Two hours before the unfathomable mass casualty occurred, Jerusalem Deputy Mayor Yossi Deitsch warned the police that a tragedy was imminent, B’Chadrei Chareidim reported.
Deitsch told B’Chadrei that he took part in the Boyaner hadlaka two hours before the tragedy and already then he felt the dangerous crushing force of the crowd. “I was being crushed in an unprecedented manner,” he said.
Due to the crowding, he decided to give up on his usual custom of standing and davening at the western entrance, next to the area where the tragedy occurred, and returned home early. His life was saved but sadly, so many others weren’t.
Deitsch slammed the police, saying that he warned them of imminent disaster. “What occurred could have happened two hours beforehand at the Boyaner hadlaka,” he said. “The police saw the crowding but didn’t take appropriate action to relieve it. Instead of opening an exit way, they threatened them with pepper spray.”
“I turned to a police officer and warned him that people were going to die. I told him: ‘You’re not ashamed? You see that people are going to die!’ But there was no one to talk to,” Deitsch asserted.
[MERON VICTIMS: 24 Bochurim And Boys, 4 Mir Talmidim, At Least 6 US Citizens, 2 Canadians]
[HEARTBREAKING: List Of Niftarim R”L Killed In Meron Crush Released]
[How Exactly Did The Terrible Disaster At Meron Occur?]
[Father’s Heartrending Hesped For His Son: “You’re Now In Rebbe Shimon’s Yeshiva”]
[WATCH: 10-Yr.-Old Meron Survivor: “I Cried Out Shema Yisrael”]
[“People Were Crushed To Death Before My Eyes” – Survivors Of The Harrowing Scenes Talk]
[Chareidi Reporter Warned Of This Very Tragedy In 2018!]
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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16 Responses
hashem wanted this to happen
but he’s letting the world but the blame on the police
From the PM on down, these political hacks rejected all the efforts by the public health and safety authorities to restrict the number of attendees in close proximity to the bonfire site. They even ignored enforcement of the much higher numbers that originally agreed upon shrugging their shoulders that it would have been difficult to block entry to anyone who arrived. If this doesn’t rise to the level of criminal negligence and manslaughter under whatever legal standard applies in EY, not sure what would. Just because some politicians didn’t want to offend certain elements of the religious parties, we lost more neshamas in one night than the terrorists were able to take over the past several years.
Blaming the police for the behavior of the crowd? Blaming the police when it is the Chareidi politicians of his own party who pushed the government to allow Meron to be open without restrictions. here should have been limits on numbers of people at one time, There should have been limits on the amount of time spent enjoying. As Rav Yosef Chief Rabbi said, go early and leave early.
Blaming the police is a cop-out (no pun intended), but that seems to be the new way of dealing with problems. Not the Jewish way. How about taking personal responsibility?
The wicked Zionists there caused Jews to die. The fact that this official warned them before-hand makes the Zionists’ actions and inaction all the more evil.
One wonders if these Zionists did this intentionally, hoping for an outcome like this, or were at least happy that scores of Jews died and their families are left to mourn their respective losses.
This would not happen under a normal (Gentile) governing entity (as opposed to Zionist thugs rule).
The world so desperately needs Mashiach.
The title is a bit misleading. “Warn the police” implies that he discussed his concerns with police leadership or at least the authorities on site. That’s not what he did. What he did was make a comment to a random cop standing at his beat.
But most important, this is not a time for blaming. Let’s appropriately mourn first. And then do our cheshbon hanefesh. Leave the police out of this.
The issue the charedi policiticians fought for was a national, Covid- related and in that they were 100% correct. There was no reason to limit the numbers more than any other year.
With regards to ovwrcrowding, that was a local issue to be dealt with and could have been prevented had the police opened the emergency exit earlier etc. and done crowd control sensibly as every year or w’ever the issue was this year.
The police demanded that no more than 10,000 people be allowed to come to Meron but they were ignored and over 100,000 people were there. When the police tried desperately to tear down temporary barriers to save people from being crushed – people screamed at them that they were Nazis. And now this Deitsch fellow is actually blaming the police, instead of himself and his cronies, for this disaster? Unbelievable.
Sorry, but this was a carefully arranged event with authorities who were responsible for crowd control. The comments above blaming the frum world are from the typical haters.
the police are definitely to blame! people were screaming for them to open the exit that for some stupid reason the police closed. but they couldn’t care less!! they hate the chraidy community!!
Ok putting blame is pointless, what is needed now is a clear plan how to build up the area for next years to prevent such an occurance.
i wonder if the police who blocked the exits will feel bad even for a second, if they are capable of it
Ohevet Yisroel, yes blaming the police. They blocked the exists. Are you capable of ever seeing an Israeli in military uniform ever doing anything wrong? Is that your idol?
I heard from a mother that her son was an eye witness in Meron. He said the police was so negligent that it looked like it was intentional to hurt people. When a tragedy happens, just because it’s Bashert, you still have to point a finger at the wicked and call them by name .
All the talk of opening Meron without restrictions due to COVID is just a red herring. Meron is not capable of safely accommodating the multitudes who flock there on Lag b’Omer without any reference to the pandemic. A ring of steel for, say five days before Lag b’Omer, should have been put around the area years ago with only approved buses allowed access to the area and the number of buses limited by the Ministry of Transport. There should be a lottery system for a bus permit supervised by independent outsiders. There can be shuttles to take the genuinely disabled and VIPs up to the top of the mountain. If the Rebbes, or their gabboyim, don’t want to travel in anything other than their own luxury vehicles, let them go some other time. That way access can be limited to a safe number of people. Please don’t blame the chiloni politicians for what happens. Any haredi in the street knows that the haredi politicians use Lag b’Omer to flex their muscles and show what they are capable of. They dish out VIP access and parking permits with a smile that says just remember how I “helped” you. They have a share of the responsibility for the tragedy that happened. But of course, it will be much easier to blame a few policemen, probably the few who were unluckily enough to have been right at the scene. Their superiors were likely sitting drinking coffee with the haredi politicians and were too busy to answer the frantic calls from those at the scene asking for instructions.
Mr. Deutsch should take some responsibility too. He should not have expressed himself so, especially at such a holy site. The Talmud tells us “אל תפתח פה לשטן”.
RRR:
R’ Elya Lopian once explained that when a plane crashes and everyone on board dies, really, all those people were supposed to die anyway at that moment. However, the Malach HaMovess engineered it that all the people should be on one plane and he kills them all together.
Perhaps therefore, all these precious Neshomos would have departed our world anyway. But instead of each dying by himself at one in the morning, the Malach HaMovess gathered all these people together on one ramp and staircase and killed them together. Why? Perhaps because if they each died in their own bed, there would be no effect on the Tzibur. However, in this way, there may be a Hisorerus.
Let us make sure at least that part worked.
Maybe the police are at fault, and M’galgelin Chov al yedei Chayov, but that is their Pekel to work out. Our job is different. Additionally, all of us should make a personal Cheshbon and avoid crowds where safety measures are not in place.