Arab-Jewish Violence Breaks Out in Cities

Violence on the ground in Israeli cities paralleled the war in the air with Gaza terrorists for a second night on Wednesday.

Israeli news media was calling it “chaos,” as reports streamed in of bloody clashes between Arabs and Jews in Akko, Haifa, Lod and Bat Yam.

In Akko, a Jewish man, around 30, was reportedly wounded seriously after being pelted with rocks by Arab rioters in what has been described as a lynching. He suffered a head injury.

The man was later identified as Elad Barzilai, who was niftar from his wounds Wednesday evening.

Meanwhile, Jewish protesters marched in the city, shouting “Death to Arabs.”

In Lod, which was under curfew after terrible rioting on Tuesday night, a young Arab man was shot and moderately wounded, Channel 12 reports. It is not clear who shot him. He was taken to hospital.

In Haifa, Jews threw rocks at an Arab man in a car. He then accelerated and hit one of the assailants, wounding him, according to reports.

In the coastal town of Bat Yam, the Kan broadcaster filmed a group of far-right Jewish nationalists beating a man they apparently believed to be an Arab Israeli, even after he was lying on the ground.

Sephardi Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef issued an appeal to Jews not to turn violent against Arab citizens:

“Innocent Israeli civilians are attacked by terror organizations, the blood runs hot and our hearts are outraged, the scenes are difficult to watch. But we mustn’t be dragged to provocations and to hurting people or harming property,” he said.

The Torah does not permit one to take the law into one’s own hands. “The work of restoring order must be left to police,” he says. “We must be a light unto the nations, and not, God forbid, the opposite.”