Man to be charged for assaulting Haredi man in Tel Aviv
Police to also ask court to hold 26-year-old resident of Pardes Hanna until end of legal proceedings; victim was walking down Allenby Street when he was shoved to the ground
Tel Aviv police said they would be filing an indictment Wednesday against a man accused of assaulting an ultra-Orthodox man in the city center last week.
Footage of the incident uploaded to Twitter on Sunday showed Levi Blau and two other men — all members of the Chabad movement — walking down Allenby Street when the assailant knocked Blau to the pavement in an apparently unprovoked attack.
Police said they had opened the investigation into the incident on Sunday as soon as they received a complaint about the assault.
A day after the 26-year-old alleged assailant was arrested in his home in the northern town of Pardes Hanna, the police said charges would be pressed later in the day at the Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court, alongside a request for the suspect to be remanded until the end of legal proceedings against him.
The investigation found that without any prior provocation, the suspect “attacked the citizen, shoved him violently to the ground and left the scene.”
Blau told Channel 12 news that he and his companions were walking to the corner of Allenby and Ben Yehuda Street where they planned to encourage men to don phylacteries, when he was attacked by a stranger.
Phylacteries or tefillin are two small black boxes containing parchment with verses from the Hebrew Bible that are wound around the head and the arm with black leather straps. They are used by observant Jews during morning prayers.
אנטישמיות: הסרטון המזעזע הזה, מיום שישי האחרון, ברחוב אלנבי בתל אביב.
סיימתי עכשיו שיחה עם הבחור שהותקף: "אנחנו כהרגלנו, עושים 'מבצע תפילין' בתל אביב כמידי שבוע, הולכים על שדרת רחוב אלנבי, כשלפתע מגיע אדם מולנו, צועק 'חרדים' ודוחף אותי בכוח לרצפה".
מה דעתכם? pic.twitter.com/meGtGztXx2
— לוי נוישטט – levi noishtat (@levi_noishtat) September 4, 2022
“I never met him,” Blau said of his attacker. “I was on the floor for two minutes, completely shocked,” he added.
Blau’s father told the Walla news site that the attacker “hissed something against Haredim” during the assault. However, police have made no mention of a potential motive in their statements.
The Times of Israel Community.