The Israel Press Council’s Ethics Court last week censured the far-left Haaretz newspaper and journalist Uri Misgav for an article that spewed hatred and incitement against the Chareidi public and ordered it removed from the Haaretz website.

The article was published during the first coronavirus outbreak in Israel when Chareidi areas had high infection rates due to their population density.

Entitled “Where Is The Left To Ignite A Secular Intifada?” the article called on the secular public to launch an intifada against the Chareidi sector, saying that “whoever does so will become a superstar.”

Misgav continued to write that “the Chareidim today are more dangerous to Israel’s present and future than Hezbollah’s missiles and Iran’s nuclear program. The damage they cause is tangible on a day-to-day basis.”

“COVID, as per the nature of dramatic crises, has revealed the truth. The Chareidim are the lords of the land. Israel is afflicted with COVID mainly because of them…it isn’t a disease of the secular, certainly not an epidemic. The lockdown is only imposed on the secular. They’re not enforcing it in Jerusalem, Bnei Brak, Beitar Illit and Modiin Illit and the infection rate is rampant.”

Misgav also recycled the often-repeated lies that Chareidim receive large amounts of money from the government. “In the past six months, they of course have been the first to receive budget additions of hundreds of millions of shekels for yeshivos and their educational institutions.”

The Ethic Court’s decision denounced the article as racist and inciteful and encouraging of violence and civil war.

“The article turns the Chareidim into an enemy of the people and the state,” the court wrote. “The title of the article and the end of the article calling to ‘ignite a secular intifada that will turn the one who launches it into a superstar’ are words of incitement, creating a feeling that the danger is certain and imminent, and encourages a civil war. These words can only be interpreted as a call for physical harm to an entire public.”

“We have no choice but to state that Haaretz and journalist Uri Misgav violated Rule 14A of Israel Press Council’s Code of Ethics.”

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)