On Saturday, a Jewish woman was found stabbed twice in the stomach at her apartment in Lyon, France, with a swastika painted on the door when police arrived.
According to the Daily Mail, the young woman was attacked when she opened her door after her doorbell rang suffering from mild injuries. The attacker was reportedly wearing all black with his face covered and fled the scene shortly after.
The woman's lawyer, Stéphane Drai, told BFMTV “The victim, her family and the Jewish community are shocked." She added, "When we opened the door, we did not know that we could be the victim of an anti-Semitic attack, which could amount to an attempted murder.”
In a post on X, Mayor of Lyon Grégory Doucet said (translated from French), "Such a surge of violence is unspeakable. All my support to the victim, to her loved ones."
The suspect is still on the loose and is expected to be charged with attempted homicide when caught. A spokesman for Lyon prosecutors told the outlet, "The initial findings have led the prosecution to open an investigation into attempted murder aggravated by the fact that the act could be motivated by an anti-Semitic motive."
The attack comes as pro-Hamas protests have taken place around the world since the organization's October 7 terrorist attack on Israel, which left over 1,400 dead. French authorities have launched an investigation into an incident in Paris earlier this week after a video of anti-Israel protestors yelling "f*ck the Jews" and "We are Nazis and proud" on the metro went viral.
There have reportedly been over 857 total registered markings and 425 arrests made in Franch in connection to antisemitic actions since the attack. Many people in the large Jewish community in France are concerned that the conflict in the Middle East will make them targets of violence. President of the Council of Jewish Institutions in France, Yonathan Arfi noted that there is often "a correlation between a flare-up of violence in the Middle East and anti-Semitic acts in France."
