Two arrested in wedding party riot
Guests attack police responding to a noise complaint in Jisr az-Zarqa; more arrests expected
Police on Thursday arrested two men suspected of rioting at a wedding celebration in the Arab town of Jisr az-Zarqa, just north of Caesarea, last week.
The men, aged 18 and 21, are suspected of attacking police officers who responded to noise complaints from area residents during the celebration on Friday night. One police officer who suffered a head injury was taken to Hillel Yaffeh Medical Center in Hadera.
The spokesman for the Israel Police’s Coastal District, Chief Supt. Eran Shaked, said that complaints about the noise came from residents of Jisr az-Zarqa and from the surrounding area, Ynet reported.
“A loud wedding celebration was taking place there. Police officers from the Zichron Yaakov station had to ask the organizers to stop making such unusually loud noise,” he was quoted as saying. “When they got there, they were attacked by wedding guests. One police officer was set upon and wounded in the head so badly that he had to go to the hospital.”
A relative of the family giving the party said that police officers had threatened the wedding guests. “It was an ordinary wedding, like on any Friday night in the village,” the man, identified only as Hamis, told the news site Walla.
“The police officers who arrived behaved badly, threatened the family right away and ruined the celebration,” he said. “They tried to take people away by force, and that’s when the chaos started. We’ve seen on television what happens to citizens whom police take away in police cars and beat up.”
Sami Ali, a local council member and the chairman of the People’s Committee for Jisr az-Zarqa, told Channel 2 that police had behaved provocatively and had turned the wedding celebration into a battlefield. “It was an irresponsible act that showed lack of judgment,” he said.
The noise complaints came in after midnight, while by Israeli law all loud noise must stop by 11 p.m.
The two suspects were brought to Hadera Magistrate’s Court for a remand hearing on Thursday. The investigation is ongoing, and more arrests are expected, police said.
The Times of Israel Community.