By Josh Hasten
Jerusalem has seen nightly violent clashes between Arabs and Jews in the past two weeks with the epicenter of confrontation taking place near the Old City’s Damascus Gate.
Jewish and Muslim Hatzalah volunteers in downtown Jerusalem.
The violence began on April 13, the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, and according to police was sparked in part by a new social media trend among young Arabs that involves physically assaulting visibly Orthodox Jews and posting the attacks on TikTok.
The past two weeks have been especially busy for first responders, who have been treating those injured during the riots.
One of those on the front lines is Khaled Rishek, a religious Muslim who, for the past 12 years, has served as a paramedic with United Hatzalah, a volunteer-based, national emergency medical-services provider.
Rishek, a married father of two who lives in Jerusalem’s Abu Tor neighbourhood, is a full-time cultural programs director at the Jerusalem International YMCA.
Even though he has spent the past two weeks fasting during daylight hours per the Ramadan tradition, he has mustered the strength to be on call in downtown Jerusalem — specifically, in the area of the Old City. He asked Hatzalah to station him there because he knows the area well.
Equipped with an ambucycle to avoid traffic, Rishek has treated scores of wounded in the past two weeks. He has spent a considerable amount of time treating those injured in rock-throwing attacks and suffering from head injuries.
“Last Thursday night [April 22], a bus was attacked by rocks on the Mount of Olives, and six ultra-Orthodox Jews were injured,” he said, who was on the scene to attend to the wounded.
The same day, he assisted a young Arab man who had broken his arm in a scuffle.
Rishek said that he is empathetic to all and treats people in need regardless of their background.
“When I treat a person, there is no politics there,” he said. “As an Arab and a Jerusalemite, it’s important for me to treat all populations; it doesn’t matter who they are. I see this as holy work.”
Raphael Poch, international media spokesperson for United Hatzalah, said that “the Muslim volunteers play an incredibly important role, especially in Jerusalem, where it has at times, such as during the Second Intifada, proved to be especially dangerous for Jews to enter into Muslim neighborhoods of the city.
“For this reason, it has become the protocol that ambulances need to wait for a police escort before they can enter an Arab neighborhood in east[ern] Jerusalem.”
This has “caused a severe delay in emergency medical response times,” he said, “and many people lost their lives due to waiting for help to arrive when they were suffering from a medical emergency such as a heart attack, strokes, drownings and choking.”
About 10 years ago, a Muslim medical practitioner approached Hatzalah about their concept of training emergency medical first-responders from the community for eastern Jerusalem. According to Poch, David Friedman, later US ambassador to Israel, helped arrange for the funding of the first Muslim chapter of United Hatzalah.
“Volunteers like Khaled Rishek provide the first line of care to Muslims who need emergency medical assistance,” Poch said. “This includes during times of political or religious unrest.
“When a person signs up for a volunteer position such as an emergency responder, they tend to recognize the value of human life,” he said.
“When we rush out, we don’t know who we are saving. Regardless of their past, and who they are or where they are from, we need to provide them with the highest level of medical care that we are able to.”
Rishek said that he was very happy that as tensions in the city quieted down, he didn’t have to run out and treat anyone. “I saw that everyone relaxed a bit and hopefully, we are going back to normal, or as close to it as possible.
“There are another two weeks of Ramadan, a period I like very much. I hope that businesses and stores will be opened, and the focus will be on what Ramadan is meant to symbolize — welcoming guests into our homes, prayers, brotherhood and helping the poor,” he said.
“I would rather get emergency calls for good things like births, and that all of these other incidents would stop.”
