JERUSALEM (JTA) – A leading Orthodox lawmaker said that not following the country’s lockdown rules to slow the spread of the coronavirus is comparable to murder.
Join our WhatsApp groupSubscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
Aryeh Deri, the head of Israel’s Sephardic Orthodox Shas Party who also serves as Israel’s interior minister, made his comments Saturday night and posted a clip of the speech on his Facebook page. He criticized the members of the haredi Orthodox community who deny that the coronavirus is a threat. Israel is preparing for a lockdown to contain an outsized second wave of COVID-19 cases.
“It’s murder,” Deri said of those who disregard the regulations. “It ‘will not stand on the blood of your neighbor,’” he added, quoting Leviticus 19:16, which is an injunction that if one sees his neighbor in danger and has the ability to do something, he must do everything in his power to help him.
Israel’s lockdown will start on Rosh Hashanah and last until after the Sukkot holiday in early October. Members of the haredi Orthodox community, including former health minister Yaakov Litzman, have been criticized for gathering in large groups in defiance of national rules and guidelines.
“It is spreading all over the country,” Deri said, referring to the coronavirus. “It is spreading because many rabbis unfortunately do not follow the instructions. The weddings and restaurants. I walk around and see observant Jews, with beards, walking without masks. I look and want to shout ‘Who gave you permission? This is harmful, you owe it to me (to wear a mask).’”
Deri pledged to do everything possible to allow synagogues to be open for the High Holidays, but he cautioned that this year will be different.
“It is not possible to have the same density as other years,” he said.
The lockdown rules for indoor worship provide a complicated formula for the number of people allowed inside synagogues, which involves the number of entrances to the space and room square footage.
No need for Mr. Deri to use inflammatory rhetoric. If he truly feels that they have the din of a rodef or rotziach, so then HE is michuyav to kill them. One must kill a rodef. If not, then you are just as guilty. You can’t just be a coward, by name calling but then not backing it up with actions. Middle Easterners tend to be very good at talking tough but then doing absolutely nothing about it. Netanyahu is a case in point. The Palestinians send rockets into a populated City like Sderot and as a response, Bibi bombs an empty field while threatening them that they will pay a heavy price.
“But there’s a more fundamental point that I want to make sure have time to address and that is this idea that somehow has evolved that we must stop cases. That was never the policy, that should never be the policy when you have an infection that 99% of people have no problem with. It’s no big deal if low risk people get the infection….It doesn’t matter that young healthier people get the infection. In fact there’s a positive. Because we know the way to get immunity in the population is to have more people who are lower risk get the infection and become immune. ” Dr. Scott Atlas, MD, Hoover Institution, Stanford University, President Trump’s new Corona adviser
Dr. Scott Atlas, MD another trump flunky
I usually do not agree with Mr. Deri, but he is right here.