More broadly, police actions against them are seen by many Israelis as a long-awaited effort to end the exceptionalism that has characterized the ultra-Orthodox for decades. This has allowed them to avoid military service, live off the benefits of the state and often act as king-makers in Israeli politics, say critics and political rivals.
Bnei Brak, a largely ultra-Orthodox city with more than 200,000 inhabitants, and the small Jerusalem neighborhood of Mea Shearim have seen the worst of the violence.
Extremists within the community were accused of graffiti on a Jerusalem wall that said the city’s chief of police was “Hitler”.
The atmosphere became so feverish that some Haredim, as the ultra-Orthodox are collectively known, put yellow Star of David emblems on their jackets and labeled the recent police crackdowns on Bnei Brak as “Kristallnacht”.
These allusions to the Holocaust and claims of Israeli “Nazism” were widely and immediately condemned by rabbis and politicians in the Haredi community. But the same leaders have been ambiguous, at best, regarding compliance with the country’s blocking and social detachment regulations during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The leader of the Lithuanian ultra-Orthodox community, Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, has repeatedly ordered the schools in the community to remain open, defying government regulations for many months. The rabbi recently said they should not open up if the confrontation with the police seemed likely.
The rate of Covid-related deaths among people over 65 years of age among ultra-Orthodox was estimated last December to be about 3.6% higher than the Israeli standard, according to the Ministry of Health.
Data from the Ministry of Health show that Haredi communities suffer infection rates of well over 20% of those tested, and hospitalizations for ultra-Orthodox patients are among the highest in the country.
The haredi families have an average of seven children and are (along with Israeli Arabs) the poorest community in the country. They live in densely populated areas, where men are encouraged to spend their entire lives in religious study.
Almost half of the Haredi population lives in material poverty, according to the OECD.
Although rarely integrated with other parts of Israeli society, they live highly active social and religious lives. Meeting in large numbers frequently is a central part of your cultural life.
“Every day, for hours, we are in synagogues, we meet, we are together in classes, we meet the rabbis every day, more on Shabbat,” Dov Halbertal, an ordained rabbi and specialist in Jewish law, told CNN.
“In the end it is very difficult to practically [to socially distance]. In addition to being large families, we have people of all ages, we have 10 people in a small apartment, it is very difficult … Being locked in the apartment, you are used to social life, ”he said.
An ultra-Orthodox Jew himself, Halbertal is also deeply critical of fellow rabbis who, for almost a year, led their communities in rebellion against national regulations aimed at reducing the Covid-19 infection rate in Israel.
He said that many rabbis feared that their followers would suffer spiritual harm if they stayed away from study and community prayer. And that some feared that the younger members would drift away from their congregations altogether.
“Rabbis can lose their power over communities,” added Halbertal.
But he condemned the haredim for placing themselves above secular laws designed to save lives.
Halbertal spoke on a street in Mea Shearim, where almost every corner is full of signs announcing the recent deaths of ultra-Orthodox people. Not all of them were killed by Covid, but it is hard to avoid the feeling that there are more warnings in black and white than normal.
“I love the ultra-Orthodox I belong to. But I see that the moral failure is so profound and for me I cannot sleep at night thinking about the deaths – in their blood on earth screaming for us. We failed in the time of our test, of our test moral as religious people, “said Halbertal.
The Israeli government is considering extending a strict blockade that is expected to end on Sunday for another week, and some politicians have called for a doubling of fines for violations of social detachment regulations.
Infection and death rates have fallen slightly, but remain high, even as Israel continues to lead the world in the distribution of vaccines, with about a third of people who received vaccinations having their first vaccines.
Bnei Brak’s mayor, Avraham Rubinstein, insists that his city is facing Covid regulations and has condemned the violence and attacks on the police.
“There are some people who are behaving violently. We denounce them. We don’t want them, and their own communities don’t want them. Their communities handed them over to the police, ”he said, a few days later he was personally threatened on the city streets by crowds of young Haredi extremists.
Rubinstein insisted that most schools and synagogues are closed and that the municipality is vigorously promoting the vaccination campaign. But data from the health ministry suggests that much remains to be done in places like Bnei Brak, with only 12% receiving the first dose. Many other Haredi communities have unique low numbers.
Part of this poor vaccination record can be explained as a result of a boycott encouraged by anonymous red posters seen across Mea Shearim.
They say the media is part of a plot to hide evidence that the inoculation campaign started at the same time that a new variant of Covid appeared in the UK and called the vaccine a “death vaccine”.
These same posters may also be the reason why a CNN team filming in the area was attacked by teenage students from yeshiva (religious school) who tried to break a camera and called the media “killers”.
Michael Schwartz contributed to this report.