C'mon Charles! The Nepalese mayhem had the Mossad's handwriting all over it! <g>
Here's the evidence:
Aug 14, 1996
Religious-secular conflict splits Jews in Israel
by Storer H. Rowley
Chicago Tribune
JERUSALEM - Outfitted in a short dress, undercover policewoman Gili Levy set a trap in the ultra-Orthodox Mea She'arim neighborhood simply by stepping out of her car.
Suddenly, a group of Haredi men, ultrareligious Jews who consider modest dress a strict commandment, gathered and shouted at her: "Whore! Get out of here!" Later, one ultra-Orthodox man threw a large stone, missing her but hitting her windshield. An elderly woman slapped Levy while Haredi bystanders cursed her and protested strongly when police hauled the male assailant away.
Several other Jerusalem women have been threatened, cursed, spat upon, stoned or assaulted in recent days - all in the name of God - for not wearing modest attire, long sleeves and skirts stretching below the knees.
Pious passions among Israel's ultra-religious Jews are running at a fever pitch this summer, and thousands turned out along Jerusalem's Bar Ilan Street over the weekend for the sixth straight week to demand the closure of the thoroughfare on the Jewish Sabbath to observe a day of rest.
As the black-garbed faithful wail "Shabbas! Shabbas!" ("Sabbath! Sabbath!") at passing cars Saturday afternoon and scuffled with police trying to keep them from blocking the street, hundreds of less-observant Jews held a counterdemonstration denouncing what they consider fundamentalist fanaticism and demanding that the road remain open. Some Haredi spat and threw stones at passing cars.
A cultural battle rages
With Arab-Israeli tensions simmering but subdued in the early months of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's new administration, another battle rages in the Holy City's blistering August heat - pitting Jew against Jew.
More than a fight over skirts and streets, it is a cultural battle between religious and secular visions of Israel. Since Netanyahu's election, the ultrareligious hope restaurants, shops and cinemas will be closed on Shabbat.
Since mid-June, 28 female workers at the Ministry of Education building on the edge of Mea She'arim have said they were harassed for what the Haredim, in their formal black hats and dark suits, consider immodest dress.
Sewage was dumped on one woman. Another's car was set upon by dozens of Haredi men smashing the windows with pipes, trying to turn it over and threatening to burn it and kill her. Other cars were spattered with eggs or their tires slashed.
"Look at Jerusalem as a portrait of Israel," said Ornan Yekutieli, head of the left-wing Meretz opposition faction on the Jerusalem City Council and one of the leaders of the drive to keep Bar Ilan Street open on Shabbat.
"The ultra-Orthodox want this to be a Holy City. But aside from that it's also the capital of the State of Israel, and that's a secular term," he declared. "If we have a capital portraying our country as being a medieval, chauvinistic, ultra-Orthodox kind of place, on the scale between Tehran and Paris, or New York, we're moving a big step toward Tehran. We're having a city where God is telling the people what to do, and we're in trouble."
Haredi leaders, concerned that the violent incidents will mar their campaign to close Bar Ilan Street during prayer times Fridays and Saturdays, recently called for calm. The rabbinical leadership issued a halachic ruling (a ruling under Jewish law) forbidding stone-throwing or other acts of violence.
Rabbi Menachem Porush, deputy chairman of Agudath Israel, an ultra-Orthodox party allied with Netanyahu's Likud-led ruling coalition, denounced the stone-throwing as a desecration of the Sabbath and a "great sin."
But Porush insisted that more than 95 percent of the residents of the section of Bar Ilan Street proposed for closing are deeply religious and deserve to have peace and quiet on the Sabbath, which begins at sundown Friday evening, when observant Jews must not work. To the ultra-religious, work includes driving a car.
He pointed out that for decades buses haven't run on the Sabbath and up to 60 streets in predominantly ultra-religious neighborhoods have been closed. He estimated 60 percent to 70 percent of the Jewish population is observant and 85 percent observe the Sabbath.
The High Court of Justice will hear petitions for and against closure of the street Thursday. Last month, the court issued a temporary injunction against the closure after a protest of the Transportation Ministry's decision to close the road at prayer times.
Maintaining a Jewish tradition
Chaim Miller, deputy mayor of Jerusalem and party chairman of Agudath Israel, denounced fellow ultra-Orthodox people who provoked violence as "hoodlums" and insisted they were only a tiny fraction of the ultra-religious population.
He pointed out that it would take secular drivers only two or three more minutes to bypass Bar Ilan Street on the Sabbath.
"A majority of Jews are traditional, and even the more secular are happy that there are religious people willing to fight for the Holy City. We want a Jewish public with a Jewish tradition, and this is what we are fighting about."
Permission to repost or reprint any material on this site must be obtained by contacting Barbara Davis at The Seattle Times, (206)464-2310, bdav-new@seatimes.com
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It's obvious that these Nepalese Maoists were properly trained by Israel's Sabbath-freaks....
BTW, while we're at it, do you think that Democratic Party's match for Rev Jerry Falwell, that is Jo Lieberman, will petition Congress for a bill enforcing a "Sabbath standstill" in the US? Americans might quite soon face the shibboleth of a theocratic state.... |
