An Israeli Orthodox Rabbi in charge of a prestigious premilitary academy is under fire for comments he made about gays.
The Times of Israel reports Rabbi Yigal Levinstein, one of the heads of a religious pre-army academy in the West Bank was filmed calling homosexuals “deviants."
He was also caught saying, “There is a crazy movement of people who have simply lost the normalcy of life. This group is making the state crazy and is infiltrating the army with all its might. Nobody dares to open his mouth or make a sound against them.”
His statement has proved prophetic. Education Minister Naftali Bennett, who is also the head of the religiously-based Jewish Home party, condemned the statement.
Bennett said, “Jewish law was meant to establish what is forbidden and what is permitted. It was not meant to be a divisive tool to mark people and communities [...]. [W]e do not remove from our midst everyone who fails to uphold a commandment in the Torah.”
This strong condemnation seems unwarranted. As far as I can tell, Levinstein is not calling for the physical removal of homosexuals. His rhetoric, while inflammatory, is not some radical new interpretation of the Torah. The opponents of Levinstein's speech simply hate the Jewish Orthodoxy: that homosexual acts are an offense against God.
Levinstein’s point that people are afraid to speak out is proven by the vicious backlash and condemnation. As a result of his remarks about homosexuality, Levinstein has been professionally blacklisted. Speaking engagements of officials at his school have been canceled, and he has been disinvited from speaking engagements at other institutions. An LGBT group has even filed a formal police complaint against him, claiming he is inciting hatred and endangering the LGBT community. He is facing more than being professional ostracized, for what? For stating the Orthodox Jewish belief.
Just another nail in free speech’s coffin.