Tuesday, January 2, 2007

Orthodox Jews trash prison vehicle over electronic tagging

JERUSALEM (AFP) - Crowds trashed a prison vehicle in an Israeli city in a row over the electronic tagging of an Orthodox Jewish man.

Prison officers went to Bnei Brak after they stopped receiving signals from the high-tech device that local rabbis decreed could not be worn on a Saturday, the Jewish sabbath, the Yediot Aharonot newspaper said Tuesday.

Confronted by an angry mob, the prison offers fled the city -- a stronghold of Haredi Judaism, the most conservative branch of the Jewish faith -- on foot, leaving their vehicle to be smashed and overturned with its windows broken.

The man had been electronically tagged as a form of house arrest for his role in a recent violent demonstration against a gay pride parade in Jerusalem that was subsequently cancelled.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070102/wl_mideast_afp/israelreligionjudaism_070102104324

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