Rabbis Place Death Curse on Gay Parade

Ultra-Orthodox Jews have been burning tyres and clashing with police of several days. (Reuters)

"The Rabbical Court has held a special session and discussed placing a pulsa danura on those who have a hand in organizing the march," said Rabbi Shmuel Papenheim, editor of the court's Ha'eidah weekly magazine.

Pulsa denura is a death curse that was pronounced previously against premier Yitzhak Rabin during a turbulent period that preceded his 1995 assassination for making peace with the Palestinians and comatose former premier Ariel Sharon for his withdrawal from the Gaza Strip last year.

The cursed are supposed to die within a year as rabbis call on the angels of destruction to kill them and to call down all the curses named in the Bible.

The High Court will meet Wednesday, November 8, to rule on a petition calling for the parade's cancellation.

Some 8,000 people are expected to take part in the gay parade through Jerusalem on November 10.

In a compromise proposal, police have recommended that the route of the parade be confined to an area far from Jewish ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods.

The alternate route would run from the Israeli government ministries complex near the western entrance of the city, a short distance to the Gvat Ram campus of the Hebrew University, according to the mass-circulation newspaper.

Gay parades have been held each year since 2001, but this year it is bigger than in the past and with international participation.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who has an openly gay daughter and appears supportive of her lifestyle, has been drawn into the debate.

He told a television interviewer on Monday he regarded this year's march as a "provocative act".

Incitement

The curse drew fierce criticism from Israeli lawmakers and politicians who demanded authorities to take action against the rabbis.

Leftist Meretz party Knesset faction chair Zehava Gal-On said the death curse constituted "incitement to murder."

"I recommend taking this with utmost seriousness, and to relate to this on the level of criminal offenses, not as just free speech," he told Haaretz.

"Brakes must be placed on free speech, when it is liable to turn dangerous, and we have seen that this is possible."

Protests against the upcoming parade continued into a second week on Tuesday in the religious neighborhoods,

Ultra-Orthodox protesters rolled burning trash receptacles into the streets, disrupting traffic.

Police forces deployed in the neighborhood to restore order to the area.

For the past week, Israel's newspapers have been full of pictures of angry ultra-Orthodox Jews, dressed in black suits and hats, burning tyres, pelting the police with stones and blasting homosexuality, which was legalized in Israel 18 years ago.

Israeli police had found and defused a bomb bearing the message "sodomites out."

Last year an ultra-Orthodox Jew stabbing three participants and was slapped with a 12-year jail sentence for attempted murder.

"This march tries to destroy the moral and spiritual values for youths," said Tamimi.

The gay parade has not drawn criticism from Jews only but Muslims as well.

"This march tries to destroy the moral and spiritual values for youths," Al-Quds Chief Justice Tayseer Tamimi told The Daily Telegraph Tuesday.

"All religions discredit gays because it is against the decent human nature created by God."

Gay relationship and same-sex marriages aretotally prohibited in Islam as well as in all the divine religions.

Jews and Muslims have been calling for the cancellation of the already twice-delayed event, downscaled from a World Pride parade that would have gathered gays and lesbians from around the globe.

"This isn't the gay pride parade but the disgrace parade," said Yaakov Cohen, an MP from the United Torah Judaism party.

"This shouldn't be legitimized and our youth shouldn't be exposed to this. Obviously, no one would want his son to catch this disease."

Ben Yizri, an MP for the ultra-orthodox Shas party, part of Israel's ruling coalition, said: "We believe God will be very upset."