For Second Straight Year, Marchers Chant Anti-Arab Slogans During Jerusalem Day

[Purveyor]

Hundreds of Jewish youths participating in the Jerusalem Day flag procession shouted anti-Muslim slogans like "Mohammed is dead" at Palestinians holding a rally in the capital's Old City to protest the march.

The marchers yesterday also attacked three left-wing protesters trying to document the flag procession, the activists said. One said dozens of marchers surrounded them, shouting "Death to the leftists," and that a marcher broke the handle of an Israeli flag on her head. The left-wing activists also said the marchers spit at them and threw things at them.

Border Police protected the activists and escorted them away after 10 minutes.

Police also clashed with hundreds of the Palestinian protesters near Damascus Gate. They arrested 10 marchers suspected of shouting anti-Muslim and anti-Arab slogans, and five Palestinians suspected of throwing objects at the marchers.

MORE...

http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/for-second-straight-year-marchers-chant-anti-arab-slogans-during-jerusalem-day-1.431580

[oberliner]

1. Glad to see they were arrested for doing so

Tip your hat to the Israeli authorities for stepping in.

[azurnoir]

2. more from Jerusalem Day-Report: Israeli MK's tour Al-Aqsa to mark Jerusalem Day

National Union parliamentarians Uri Ariel and Michael Ben-Ari participated in the tour, which was organized by Yehuda Etzion, a former member of militant religious group the Gush Emunim Underground.

During the tour, Ben-Ari and other activists kneeled down to pray, before being prevented from doing so by police. Yehuda Etzion was then forcibly removed from the compound after sitting on the ground and refusing to move, the Israeli daily said.

Ben-Ari is a known supporter of Meir Kahane, who founded the far-right Kach party now banned under Israeli anti-terrorism laws.

Etzion was jailed for five years in the 1980s for plotting to blow up the Al-Aqsa mosque.

http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=487556

[oberliner]

3. Mount of Olives Community Suffers Big Jerusalem Day Attack

A Jerusalem Day attack on Jews near the community of Maale HaZeitim in the Arab Ras al Amoud neighborhood has increased tension between Jews and Muslims in the region, amid intensified demands from Jewish residents that Jerusalem police forces crack down on threats to security.

At approximately 10pm on Wednesday night, as the music of the celebrated flag-dancing “Rikudegalim” festivities in Jerusalem’s Old City reverberated on the Mount of Olives, a family returning from Jerusalem Day celebrations was brutally attacked in their car by 5-7 Arab men throwing large pieces of stone and firing firecrackers at the vehicle from the traffic circle preceding the entrance to Maale HaZeitim. Most of the men wore kefiyyehs and other face coverings.

http://www.jewishpress.com/news/jews-of-maale-hazeitim-decry-security-in-wake-of-major-jerusalem-day-attack/2012/05/21/

[azurnoir]

4. Maale HaZeitim is considered a settlement, presently 'owned' by Irving Moskowitz right?

and I am wondering 2 things here why do Jewish settlers build settlements in Arab neighborhoods and why did you address this to me and not the OP other than apparently this settlement is located near al Aqsa?

however it is fortunate that no one was hurt

[oberliner]

5. Here's an interview that may answer some of your questions

It's from 2003

The Ras al-Amud neighborhood guards the Temple Mount
an interview with Uri Ariel

bitterlemons: What is the objective of establishing a Jewish neighborhood at Ras al-Amud, in the heart of Arab Jerusalem?

Ariel: The central objective is to create Jewish contiguity between different areas.

http://www.bitterlemons.org/previous/bl280403ed16.html#is2

He was a National Union MK at the time (and I believe currently)

[azurnoir]

6. There are three guiding principles for Jewish settlement in Jerusalem: linkage, division, and void

thanks

[LeftishBrit]

7. Ugh. Racist thugs. Glad they were arrested.

[Scurrilous]

8. March of the Flags

<snip>

"The Jerusalem day march is more appropriately also called “the march of flags”, and that's exactly what I witnessed last Sunday when thousands of Israeli flags swept the streets of the old city of Jerusalem. Flags represent national identity, independence and sovereignty. For those who are still fighting for their freedom and rights flags represent the hope that these will be achieved, and they represent victory for those who have achieved it. The thousands of Israeli flags that stormed East Jerusalem were a clear message: we are the sovereigns here, we own this land, we can place our flags here - The whole of Jerusalem is ours!

Thousands of flags closed down the entire old city of Jerusalem, the main Palestinian market in Jerusalem, and several more neighborhoods in East Jerusalem that the march did not even go through. All the roads in East Jerusalem surrounding the old city from north, east and south were closed down -- not to allow the flag bearers to march, but to prevent Palestinians from walking in their streets.

A couple hundreds of Palestinians and a hand full of Israeli activists tried to stage a counter demonstration. We were determined to say "No, this is not Israel, it's Palestine, the people who live here are Palestinians. The streets, the shops, the cars, and the people that were all closed down and invisible for the marchers - they are all here, you must see them!" We were fenced in across the street from the Damascus gate, "allowed" by the police to protest as long as we stayed inside our cage. No one could see us, while small settler groups ahead of the march are dancing on the streets, blocking them and waiving their blue and white flags with no interference. An old lady outside our cage, but safe on the side walk was pushed back by police again and again until they formed a line isolating her from the rest of us, then grabbed her and pushed her into a police car - the first arrest of many that day.

The settlers were still dancing with their flags, while the Palestinian protest desperately tried to raise their flags high enough to be seen through the line of police that seemed to be the buffer between the two protests: the blue and white protest and the red, green, black and white one. The only problem is, the uniforms of that "neutral buffer" carried a small white and blue flag - just to remind us to make no mistake and remember who's side the police is. The second arrest was minutes later when the border police stormed into our caged protest, running after a crowd running away from them. They caught one Palestinian youth who's main crime was that he ran from them, but just not fast enough. It was the second arrest of the day, and more importantly the running crowd was dispersed and the police blocked the way back."

http://mondoweiss.net/2012/05/march-of-the-flags.html