Israeli authorities are moving rapidly to beef up security as well as taking a number of other measures to improve conditions on Har Hazeitim (Mt. of Olives). This was the essence of a report given by Avrohom Lubinsky during a telephone conference yesterday with members of the International Committee for the Preservation of Har Hazeitim, which he founded in May 2010 and currently chairs. The report followed a whirlwind mission that included meetings with Israeli officials, including the Prime Minister’s Office, Mayor Nir Barkat of Jerusalem, the Jerusalem Development Authority, police officials, leaders of the Chevra Kadisha (Burial Society) members of Knesset and government ministers.

Mr. Lubinsky reported that 63 of a planned network of 138 surveillance cameras was operational, contributing to increased security over the past six weeks, following the destruction of 30 graves in July, mostly of American citizens. He said that security will be further improved in the coming weeks with the deployment of a police garrison. “The presence of a significant police contingent will dramatically change the landscape of conditions on Har Hazeitim,” Mr. Lubinsky added. He praised Mayor Barkat for taking the initiative in building walls and fences around violence prone areas in the cemetery as well as his general support for making the area a visitor and tourist friendly site.

In other significant developments that will have a major impact on Har Hazeitim, officials are planning to add lighting and signage, particularly singling out areas that include the burial sites of three Jewish nevi’im and other Jewish luminaries. They are also continuing to restore some of the 38,000 graves destroyed by Jordanian authorities prior to 1967. Mr. Lubinsky was joined at the meetings by Harvey Schwartz and Jeff Daube, leaders of the Israeli section of the International Committee for the Preservation of Har Hazeitim. The committee leaders also met with Knesset members and staff in promoting legislation that will impose mandatory jail sentences on perpetrators of violence and destruction in any cemetery in Israel.

Said Mr. Lubinsky: “Thanks to the efforts of our committee there is a strong commitment by Israeli authorities to preserve Har Hazeitim at all cost. We are extremely grateful to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Mayor Barkat, and ministers like Eli Yishai who responded to the demands of the Committee to finally do justice to the holiest and oldest cemetery in Jewish history.”

Committee Slams State Department’s Equation of Violence on Har Hazeitim with Fraudulent Muslim Graves in Mamilla

“Jewish tombstones on the Mount of Olives cemetery were vandalized, and the Jerusalem Municipality demolished tombstones in the Muslim Mamilla cemetery it deemed were constructed illegally,” the US State Department noted in its annual International Religious Freedom Report released on September 13th and covering the period of July-December 2010. While this was the first time that the State Department called attention to the violence and abuse on Har Hazeitim, it absurdly linked the wanton violence against tombstones and visitors on Har Hazeitim with the Jerusalem Municipality’s removal of fake graves planted by Muslims to prevent the development of the area.  The State Department noted: “The desecration of Muslim and Jewish cemeteries in Jerusalem continued throughout the reporting period.” In its attempt to balance the report, the report also included the fact that “trash commonly littered both cemeteries, and maintenance was largely insufficient.”

Jerusalem city officials said last year that there was “clear and indisputable evidence” that the 300 tombstones that were discovered inside the ancient Muslim cemetery in Mamilla were fraudulent. Jerusalem Municipality released photographs and a clear timeline of what officials described as “one of the largest deceptions in recent years,” detailing how “Islamic officials” had used permits obtained for the purpose of cleaning and renovating tombstones at the site to instead erect hundreds of “fictitious graves” on a neighboring plot of land.
Jeff Daube, who represents the Zionist Organization of America in Jerusalem and is a member of the Israeli section of the International Committee for the Preservation of Har Hazeitim, had lobbied the State Department to include the violence on Har Hazeitim in its annual report of abuses of religious freedom. Mr. Daube was shocked and dismayed that the State Department had decided to make such an absurd comparison. Said Mr. Daube: “I was incensed to see that they had resorted to the worst form of relativism, even in this post-modernist age, by equating the removal of tombstones over faux-graves in Mamilla where there is no abuse of visitors to the desecrations on Har Hazeitim. There was also no mention of stonings and harassment.”

Mr. Lubinsky said the State Department’s report was disappointing “since much of the violence perpetrated on Har Hazeitim is against graves of Americans who chose to be buried on the holy 3000-year old cemetery. American visitors are also frequently the subject of violence including stone throwing and even Molotov cocktails in one instance.” He concluded: “One would think that the State Department would assist Americans rather than making such an absurd and ridiculous comparison of neglect.”

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