Orthodox Jews Can’t Protest Gay Pride Parade, Hire Mexicans Instead

Some of the most curious costumes worn along the parade route belonged to protesters. Behind a barricade, a group of men wore the fringed Jewish prayer garment known as the tzitzit and held up anti-gay signs bearing the logo of a group calling itself the Jewish Political Action Committee. “Judaism prohibits homosexuality,” one sign read.

But the men were not Jewish. They were Mexican laborers, protesting because they were paid to protest, said one of the men, who would not give his name. Heshie Freed, a member of the political action committee, an Orthodox Jewish group based in Brooklyn, said that the men were supplementary troops, filling in for the Jewish students who would normally be called upon to demonstrate.

“The rabbis said that the yeshiva boys shouldn’t come out for this because of what they would see at the parade,” Mr. Freed said.

The New York Times

Ultra-Orthodox Jews Delay Flights Over Seating

Yet again, the takeoff of a flight from New York to Israel was delayed because haredi (ultra-Orthodox) male Jewish passengers refused to sit next to women because their faith forbids it. The Dec. 20 El Al flight’s takeoff was delayed for 30 minutes when haredi men balked at sitting between two women, and other passengers refused to accommodate them in protest until one passenger finally relented.

In October, a Delta flight was delayed after haredim refused to sit with members of the opposite sex, resulting in the plane arriving an hour late. In September, a group of haredim turned another El Al flight into a nightmare when they stood in the aisles rather than sit next to members of the opposite sex.

By any measure, the haredis’ behavior is an asinine display.  That one would board a plane fully expecting the crew and passengers to accommodate their wish to not be seated next to a member of half the human race is entitlement in the extreme. And yet not only are these unruly passengers who are disturbing the peace not kicked off the plane and arrested, but they are accommodated because they say those three magic words that in one breath excuse a host of idiocy, ignorance, and irrationality: “It’s my faith.”

More at The Daily Banter

Also see: Photo of haredi man covered in bag puzzles foreign media (ynetnews 2013)

Haredi: The Ultra orthodox society in Israel

More parts on YouTube

Forget Hamas and Iran. This may be Israel’s most pressing problem. As tensions grow between secular Jews and the ultra-Orthodox, many Israeli feel it is the most troubling conflict the country faces.

The country’s 1 million ultra-Orthodox, also known as Haredim, account for about 19 per cent of the country’s Jewish population of 5.4 million. Many Haredim, a Hebrew word meaning those who tremble before God, marry in their teens. Academics say they typically have eight children, compared with two for secular couples.

In 1960, 15 per cent of Israeli primary students attended schools in the Arab or Haredim systems, rather than non-religious state-run schools. Now it’s about 50 per cent, and is on pace to reach 78 per cent by 2040, according to the Taub Centre, an Israeli think-tank. By 2050, 25 per cent of Israel’s population will be Haredim, the International Monetary Fund estimates.

More on The Star

Anti-Putin punks Pussy Riot go on trial in Moscow

The trial of three Russian women who face up to seven years in jail for performing an anti-Vladimir Putin song in a Moscow church got under way on Monday, in a case that has divided the country. Initial hearings in the trial earlier this month saw the court order the three members of rock group Pussy Riot to stay in detention until January 2013, a move their supporters condemned as travesty of justice.

With the initial hearings in the trial now over, Monday's audience will see the first legal arguments in a process that is growing into a landmark event in the struggle between President Putin and the emboldened opposition. The hearing at the packed Khamovnichesky court in Moscow got underway with all three detained present shut in a glass-fronted defendants' box as judge Marina Syrova declared the session open.

In February, the three women climbed into an area reserved for priests in the Church of Christ the Saviour, the country's top Orthodox cathedral, and performed a "punk prayer" against Putin. (RNW)

Official website/blog - Official YouTube channel - Free Pussy Riot web-site - no prison for art

Russians join in call for Pussy Riot trio's release

Artists and musicians around the world have called for their release. Now, nearly four months after three women were arrested for performing a protest anthem inside Moscow's most important Orthodox church, Christ the Saviour cathedral, a growing number of Russians are joining calls for their freedom.

Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Ekaterina Samutsevich and Maria Alehina – all members of the anarchic Pussy Riot punk band – have been in prison since March, held on charges of hooliganism which could eventually mean a seven-year sentence. Many Muscovites were happy enough to see a tough response to the band's irreverent act of rebellion, which was aimed at President Vladimir Putin. But with no trial date set, no signs that they will be released and opposition to Putin spreading, support for the trio has grown, even among those who at first condemned them.

The Observer

Ultra-Orthodox Jews Hold Rally on Internet

It was an incongruous sight for a baseball stadium: tens of thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jewish men, all dressed in black suits and white shirts, filing through the gates of Citi Field on Sunday, wearing not blue-and-orange Mets caps but tall, big-brim black hats.

There was no ballgame scheduled, only a religious rally to discuss the dangers of the Internet.

The organizers had allowed only men to buy tickets, in keeping with ultra-Orthodox tradition of separating the sexes. Viewing parties had been arranged in Orthodox neighborhoods of Brooklyn and New Jersey so that women could watch, too. For the attendees, many of whom said they came at the instructions of their rabbis, it was a chance to hear about a moral topic considered gravely important in their community: the potential problems that can stem from access to pornography and other explicit content on the uncensored, often incendiary Web.

NYTimes.com – Vital, pointless, sexist, hilarious? New York’s ultra-Orthodox battle-the-Internet gathering goes viral (Times of Israel)

Pussy Riot members charged with hooliganism, face 7 years in jail

Two members of the now notorious "Pussy Riot" punk band have been charged with hooliganism.

­The women face up to seven years in jail for their performance of an anti-Putin song in Christ the Savior Cathedral in Central Moscow. Both detained young women are the mothers of young children. Late last month, four members of Pussy Riot ran into the cathedral in mini-dresses and masks, and performed a song entitled Holy Shit – right at the altar. Two members were subsequently tracked down and arrested. Police opened a criminal case on charges of hooliganism, which could result in up to seven years behind bars. 

More on RT and Reuters

Israeli 'immodest dressed' woman attacked by crowd of ultra-Orthodox men

A woman was attacked in her car in Beit Shemesh Tuesday by ultra-Orthodox extremists - the latest in a series of incidents apparently sparked by what members of the town's Haredi community view as immodest dress.

Ultra Orthodox Jews hold a placard that reads in Hebrew "segregate women" during a protest in the central town of Beit Shemesh, near Jerusalem, on December 26, 2011.

A crowd of ultra-Orthodox men jumped on 27-year-old Natali Mashiah's car in the Haredi Ramat Beit Shemet Bet neighborhood, she said. Members of the crowd smashed her car windows and punctured her four tires before spilling bleach on the inside of her car, said the Beit Shemesh resident, adding that she believed the men were going to set her on fire. As she fled the car, she said she was hit on the head by a rock thrown from very close range.

Haaretz

Jerusalem battles ultra-orthodox groups over women-free billboards

Jerusalem's secular mayor, Nir Barkat, has pitted himself against the city's swelling ranks of ultra-orthodox extremists by demanding that local police enable women to reclaim their position in the public domain. Over recent months, women's faces have disappeared from billboards across the city amid mounting pressure applied by the powerful ultra-orthodox lobby, who find the female image offensive.

Several advertisers have erased female models from their posters in Jerusalem. Elsewhere in Israel, the winter campaign of Israeli clothing brand Honigman features a model cosily dressed in winter knits. In the capital, the woman's head has been removed from the image, leaving just her arm and a handbag. (See here)

Companies that do not fall in line with the standards of the extreme ultra-orthodox have frequently fallen victim to direct action. Across Jerusalem, female figures have been blacked out of billboards with spray-paint, or vandalised with graffiti branding the image "illegal". Other posters are simply torn down.

The Guardian