Anti-Jewish Pogram in Venezeula?

It appears that the ground is being laid for the leftist government of Hugo Chavez to scapegoat the Jews of Venezeula for the hard times being brought on by the drop in oil prices due to the world-wide recession. The signs are ominous and, to anyone with any sense of history, all too sickeningly familiar.

CNN reports:

"Armed men forced their way into a Caracas synagogue, defacing its administrative offices with anti-Semitic graffiti and vandalizing an interior room where the Torah is kept, officials said. Vandals smashed items in an interior room where the Torah is kept, officials said.

About 15 men forced their way into the Mariperez Synagogue in Venezuela's capital about 10 p.m. Friday, staying until about 3 a.m., police said. They tied up a security guard at the synagogue before vandalizing the rooms.

Graffiti left at the scene included the phrases "Damn the Jews," "Jews out of here" and "Israel assassins." The men also left behind a picture of a devil, authorities said.

The men stole computers and administrative papers or documents, officials said. They did not cover their faces, but took the recordings from security cameras with them. The synagogue had canceled services in recent weeks because of a feared backlash from the Israeli military operations in Gaza, which resulted in the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador from Venezuela.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americas/01/31/venezuela.synagogue/index.html?section=cnn_latest

In this article from the Washington Times, we learn why the Jewish community had better not hold its collective breath waiting for the government to come to its aid:

"The regime — which boasts of cozy friendships with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's Iran and Fidel Castro's Cuba — has also engaged in steady anti-Semitic and anti-Israel propaganda. Mr. Chavez declared in a Christmas Eve speech little more than a year ago that, "The world has wealth for all, but some minorities, the descendants of the same people that crucified Christ, have taken over all the wealth of the world."

Publications by the government's Culture Ministry have featured titles like "The Jewish Question" with cover art showing a Star of David superimposed over a swastika. Jews were accused of complicity in the murder of a prosecutor. An article in a leading newspaper, El Diario de Caracas, asked whether it would become necessary "to expel [the Jews] from the country."
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/jan/31/a-pogrom-in-venezuela/

Here is a good analysis by Daniel Debow:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daniel-debow/venezuelan-kristallnacht_b_163202.html

Note especially 3 points:
1. In times of economic depression, the Jews throughout history (all over the world and not just in the West) always have been more vulnerable.

2. Venezeula is a socialist country not a right-wing or Fascist one. This supports my sense that the Left is increasingly turning Anti-Semitic these days.

3. Every time Israel is embroiled in a conflict (eg. Lebanon, Gaza) the Western (left-wing dominated) media goes into an anti-Israel flap and this clearly provides cover for anti-semites like Chavez and his friends. Don't think that Hamas and its patrons are oblivious to this fact.

Last word: I find it doubly offensive that Hugo Chavez would utter his anti-semitic slurs in the context of Christmas. What he said was evil and attempting to link it to a Christian holy day was also evil. All Christians should consider themselves slandered by this low-life and should consider themselves to be attacked by him.