Israel | Tens of thousands of participants in the Pride march in Jerusalem

(Jerusalem) Several tens of thousands of Israelis participated Thursday in Jerusalem, under heavy police surveillance, in the pride march, protesting in particular against the presence in the government since December of ministers hostile to LGBTQ + people.

“Faced with the most homophobic government in history, we must be a bulwark to prevent the deprivation of our rights and fight for equality for everyone,” Yoray Lahav-Hertzano, an openly gay centrist MP, told AFP. participating in the walk.

In a cloud of rainbow and Israeli flags, some 30,000 people took part, setting a record since 2016, organizers said.

The march, organized since 2002 in Jerusalem, is being held for the first time since the formation in late December of the government of Binyamin Netanyahu, one of the most right-wing in the country’s history and which includes several homophobic members, while Israel is historically among the most liberal countries in the Middle East when it comes to LGBTQ+ rights.

Itamar Ben Gvir, Minister of National Security, was one of the organizers of the “parade of the beasts” in Jerusalem in 2006, during which religious opponents of the march paraded with donkeys, associating homosexuals with animals.

“It is the responsibility of the police to protect and ensure that even if a minister has a problem with the march, the most important thing is still the safety of the demonstrators,” he said in a statement on Wednesday.

He went to the rally site on Thursday while opposition members took part in the march.

“It is particularly important (to participate) this year because the minister in charge of our security, Ben Gvir, is the one who has demonstrated for years against us by calling us animals”, testified to AFP Oshrit Assaf, 28 years old, came with his girlfriend.

In Jerusalem, a holy city for Jews, Christians and Muslims, LGBTQ+ people complain of being poorly accepted by the population.

According to the police, some 2,000 police officers were mobilized and three people, suspected of “having expressed themselves in a threatening way vis-à-vis the march”, were arrested before the parade.

In a small counter-demonstration organized on the other side of a police cordon, one could read “No to the march of abomination”, noted AFP journalists.

In July 2015, during the parade in Jerusalem, an ultra-Orthodox Jew stabbed a teenage girl, Shira Banki, who died of her injuries a few days later. Six other people were injured.

The assailant had been released from prison weeks before the attack, after serving time for injuring three people during the 2005 LGBTQ+ pride march in Jerusalem. He was sentenced to life in prison.