An Ultra-Orthodox Jewish man is removed from the middle of the street by Israeli police during a demonstration next to Jerusalem's Old CityPosted on 07/05/2009 3:30:53 PM PDT by BGHater
Religious Jews have rioted in Jerusalem on the Jewish Sabbath for the second straight week.
Thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews took to the streets of Jerusalem, throwing stones and scuffling with police. The demonstrators were protesting the opening of a parking lot on the Sabbath to accommodate an influx of Israeli visitors from around the country to Jerusalem's Old City. Jewish religious law forbids driving on the Sabbath and the Orthodox accuse the secular government and public at large of desecrating the biblical holy day of rest.
Some demonstrators chanted that "Sabbath desecrators will die."
Riots first erupted last month when the Jerusalem Municipality opened a lot near the Old City to ease a severe shortage of parking on the Sabbath. The violence underscores a deep divide between the ultra-Orthodox and the secular majority in Israel.
Secular Israeli Eran Abromovitz is fed up with ultra-Orthodox violence. "They're disrupting the life of the city. We cannot continue in this situation. We the secular Jews demand that our rights to freedom be fulfilled. We demand that this parking lot and all the rest of the city be open to secular Jews," he said.
The ultra-Orthodox say they are safeguarding Jerusalem as the Holy City. But as one group of secular activists put it: "Jerusalem is not Teheran."
An Ultra-Orthodox Jewish man is removed from the middle of the street by Israeli police during a demonstration next to Jerusalem's Old City
Fellas fellas, there’s money to be made. You can’t still have Blue laws?
You mean actually observe the sabbath?
And they made fun of us southerners, with dry counties and blue laws. Makes us look like pikers in comparison.
Such things will happen in a country founded upon religion, yet governed largely by militant secularists.
In Jerusalem? Yes. It's actually eerie.
ML/NJ
Exactly.
What’s up with these mid-eastern religions?
Shouldn’t people who pre-cut toilet paper on Friday lest they break the Sabbath wait until Sunday to riot?
That’s a cynical take on something that needs to be understood in a completely different light. The right context is to ask how much religion a majority can impose on a minority?
This will end in trouble eventually. Some ticked-off Sabbath desecrater who is the target of stone-throwing will pull out his Uzi and fire it.
Nothing is sacred anymore, instead of The Almighty God, it’s the almighty dollar (their idol).
And in Israel, the Ultra-Orthodox Jews are a small minority and the secularists control the state apparatus and can make the rules, since as your tagline reads, they have the guns.
Isn’t it the case that the ultra-Orthodox are exempt from serving in the military that protects them in their rioting?
I’m confused. I thought rioting and stone throwing and such would be considered work.
When you seek to impose Religion on people nothing but bad things happen.
I don’t care if you are Christian, Muslim, Jew or Hindu. NO ONE has any right to impose religion just as no one has any right to take away my right to practice my religion.
Blue laws are STUPID. No two ways about it. If you want to observe the Sabbath, go do it in your own house. Don’t impose it on me.
These Ultra Orthodox in J-Town are no better than the Mullahs in Tehran.
Just because you are a majority XYZ country does not mean you can take away the rights of the minority.
How is this ANY DIFFERENT than what the Mullahs do to Christians in Arab countries.
Shame on these Ultra Orthodox. They want to impose their version of the Bible on everyone else.
IIRC, ultra Orthodox Jews haven’t killed any young female demonstrators, hijacked any airliners, called for the extermination of those who do not believe exactly as they do, or declared war on the world in general.
Compared to the mullahs in Iran, UOJ’s are pikers, JMHO.
If the numbers were reversed, their behavior shows the Orthodox are not to be trusted. It’s one thing to control your own behavior, its quite another to require religious observance of others.
The only difference, it that the UOJs haven’t done it YET. Pretty clear they would if they could. Not OK.
Okay, I’m a Gentile, but wouldn’t rioting technically count as physical labor?
Not if protecting a principle of Judaism as they perceive themselves to be doing. And I basically agree with them as shabbat is just 24 hours out of the week, and they are in Israel after all.
If turning on a light switch or starting a fire is physical labor, I would think voluntary rioting would count, too. But no one knows without appealing to some scholastic authority.
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