A civilian driver pulled a firearm on Haredi protesters during Wednesday's massive convoy demonstration on Highway 1, in one of several violent incidents that marred what organizers had billed as a peaceful day of protest against the arrest of Haredi draft evaders.
Video footage released by protest organizers shows the driver slowly rolling his car toward a group of young Haredi men standing on the highway, weapon in hand and pointed in their direction. No shots were fired.
Protest leadership called the episode a "murder threat" and demanded police "act immediately against the inciters and the incited. Enough with the violence."
The gun incident was not the only alarming confrontation of the day. The deputy mayor of Beitar Illit, Gedalia Eisenstein, was violently attacked during the convoy, with witnesses saying a hostile driver deliberately rammed his vehicle before physically choking the official. Separately, a truck driver on the Ayalon highway exited his cab armed with a knife and sticks and began beating a convoy vehicle from Bnei Brak, pounding on the windows as terrified passengers called police.
Organizers also accused police of attempting to suppress the protest by issuing fines to slow-moving vehicles, calling it "a serious attempt to harm a basic right in a democratic state."
The convoy, organized by Agudath Israel and joined by factions of the Jerusalem breakaway sect, drew more than 2,000 registered vehicles departing from 19 staging points across the country, from Tzfat in the north to Arad in the south, all converging toward Prison 10 near Beit Lid, where Haredi draft evaders are currently being held. Highway 1 toward Tel Aviv and the coastal road south of Haifa were blocked intermittently as the slow-moving procession wound through the country's central arteries during the 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. demonstration window.
Shas and Degel HaTorah did not participate in the demonstration and were reported to oppose it, leaving the action to the Hasidic factions operating under Agudath Israel's banner.
