Attacks In Israel During The Week Of Passover and Ramadan

The past couple of weeks of April marks the deadliest period of attacks in Israel in 2006. Specifically one of these attacks happened on Dizengoff Street, one of the busiest streets in Tel Aviv.

Here, Terrorist Ra'ad Hazem opened fire at the Ilka Bar and killed three people. Hazem was from Jenin in the occupied territory in the West Bank. He led 1,000 police, military, and anti terrorism members on a manhunt where they eventually shot him in a shootout near Jaffa.

While I was in Israel, my father, Shimon, and I went to the Ilka Bar to make a toast in the name of the victims of this terrorist attack on Israeli citizens.

When I was sitting at the bar I asked one of the bartenders if people were scared to come back to the bar. He responded saying that in the first couple of days people were a little frightened to come to the bar, but business resumed as usual by the end of the week. Outside the bar hanging on a tree was a sweatshirt of one of the victims. This was the only item left of the many memorial candles and other remembrance items that were left from the friends and families of the victims.

After I saw this bar and read about what had happened a week before I arrived, I wondered why there was so much violence during these two weeks. While there tends to be a lot of violence throughout the years in this part of the world, Passover, Easter, and Ramadan, happened to all fall on the same week. This means that Jews, Christians, and Muslims are are practicing their religions generally in the same place and at the same time. On Friday, the 16th clashes started at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in the Old City Of Jerusalem. Inside and outside of the Mosque Muslims were fasting for their 14th day of Ramadan. However, just a few hundred meters away, Jews were burning bread, a tradition that they follow every year for centuries. Several minutes North, were Christians holding up crosses retracing the route they believe Jesus took before his crucifixion. As you can see, there is a lot of religious activity going on in a very small part of the Old City Of Jerusalem. Over the past weeks in Al-Aqsa Mosque there have been a lot of protests between the three religions, resulting in a lot of violence between the military and the civilians. With protests rising, many other attacks start to follow in Israel.