A video of ultra-Orthodox Jews spitting on the ground beside a procession of foreign Christian worshippers carrying a wooden cross in the holy city of Jerusalem has ignited intense outrage and a flurry of condemnation in the Holy Land.
The spitting incident, which the city’s minority Christian community lamented as the latest in an alarming surge of religiously motivated attacks, drew rare outrage on Tuesday from the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and other senior figures.
The incident emerged as thousands of Jewish settlers continued to celebrate the weeklong holiday of Sukkot, which will end on Friday.
Several incidents of Jews spitting on Christians and Christian sites were reported in recent days, prompting the Israeli government to condemn the act.
On Wednesday, Israeli police said they arrested several people suspected of spitting at Christian pilgrims.
There are roughly 15,000 Christians in Jerusalem today, the majority of them Palestinians who consider themselves living under occupation.
Netanyahu’s office insisted on Tuesday that Israel “is totally committed to safeguard the sacred right of worship and pilgrimage to the holy sites of all faiths”.
“I strongly condemn any attempt to intimidate worshippers, and I am committed to taking immediate and decisive action against it,” he said.
The spitting scene, captured on Monday by a reporter at Israel’s left-leaning Haaretz newspaper, shows a group of foreign pilgrims beginning their procession through the limestone labyrinth of the Old City, home to the holiest ground in Judaism, the third-holiest shrine in Islam and major Christian sites.
Raising a giant wooden cross, the men and women retraced the Old City route that they believe Jesus Christ took before his crucifixion. Along the way, ultra-Orthodox Jews in dark suits and broad-brimmed black hats squeezed past the pilgrims through narrow alleyways, their ritual palm fronds for the weeklong Jewish holiday of Sukkot in hand. As they streamed by, at least seven ultra-Orthodox Jews spit on the ground beside the Christian tour group.
Further adding to the outrage, Elisha Yered, an ultranationalist settler leader and former adviser to a lawmaker in Netanyahu’s governing coalition, defended the spitters, arguing that spitting at Christian clergy and at churches was an “ancient Jewish custom”.
“Perhaps under the influence of western culture we have somewhat forgotten what Christianity is,” he wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter. “I think millions of Jews who suffered in exile from the Crusades … will never forget.”
Yered, suspected of involvement in the killing of a 19-year-old Palestinian, remains under house arrest.
While the video, and Yered’s comment, spread like wildfire on social media, the chorus of condemnation grew. Israel’s foreign minister, Eli Cohen, said spitting at Christians “does not represent Jewish values”.
The country’s minister of religious affairs, Michael Malkieli, a member of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, argued such spitting was “not the way of the Torah”. One of Israel’s chief rabbis insisted spitting had nothing to do with Jewish law.
Activists who have been documenting daily attacks against Christians in the Holy Land were taken aback by the sudden wave of government attention.
“Attacks against Christians have 100% increased this year, and not just spitting, but throwing stones and vandalising signs,” said Harani. “Excuse me,” she added, addressing Israeli authorities. “But where were you?”
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