The vandals certainly chose their date carefully. In the run-up to November 9th, the 69th anniversary of the Kristallnacht pogroms, vandals in the Britz neighborhood of southern Berlin prized away 16 so-called Stolpersteine (literally “stumbling blocks”), brass cobblestones commemorating victims of the Nazis. Embedded in sidewalks outside the victims’ former homes, they detail the deportations and deaths (and, occasionally, escapes) under Nazi terror. They mark dwellings of people from persecuted groups, including Jews, Roma and Sinti, homosexuals, people with disabilities, and Jehovah’s witnesses.
Suspecting neo-Nazis are the culprits, locals are disgusted. Many have already donated money to have the stones restored. These thefts do not stand alone. Some vandalism of stones has occurred all across Germany since the memorial program began in 1992—a man stealing two in the small town of Boppard was even caught on camera this May, although not ultimately tracked down for arrest. Never have they been so systematically carried out as this month in Berlin, however, leaving communities to steel themselves for a possible rash of new thefts.
