Man wearing tefillin and tallit
Man wearing tefillin and tallitFlash 90

Omri Yadlin, President of Sapir Academic College, stated Friday afternoon that the college's managing board had decided to remove an offensive art exhibit in which Jewish sacred objects were desecrated and used as underwear.

Yadlin wrote in a letter to students that "the controversy over the exhibit has gone on for a while. As long as the criticism surrounded the interpretation of the art work (as was the case with the Hamsas) the management did not see fit to interfere or censor, but recently the controversy has taken a different focus from students who felt a violation of their religious sensitivities - a violation which derived from an exhibit displaying religious icons in a manner deemed by many to be offensive."

"I assure you that was not the intention of the the display's creator or of the college," Yadlin added. "This creation featured in other museums in the country and in the US, and did not receive responses such as these, but after we engaged in long conversations with students who felt hurt, and after we understood the depth of that pain, we decided to remove the film from the exhibition until we conduct a deeper debate with a joint forum of artists, staff and students. Anyone who wants to view the film privately can request to do so on an individual level.

"I feel I have learned a lot from the many conversations I held with the students (and with members of the wider community). I really hope that the open discourse which is playing out regarding these subjects will continue, and that our community will emerge stronger from it."

Yesterday (Thursday) Arutz Sheva exposed the movie-display, in which tefillin (phylacteries) and a tallit (prayer shawl) are used as underwear by naked female models.

Following the Arutz Sheva expose, a large number of students turned to Sapir College's management to voice their outrage at the seemingly gratuitous desecration of sacred items.

Several foreign donors to the college in the US also pressured the college to withdraw the exhibit, after reading the story on Arutz Sheva English.

As hinted to in Yadlin's letter, this was not the first time Sapir Academic College has hosted a controversial art exhibit.

The controversial art display at Sapir Academic College, which is located in the northern Negev near Sderot, triggered a protest when it first opened to the public last Tuesday, after students were astonished to find hamsa palm-shaped Jewish amulets with "slaughter the Jew," "in blood and fire we will redeem Palestine," and "Daesh" - the Arabic abbreviation of Islamic State (ISIS) - written on them.