Three Young Orthodox Jewish Women They were Incarcerated this Week for Refusing Army Enlistment Violating their Religious Beliefs

NY, USA, June 26, 2019 /EINPresswire.com/ -- New York – More than ten thousand Orthodox Jews will gather today, Wednesday, to protest Israel’s campaign to force Orthodox Jewish girls into military services, culminating in this week’s brutal arrest of three girls for refusing enlistment orders. The protesters will express solidarity with their brethren in Jerusalem who are demonstrating for days these arrests. They will decry Israeli Police’s brutal crackdown and arrests of tens of protesters, and will express their support for the arrested girls and will call for the end of the IDF’s tactics to entangle and entrap Orthodox Jewish girls into military service.

Israel is one of roughly a handful of countries to draft women into military service. For all these years, the Israeli government understood the opposition of Orthodox Jews to serve in the military because it is a grave violation of their religion. During recent years, the government started a campaign to coerce Orthodox Jews into military services, and in the past year it went from bad to worse, with the government’s forcing girls from vulnerable backgrounds to join the military.

This campaign is a part of an effort by the Israeli authorities to force Orthodox Jews to assimilate in the larger society. That initiative includes the imposition of annual quotas of Orthodox Jews to enlist in the army, sanctions against the community if those quotas aren’t reached, and curtailments of the exemptions that were granted since the inception of the State of Israel for Yeshiva students from conscription.

At the beginning of this week, three 22-27-year-old Orthodox girls were arrested and kept imprisoned for non-enlistment in the military. Their arrest triggered days of mass demonstrations in Jerusalem and other Israeli cities. In an effort to further destroy the spirit of Orthodox Jewry, the Israeli Police unleashed a brutal response that included the vicious beatings and the arrests of tens of peaceful demonstrators.

The mass demonstration - organized by the Central Rabbinical Congress of the USA and Canada – will take place today, Wednesday, 5:45 PM, at the Israeli Consulate in Manhattan, at Second Avenue and 42nd Street.

More than ten thousand are expected to join the demonstration to express solidarity with their religious sisters and brothers in Israel; call for the release of the three prisoners of Zion for dodging military service and the tens who were arrested for crying out on their behalf; and for an end to the anti-religious campaign by the Israeli government.
“Israel is the only country imprisoning Orthodox Jewish girls for practicing their religion. It’s a shame that we have to turn out in New York to call for a sanctuary for Jewish girls in Israel, but this is sadly a reality. The brutalities must stop,” said Rabbi Isaac Green, a CRC spokesman.

Isaac Green
central rabbinical congress of USA and Canada
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