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Support for Israel's Gay Rally Edward I. Koch Last week, Israel's gay and lesbian community sought to hold a series of events, including a gay rights parade. These events have been held for the past five years. Jewish, Muslim, and Christian leaders, as they have in previous years, publicly objected. The New York Times reported, "Last year a 10-day international gay festival was planned" for Jerusalem. It was canceled when, during a local march, "an Orthodox man stabbed and wounded three participants." This year, Israeli security forces are on a heightened state of alert to guard against Palestinian attacks. Increased tensions have resulted from a shelling incident in Gaza in which 18 Palestinian civilians were killed. The police obtained the consent of the gay community to transfer the parade into a rally and move it to Hebrew University stadium, where maximum security would be possible. To its great credit, the Israeli Supreme Court rejected all requests to bar the parade. The rally took place, guarded by 3,000 police officers. The leaders of all three religions who protested the right of gays and lesbians to rally and parade should bow their heads in shame, particularly the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community. The Forward reported, "Nearly two weeks of rioting have rocked the city's Orthodox neighborhoods, several times spilling over into the city center, in protest of the planned gay pride march. Crowds of ultra-Orthodox youths, at times numbering in the thousands, have showered police and motorists with stones and have set trash cans on fire. Dozens of police have been injured, and at least 60 protesters have been arrested." Story Continues Below
Reporters should follow up and report on how many of those arrested are actually tried and convicted, with punishment imposed. To the credit of Israel's Attorney General Menachem Mazuz, he rejected, according to the Forward,"an appeal by Jerusalem police who said they could not guarantee the marchers' safety. Giving in to threats is a threat to democracy, and therefore it is unthinkable not to hold the parade," he said. The Forward further reported, "Israel's chief rabbinate issued a statement Monday calling Israel's homosexuals the ‘lowest of people.'" Jews suffered so much under the Nazis who killed six million of them. It boggles my mind that Jews and rabbis in particular would seek to dehumanize and even to injure fellow Jews of whose sexual orientation they disapprove.
Jews and homosexuals were placed in the same concentration camps by the Nazis. Homosexuals, like Jews, were required to wear identifying badges on their clothing — in the case of homosexuals, pink triangles. Both were herded into the same gas chambers and their remains burned in the same incinerators at Auschwitz and other death camps. The estimated number of homosexuals murdered by the Nazis is 10,000-25,000. The National Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. and the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City make note of those tragedies. In Israel, people who are openly gay are permitted to serve in the military, which is also the case with every member of NATO other than the U.S. So undoubtedly, Israeli homosexual soldiers have died in every war initiated against the Jewish state by its Arab neighbors, including the most recent one in Lebanon.
In contrast, many ultra-Orthodox youths have avoided military service by claiming a religious exemption.
Some time ago, I went to Israel with Mayor Mike Bloomberg and others to show solidarity with its people in the face of a suicide bombing of a bus on which many ultra-Orthodox Jews had been traveling. We boarded a No. 2 bus, the same bus line on which the bombing took place. On the bus, I chatted with a young man, approximately 25 years old, who is a member of the ultra-Orthodox community who were the primary victims of the bus bombing. I asked whether he served in the army. He said, "no." I asked if he didn't think he and other religious young men owed military service to the state. He answered that "their daily prayers and study of the Torah also protect Israel." I said, "Forgive me, but I think that's not adequate. If you feel that way, why not give half a day to prayer and study and half a day to guarding bus stops and other public places from suicide bombers?" He replied, "We will have to agree to disagree." All citizens of Israel — Jews, Christians, and Muslims — should speak up and denounce the discrimination against their fellow citizens just as Americans of all persuasions should stand up for their gay and lesbian fellow citizens, when the latter's rights are violated. It was especially interesting for me to read in the Times that "Rabbi Yehuda Levin who flew in from Brooklyn, denounced the rally from the front gate of the stadium" When I was mayor, he and two others held a ceremony in the early 80s imposing on me a cherem (similar to excommunication) because of my support for the gay and lesbian community, as their bigoted counterparts long ago expelled Spinoza.
I am just as proud of the fact that as a congressman I supported the rights of gays and lesbians to rally when they were seeking a permit to use Central Park and the Department of Parks was opposing the application. Before that, I supported the gay rights parade committee in securing from the Beame administration a shift in the parade route from 6th Avenue to 5th Avenue. In 1978 during the first weeks of my mayoralty, I issued an Executive Order that barred discrimination by government against anyone in government on the basis of their sexual orientation. In 1986, I signed into law legislation protecting gays and lesbians from discrimination in the private sector. Because I am considerably older than Rabbi Levin, it is probable that I will see the face of God before he does. I wonder: should I ask the Lord to cast him down into hell and despair for the evil deeds and words he has uttered against his fellow human beings? I've decided not to do that, in the interest of freedom of expression. The rise of religious fanaticism throughout the world is a great danger to free people everywhere. Theocratic coercion must be prevented whenever possible. Instead we should safeguard secular freedoms so that everyone can celebrate their belief in God in their own way. Those who preach hate and violence, and those who seek to enforce religious conformity are the enemies of peace and freedom.
Editor's note:
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