Jerusalem – As Israel reels from the aftermath of the Jerusalem gay pride parade stabbing and prepares to lay to rest 16-year-old victim Shira Banki, one leader in the religious gay community says that preventing further attacks like this will require a huge change in the Israeli religious establishment.
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Daniel Jonas, the chairperson of Havruta, an organization for the religious gay community in Israel, said that stabber Yishai Shlissel “did not operate alone.” In an interview withThe Jerusalem Post on Monday, he said that the attack was committed with the backing of rabbis, members of Knesset and leaders in the religious community who have failed in the past to denounce anti-gay sentiment and continue to criticize the gay pride parade’s existence. For example, Jonas described a recent article after the attack which said “two horrible things happened on Thursday: the pride [parade] and the stabbings.”
He said that this mindset leads people to believe that violence is an acceptable way to stop a gay pride march.
He demanded that leaders in the religious community allow the gay people to have the place they deserve. “Religious leaders have to accept us as part of the society,” he said. “You have to start and come to talk to us.”
Though Jonas did not comment on Shlissel’s religion-based motives for the attack, he did criticize police for not keeping track of the attacker, who publicly published a letter saying he would attack the parade following h. “How come a person who was released from jail just a few weeks before and published statements … [how come] police just let him walk around next to the pride parade?”
Jonas mourned Banki’s death and all the others who were injured in the stabbings. He said that he can only hope some good will come from all this tragedy and that it will spur “a new chapter for LGBT society in Israel and religious society in particular.”
He praised Rabbi Benny Lau and others for going on stage in front of a crowd Saturday night to denounce the attacks. He also noted that he was part of a group on Sunday that was invited to meet with Bayit Yehudi headNaftali Bennett, who Jonas said was very interested in hearing what the gay community had to say.
“People maybe are starting to realize that something needs to change,” he said. “I hope we will succeed to see a better place for all of us.”
Content is provided courtesy of the Jerusalem Post
Nice try, Jonas.
The stabbings are horrible, have no place in ANY society, and the perpetrator should be appropriately punished.
However, imagine if this attack happened during a (hypothetical) pro-pork parade. No one in their right mind would proclaim that the rabbis must now embrace the pro-pork community and invite them into the Orthodox community.
Jonas, stop this exploitation of a horrific act.
Hey Jonas: Whether Shlissel had the backing of the Rabbis or not, he definitely assumed he had the backing of The Creator & The Torah. No matter how low and demoralized the State of Israel and the rest of society have unfortunately become, homosexuality will NEVER become right, and will never be accepted by the Torah. Knock that into your head, Mister!!!
Religious Gay…
A phrase coined only in …
Hey buddy, either you accept HaShem, His Torah, His Mitzvohs, or you join the others… Welcome to the club… HaShem left no ifs and buts regarding this abomination, anyone sticking up for it is CLEARLY and OPENLY defying HaShem.
““Religious leaders have to accept us as part of the society,” he said. “You have to start and come to talk to us.””
Jonas, so I see, you figure accomplishing that by sticking it into everyones face via parading on the streets of Jerusalem.
Had you kept your gayness in your bedroom, no one would have looked at you.
It is only that you have to stick into everyones face and then cry..
I!m allowed to believe what I want! If I believe it’s immoral, I have that right!! No I would never hurt anyone and I think the guy that did is a sick deranged person and my heart goes to all the victims. But that doesn’t mean I have to agree with your morals. Furthermore there is no such thing as a ‘religious Jew’ who says I’m religious and also there’s nothing wrong with homosexuality. Of course I’m not judging anyone and have plenty of things I do wrong. But at least I know it’s wrong or I try to change. Maybe I can be orthodox but start a movement for eating pork. That’s ridiculous!!!
“religious gay”?
Why not trief eating, mechalel shabbos and frum?
“You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.” (Leviticus 18:22)
“If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.” (Leviticus 20:13
“religious gay”? an oxymoron…
unfortunately Israel should shame itself for being this low and promote homosexuality to become this open ,although lots are tinuk shnishbuh and dont keep any yiddishkiet ,still this is overboard , i surely understand someone be mekayim “knoyim poegin boh” and be mekadsh shem shumayim
Interesting (& provocative) how Mr. Jonas twists a statement to say the stabbing was justified. WHICH Rabbis & MK’s backed this lunatic? Name names or get lost.
meet with who besides being sickos they are also chayev mise the torah will not change because of your unabashed rishos no shlissel was wrong
Nice tactic this clown is using. Blaming anyone who disagrees with an anti-Torah lifestyle is complicit in murder. The reverse then can also be said; knowing full well the impact their parade would have, they too are complicit in murder. The fact that they did it in Yerushalayim makes it even more so.
Bad enough doing what they are doing, but their in your face approach generates crazies to act.
you cannot be a religous gay person its like being a compassionate conservative.
The heading is like ‘The Capitalist Leader Of The Communist Party’
#10 why isn’t there a there a ‘baseball pride parade’ or ‘eating doughnuts parade’ ?? This is like nimrod “yodaya es boiro umechavin lehamrido’, what pride ? what are they proud of? Just like the women off the wall. Their whole agenda is to lehachis. To trample the torah behind the screen of free speech
Gay and religious is not a contradiction!!! You are all wrong. Jonas is gay and very religious and follows the bible perfectly. His bible is just a new version which is codified a bit different and can be found scribbled on the walls in a public smelly men’s room toilet stall. -a place where normal folks won’t longer and certainly not want their children to use.
Forgive me, but there are some things here I don’t understand. Being gay is about physical and emotional attraction, not specific sexual acts. A heterosexual virgin is still heterosexual. The gay-orthodox community is not looking to normalize homosexual sex. They are looking to be accepted and understood as people whose desires are different than most of us. What’s wrong with that? Am I not allowed to understand and respect that my friend’s brain works a little different than mine?
Those who make it all about the sexual acts are missing the bigger point and choosing to hate what they don’t understand rather than try to understand.
People have desires for all sorts of things. I know many who allowed themselves to be overwhelmed by their desires once or twice It happens. But what makes a yid “orthodox”, is knowing it was wrong and fighting to be better and do teshuvah. Loshon hora, cheating on taxes, eating treif… if you wake up the next day honestly trying to be better, that’s what matters.
As for #18 , you have no idea what you are talking about. Science has already shown that to be a pile of nonsense used by the thieves in the “pray the gay away” business.
““Religious leaders have to accept us as part of the society,” he said. “You have to start and come to talk to us.””
Certainly, attacking people and murdering them goes beyond the pale. The stabber most likely will never breathe “free air” again. To believe the general opposition to the parade as it is a desecration of Jerusalem’s inherent sanctity being the justification for the stabbings is silly.
Celebrating the violation of a Mitzvah is guaranteed to generate protest in religious circles. The sense of religious indignation rises exponentially when such a sin-celebration is inserted in to Jerusalem. Yet to go that next step to harm and murder is not the logical progression. To think Yishai Shlissel is a modern day Pinchas is delusional at a minimum or that he enjoys any support in the religious community is outrageous.
The demand for acceptance while understandable Mr. Jonas it is unreasonable to demand equality within a community which rejects your lifestyle as sinful. Yes there needs to emerge a level of respect between people that does not require compromise of Torah law.
this guy was mekadesh shem shumayim berabim like pinchus ben eluzer ben aharon hakohien ,and this parade is clearly a chillel hashem and certainly doesnt belong in the holy land , i truly believe that he is gonna be rewarded in heaven and a huge paradise awaits him in gan edan after his 120
The heads that permitted the parade to take place in the holy city of Yerushalayim should roll. Next in line for lack of responsibility are the intelligence people who failed to make sure the recently released deranged individual’s go about was monitored. But the bottom line is that nothing occurs without the explicit approval of Hashem. He has myriad ways of showing His disapproval. No, being ‘gay’ is not sinful, but the ostentatious display of a gay lifestyle, in Jerusalem yet, is criminal. I shudder at the repercussions of such idiocy.