Jerusalem – Early Morning Muslim Prayer Call is a Rude Awakening for Many

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    Jerusalem – While recent rioting in and around Jerusalem’s Old City has left religious tensions between the capital’s Muslims and Jews simmering, a new dispute – this time concerning the volume of prayers, more than the prayers themselves – is resonating in outlying neighborhoods.

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    Jewish residents of these areas, all of which are in close proximity to Arab neighborhoods in the capital’s east, have begun to complain that the Islamic call to prayer, which is broadcast five times a day from loudspeakers inside local mosques, has become an intolerable nuisance, particularly when it blasts through their neighborhoods at 4 a.m. every day.

    “It’s as if they took the speakers and put them inside my bedroom,” Yehudit Raz, a resident of the northeast Pisgat Ze’ev neighborhood, told The Jerusalem Post. “And it’s not from one mosque or two mosques – we’re talking about tons of speakers going off, one after the other, every morning.”

    According to Raz, many residents of Pisgat Ze’ev are fed up with the noise, which they say has only gotten louder of late. And the police and municipality, to which, Raz said, residents have complained a number of times, aren’t doing anything about it.

    “Everyone is shirking their responsibility,” she said. “All we want is for them to turn their speakers down. How would they feel if we did the same thing to them?”

    Raz added that the gunshots and fireworks that often accompany weddings in the nearby neighborhoods of Shuafat, Anata, Beit Hanina and Hizme were adding to the problem, and that residents of Pisgat Ze’ev felt as if they were under siege.

    “It’s like we’re living under their rule,” Raz said, adding that the Shuafat refugee camp affected her the most. “It’s the area that’s closest to my home,” she said. “And they just don’t care.

    Continue reading at The Jerusalem Post


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    70 Comments
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    Charlie Hall
    Charlie Hall
    14 years ago

    The calls would be an hour later if Israel were still on daylight savings time.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    put one out your window when they pray or at 3 in the morning. then againg you may get shot. as jews that just the way it works

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    “Why must they wake up the whole neighborhood with the noise?” she went on. “Can’t they just get alarm clocks?”

    And why must frumme yidden to all the things they do under halacha or minhag that may be viewed as disruptive to established Arab neighborhoods. The Muslim traditions have the same legitimacy and entitlement to respect as yiddishe haskofah and minhagim. In some cases, as the article notes, these mosques have been at their locations for hundreds of years, well before many of those neighborhoods attracted jewish residents. If you don’t like the noise, than MOVE.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    Reply to 1 ok you truly confused me how did this become a frumeh issue or is your hatred of your peppol so great it’s the only thing you know to say

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    Its not only in pusgat zeev I am on minchat yitzchak street an american area next to kiriyat belz and the noise is very strong

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    # 1 says… “d minhagim. In some cases, as the article notes, these mosques have been at their locations for hundreds of years, well before many of those neighborhoods attracted jewish residents.”..
    1) did this crazy abusive “minhag” of setting up loudspeakers to wake all of Jerusalem and all towns around 4 o’clock in d morning go back hundreds of years? when there was no such technology as a loudpeaker at all?
    2) No, the Jewish people also live in Jerusalem for hundreds of years.
    3) why do you aim your comment at frumme when this issue has nothing with frum, are you obsessed with something?

    farrockgrandma
    farrockgrandma
    14 years ago

    Let’s hear it for tradition! Traditional calls to prayer did not include amplified sound. That’s a more recent innovation. How about a return to the old-style – and if a modern enhancement is appropriate, how about an automated call or text message to members only?

    Let them do it the old-fashioned way
    Let them do it the old-fashioned way
    14 years ago

    “”We were living here long before Pisgat Ze’ev even existed,” Sanduka said.”

    But they didn’t use loudspeakers in the old days.

    If they have to make the prayer call, let them do it live, as in the old days, with just human voices, without artificial electronic amplification..

    Wouldn’t that be more historically authentic too? In the time of Muhammed they didn’t have electric loudspeakers!

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    To those who ask why they need recorded “call to prayers” you need to understand that they no longer have young “chazonim” who can climb up the stairs and have a voice loud enough that can properly to the call to prayer.

    It woke me up too!
    It woke me up too!
    14 years ago

    When I was learning in the Mir it used to wake me up early morning. Oh and what a rude way to wake up. It made my blood boil! Its a huge Chutzpah and its shocking that its been allowed to go on for so long without protest. In America or any other civilized place in the world the police would shut it down.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    Before there was electricity how did the muslims pray?

    professor
    professor
    14 years ago

    Sanduka spoke like a true Muslim diplomat when he said he is always willing to talk. Talk is cheap! In this article he also states it is their problem- making it clear that he has no interest in adhering to the noise ordinances.
    If the shoe was on the other foot blogger #1 would probably be screaming, dina dimalchussa dina.

    shmilfke
    shmilfke
    14 years ago

    “This is an integral part of our religion” Speaker systems werent invented till about a hundred years and probably took a few more decades to reach the technology-handicapped muslims. How integral can it be? MUhamad didnt have them?!

    5T Resident
    5T Resident
    14 years ago

    Buy a good set of earplugs at any pharmacy and presto, no more noise. Its as simple as that.

    PS: I live with a snorer, which is much worse than that call to prayer stuff.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    I remember them from my days in eretz yisroel as well. I actually found it quite inspiring.
    Its a call to prayer. Were praying to the same GOD.
    I would wake up and say a kapittel of tehillim for the speedy redemption. It really made me feel good about myself.
    I guess its how you look at it.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    Set up sirens that would get set off by their loudspeakers and let them stay on throughout the service. Say to them that nobody can fix it and we don’t know who the perpetrators are. If they complain, say “we can’t find where the noise is coming from but it is set off by your loudspeakers”. They’ll get the hint.

    Ben Israel
    Ben Israel
    14 years ago

    I have an easy solution, it may cause a few disrupted nights but it will get the message across. Each neighborhood needs to get real powerful loudspeakers, download the adhan from the net and blast it an hour before they do one day then an hour and a half before the next day then a half hour before the third day and confuse them, they will get the message. Let them be an hour short of sleep too

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    They should blast Klezmer ‘music’ back at them.

    Levi
    Levi
    14 years ago

    Stop complaining how ur guv does nothing for u, u already know that the israeli guv is there to help the arabs. Jus move to america and b free jews

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    Then we wonder why our brothers take matters into their own hands…they have no where to turn

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    and its not just pisgat zev…..when i was in seminary i would stay by my uncle in bet el and every morning at 5 am i would wake up to their “moaning” which is extremely loud when your leaving in a frum yeshuv where there’s no background noise to drown them out.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    14 years ago

    when i used learn in israel we had our dirah at shmiel hanovie it was terrible when we ware aredy trying to a fall asleep came this krazy speakers and woke us up

    formally
    formally
    14 years ago

    milhouse, and Talmid Says, do not represent Torah Judaism, they represent hate, and cloak it in they misinterpation of the Torah.

    They are no different then Muslim extremists, and others of that kind. The only difference is, who should be intolerante of the onthers.

    Also I do not think they learned tanach. Since, there are many instances of the prophets condemning the Jews about how they treat their gentile neighbors