Dozens of ultra-Orthodox protesters blocked major roads in southern Israel on Thursday evening, hours after violent clashes in Jerusalem, as demonstrations against the arrest of military draft evaders spread to the coastal city of Ashkelon.
Police said eight protesters were arrested at the entrance to Ashkelon on suspicion of violently assaulting officers and disturbing public order. The demonstration was organized by members of the extremist Jerusalem Faction, a Haredi group that strongly opposes compulsory military service.
Unrest outside of Ashkelon
According to police, protesters initially planned to demonstrate near the home of a senior Military Police officer in Ashkelon. Officers, who were unaware of the planned location in advance, stopped a bus carrying protesters as it exited the nearby city of Ashdod. After learning of the group’s destination, police barred buses from entering Ashkelon.
Jerusalem Faction organizers then instructed protesters to disembark and demonstrate on nearby main roads. As a result, protesters blocked the northern entrance to Ashkelon and several key traffic arteries across southern and central Israel.
Police said roads blocked included Highway 4 in both directions at the Ad Halom interchange and the Silver Junction, as well as the Highway 4 Ashdod North interchange. Officers were deployed to the scenes and directed traffic to alternative routes.
In a statement, police said that after protesters ignored orders to disperse, officers used crowd-control measures to clear the area. “Israel Police will allow any person to protest within the bounds of the law, but will act against disturbances of public order, assaults on officers and violent rioting,” the statement said.
The Jerusalem Faction said hundreds of yeshiva students and married seminary scholars took part in the protest to oppose what it described as the “criminal arrest” of Torah students and recent attempts to detain draft evaders at their homes. The group said protesters sought to demonstrate beneath the Military Police officer’s residence but were prevented from doing so by police, leading to the road blockages.
Ashkelon municipal officials said the city’s northern entrance from Highway 4 was closed by police, while traffic continued to flow through southern access points.
The protest followed a series of recent arrests of ultra-Orthodox men accused of evading military service. Earlier this week, a draft evader was arrested in Ramat Gan and later sentenced to 17 days in prison, after a previous attempt to detain him was thwarted by protesters who overturned a police vehicle. Additional arrest attempts overnight in Herzliya and Ramat Hasharon were also blocked by demonstrators.
Clashes between police and Haredi protesters in Jerusalem
The unrest came hours after clashes in Jerusalem left 13 police officers lightly injured. Those confrontations erupted after a municipal parking inspector issued a ticket to a young Haredi man near Bar-Ilan Street. When police discovered that several people involved were draft evaders and sought to transfer them to military police, hundreds of ultra-Orthodox protesters gathered, triggering hours of violence after an alert circulated warning that “the kidnappers have arrived.”
The demonstrations are unfolding as the coalition continues efforts to advance legislation that would exempt most ultra-Orthodox men from military service, an issue that has sharply divided Israeli society.