Australian police have said they foiled a potential antisemitic attack on discovering a trailer packed with explosives in northwest Sydney, alarming the Jewish community following a spate of arson and graffiti incidents.

Police in Australia say they have seized explosives that they believe were intended for a plot to target Jews. The explosives, as well as material containing details about Jewish institutions, were found earlier this month in a camper van in a suburb of Sydney.

Australian police suspect explosives stashed on Sydney’s outskirts were evidence of a deadly escalation in a campaign of antisemitic arson and graffiti crimes that has been waged in major cities for months,

Sydney restaurateur Judith Lewis couldn’t save the mezuzah, a framed parchment inked with Hebrew prayers, that was hanging in her family’s café when arsonists set it alight in the early hours one Sunday in late October.