A number of Chabad talmidim who on Erev Shabbos visited Azrieli Mall for ‘Mivtzaim’, putting on Tefillin, were questioned by police on Sunday, 28 Iyar. These talmidim visit the mall on Friday afternoons, as Chabad talmidim do in many areas around the country.
This past week, member of the mall management decided the talmidim were bothering and harassing some of the visitors to the mall. The talmidim explain they did not have a booth, but obtained permission from a number of store owners, using those areas only.
MK (Shas) Michael Malchieli stated, “It is chilling to hear the extent of the insensitivity and hared that people have for everything holy”.
Following the outrageous incident, MK Malchieli announced that he would approach the management of the Azrieli Mall in order to receive clarifications in case. At the same time, we must work to find a permanent solution in favor of the tefillin stand so that the young people can continue to merit passers-by, with putting on tefilin.
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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7 Responses
A lot depends on the legal status of a shopping mall in EY as private property or public access. In the U.S., mall owners can legally prohibit these kinds of “solicitations” or allow some and exclude others at their discretion. There have been court cases here in the U.S. upholding the right of mall owners to prohibit the distribution of evangelical materials by various religious groups and to restrict fundraising by religious groups to only those approved by the mall (e.g. the familiar Salvation Army red bell ringers at Christmas time). There should be some way that mall owners in EY can allow Chabad or other groups to come to the mall and operate out of a kiosk or other area as long as they don’t bother customers or disrupt traffic flow.
Do these mall management people or/& police who did the questioning fall into the category of “Poshei Yisroel” if even 1 potential person missed opportunity to lay Tefillin this past Friday because of their apathy?
To 147′
The Mall management MAY have a legal right to evict them from their private property if that is the law in EY as it is here in the United States. That doesn’t mean they SHOULD restrict these Chabad bochurim unless they are being disruptive or pushing themselves on people who don’t want to deal with them. Most yidden who are approached by Chabad in lower Manhattan or midtown for tefillin, sukkah or whatever else they are pushing find them polite, upbeat and respectful of their yes/no response.
Gadolhadorah
Thanks for reading the headline.
Had you actually read the rest of the article, you would have noticed it states “The talmidim explain they did not have a booth, but obtained permission from a number of store owners, using those areas only.”
What where you saying again?
there are places in Israel where they hate with passion any observance of Jewish laws and when they see the Chabad boys putting tephilin on other people it burns them up.
This has been going on around the country for years and now that Israel is becoming more religious, it is more painful to the anti-religious elements in Israel. So they make a big deal out of a gornisht….
What exactly did they do? Did they just stand there with a sign? Did they follow people around? I once had an experience where some nudnik followed me around a store demanding “tzedaka”.
It really depends how they asked, did they take a simple no or where they agressive in pursing people