Tel-Chai Nation

These vandals were thankfully caught, and should be punished to the full limit of the law:

Jerusalem's old-new face? Dozens of Khan Theater ads were destroyed last week along the entrance to Jerusalem and Highway 1. The vandals sprayed the image of an actress presented on the posters with paint, causing damage estimated at thousands of shekels.

The Jerusalem Police arrested two young ultra-Orthodox men spotted defacing the billboards.

The theater's new subscription campaign was launched with ads promoting its 2013-2014 season. They included pictures of actor Ariel Wolf and actress Tamar Alkan, who star in "The Imaginary Invalid."

"It should be stressed that the two actors' clothing is modest and respectable, and does not aim in any way to create a provocation," a source in the theater said Thursday. Yet in recent days, Alkan's image was covered in turquoise and beige paint.

The Jerusalem District Police chased two young haredi men seen defacing the billboards and arrested them. According to the police, one of the men denied the allegations while the other told his investigators that the pictures offended the haredi public's sentiments.

The two were released under strict conditions by the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court, and the police plan to recommend that they be prosecuted.

'Great damage to city's image'
Danny Weiss, the Khan Theater's executive director, appealed to the Jerusalem Municipality in an urgent request to handle the phenomenon and increase its enforcement.

"The fact that this is the third time in a row that Khan Theater ads are destroyed because of the presence of a woman in them is infuriating," he said. "We call on the Jerusalem Municipality to act firmly against this phenomenon, which causes great damage to the city's image."

He added that beyond the emotionally charged issue of excluding women, there was the practical question of how anyone could even destroy billboards located so high, on a main traffic artery like the entrance to Jerusalem.

"The Khan Theater will continue, as always, to present its actors and actresses in all its publications, including on billboards in Jerusalem."

The theater added in a statement that "this is the third year in a row that the Khan Theater's subscription campaign, which refuses to give in to the demand to avoid posting signs with pictures of a woman in Jerusalem, suffers due to the growing intolerance in the city.

"Last year, posters with the illustrated image of actress Orit Gal were posted across Jerusalem, and the year earlier we included a picture of actress Nili Rogel. Those signs were defaced too, although those female characters had nothing provocative about them."

This proves that it's got nothing to do with how the women in the pictures are dressed in the view of the Haredi moonbats. Rather, it's anti-female sentiment all the way, basically implying that women are "meat" or sexual objects, which is as dehumanizing as it's contempt for other people's property. The municipality has condemned the vandalism, but more needs to be done, like getting the police to crack down on these perpetrators.

And it's not just in Haredi areas where this is a problem: even in Arabic/Islamic neighborhoods like Shuafat, there was some vandalism of the advertising cases at the train stations late last year. It was only a few weeks ago that the cases were fixed; they'd had their glass smashed, as compared to where Haredi vandals only spray painted.

That told, the two vandals who were arrested should be made to pay for their damage out of their own pockets and if they spray painted any advertising cases, they should be instructed to clean up their own mess. Their act wasn't just contempt for other people's property, it was also contempt for the opposite sex.

Labels: haredi corruption, islam, Israel, Jerusalem, misogyny, Moonbattery