A social experiment where a gay couple holds hands in public has been recreated in Jerusalem, with shocking results. Similar to videos created in Ukraine and Russia, and shows the men enduring vile abuse. As they walk down the street, dozens of people look, and others make homophobic comments. This video comes just two weeks after six people were stabbed at a Pride parade in the city, which left one 16-year-old dead.
The clip auto-plays so you'll have to watch it at the link.
Posters praising last week’s deadly attack at the Jerusalem gay pride parade appeared in the city’s ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods Thursday morning. Distributed by an extremist group calling itself “The Faithful Judaism,” the notices applauded the stabbing as an act of holy “self sacrifice.” “May all of the people of God be zealous as you,” one poster read, as its authors expressed hope that similar acts would be carried out in the future. Under the headline “And the Plague Shall be Stopped,” another poster praised the deadly attack as an “act of Phineas,” a reference to an Old Testament priest who personally executed an Israelite man and a Midianite woman while they were together in the man’s tent, by running a spear through them both. His action is thought to have brought an end to a plague sent by God to punish the Israelites for sexual encounters with the Midianites. In another poster titled “Blessed are you Rabbi Yishai,” Schlissel was hailed as an emissary from God; the text on the poster quoted the Old Testament verse “Whoever spills the blood of the wicked is as if he brought a sacrifice.”
Yesterday a judge ordered the killer to undergo an evaluation to determine if he is mentally competent to stand trail.
Rallies to protest Thursday's stabbing attack at Jerusalem's Gay Pride parade and the arson attack in which a Palestinian child was killed will be held in major Israeli cities on Saturday night. A rally in Tel Aviv already planned to mark six years since two people were killed in a shooting at Bar Noar, a Tel Aviv gay youth center, will be turned into a protest against violence following Thursday's stabbings. At 7:30 P.M a Peace Now rally will be held at Tel Aviv's Rabin Square, and from there the participants will march to Gan Meir, where another rally is scheduled to take place. Opposition leader and Zionist Union head Isaac Herzog is scheduled to speak at the Rabin Square rally, as well as Meretz leader Zehava Galon, Zionist Union MK Amir Peretz, former Shin Bet chief Carmi Gilon and more. The Jerusalem rally will begin at 9:30 P.M. in Zion Square. A protest will also take place at 8:00 P.M. in the northern city of Haifa, and at 8:45 P.M in the southern city of Be'er Sheva.
During yesterday's arraignment the deranged attacker declared that he does not recognize the authority of Israel's legal system as he was acting under orders from God.
RELATED: Yesterday the New York Postpublished an op-ed which denounces the resurgent claims of "pinkwashing" that appeared on social media after Israeli politicians and religious leaders unanimously expressed outrage about the attack. An excerpt:
Their voices arrived this week both loudly and swiftly, often cloaked in the veil of “pink-washing” — the academically vogue assertion that Israel uses its pro-LGBT record to obscure its Gaza blockade and West Bank occupation. Transgender activist Pauline Park declared Thursday on Twitter: “Jerusalem LGBT PrideParade attack by Ultra-Orthodox Jewish Assailant undermines Zionist Pinkwashing Propaganda.” “Will the Zionists continue their pinkwashing campaign?” asked another on Twitter. Indeed, across the #pinkwashing spectrum, posters insisted that Israel is actually unsafe for its LGBT citizens, that it’s far from a liberal haven and that Netanyahu’s good wishes are merely political showmanship. As with most socio-political-cultural conflicts, the truth is at once far simpler — and more complex. Indeed, much as in other Western democracies, Israel’s open society can cultivate extremists who may act out with violent results. Yet despite their horror, these egregious examples do not render those societies fundamentally violent.
Yeshai Schlissel was sentenced for 12 years in prison for the 2005 attack after his conviction on charges of attempted murder and aggravated assault. However, in 2007, following an appeal, the Supreme Court mitigated his sentence to 10 years. After his release, Schlissel returned to his hometown, where residents said that he distributed hand-written pamphlets in which he called on "all Jews faithful to God" to risk "beatings and imprisonment" for the sake of preventing the parade. The Judea and Samaria Police District said after the attack that they were not supposed to track Schlissel after his release, even though he resides in their jurisdiction, because his crime was perpetrated in the Jerusalem district. Jerusalem District Police chief Moshe Edry said police didn't have concrete intelligence that Schlissel was in the area of the parade. "We were prepared for every scenario, but our perimeter was breached. This is a severe, hard incident, which required us to investigate to find out what fault cause this breach," he said. Benzi Gopstein, chairman of the right-wing group Lehava, said that while activists from his organization staged a protest against the "abomination parade," they "oppose the stabbing of Jews." He called on the police not to allow the parade to take place in Jerusalem again. Police had granted a permit to 30 right-wing activists to protest against the event near the Great Synagogue, not far from the marchers. Earlier on Thursday, Israel Police arrested right-wing extremist Baruch Marzel though they denied the arrest had anything to do with the city's annual Gay Pride Parade. Marzel is a member of the far-right Otzma Yehudit party and usually takes part in the annual protest against the parade.
An assailant stabbed six people marching in the annual Jerusalem gay pride parade on Thursday. The assailant, an ultra-Orthodox man, was arrested. According to MDA, six people were wounded in the incident that took place on the corners of Sokolov and Keren Hayesod streets in the capital. Paramedics were treating two people in serious condition, one in moderate condition and three people who were lightly injured. All of the victims were in their thirties, according to MDA. The wounded were being evacuated to Shaare Zedek Medical Center and Hadassah University Medical Center in Jerusalem's Ein Kerem neighborhood. Thousands of people were taking part in the annual pride parade in the capital when the attack occurred. "I saw an ultra-Orthodox youth stabbing everyone in his way," said Shai Aviyor, a witness interviewed on Israel's Channel 2 television. "We heard people screaming, everyone ran for cover, and there were bloodied people on the ground," Aviyor said.
The ultra-Orthodox group Lehava yesterday announced that it would not allow today's parade to "pass quietly." Today's incident mirrors an attack at Jerusalem Pride 2005 in which three attendees were stabbed by an ultra-Orthodox protester. I'll have video reports of today's attack as soon as they become available. Below are apparent photos of the attacker being subdued by police.
UPDATE: The attack was caught in this photo.
UPDATE II: Here is the attacker chasing two girls with his knife as the police come after him.
UPDATE III: The Jerusalem Post has updated their above-linked story to report that the attacker is the same man arrested in the in the 2005 attack: "The suspect in Thursday's stabbing attack, Yishai Shlissel, is the same man who perpetrated a similar stabbing attack at the 2005 Jerusalem gay pride parade. He was recently released from prison after having been convicted of stabbing three people during the parade ten years ago."
UPDATE IV: Here's the attacker about to pull his knife.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the attack contradicted the country's "basic values". "In the state of Israel the individual's freedom of choice is one of basic values. We must ensure that in Israel, every man and woman lives in security in any way they choose. That's how we acted in the past and how we'll continue to act. I wish the wounded a speedy recovery," he said in a statement. President Reuven Rivlin condemned the stabbing as a "terrible hate crime". "People celebrating their freedom and expressing their identity were viciously stabbed," he said. "We must not be deluded, a lack of tolerance will lead us to disaster. We cannot allow such crimes, and we must condemn those who commit and support them." Hundreds of police are deployed along the parade route to prevent violence breaking out. Jerusalem police spokesman Asi Ahroni told Reuters there was a "massive presence" of police at the parade but "unfortunately the man managed to pull out a knife and attack".
"Homosexuality has long ceased to be a sexual deviation, belonging to individuals and their private lives, which no one wants to interfere with.They came out of the closet a long time ago and are now the spearhead of the 'post-' culture. We are dealing with the undermining of the family unit, which is the basic building block of every national society. Throughout history from Rome to Europe in our day, the approval and spread of homosexuality presaged the decline of nations and cultures. If one reads the Torah portion 'Noah' – this comes as no surprise. The organizers of a pride parade do not wish to gain rights. They strive to force homosexuality as a culture upon the public sphere." - Moshe Feiglin, head of the Likud's Jewish Leadership group. In the past Feiglin has said that the Nazi Party was made of up "thugs and homosexuals."
Yesterday another Jewish group once again brought donkeys to Jerusalem Pride as a protest against "the bestiality of the parade." Last year the donkeys were accompanied by signs such as the ones below and others in Hebrew which read, "Sick perverts get back to the closet that you came from."VIDEO: Donkeys aside, the parade drew 4000 marchers and took place without incidents.
Over the strenuous objections of religious groups, yesterday about 3000 activists marched in Jerusalem's pride parade. The event coincided with the date of the murderous 2009 attack on a Tel Aviv LGBT youth center. The perpetrators of that attack have still not been apprehended.
ISRAEL: Hate Group Leads Donkeys Through Jerusalem In Pride Protest
An anti-gay group led donkeys through the streets of Jerusalem today in protest of the gay pride parade also taking place. Because gays are like donkeys somehow.
"Muslims, Christians, Jews, all of them are hurt by the fact that the Holy City of Jerusalem is defiled by abominations like today's march in Jerusalem," said Marzel. "These donkeys do not commit acts that are as bad as what the marchers are doing," Marzel added. "The question is why are they allowed to carry out this provocation," explained Ben Gvir. He noted that whenever nationalists request the courts' permission to march through Arab towns like Umm El Fahm, they are made to jump through hoops because the act is considered "a provocation."
JERUSALEM: Ultra-Orthodox Protest But Pride Parade Goes On Without Injuries
Yesterday's gay pride parade in Jerusalem was met by three separate protests by the city's Ultra-Orthodox Jews, but the event finished without significant incidents or injuries.
It was homosexual rights vs. religion on Thursday in Jerusalem as some 3,000 Israelis joined a gay pride parade, marching with colorful balloons and dancing in the streets. The march infuriated Orthodox Jews. But Yonatan Gher, one of the parade organizers, says there is no religious monopoly on the Holy City. "The reason the march takes place in Jerusalem is not to upset anyone," said Gher. "We're here because we're Jerusalemites. This is our city as much as anybody else's." Ultra-Orthodox Jews held counter-demonstrations, carrying signs that read: "Sick perverts, get out of Jerusalem." Many agree with this man who says that the Bible describes homosexuality as an "abomination." "The promotion of a gay lifestyle in the streets of Jerusalem, which is the holiest city for the Jewish people, [and] for the other religions - for Muslims, for Christians - it's a provocation" said one Orthodox Jewish man.
The planned donkey parade by Jerusalem's deputy mayor was downgraded to a donkey puppet event, when he was denied permission to bring the animals through the city's center.
Jerusalem's Deputy Mayor Plans Donkey Parade To Counter Gay Pride
Angry over the planned gay pride parade in Jerusalem, the city's ultra-Orthodox deputy mayor wants to parade 50 donkeys through the city on the same day.
"This expresses what we think -- that this is a beastly act," Rabbi Yitzhak Pindrus, who represents the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party on the city council, told the Ynet news website. His spokesman Menahem Zaide declined to link the donkey march to the parade, saying only: "Donkeys also have rights to be recognised as couples. We are in favour of donkey rights," he told AFP. However, Zaide said they were still awaiting permission from the agriculture ministry. About 1,000 people were expected to take part in the pride parade under heavy security.
In 2007 marchers at Jerusalem Pride were pelted with eggs and human feces by ultra-Orthodox protesters.
"The latest outrage, the sodomy celebration in Jerusalem, specifically planned to begin in an ultra-religious neighborhood, is nothing less than the spiritual rape of the Holy Land with the active support of the Israeli State, her courts and her police. This is just the next stage of confronting and silencing religious opposition locally and worldwide.
"This Perversion Pride Parade would never be countenanced in Mecca, the Vatican, Karbala, or Moscow, where the mayor and Russian Orthodox Patriarch vigorously oppose it. The 'brave' 'progressive' Israeli Government and Supreme Court would never dream of allowing the parade route to include Arab East Jerusalem or the Al Aqsa Mosque. The Moslem community locally and worldwide would never tolerate this. Just ask Arab Knesset member Sheikh Ibrahim Sarsur. Thus we see the Israeli elite treating religious Jews with less respect than their Arab co-citizens." - Rabbi Yehuda Levin, spokesman for the Rabbinical Council of America.
ISRAEL: Jerusalem Police Reverse Ban On Gay Pride March To Knesset
Jerusalem police have reversed their ban on a planned gay pride parade route that is scheduled to conclude at the Knesset.
A number of weeks ago, the police recommended that the parade be held on the same route as it was last year, citing security concerns. This year, the Jerusalem pride parade will mark the one-year anniversary of the slaying at the gay youth center in Tel Aviv and will be billed as Israel's national gay pride parade. For this reason, the organizers insisted that the parade conclude at the doorsteps of Israel's legislative branch. Jerusalem Open House Executive Director Yonatan Gher said, "The parade route to the Knesset, on the anniversary of the murder, is the proper route to symbolize what the parade is demanding – full equal rights for the gay community in Israel and an end to the incitement, violence, and silencing that we experience everyday."
Marching in the Jerusalem parade will be the mother of one of the young people murdered during the attack on the Tel Aviv LGBT youth center.
This morning a bomb exploded near Jerusalem and investigating police found leaflets protesting the upcoming Jerusalem gay pride parade. Ultra-orthodox Jews are suspected to have planted the bomb, which slightly injured a farmer when his tractor rode over the device. Noah Sattah, executive director of Jerusalem Open House issued this statement: "Jerusalem Open House could not more strongly condemn this act of violence and hatred directed at us. This violent act is just one example of the religious bigotry, prejudice and violence lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people across the world are confronted with every day." There has been previous violence involving ultra-Orthodox protesters at Jerusalem pride events.
