extermination of millions in gas chambers on a busy road, is beyond indecent.”

This incident follows a separate incident of antisemitism in Australia from earlier this month when a group of Jewish students was traveling on a bus when they were verbally harassed with antisemitic obscenities by a knife-wielding man.

The man involved in that incident reportedly described himself as a “Nazi.”

The ADC’s Abramovich calls for a rejection of Nazi ideology.

“The person who [drew the swastika on the road] was writing out a deranged fantasy about an Aryan Australia that we must reject. This is not just graffiti on a road, scrawled by cowards who seek to instill fear in our communities, it is an assault on our collective way of life and sense of safety,” Abramovich continued. He also called on the perpetrator to be prosecuted.

The ADC is an Australian organization dedicated to combatting hate. On the organization’s website, it describes itself as the leading civil rights organization in Australia. 

The ADC “works to ensure a safe and fair society for Australians of all faiths and cultures by combating antisemitism and all forms of hatred.”