Israel’s two chief rabbis instructed celebrants not to travel to a holy site on Mount Meron during the upcoming holiday of Lag B’Omer because of the war.
Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef and Rabbi David Lau instead told potential pilgrims to follow the instructions of security services. The Israeli military’s Home Front Command canceled this year’s traditional celebrations on Mount Meron following a security assessment. That assessment has taken added gravity with recent Hezbollah rocket barrages.
The mountain, located in the Upper Galilee, is also the location of a sensitive military air traffic control base which has been especially targeted by Hezbollah rockets and drones.
The mountain is better known as the burial site of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, the Second Century rabbinic leader who wrote the Zohar, Judaism’s foundational book of kabbalah or mysticism. The anniversary of Rabbi Shimon’s death, Lag B’Omer, is celebrated with bonfires and draws hundreds of thousands of visitors to his grave.
This year, Lag B’Omer begins at sundown on May 25.
Forty-five people were killed and 150 people were injured in a stampede at the grave during Lag B’Omer celebrations in 2021. The tragedy, Israel’s worst civilian disaster, was triggered by a combination of overcrowded conditions and a faulty walkway in a narrow passage.
