Will Smith Visited The Western Wall And Crashed A Bar Mitzvah

Image by Getty Images

By Jenny Singer November 9, 2017

Art and life collided today when “Men In Black” star Will Smith visited Jerusalem, home of a very different kind of Men In Black, while filming Disney’s live-action “Aladdin” nearby in the Wadi Rum area in Jordan.

You don’t see this too often! Actor and musician #WillSmith at the Western Wall (Kotel) in #Israel ?? pic.twitter.com/wyz5nxVaLi

— Fred Menachem (@FredMenachem) November 9, 2017

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Smith, his wife the actress Jada Pinkett Smith, and a coterie of companions including Israeli tour guide Barnea Selavan toured Jerusalem’s Old City. They walked through the shuk and visited the Western Wall, where their presence disrupted 13 year-old Atir Cohen’s bar mitzvah.

“At first I didn’t know who it was,” Cohen told The Associated Press. Smith put a note in the cracks of the Wall and posed for a picture with the bar mitzvah boy.

Smith with his Israeli tour guide

The couple continued on to a tour of the Western Wall tunnels with Rabbi Shmuel Rabinovitch, Chief Rabbi of the Western Wall, and went on to visit the nearby Church of the Holy Sepulcher.

“Very spiritual, very powerful place. I feel honored to be here.” Will Smith visits the Western Wall. WATCH: pic.twitter.com/Cot4sIaC7j

— (((WJC))) (@WorldJewishCong) November 9, 2017

Smith called the Wall “very spiritual, very powerful.” Rabbi Rabinovitch noted that the couple spent several minutes standing at the Wall in prayer.

Jenny Singer is a writer for the Forward. You can reach her at [email protected] or on Twitter @jeanvaljenny

Jenny Singer is a freelance writer with pieces in Vox, the Washington Post, The San Francisco Chronicle, Teen Vogue, and more. She was previously a staff writer at Glamour and the Forward, and she’s currently getting an MFA in nonfiction writing at the University of Iowa.

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