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In what continues to be a tumultuous High Holiday season in Edison, officials at Congregation Beth-El returned the morning after Yom Kippur to find three large swastikas at the front of the synagogue.

Sometime between 7:30 p.m. Monday evening and 7:30 a.m. Tuesday morning, an unknown suspect or group of suspects spray-painted the blue, 3-foot by 3-foot swastikas at the synagogue on Jefferson Boulevard, two on the glass doors at the front entrance and a third on brick nearby, Edison Lt. Joseph Shannon said.

On Tuesday, the Anti-Defamation League offered a reward of up to $1,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the perpetrators. Just nine days before the swastika incident, a 19-year-old Jewish man was beaten while walking near Edison's Rabbi Jacob Joseph Yeshiva during the second night of Rosh Hashanah.

"This was not a random swastika," said Etzion Neuer, regional director for the ADL's New Jersey Region. "The deliberate targeting of a Jewish institution immediately after the High Holy Days, it's a despicable act and it's imperative that the perpetrators are apprehended and prosecuted."

A teacher at Beth-El first noticed the swastikas Tuesday morning and notified the police. The incident is under investigation by the Police Department's detective bureau and the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office, Shannon said.

Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg, leader of Beth-El, said he thinks it's no coincidence that the swastika incident came on the heels of the beating near RJJ.

"I would like the community and others to realize it's no joke," Rosenberg said of anti-Semitism in the area.

Rosenberg said he is attempting to get funding from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for security cameras at Beth-El, and has reached out to the office of U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) for that purpose.

"If [the painting of swastikas] ever happens again in the future [at Beth-El], I want to catch these guys and prosecute them to the full extent of the law," Rosenberg said.

Shannon called the swastikas particularly "large" and "noticeable." Edison routinely increases patrols near Jewish institutions around the time of the High Holidays, he said, and "will continue to diligently patrol all the sectors in town where the synagogues and schools are for the foreseeable future" in light of the recent incidents.

"We are very concerned about actions like this," Shannon said. "It's not going to be tolerated by anyone in the community, whether it is religious [leaders] or law enforcement."

Neuer said the ADL's offering of rewards depends on whether police departments think such a step is worthwhile, as well as the nature and timing of the crime. In this case, he said, the Police Department and Prosecutor's Office deemed the reward an appropriate measure after discussions with the ADL.

"We don't issue a reward in a vacuum," Neuer said, explaining that the ADL's rewards have been successful tools in the past as far as getting people talking and giving them enough incentive to reveal key information.

According to Shannon, Edison has experienced a number of swastika incidents this year. Vandals painted swastikas at St. Matthew the Apostle Church in March, on the floor of a basketball court at Lindquist Park in April, and on a fence in a public walkway on Hansen Drive in June, Shannon said.

Additionally, at RJJ in July 2008, vandals drew swastikas, the word "Jesus," and graphic sexual pictures on two interior walls. New Jersey saw a nation-high 238 anti-Semitic incidents in 2008, according to the ADL's annual audit, and Neuer said he couldn't say for sure whether Edison's situation is any worse than the "rife" anti-Semitism throughout the rest of the state.

However, the spate of recent incidents in Edison means that questions such as "Why here?" "Why now?" and "Who?" must be asked, Neuer said. The crimes in Edison during this year's High Holiday season are certainly "bold-faced incidents," he said.

The beating near RJJ, committed by a 16-year-old boy from Edison, is still under investigation as detectives at the Police Department remain in the interviewing phase, Shannon said. Once the interviews are done, they are sent to the Prosecutor's Office, and only Prosecutor Bruce J. Kaplan himself can charge the suspect with a bias crime, Shannon said.

Rosenberg said that about five years ago, a group of teenagers in a van threw eggs at him and his wife on the way to synagogue on a Friday night in Edison. Due to the recent anti-Semitic incidents in Edison and his outspokenness against anti-Semitism, Rosenberg said "I was in fear of my life this Shabbos when I walked to shul."

Just a few days later, Rosenberg's shul was hit with the swastikas.