Thwarted Attempt To Transport Jerusalem Riots Stateside
By Nathaniel Popper
The streets around the Israeli consulate in Midtown Manhattan had the normal midday rush at 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday, but there was not a black hat or protestor was in sight.
The absence was notable because ultra-Orthodox organizers had called for a protest against the Israeli government at 2:30, across the street from the consulate on Second Avenue and 42nd Street. This was an apparently unsuccessful effort to import to America the ultra-Orthodox protests that have rocked Jerusalem every weekend for the last two months.
The ultra-Orthodox began their protests in Israel in response to the Jerusalem municipality’s decision to open a parking lot during the Sabbath, and grew when an ultra-Orthodox woman was arrested for allegedly starving her child. It got particularly bad this weekend when the Israeli government arrested a number of protestors and declined to release them on bail. The whole mess has signaled a new low in relations between Israel’s government and its ultra-Orthodox citizens though some who live in Israel have declined citizenship due to a belief that the Israeli government is illegitimate.
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