Good luck to World Pride
Best wishes to participants in World Pride in Jerusalem, which starts today.
With the Middle East in a state of war, there are people who would suggest that it would have been more responsible to cancel the event altogether. The planned Pride march has been prevented after police said that current security demands mean that they couldn't offer protection to marchers.
That in itself explains why other events must go ahead. Protection wouldn't just have been a symbol in Jerusalem. Bigots and religious thugs have threatened marchers. Police have apparently done nothing to stop Orthodox fundamentalists from handing out leaflets offering a 'reward' of 20,000 Israeli shekels to anyone who "kills a sodomite". Earlier this year, a rabbi stabbed a marcher during Jerusalem's own Pride. And an American rabbi had promised "bloodshed" if the march had gone ahead.
What an irony, that a group who suffered in the Holocaust should behave this way to another group who suffered under the Nazis.
Elsewhere in the region, it's only just over a year since Iranian mullahs trumped up charges against two young gay men so that they could hang them – effectively for being gay.
There's tyranny in the Middle East. And these religious lunatics are at the heart of it. People need to be reminded just how far their bigotry extends – and that the LGBT community has to suffer their hate crimes.
• And briefly, good luck to Brighton Pride too, which has had a disruptive build-up after accusations of heavy-handedness by police over drugs.
Hopefully, it'll be an unmitigated success for everyone.
With the Middle East in a state of war, there are people who would suggest that it would have been more responsible to cancel the event altogether. The planned Pride march has been prevented after police said that current security demands mean that they couldn't offer protection to marchers.
That in itself explains why other events must go ahead. Protection wouldn't just have been a symbol in Jerusalem. Bigots and religious thugs have threatened marchers. Police have apparently done nothing to stop Orthodox fundamentalists from handing out leaflets offering a 'reward' of 20,000 Israeli shekels to anyone who "kills a sodomite". Earlier this year, a rabbi stabbed a marcher during Jerusalem's own Pride. And an American rabbi had promised "bloodshed" if the march had gone ahead.
What an irony, that a group who suffered in the Holocaust should behave this way to another group who suffered under the Nazis.
Elsewhere in the region, it's only just over a year since Iranian mullahs trumped up charges against two young gay men so that they could hang them – effectively for being gay.
There's tyranny in the Middle East. And these religious lunatics are at the heart of it. People need to be reminded just how far their bigotry extends – and that the LGBT community has to suffer their hate crimes.
• And briefly, good luck to Brighton Pride too, which has had a disruptive build-up after accusations of heavy-handedness by police over drugs.
Hopefully, it'll be an unmitigated success for everyone.
posted by Amanda Kendal at 12:21 pm
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