[VIDEO IN EXTENDED ARTICLE]
A few hundred protesters were outside Har Nof apartment of Shas party leader Aryeh Deri on motzei Shabbos in an effort to drive their point home. Jerusalem Councilman Aryeh King explains that Deri and his Shas colleagues to date have not backed a bill sponsored by Bayit Yehudi MK Moti Yogev, seeking to silence the loudspeakers in the minarets of mosques, which are all too often just tens of meters from Jewish communities and regularly blast several times daily.
Many northern Jerusalem families have filed countless complaints with the Jerusalem Municipality, complaining over the mosques, as is the case in many other cities around the country.
King calls on newly-appointed Shas MK Michael Michaeli to back the bill as he is a resident of N’vei Yaakov, one of the northern Jerusalem neighborhoods plagued by the constant wailing of the mosques.
During his Friday sermon in al-Aqsa Mosque, Imam Sheikh Ikrima Sabri said he rejects the bill which interferes with freedom of religion, adding anyone who does not like the sound of the mosques can leave the country.
MK Hanin Zoabi added “Those who feel this is Europe should weigh moving there. The muezzin is part of the scenery of the homeland and its culture and when one opts to settle here, near a mosque, one should know where one is; the homeland with mosques. Yogev wants to silence this voice…”
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
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5 Responses
They are right we need an Israeli trump to get rid of these old politicians
Most Israelis are very annoyed by the presence of Orthodox Jews, and this would be a good precedent to establish the principle of “freedom from religion.” The law looks like it is anti-Muslim, but the real target is to set the basis for attacks on Yiddishkeit.
Let SHAS MK respond, ” why are they not voting to quiet the noise”?
Such a Bill could set a precedent
Everyone should be worried
Silencing the muezzins altogether would be an act of religious intolerance that would never make it past judicial review. Setting reasonable noise standards, that would balance religious freedom with the laws of nuisance should not be too difficult, and if properly done would pass judicial review. After all, until quite recently no muezzin anywhere either had or used a loudspeaker.
As for Deri, I’m (not) sure (at all) that his vote was not influenced by the great many votes that Sha”s receives every election from Israeli Muslim Arabs.