April 24, 2002	Wednesday	Safar 10, 1423

BERLIN, April 23: Berlin police have given informal advice to Jewish people to avoid wearing skullcaps after recent attacks in the German capital, a police spokesman said on Tuesday.

Police were advising Jews to refrain from displaying their faith through identifiable outward signs, he said, acknowledging that orthodox Jews might take offence at this.

“We said it was possible to tuck away identifying objects, but insisted it was a person’s own decision whether or not to do so,” he added, summarizing what police had said in an interview with an Israeli radio reporter.

The spokesman said Berlin was a safe city and denied the police were formally recommending that Jewish people not identify themselves as such.

Israel’s Army Radio reported on Tuesday that a Berlin police spokesman was recommending the city’s Jews refrain from wearing skullcaps or Star of David jewellery and not carry around Hebrew periodicals.

“This matter is grievous and outrageous. The Berlin police may mean well, but the recommendation indicates a fundamental problem in Germany, and in Europe at large, of unwillingness to fight anti-Semitism vigorously,” said Avner Shalev, director-general of the Yad Vashem, a Jerusalem-based organization.

In the past three weeks, a Jewish mother and her adult daughter were punched in the face on a Berlin subway car and two 21-year-old American Jews were attacked walking along one of Berlin’s smartest streets after visiting a synagogue.

Security is already tight around Jewish sites and police say there is no plan to increase surveillance. Most significant sites are guarded by armed police. Barricades surround buildings such as Berlin’s historic New Synagogue.—Reuters