A brush with some hostile hassidim - Reporter's Notebook

There is, however, little actual photographic or video documentation of such mass violations, with usually only verbal reports seeping out about such events.

By JEREMY SHARON
Haredim are seen rioting in Jerusalem and flouting COVID-19 restrictions, with a garbage can lit ablaze to block the street. (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
Haredim are seen rioting in Jerusalem and flouting COVID-19 restrictions, with a garbage can lit ablaze to block the street.
(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
The life of a religious affairs reporter is not usually one of high drama.
Military correspondents get embedded with troops on daring missions, diplomatic reporters fly to exotic locations for historic peace deals, and those covering the religious beat have to make do with rare sightings of venerable rabbis, and on occasion, mass rallies of the faithful for the critical cause of the day.
On Sunday morning, however, this reporter found himself in the thick of the action outside the Belz Great Synagogue, as half a dozen angry Belz Hassidim, replete with shtreimels and frock coats, yelled and chased after me, tried to grab my phone and sought to block my escape from the site, with one even landing a couple of blows on my person.
Swift of foot, a safe escape route was found and a rapid retreat from the hassidic headquarters in particular, and Kiryat Belz in north Jerusalem in general, was executed.
What prompted such a demonstration of righteous fury? It is well known that many of the hassidic courts have routinely flouted the government’s COVID-19 regulations for many months, conducting mass prayer services as usual, holding celebrations in violation of Health Ministry directives, shunning social distancing and totally failing to wear masks.
There is, however, little actual photographic or video documentation of such events, with usually only verbal reports seeping out about them.
At the end of the Yom Kippur fast, a brief glimpse through a narrow doorway of a tisch celebration with hundreds of hassidim at the Vizhnitz Hassidic world center in Bnei Brak was seen on two videos that circulated on social media.
Such brief glimpses are all that is usually available about these mass violations of government orders.
The Belz Hassidic community has been one of the primary groups accused of continually ignoring the Health Ministry regulations, and the intermediary days of Sukkot, a time when prayers are especially lengthy and celebratory, appeared a good opportunity to see if footage could be obtained.
Waiting outside of the gargantuan Belz Great Synagogue complex, a steady stream of hassidim flowed past this reporter’s car for at least 45 minutes, so that several hundred men, almost entirely without masks, must have entered the building through a side door during this time.
Attempts to enter that door were rebuffed firmly by some of those hassidim, while others, including women, demanded to know who I was.
But it was the effort to enter a second, unobtrusive entrance on the other side of the complex that sparked the altercation.
Physically blocked again from seeing where hundreds of men with prayer shawls and the four species were heading during a massive health crisis caused by a rampaging contagion, I conceded defeat in my efforts to obtain footage of the spectacle and resigned myself to merely documenting the stream of men entering the building and disappearing out of sight with a few quick pictures.
It was this effort that ultimately sparked the rage of the hassidim, and that precipitated my speedy departure from the scene.
What is concerning in this incident is that the police were nowhere to be seen. Despite it being well known that the Belz community is praying en masse without regard for social distancing, mask wearing, or any health regulations, law enforcement authorities have apparently decided to ignore this enormous violation of the rule of law.
They appear, in fact, to have tacitly accepted that such areas are extraterritorial to its authority.
This state of affairs has huge consequences for the nation, in particular the state’s ability to bind the ultra-Orthodox sector more tightly into the fabric of society and form a more cohesive country.
If in the Jewish state large sections of the population can decide for themselves which laws to obey and which to ignore, the ability of the country to maintain internal solidarity and continue to overcome the many challenges it faces, internally and externally, will surely come under ever-increasing strain.


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