A synagogue in the Italian city of Bologna was attacked and vandalized on Saturday night amid massive protests following the death of a young Egyptian-Italian man during a police car chase in November, according to a Ynet report on Sunday.
Ramy Elgaml, the 19-year-old son of Egyptian immigrants to Italy, was killed in November, when riding on the back of a moped with his friend. Police pulled the two over, demanding to see their licenses, but Elgaml’s friend, Fares Bouzidi, took off, in an attempt to escape, sparking a car chase with the two police officers, the report said.
The eight-kilometer (nearly five-mile) police chase ended when the moped crashed into a pole, killing Elgaml instantly.
The incident sparked protests among anti-racist and immigrant groups across Italy that died down within a few days, according to Euro News, but they were rekindled last week, after footage from the chase appeared to show that the police officers hit the moped with their car, causing it to crash into the pole.
The footage sparked renewed protests on Saturday in Rome, Milan, Brescia, and Bologna. Amid the massive demonstrations, the synagogue in Bologna was attacked and the words “Justice free Gaza” were sprayed onto the wall alongside Elgaml’s name.
Protesters also injured at least 18 police officers and caused heavy damage to shop windows, Euro News reported.
E’ semplicemente orrendo, spaventoso, che una manifestazione di solidarietà per il giovane Ramy sia stata usata a pretesto per assaltare la sinagoga di Bologna. E che su quel luogo di preghiera abbiano scritto “Giustizia per Gaza”. Precipitiamo in un odio dissennato senza ritorno pic.twitter.com/GZv3So0vZk
— Gad Lerner (@gadlernertweet) January 12, 2025
Ynet quoted the president of Bologna’s Jewish community, Daniele De Paz, on Sunday saying that the synagogue was a deliberate target for the protesters, who he said had broken through police barricades and made their way to the synagogue before hurling Molotov cocktails, explosives, and fireworks at it, while shouting threats and curses.
While no culprits were identified as of Sunday, Ynet reported that members of pro-Palestinian groups were among the demonstrators.
Israel’s Ambassador to Italy Jonathan Peled expressed his solidarity with the Bologna Jewish community in a post on X on Sunday, saying the attack on the synagogue was “a serious antisemitic attack which must be condemned with absolute firmness.”
In a Facebook post on Sunday morning, Bologna’s mayor, Matteo Lepore, also expressed his “solidarity with the Jewish community” for the “acts of vandalism and threats against the Bologna Synagogue.”
The president of the Italian Senate, Ignazio La Russa, noted the damage done to the synagogue in a Facebook post on Sunday and wrote that “no justification [and] no tolerance is admissible for these episodes.”
The president of Italian Senate, Ignazio La Russa, gestures on stage during the campaign meeting of the far-right party Fratelli d’Italia (Brothers of Italy) ahead of the European Elections, on April 28, 2024, in Pescara. (Tiziana FABI / AFP)
In a statement issued to the Agi news agency through their lawyer on Sunday, Elgaml’s family condemned the violence perpetrated in their son’s name.
While the statement did not explicitly mention the synagogue, it did say they “strongly condemn all forms of violence and vandalism that have occurred in the demonstrations.”
“We believe Ramy’s memory should be a symbol of unity, not of division or destruction. We dissociate ourselves from any political use of our son’s name,” they said.
It’s not (only) about you.
Supporting The Times of Israel isn’t a transaction for an online service, like subscribing to Netflix. The ToI Community is for people like you who care about a common good: ensuring that balanced, responsible coverage of Israel continues to be available to millions across the world, for free.
Sure, we’ll remove all ads from your page and you’ll unlock access to some excellent Community-only content. But your support gives you something more profound than that: the pride of joining something that really matters.
Join the Times of Israel Community
Join our Community
Already a member? Sign in to stop seeing this
You’re a dedicated reader
We’re really pleased that you’ve read X Times of Israel articles in the past month.
That’s why we started the Times of Israel – to provide discerning readers like you with must-read coverage of Israel and the Jewish world.
So now we have a request. Unlike other news outlets, we haven’t put up a paywall. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community.
For as little as $6 a month you can help support our quality journalism while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.
Thank you,
David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel
Join Our Community
Join Our Community
Already a member? Sign in to stop seeing this
!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s)
{if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?
n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};
if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version=’2.0′;
n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;
t.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];
s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window, document,’script’,
‘https://connect.facebook.net/en_US/fbevents.js’);
fbq(‘init’, ‘272776440645465’);
fbq(‘track’, ‘PageView’);
