Somebody came who were not here and started to paint the doors with red paint with, you know, like hands.

I mean, you put your bloody hand prints.

Bloody hand, something like that.

Nassim Benjoya is standing outside a fairly nondescript 300-year-old building in Izmir Turkey.

It's the Al-Gaza Synagogue, and he's showing

me the spot where Vandals defaced its bright blue doors on the one-year anniversary of Hamas's

brutal attack on Israel. The synagogue is in a lively area of the city, Turkey's third largest, which

Nassim calls home. He's a prominent member of Izmir's historic Jewish community

and has been working for more than a decade on restoring Jewish history in the city and promoting

Jewish culture. But that task is getting harder as the community faces rising hostility from some

members of Turkish society as Israel's war in Gaza and the wider Middle East rages.

When this happened, of course, we were enraged and I wanted all the world, you know,

come send up and scream, you know, no more vandalizing cultural heritage, something like that.

So there were some groups that expressed

solidarity and this is the best I could do. That's okay. I'm Victoria Craig and you're listening to

the documentary from the BBC World Service. In this episode of Heart and Soul, which explores personal approaches

to spirituality around the world, will hear how Jewish citizens of Muslim majority Turkey

are grappling with their religious and national identities and wrestling with decisions

about whether to speak up amid a constant barrage of criticism by President Rejip Tayyip Erdogan aimed at Israel

and its supporters.

Here in the heart of Izmir's oldest Jewish district, the doors to the Al-Gaza synagogue have been repainted.

But streaks and splatters of red paint are still visible on the surrounding frame and concrete threshold.

...