Hate Crime in Spain: Maimonides Statue Defaced With Swastika

Police in the southern Spanish city of Córdoba announced today (Sunday) that they are investigating who was behind the vandalism of a statue of Rambam. A swastika was spray-painted on the statue, which stands in Córdoba’s Jewish Quarter. The city government condemned the vandalism, and police said no suspects have yet been arrested. They are treating the incident as a hate crime.

The bronze statue was installed in 1966 in memory of Rambam, in Tiberias Square, near the synagogue named for him in the Jewish Quarter. The statue commemorates Rambam, who was born in Córdoba in 1138 and is considered one of the greatest Jewish thinkers of the Middle Ages. He was a physician, rabbi, and philosopher, and his influence remains evident today in the Jewish world and in the fields of philosophy and medicine. The statue was created in 1964 by Spanish sculptor Amadeo Ruiz Olmos, marking 760 years since Rambam’s death.

The swastika was spray-painted on the base of the statue. The Jewish community strongly condemned the act, calling it “a grave offense through a Nazi symbol, and an offense against our shared history.”