“The Jerusalem Pride March is a disgrace”
Honenu has represented many citizens whose fundamental rights to freedom of expression and freedom of protest have been violated with regard to pride marches. Please click here for a list of relevant posts.
Sunday, June 6, 2021, 12:14 Last Thursday (June 3), approximately 80 citizens, some as young as 13 years old, who passed through Center City Jerusalem near the Pride March were detained and taken into the police station. Two minors who posted legal announcements of legal demonstrations, such as the one at right, in Jerusalem the previous evening (Wednesday) were also detained.
Honenu reports that the police were following lists whose legality is questionable and detaining almost everyone with a religious appearance in the area of the Jerusalem Pride March. Most were detained solely on the basis of their appearance and their interrogations were completely unjustified.
Honenu Attorneys Rehavia Piltz and Menashe Yado were among the organization’s attorneys who represented the detainees. Yado leveled sharp criticism at the police: “After an entire year of legal battles against the injustices of the previous pride march, the police are repeating the same injustices, unfortunately to an even greater degree. The conduct of the police is simply atrocious.
“They detained people according to lists, without any connection to circumstances: A mother walking with her young daughter to a dental appointment was detained for close to an hour. A man accompanying his pregnant wife to the hospital for an appointment was detained because he was on a list. There were ‘wholesale’ detentions on the streets. People were detained left and right with no justification.”
Yado is of the opinion that “also the judges are losing their sense of logic out of fear of shaming in the left-wing media. All protest is being totally silenced. The Jewish voice is being trampled. The police are acting as if they are a ‘gray market’, without any authority, without any rhyme or reason, and without legal procedures. We will continue to fight this insane situation in the courts and in the public sphere.”
The pamphlet
In anticipation of the 2021 Pride Marches, Honenu published a pamphlet, “A Test of Freedom: False Detentions During Pride Month Events”, which summarizes several representative cases in which the police acted illegally out of excess enthusiasm to protect participants in previous marches. The pamphlet describes how the police severely violated the individual rights of innocent citizens due to profiling based solely on their outward appearance. In many instances, the injured parties sued and were awarded compensation.
See here for details.