Flouting wartime restrictions, over 1,000 men gather for address by top Haredi rabbi

Spokesperson for rabbi insists event held in protective space in Bnei Brak; police say it refused permit for event and requested its dispersal after learning it took place

Over a thousand ultra-Orthodox men on Sunday attended a holiday gathering in the central city of Bnei Brak headlined by Rabbi Dov Lando, the spiritual leader of the Knesset’s Degel HaTorah party, despite Home Front Command restrictions on the size of public events during wartime.

A spokesman for Rabbi Lando insisted that at the event, held at the Machnovka yeshiva, “both the rabbi and the audience are situated in protected spaces.”

According to Home Front Command guidelines, gatherings in central Israel can be held with up to 50 people if there is access to a nearby shelter.

In a statement, the Israel Police said that an initial request for a permit for an outdoor event was rejected and that after learning of this evening’s underground event, where there was no “immediate danger,” law enforcement “immediately” entered into dialogue with organizers and “at this stage, the event is beginning to disperse.”

Lando’s mass event was held only a day after Degel HaTorah chairman Moshe Gafni accused the High Court of Justice of issuing an illegal ruling, after the court handed down an interim order effectively forbidding law enforcement from forcibly dispersing anti-war protests of fewer than 600 attendees at Tel Aviv’s Habima Square, and fewer than 150 attendees in Jerusalem, Haifa, and Kfar Saba.

In the decision, judges accused police of selectively enforcing the restrictions, pointing to the fact that beaches and malls are regularly packed with people despite the restrictions, and that police have only focused on breaking up protests, not other gatherings.

Gafni was not alone in his criticism, with Justice Minister Levin urging the cabinet to instruct law enforcement to enforce Home Front Command restrictions on public gatherings in defiance of the court ruling.

Several other coalition lawmakers and top religious leaders also castigated the court for acceding to left-wing demands and “allowing protesters to show contempt for the law,” in the words of National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s far-right Otzma Yehudit party.

Sephardic Chief Rabbi David Yitzhak Yosef went even further, calling the High Court “the enemy of Judaism” for issuing the ruling on Shabbat, the Jewish day of rest.