Haredi extremists riot against Jerusalem Light Rail construction; at least 2 arrested

Dozens of Haredi extremists on Thursday night rioted and vandalized part of the under-construction Jerusalem Light Rail line in the capital, part of sustained efforts to disrupt the project.

At least two people were arrested, one for arson after setting part of the construction site on fire along Bar-Ilan Street, adjacent to the ultra-Orthodox Mea Shearim neighborhood.

The other was suspected of hurling objects at officers.

Police said they were working to disperse the demonstrators and restore order in the area, after declaring the gathering an illegal riot.

Earlier, police said that members of the crowd were throwing objects, igniting trash cans and trying to shut down traffic in the area in protest of the Jerusalem Light Rail construction.

There were no reports of injuries.

הפגנת חרדים המונית ואלימה ברחוב בר אילן בירושלים נגד עבודות הרכבת הקלה; המשטרה: "מפרי הסדר משליכים חפצים, מבעירים פחים ופוגעים בשגרת החיים במקום"@VeredPelman @daniel_grovais pic.twitter.com/mcBKgjJDuO

— כאן חדשות (@kann_news) August 27, 2026

Images from Jerusalem on Thursday showed demonstrators linking their opposition to the light rail to their opposition to mandatory military service, with one poster declaring, “We overcame Noam Sohlberg and we’ll overcome Moshe Lion,” referring to the deputy Supreme Court president and Jerusalem’s mayor respectively.

Sohlberg drew the ire of Haredi leaders for a November ruling that called for criminal sanctions on draft-evading yeshiva students, and in June ultra-Orthodox radicals rioted outside his home in the settlement of Alon Shvut. Several of those protestors were later indicted.

According to Channel 12 news, the demonstrators on Thursday included several people investigated over the riot at Sohlberg’s house, who later clashed with officers after marching to Bar-Ilan Street from Mea Shearim.

The construction of the public transit line has drawn protests for years from Haredi extremists, who do not want the train to cut through their insular neighborhood. They have caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damages, according to government estimates from last month, and set the project back by years.