Vandals destroyed a 9/11 memorial at Occidental College in California on the fifteenth anniversary of the terrorist attacks.
Occidental College’s Republican Club placed 2,997 flags on the campus quad Saturday night, one for each of the victims who died 15 years ago.
Shortly after midnight Sunday, club members found that vandals crushed, snapped, and threw the flags in the trash. The vandals also put up posters and fliers that “shamed the victims of 9/11,” according to the student organization’s post on Facebook.
The fliers said, “R.I.P. The 2,996 Americans who died in 9/11. R.I.P. the 1,455,590 innocent Iraqis who died during the U.S. invasion for something they didn’t do,” according to the Los Angeles Times.
The organization quickly moved to restore the memorial after it was knocked down, despite there being several other attempts at vandalism at the memorial.
“This is beyond politics, this is about those lives that were so tragically taken,” the organization wrote on Facebook.
Occidental College issued a statement to students and faculty saying that the vandalism was under investigation and that disciplinary action will be taken against the perpetrators.
“Vandalism or other acts that substantially interfere with the rights of others to engage in protected speech violate the College’s Student Code of Conduct and the spirit of this institution,” Erica O’Neal, acting dean of students, told the LA Times. “Let us work together to find ways to express ourselves and build a community founded on respect.”