Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein
Attorney General Yehuda WeinsteinIsrael news photo: Flash 90

The Judicial Zionism organization called on Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein to prosecute the organizers of a fashion show held in a Tel Aviv synagogue while congregants sang "Shalom Aleichem." 

According to the organization, which espouses reinforcing the values of Zionism and Judaism through the legal world, the rarely used law, which prohibits any actions that harm religious feelings, should be applied here. 

The law was previously used in 1997 to prosecute Tatiana Suskin on charges of offending Muslim feelings, when she hung banners of the Islamic prophet Mohammad dressed as a pig and stepping on the Koran. 

In Judicial Zionism's request, they point out that the Supreme Court recognizes that attacks against moral and religious feelings are considered attacks on public order. 

They cite Justice Zvi Berenson, who stated, "It is a truth that everyone must respect the feelings of others, including feelings of religion or belief, and avoid as much as possible harming those feelings. It is a moral imperative, without which there will exist no proper and dignified social life." 

Eyal Cohen, Chairman of Judicial Zionism, said, "While freedom of expression is one of the basic values of the State of Israel as a democratic state, Israel is also a Jewish state, whose flag bears the most basic Jewish values." 

"As Judge Moshe Landau [the fifth President of Israel's Supreme Court] wrote: the duty not to harm the religious feelings of others stems directly from the obligation of mutual tolerance between free citizens of different faiths, without which there cannot be a diverse democratic society, such as ours." 

"Desecrations [such as this] insult religious feelings, go against the values of tolerance, and damage the delicate fabric between various sectors within Israel. This is precisely why the legislature saw fit to limit such actions," Cohen noted. 

"I am sorry that it is during Hanukkah, in which we take pride in maintaining our Jewish culture and tradition, that someone did not hesitate to provoke that culture through the objectification of women at a site of sacred prayer." 

"There are red lines that in the name of sharing common life and maintaing public order are simply not allowed to be crossed. I call on all concerned to work to clarify that such things will not happen again," Cohen stressed.