Ultra-Orthodox Burn Jewish Prayer Book To Protest Women At Western Wall
Image by Getty Images
(JTA) — Haredi protesters burned a Jewish prayer book near the Western Wall in Jerusalem to protest the actions of female worshipers seeking greater freedom at the holy site.
The incident Friday occurred as nearly 200 Women of the Wall activists arrived for their monthly prayer service at the Western Wall in celebration of the beginning of the Hebrew month of Av. Several thousand haredi protesters greeted them with booing and shouting.
The haredis and other conservatives oppose the group’s singing and, at times, use of prayer shawls, kippahs and Torah scrolls, which are reserved for men in Orthodox Judaism. Some of the protesters set fire to a prayer book bearing the group’s logo, Arutz 7 reported.
They “laughed with pleasure as a WOW participant burned herself trying to salvage it,” the group said in a statement.
According to the Foundation of the Heritage of the Western Wall, which administers religious services there, Women of the Wall declined to pray at a space allocated to them for this purposes, “triggering serious disturbances.”
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
