Women For the Wall, the grassroots organization of women dedicated to preserving the traditional sanctity of the Western Wall, condemned the Reform-led Women Of the Wall for announcing a “sit in” at the holy Western Wall. “Jerusalem is not Selma, and this issue cannot be compared to the fight for civil rights in the US,” said Ronit Peskin, co-founder of Women For the Wall.
This evening, the Women Of the Wall declared a “sit-in” at the Holy Western Wall. Ten to twelve WOW members came to the Wall for the express purpose of engaging in this protest. WOW’s carefully-angled photographs avoided showing that they were outnumbered over 25:1 by women who came to the Western Wall this evening not for any political activity, but in order to pray in the traditional fashion.
“By organizing a sit-in at the Kotel, Women of the Wall demonstrate what Anat Hoffman has been saying for years – that WOW views the Kotel as an opportunity, and lacks reverence for the place held sacred by millions of Jews around the world,” noted Leah Aharoni, co-founder of Women For the Wall. “They have failed to galvanize serious support for their radical agenda, intended to change the traditions of prayer that Jews have followed for millennia. This political protest shows that they do not understand what it means to respect the sanctity of the place.”
“The Kotel is a holy site and a symbol of unity for Jews worldwide,” added Peskin, “and it should not be used to promote the political agenda of any specific group. They should take their business to the Knesset where it belongs.”
Women for the Wall called on leaders of the Reform and Conservative movements to reject this breach in the sanctity of the Kotel.
Peskin concluded that “The Kotel must transcend politics. We call on the leaders of the liberal Jewish community to condemn the use of the Kotel as a place of political theater.”
Women For the Wall is a grassroots movement of Jewish women, dedicated to ensuring that the Western Wall can be a place for all Jews to come and pray with respect and dignity. It believes that only by preserving classical Jewish practice at the Wall can it be a place where all Jews are truly welcome.
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6 Responses
“This political protest shows that they do not understand what it means to respect the sanctity of the place” – I agree wholeheartedly, but of this chaza”l say ‘kol haposel, bemumo posel’. For was it not charedim who initiated the original (and violent) political protests at the kotel – against the WoW?
Thankfully, the WoW have not yet achieved widespread public support, though with every attack against them they gain sympathy and their support grows. The only way to ensure that they gain no further support is to ignore them – as we did for decades in the past.
12 Women came for a “sit in”…not much of a following!!
This is a retreat by WoW. In the past they engaged in shenanigans. Now they’re just sitting.
It was Women For The Wall who were doing sit-ins last Rosh Chodesh!
Amazing hypocricy on part of WOW. Doesn’t the reform playbook declare korbonos to be cruel thus negating the kedusha of the beis hamikdash? Yet they hold these protests on what we, torah knoweldgable jews consider to be near the holiest of places?
Maybe to beef up attendance for these so called “protests” anat hoffman can organize a “million women march to rival farakhan’s “milion man march” back in ’95. That march was a resounding success as it cured all that ailed the black community.