A Jewish-owned ventilation and air conditioning business in San Jose, California, was vandalized Monday night with swastikas, the letters “KKK,” and other hate graffiti sprayed on its walls and vehicles. Police are investigating the incident as a targeted hate crime.
Owner Lior Zeevi discovered the damage at HVAC & Insulation Gurus Tuesday morning. “They broke the windows, they broke side mirrors and swastikas and KKK on the door,” he said. “It’s very sad and very disappointing that they do these kind of bad things. It makes no sense – this kind of hate.”
Zeevi said he was stunned to find his business covered in hate symbols, with broken glass and car parts scattered on the ground. “Three guys came in and started spraying right away,” Zeevi said, referring to the security camera footage. “You can see they are checking which vehicles have our stickers on it – so they targeted us, clearly. I just think that it was weak people that had nothing better to do.”
Rabbi Menachem Mendel Weinfeld, a Chabad emissary in San Jose, told ABC the only response to hate is “to bring more light, to do more goodness, more kindness.” Zeevi said he plans to use the incident as a lesson for his children about resilience and “confronting darkness with light.”
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Antisemitic vandalism on a truck of a Jewish-owned business in San Jose, California
(Photo: ABC)
“I will definitely talk to them about it,” Zeevi said. “I will explain to them that there is some people that don’t like us, but we don’t need to be afraid of them. And, like the Rabbi said, said we need to fight the darkness with light.”
Weinfeld added: “It’s very sad to see this, just for being Jewish. This is a business who actually supports the community and does a lot for the community. We await the day that such things will never happen. We await the day of just goodness and kindness in the world.”
