Stars of David daubed on the wall of a street in the 14th arrondissement of Paris. Photo: Reuters/Magali Cohen

The French authorities announced on Thursday that a couple had been arrested for daubing Stars of David on Jewish-owned buildings in the 10th arrondissement of Paris.

The unnamed couple — a 33-year-old man and a 29-year-old woman from Moldova — were apprehended after witnesses spied them painting the symbol of Judaism on the walls of 15 buildings where Jews either reside or which house organizations serving the Jewish community.

The pair are being held in an administrative detention center while French officials decide whether to deport them.

The arrests were not connected to the 60 Stars of David painted on the walls of buildings in the 14th arrondissement during this week. An investigation into these incidents was opened on Tuesday by the Paris Public Prosecutor, but no arrests have yet been made.

A statement from the prosecutor said that it had not yet been determined whether the vandalism was “for the purpose of insulting the Jewish people, or claiming membership,” pointing out that the Stars had been daubed in blue rather than yellow — the color of the “Judenstern” (“Jews’ Star”) which the Nazis forced Jews to wear on their outer clothing.

The phenomenon of vandalizing buildings with the Star of David has surfaced in Germany and Argentina, as well as France. In the French case, the vandalism has taken place amid a surge in antisemitic acts since the Hamas pogrom of Oct. 7 in southern Israel.

Addressing the French parliament this week, Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne noted that “more than 850 incidents have taken place and nearly 6,000 online reports have been made.”

She added that more than 430 arrests had been made by police and that 230 investigations were currently “in progress.”

Commenting on the latest wave of antisemitism, the French anti-racist organization LICRA observed that while this was not the first time that French Jews had been under threat since World War II, the present situation “is of a new scale,” representing “gangrene in the social fabric, national cohesion, and values of the Republic.”