Video: When Blowing The Shofar At The Kotel Was A Crime

Hat tip to Jameel at The Muqata:

80 years ago, at the end of Yom Kippur's Neilah (closing) service at the Kotel, 26 year old Moshe Segal blew the shofar. He was promptly arrested and taken to jail, still fasting. He was only released when Rav Kook, the Chief Rabbi, interceded later that night.

Toldot Yisrael and the History Channel have created the film series "Eyewitness 1948," of which "Echoes of a Shofar" is the first episode, and gives the background to the story:

Under a British law in Palestine passed in 1930, Jews were forbidden to blow the shofar at the Kotel, pray loudly there, or bring Torah scrolls, so as not to offend the Arab population.

Despite this restriction, for the next seventeen years, the shofar was sounded at the Kotel every Yom Kippur. Shofars were smuggled in to the Kotel where brave teenagers defiantly blew them at the conclusion of the fast. Some managed to get away - others were captured and sent to jail for up to six months.

Six of these men are still alive.

Two weeks ago, these six men returned to the scene of their "crime". Armed with shofars, they recounted their individual stories and blew shofar again at the Kotel.

Here is the video:




Technorati Tag: Shofar and Kotel and Yom Kippur and Neilah.