Rosh Chodesh Av

This week has been a challenging one in Israel.

Monday morning was Rosh Chodesh Av, the beginning of the month of Av. I woke up even earlier than usual in order to join the Women of the Wall group for early morning prayers at the Kotel, the Western Wall, in the Old City. For more than twenty years this group has gathered at the Kotel every Rosh Chodesh to welcome the new month with prayer and song, and to read from the Torah. The Kotel is one of the most sacred sites for Jews, both men and women. For thousands of years Jews have come to pray at the Wall, to talk to God, to place small notes of prayer in the cracks and crevices of the Wall. But over the last 4 decades the Wall has been divided into separate men’s and women’s sections with a mechitza (divider) between them. The orthodox authorities who have control over the site say that women must pray quietly, inaudibly so that our voices do not disturb the men in prayer, that women cannot read from the Torah or wear tallitot (prayer shawls) or tefillin at the Kotel. Over the years the Women of the Wall group has sued for equality in the Israeli Supreme Court, and women have been harrassed, had chairs and filth thrown at them, been spit on and cursed, and have been arrested for coming to do the same thing that the men on their side of the divider have come to do - lift their voices in song and prayer to God at this most holiest of places.




This Rosh Chodesh Av a large group of more than 100 of us gathered, including a number of women rabbis, to pray, and to show our support for Women of the Wall. We were joined on the opposite side of the mechitza by supportive men, fellow liberal Jews, who came to pray in support and join us for the Torah reading, which is held away from the Kotel, at Robinson’s Arch near the Southern Wall, since the Israeli Supreme Court has ruled that we may not read Torah at the Kotel. Only this month we did not make it to Robinson’s Arch. After we chanted the prayer service and sang Hallel, we began to move in a group towards the Southern Wall for the Torah reading. We moved together, singing and following Anat Hoffman, the chairperson of WOW, who was carrying the Torah scroll. As she made her way up the stairs in front of us, I could see pushing and shoving and then we saw that it was Anat being shoved and pulled as the police tried to pull the Torah out of her arms. She was pushed into a police van as the cries rang out in the crowd “Anat has been arrested, the Torah has been arrested.” So instead of our Torah reading this month, we marched and sang our way to the Jaffa Gate Police station, where Anat and the Torah had been taken, to finish the service and to stand in support of Anat. After being fingerprinted and detained for 6 hours, she paid 5000 NIS bail and has been ordered to stay away from the Kotel for 30 days.

My feelings ranged from excitement and pride as so many gathered on this beautiful morning, to trepidation and anger as our group endured taunts, curses and jeers from both men and women at the Kotel, to an immense wave of sadness that at this holy place, there is so much sinat hinam (baseless hatred), and once again to a sense of pride and joy, as I looked at the faces and listened to the song surrounding me, that within all of it, all the mixed up and challenging parts of Jewish life here in Israel, it is our place. We cannot ever forget that or let go of the challenge that Israel is a place for all Jews - it is ours to claim, and if we do not stand up for pluralism and equal rights and claim Israel as ours too, we do so at our peril.

For more:
Arrested Torah
Police Arrest Women of the Wall Leader for Praying with Torah Scroll
Cops Release Women of the Wall Leader
Women of Wall Head Held for Kotel March