Jewish Agency chairman calls on Israel supporters to hold rallies, prayer vigils in memory of slain yeshiva students.
By HAVIV RETTIG GUR
Israel supporters worldwide must organize massive rallies and public prayer vigils in memory of those killed in the Thursday attack on a yeshiva in Jerusalem, Jewish Agency Chairman Ze'ev Bielski wrote in a letter to Jewish leaders this week.
The attack killed eight students, seven of them teenagers, and was the worst terror attack in Israel since 2006.
Bielski's letter will be included in information kits that will be sent to over 500 agency emissaries throughout the world in the coming days, together with photographs from the attacks, banners, stickers and informational materials.
"We must unite and bring word of this attack to all corners of the world, to expand the circle of support and identification with Israel's ongoing struggle against terror," Bielski wrote in the letter.
An agency press release said the information kits will also be sent to Zionist groups, synagogues and youth movements in what an agency representative called "the first time in the 21st century, and in recent memory, that the Jewish Agency launched a campaign of this scale."
In addition to the rallies in support of Israel, the agency called for massive demonstrations outside Iranian embassies worldwide protesting that country's support for Hamas.
Amos Hermon, chair of the agency's Education Committee, said the initiative will also include non-Jewish pro-Israel groups, and that agency emissaries themselves will coordinate demonstrations globally.
The agency has in the past coordinated rallies for Israel's MIAs and against Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.