I mentioned a recent case in London of how ultra-Orthodox Jews tried to enforce their anti-women policies on everyone, in that situation trying to get all women to walk only on one side of the street so that Haredi men would not accidentally touch them.
Now we hear of a case in which ultra-Orthodox men traveling from New York to Tel Aviv for Rosh Hashanah created a fuss on an airplane, trying to create segregated seating and in the process delaying the flight for what one passenger described as “an 11-hour long nightmare”.
Because their beliefs require men and women to be segregated, the ultra-Orthodox men, recognizable by their black hats and curly tendrils over the ears, attempted to trade their pre-assigned seats with other passengers, offering money in some cases, the Israeli news Web site ynetnews.com reported.
The pilot pleaded for them to sit down and the flight finally took off. But after takeoff, chaos erupted.
“I ended up sitting next to a … man who jumped out of his seat the moment we had finished taking off and proceeded to stand in the aisle,” a woman passenger identified only as Galit told Ynet. The man had asked her to move from the seat beside her husband to accommodate his religious beliefs, but she refused.
“People stood in the aisles and refused to go forward,” said Amit Ben-Natan, a passenger who was on board the plane.
“I went to the bathroom and it was a mission impossible, the noise was endless,” Galit said of the men crowding the aisle and praying loudly.
This happened on Israel’s national airline El Al so the crew were likely a lot more conciliatory to this group of obnoxious people than would have been the case in any other airline because the Haredim are very powerful in Israel, which is why they throw their weight around a lot. These people have also loudly complained about inappropriate films being shown and a woman once sued El Al because a flight attendant moved her to the back of the plane to placate a Haredi man.
Looks like we need another Rosa Parks, for planes this time.
From the article: El Al promised to look into the issue, Ynet reported: “The company will examine the complaints and if some passengers are found to have acted out of line the company will examine its future steps,” the airline said.
Huh. Usually I thought that if passengers disrupt a flight in midair, the usual result is that they are detained by law enforcement and even charged with a crime.
Chiroptera (#1) --
No kidding. Why are people and companies terrified of false accusations of “anti-semitism” when having them arrested for endangering the flight clearly isn’t?
I’d bet the farm that those who raised a stink rehearsed and planned this. They actively sought out to make a scene and cry for attention. If they weren’t, they would have booked and paid for a block of seats with the airline to separate themselves from sitting near women.
They’re not trying to dictate their own lives, they’re trying to dictate everyone else’s. It’s just another example of typical religious extremism.
Sounds like terrorism to me…it is time for Jewish terrorists to get some of the limelight!
left0ver1under @ # 2: … those who raised a stink rehearsed and planned this.
I dunno -- apparently they didn’t bring a single shofar.
How would Haredi handle cross dressing situations? There is a episode of a situation comedy in the variations on that theme.
Under any other circumstance -- the shit disturbers not being Israeli in an airplane of an Israeli airline: the plane would have turned around, the troublemakers removed from the plane , detained and being charged. But again -- religious exemptions rears it ugly butt.
Any other passenger who has to put up with this bullshit should get a 90% discount at the Haredi`s expense.