SHAFAQNA- Thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews breaked lockdown rules to attend a rabbi’s funeral on Sunday. A huge crowd, many not wearing masks, packed the streets in Jerusalem for the funeral of 99-year-old Rabbi Meshulam Dovid Soloveitchik, Head of the influential Brisk yeshiva, or religious educational institute. Soloveitchik died earlier on Sunday, France24 reported.
Israel’s ultra-Orthodox, or haredim, have been at the centre of the country’s struggles to control the spread of coronavirus, with some groups flagrantly defying lockdown rules, especially concerning school and synagogue closures. Police seeking to enforce the lockdown have in recent days clashed with haredim in Jerusalem’s Mea Shearim neighbourhood and in Bnei Brak near Tel Aviv. While police were on hand for the rabbi’s funeral, they did not act to disperse crowds, an AFP photographer said.