Since January, a vandal has been making the rounds, ripping pages out of Anne Frank books in libraries across Tokyo, Japan.
Police investigators have counted a total of 265 damaged books.
One of the most renowned, historical books of the Holocaust victim includes The Diary of a Young Girl, which details a firsthand account of Anne Frank’s experience.
Evidence has shown that dozen of pages were ripped out of the book. Investigators believe that the books may have been searched in the librarian database.
One library has now relocated their copies in a safe area behind the counter of the checkout area.
There is reportedly no motive behind the vandalism, or is there?(image)
The Associated Press implied that the former relationship between Germany and Japan could be the reason why the “paper-reaper” is targeting Anne Frank literature.
Japan and Nazi Germany were allies in World War II, and though Holocaust denial has occurred in Japan at times, the motive for damaging the Anne Frank books is unclear.
According to BBC News, Japan has no history of anti-Semitism. Associate Dean Abraham Cooper of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, which is a Jewish rights organization, believes otherwise.
“The geographic scope of these incidents strongly suggest an organized effort to denigrate the memory of the most famous of the 1.5 million Jewish children murdered by the Nazis in the World War Two Holocaust,” he told BBC.
Literature about Anne Frank has been popular among the Japanese community for years. Historians from Israel have confirmed that young adults in Japan are more receptive towards the Anne Frank story than any other age group.
The The Diary of a Young Girl was first translated in 1952 and became a bestseller in Japan a year later. The country reportedly ranks second to the United States the number of copies sold.
Images via YouTube