Vandals scrawled swastikas and other Nazi references on the walls of the Grand mosque in south-east Paris, religious leaders said yesterday, as authorities investigated a possible arson attack on a memorial for deported Jews.
"This intolerable act of Islamophobia is a worrying symptom in the capital," Dalil Boubakeur, the director of the Paris mosque, said in a statement.
The vandals, writing in what appeared to be ink from a black marker, scrawled about a dozen swastikas, other Nazi references and "get out" on the white walls around the mosque.
Meanwhile, police in Drancy, a north-eastern Paris suburb, were investigating a suspected arson attempt over the weekend at a memorial honouring Jewish deportees from France during the second world war.
Firefighters put out a fire that charred a wooden rail car at the memorial on Sunday. A note found at the site referred to the little-known Islamic group for Palestine, and carried the name Bin Laden on it, next to a swastika.