MIAMI – A vandal spray painted swastikas and the SS for Schultzstaffel, the Nazi Germany paramilitary force in support of Adolf Hitler, on palm trees near the Mac Arthur Causeway.
The iconography of hate appeared near the westbound off-ramp at Northeast 13th Street Wednesday. Someone used paint matching the color of the palm trees to cover the white symbols hours after The Miami Herald's Joe Flechas spotted them.
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The symbol, which has also appeared in other parts of the country, was triggering fury after 32-year-old Heather Heyer was killed Saturday, while protesting against a group of white nationalists -- including neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan members.
James Alex Fields Jr., the 20-year-old driver who killed Heyer in Charlottesville, Virginia, is an admirer of Hitler and Nazi Germany.
The growing white nationalists' movement, also known as the alt-right, uses the swastika not only to express their anti-Semitic sentiment. They also use it to express their opposition to immigrants, African-Americans, Muslims and the LGBTQ community.
Earlier this year, a vandal etched swastikas on five parked cars in Miami Beach, where there is a large Jewish community and several holocaust survivors and their descendants found refuge.