MONDAY, 5.00PM
FEARS have been expressed that the Jewish community could become the target of Muslim groups after the Cape Town home of a prominent Jewish resident was petrol-bombed early on Monday morning.
The attack, reminiscent of recent shootings and bombings of houses of alleged drug dealers by People Against Gangsterism and Drugs vigilantes, followed new conflict between Jews and Palestinians in Israel and the occupied territories, and Saturday’s march by Muslims in Cape Town on the Israeli embassy.
Cape Town’s west metro police spokesman Superintendent Shorty Pistorius confirmed two bomb threats were made on a Jewish old age home in Claremont and the Wynberg synagogue.
He asked the Jewish community to contact their local police stations if they notice any suspicious behaviour in their neighbourhood. “Any information that comes to our ears will be treated as a priority,” Pistorius said.
He said there was a possibility Monday’s petrol bomb attack on the home of Brian Maron, 50, in Newlands was linked to events in Israel. “The possibility that the attack was politically-religiously motivated is not being overlooked in the investigation. We will only be able to confirm after the perpetrators have been apprehended,” Pistorius said.
The Marons’ home in Thibault Avenue was extensively damaged in Monday’s attack and property valued at about R200 000 was destroyed. The lounge, study, some of the bedrooms and the roof of the house were extensively damaged but Maron, his wife and two children were not injured.
Meanwhile, Muslims condemned Monday’s bomb attack. The Imam of the Claremont Main Road Mosque congregation and vice-president of the World Conference on Religion and Peace, Rashied Omar, on behalf of Cape Town’s Muslim community “unequivocally” condemned the attack on the Marons’ home and premises of the Jewish Book Centre. “We are also outraged by the bomb threats to a Jewish old age home and a Wynberg Synagogue,” Omar said.