Anti-Zionist rabbi gives Hezbollah chief in Beirut gift ‘from the Jewish people’
Attending Palestinian solidarity meet, Rabbi Dovid Weiss of Neturei Karta says, ‘We pray every day for a free Palestine. We want it returned to the Palestinian people’
Sue Surkes is The Times of Israel's environment reporter
A rabbi from an ultra-Orthodox, anti-Zionist fringe group on Tuesday addressed the Fourth Global Convention of Solidarity with Palestine, held in Beirut, and pledged that Judaism would never accept the “unholy occupation in any shape or form of any part of Palestine.”
Rabbi Dovid Weiss of Neturei Karta said, “This is not a conflict between Jews and Muslims. This is the despicable narrative of the Zionist state.”
Zionism and Judaism were diametrically opposite, Weiss told delegates, Zionism having been established mainly by people who “despised” the Jewish religion. “We declare that Judaism, as subservient to the Almighty, will never accept this unholy occupation in any shape or form of any part of Palestine.”
Weiss added, “We pray every day for a free Palestine. We want it returned to the Palestinian people. The Muslim people were so good to us. They… embraced us in our suffering throughout the exile. We want to show our gratitude.”
Before his address, Weiss presented Sheikh Naim Qassem, the Deputy Secretary-General of the Lebanon-based Hezbollah terror organization, with a gift for Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah “from the Jewish people, from my brethren in Palestine and around the world.”
The anti-Zionist, ultra-Orthodox Neturei Karta sect holds a theological view that sees the founding of the State of Israel as a violation of God’s plan for history. Israeli members of the fringe group burn Israeli flags on Independence Day. In 2013, when president Barack Obama visited Israel, it sent him a letter urging him to save the Jews from Zionism. Weiss previously led a Neturei Karta delegation to meet with Iran’s president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
On receiving the gift, which was not shown to the gathering, Qassem said, “In Palestine, the Jews are with us, the Christians are with us, and the Muslims are with us. We are all with Palestine.”
In remarks translated and posted by the MEMRI watchdog group on Wednesday, Qassem told the convention the only way to regain what was once Palestine was through resistance and “first and foremost, armed resistance.”
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