Meah She’arim, Jerusalem
Tuesday, August 8, 2017
Early this afternoon Israeli Minister of Defense Avigdor Liberman paid a condolence call [to the medical activist Elimelech Firer, who is sitting shiva for his sister] at 15 Avrohom MiSlonim Street, just off the ultra-Orthodox and anti-Zionist enclave of Meah She’arim
When he entered the apartment all the other mourners, upon seeing who their “distinguished” visitor was, got up and left the room – with the exception of [Firer] [the one he had come to visit.]
That was, however, just the beginning of Liberman’s troubles.
His arrival, together with a contingent of security personnel, had not gone unnoticed by the neighbors – who are not only opposed to Liberman and his position as Minister of Defense, placing him at the top of the hierarchy of those attempting to force the ultra-Orthodox to serve in the Israeli army, which they see as clearly in violation of their religious beliefs; they are opposed to the very existence of a “Jewish” state in the Holy Land before the coming of the Messiah and opposed to the action the IDF carries out.
As such, a large crowd gathered to protest the enemy’s encroaching of their neighborhood, blocking his way out of the building. After his security detail called for police assistance numerous officers arrived and violently dispersed the protestors. Nonetheless it was about twenty minutes before he was able to leave the area.
One of the cars in his motorcade was somehow left behind; when the driver went back to retrieve it he was also blocked by the ultra-Orthodox protestors. It took the police another quarter of an hour to extricate him.
Despite the fact that a spokesman for Liberman played down the incident, saying that there was nothing more than a few shouts as he left the building, Liberman himself tweeted that it was a “humiliation.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who had also planned on making a condolence call, cancelled his plans – apparently in fear of a repeat of Liberman’s embarrassment – and only paid his respects by phone.