Israel’s Sephardi Chief Rabbi, Rabbi Yitzchak Yosef, launched an unusually harsh attack on Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara during his weekly class on Saturday night at the Yizharim synagogue in Jerusalem. He accused her of ordering arrests of yeshiva students and called her “a wicked filth,” saying, “She is the one giving the order to arrest.”
Yosef also tied what he described as Donald Trump’s change of attitude toward Israel to the government’s treatment of Torah learners. “Why did Trump turn against us for nothing? It is בגלל the decrees on the sons of תורה,” he said, adding that since David Ben-Gurion’s era yeshiva students had been exempt from enlistment.
He urged authorities to stop the arrests, saying the pressure on religious students was the cause of Israel’s troubles. His comments came as protests by the “HaPeleg” faction and footage of confrontations with police have circulated in recent days.
The rabbi also spoke about police violence at ultra-Orthodox demonstrations, saying some officers were influenced by “that filth” and beat yeshiva students. He said, “You see the hatred they have, how they tear clothes, what blows they give to little children and injure them,” while stressing that not all police officers share that attitude.
