Haredi protest in Ashdod (file)
Haredi protest in Ashdod (file)Flash 90

A violent riot by several dozen haredi extremists in Ashdod made headlines this morning, as rioters overturned a police car and attacked officers coming to detain suspected IDF draft-dodgers.

But what went largely unreported was that the rioters in question were not from the area, and that locals in fact tried to stop them, according to residents.

While Ashdod has a sizable and growing haredi community, it has been generally free of some of the more extreme, anti-Zionist elements who often clash with authorities in cities such as Jerusalem or Beit Shemesh, making the incident all the more surprising.

One local resident told Arutz Sheva that the rioters were yeshiva students who study in a local yeshiva but who are not actually from the Ashdod community.

"When it became clear that it was the military police who came to arrest a fugitive, some yeshiva students came and began to riot at the location," he recounted.

"First they overturned the vehicle and smashed the windows, and then they tried to block the second vehicle from leaving."

Watch: Haredi rioters in Ashdod:

The witness, who asked not to be named, described how local residents then emerged from their houses and tried to break up the crowd.

"Haredim who live in the neighborhood tried to protest against the violent protesters and asked them to disperse, but they (the yeshiva students) just responded harshly and with profanities," he said, quoting the extremists as shouting epithets such as "'You are criminals! You are secular (i.e. not religious)! You are sucking up to the secularists! We will go to the very end, until the enlistment decree is annulled!'"

The reference is to the enlistment law, which was passed by the previous government and ended the blanket exemption for haredi men from military service. The current government - at the initiative of the haredi parties - watered down that law, much to the chagrin of other MKs. But that wasn't enough for the protesters, who then moved on to loudly cursing mainstream haredi leaders including prominent rabbis such as the Rebbes (Grand Rabbis) of the Gur and Belz hassidic sects, both of whom supported the amended law, witnesses say.

But the resident who spoke to Arutz Sheva cautioned that the protesters were from a single, particularly extreme yeshiva, and do not represent the local populace.

"We're talking about one single yeshiva in the city which accepts students from all over the country and is affiliated with Rabbi Shmuel Auerbach," he said, expressing concern that the actions of a few extremists would once again paint the entire haredi public in a bad light.

"Their behavior has tarnished the entire haredi public in Israel and in the city of Ashdod in general.

"We have nothing to do with them. They profane the Name of God, and they will be held accountable for that."