Knesset member Rabbi Gilad Kariv, a new Labor lawmaker, arrived at the Western Wall in Jerusalem on the morning of April 13 with a group of activists calling themselves “Women of the Wall.” Standing in front of Judaism’s holiest site, Kariv pulled a Torah scroll out of his bag and the women held their customary prayer service marking the first day of the Hebrew month of Iyar.
For years, this women’s group has been fighting for the right to wear prayer shawls, pray and read from the Torah at the site, incurring the wrath of the dominant Orthodox stream of Judaism that bans women from engaging in such rituals or mixing with male worshipers.
