{Originally posted to the author’s website, My Right Word}
That American Yeshiva students are killed in Eretz-Yisrael while studying Torah as has just occurred is not, unfortunately, a new phenomenon.
Already in 1929, eight Americans were murdered in Hebron and their names are:
William Zev (Wolf) Berman, Philadelphia;
David Sheinberg (Shunberg), Memphis;
Benjamin (Bennie) Hurvitz (Horowitz), Brooklyn;
Harry Frohman, Chicago;
Wolf Greenberg, Brooklyn, N.Y.;
Hyman Krasner, Chicago;
Aaron David Epstein, Chicago;
Jacob Wexler, Chicago.
But did you know just how parallel a situation exists between the events of 1929 and 2015?
The 1929 riots broke out due to the Mufti fueling the flames of religious hatred based on the false claim that ‘Al-Aqsa is in Danger’ and that the Jews not only desired more rights at the Western Wall but also sought the rebuild the Temple.
Here are the words of Binyam Hurwitz, 19 years old, from a letter he wrote two days before he was knifed to death in Hebron:
The Arabs began to realize that the Jews could manage without upsetting the status quo, but the Arabs started to build. They built a new gateway near the Western wall, they opened a doorway so that they could disturb the Jews, and they declared that the status quo pertained only to the Jews and not to them. The Jews protested, but to no avail. The Arabs began to disturb those engaged in prayer. The British government was silent! Only the Jews were causing trouble! On last Thursday, youth from the Trumpeldor legion [Betar] rallied against the government regarding access to the Western Wall. They marched to the wall and decried the Zionist leaders for their weak stand. But they did not hit or even touch anyone. The next day the Arabs rallied too. But this was an entirely different protest. They marched out of the new gate and hit Jews in the midst of prayer, tore up prayer books, and removed the notes of beseechment that had been placed in the crevices of the Wall. The British police did nothing, not only that but they did not even permit the Jews to approach the Wall to pray. And this is the status quo?! Then the British issued a statement that equated the two protests!
Reads like today’s news.
Palestine Bulletin, September 2, 1929: