Hundreds of copies of the Bible have been burned in an Israeli city with a large population of Ethiopian Jews, and now an investigation is being demanded into the "institutional discrimination" the bonfire represented, according to a report from the BBC.
The report said the Bibles, including the New Testament's teachings of Jesus, were distributed recently to the Ethiopian population in Or Yehuda, prompting outrage from Orthodox Jews who don't believe in Jesus as the Savior and don't even recognize Messianic Jews, who do believe and distributed the Bibles, as Jews.
The city's deputy mayor, Uzi Aharon, reported he got complaints about the books, and arranged for them to be burned, according to the BBC report.
"He has now apologized after his actions have been compared to those of Nazis who burned Jewish holy scriptures," the report said.
The BBC reported the details of exactly what happened in Or Yehuda now are being disputed.
"But the deputy mayor says Messianic Jewish missionaries had targeted an area of the town where many Ethiopian Jews live, distributing packages containing New Testaments and pamphlets," the BBC said. "He says he received complaints and then drove around the area with a loudspeaker urging people to hand over the material to Orthodox religious students who went door-to-door collecting it."
The Bibles then were "dumped in a pile and burned."
The Messianic Jews who distributed the Bibles now are complaining of institutionalized discrimination and want an investigation, with appropriate charges against those responsible.
"Meanwhile, Orthodox Jews are applauding the destruction of texts they say urge Jews to convert," the BBC said.
The report said proselytizing to Ethiopian Jews is sensitive because missionaries reached out to them in Ethiopia, and converted many.
An earlier report from the ADNKronos news site said it was Aharon himself who "drove around the neighborhood with a loudspeaker urging people to hand the texts to Jewish religious students."
"In an interview with Israeli Army Radio, Aharon said that he indeed called on the community to get rid of the missionary texts but denied any involvement in the book burning," the report said.
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