Rosh Yehudi Leads 2nd Hakafot on Dizengoff Despite Protests

Members and followers of Rosh Yehudi, a group offering Jewish information and opportunities to participate to unaffiliated Tel-Avivians, marched up to Dizengoff Circle Thursday evening as part of the second Hakafot at the end of Simchat Torah. The convoy was accompanied by police security against harassment from protesters who also marched to the Circle where they covered their eyes, recited the Kaddish prayer, and hung signs with pictures of the hostages – their routine appropriation of the 101 abductees for the war against Bibi.

Before Yom Kippur, Rosh Yehudi received permission from the High Court of Justice to conduct public prayer with mechitzas separating men from women in Gan Meir, a small park not far from Dizengoff Circle, where last year anti-Jewish protesters demolished the prayer service, forcing worshippers away. Despite this year’s ruling, Rosh Yehudi announced it would not conduct a separate-seating prayer in the park to avoid repeated clashes with protesters on the holiest day of the year. However, a group of secular Tel Aviv women organized separate prayers anyway.

Thursday night was time for the second hakafot, possibly the most joyous public event celebrated in hundreds of municipalities, religious, secular, and mixed, across Israel – and Rosh Yehudi was there, with police protection.

As expected, the protesters were not ignited with faithful zeal at the site of holy Torah scrolls being carried on the shoulders of men covered with tallitot who looked more like the protesters’ grandfathers than they. Instead, they turned to the impoverished repertoire of familiar slogans, and while the happy Jews sang tunes based on holy verses, the sad Jews yelled, “Busha! Busha!” (Shame, shame), and “Now!”

Yes, they want the hostages released now like a child throwing a tantrum in a supermarket aisle demanding her chocolate candy.

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