Nazi symbol painted onto Dundas Street, Rye in wake of new ban making act illegal
A small Mornington Peninsula community has been rocked by a huge hate symbol painted onto a local street.
South East
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A giant swastika has been painted onto a Mornington Peninsula road less than 24 hours after the State Government announced a ban on the public display of the Nazi symbol.
The hate symbol was painted overnight on Thursday on Dundas Street at Rye near a group of shops.
Outraged locals were quick to phone the local council and a road crew was sent to clean it on Friday afternoon.
A council spokeswoman said the crew would also paint over the white lines with black paint to ensure no signs remained.
Mornington Peninsula Shire deputy mayor Sarah Race was “so disappointed that this has happened in our beautiful community”.
“I know life is hard at the moment … but it isn’t Germany in the 1930s/40s.”
The ugly incident prompted a local to share his anger about the racist act on social media.
“This is not who Rye is and we will not stand for racism or intolerance,” the man posted.
“Disgusting lowlifes,” another resident posted.
Yet another suggested that the graffiti was in retaliation to Thursday’s announcement that public display of Nazi symbols would become illegal in response to a parliamentary committee report that recommended the change in March.
Chairman of the Anti-Defamation Commission and Australia’s leading anti-hate campaigner Dvir Abramovich said the incident was an example of a dramatic surge of white-supremacist graffiti and activities.
““The Hitler worshippers and ‘Final Solutionists’, who dream of turning Australia into Nazi Germany and who were dealt a crushing blow yesterday, are out in force again, spreading their poison of hate in Rye,” he said.
“It is incumbent on the entire community to speak up against the uptick of xenophobia, and we call on all leaders to say in a strong and loud voice that such intolerance will never find a safe haven in our neighbourhoods,” he said
“I hope that those responsible are arrested and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
