For the last three years, there has been a Gay Pride Parade in Jerusalem with protests but no significant problems. Today (now yesterday), just one week ahead of the fourth annual parade, city officials gave notice that they were shutting it down.
The city council, including the mayor, decided "it is not right to allow the march or other planned activities to take place in the streets of Jerusalem, fearing that it will create an uproar, offend a wide sector of city residents and out of fear of public disturbances," wrote Eitan Meir, Director-General of the Jerusalem Municipality in a letter to event organizers.
This is total unadultered bullsh*t. And it's further evidence of an alarming trend toward erosion of the ideals of democracy and tolerance in Israel of late. This clearly has nothing to do with security or saving lives. It's just another arbitrary and capricious imposition of the will of the few and the elite on the liberty of those who dare to disagree.
Last month, organizers of the international WorldPride event, scheduled to be held in Jerusalem in August, agreed to postpone it for a full year in deference to both the security concerns and the emotional upheaval anticipated in connection with the 'disengagement,' electing to hold only the dramatically scaled down parade on June 30th. It's sad to note that WorldPride has so much more respect for the spirit of compromise and accomodation than Jerusalem's municipal leaders do.
Update: (perhaps to be moved up top tomorrow)
Good news (for now).
The Jerusalem District Court ordered the Jerusalem municipality on Sunday to drop its ban on the fourth annual gay pride parade in the city, accepting a petition by Open House, Jerusalem's gay and lesbian community center.
Judge Moussia Arad, who is vice president of the court for administrative affairs, also ordered the municipality and Mayor Uri Lupolianski to pay court costs of NIS 30,000 [roughly $6,500] each.
The judge ruled that City Hall cannot discriminate against a particular public because certain of its members object to that public's opinions or sexual orientation.
Yes, there go those "activist judges" again. Upholding the ideals of democracy and tolerance and all that other "liberal" stuff.
