It’s not history.
It’s not another lugubrious Jewish tale.
It’s not even primarily a marker of the Arab pogrom in Hebron that killed 67 innocents in 1929.
It’s not just the death last week of the last survivor of that Arab pogrom nearly 100 years ago. It is, rather, a story of sheer religious bigotry by the Muslim authorities in Jerusalem at the time.
Look at the cause of the 1929 pogrom. Google it. It’s all there.
The Muslim authorities in Jerusalem forbad — we’re not making this up — Jews from bringing chairs or tables to the Western Wall to make it more comfortable for Jews to pray there. Keep in mind that the space for Jews to pray there was already about 20 times smaller than the current Western Wall plaza. Chairs and tables were too much for the Mufti of Jerusalem and his fellow Muslim functionaries.
Chairs and tables were the least of it. The Muslim authorities in Jerusalem became apoplectic — there is no other word — over the prospect of Jews blowing a shofar to mark the end of Yom Kippur after a day of prayer at the Western Wall. That ritual might symbolize a Jewish desire to “take over” the Western Wall, i.e., to pray there any time they wanted, unhindered.
Under the Muslim definition of religious freedom at the Wall during the British Mandate (1922-1948), the only way for Jews to enjoy the freedom to sound the shofar at the end of Yom Kippur was to smuggle in a shofar. And smuggle they did.And sound the shofar they did. Due to this, “Muslim sensibilities” (said the Muslim authorities) were profoundly violated. That was the Muslim definition of religious freedom in Jerusalem.
We’ve come a long way. No longer need Jews smuggle in a shofar or beg for the right to bring chairs and tables. Nor need Muslims beg for their own religious practices. Religious freedom is guaranteed by Israel to the practitioners of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Bahai’i, Druze and lesser known religions. Israel’s commitment is light years ahead of the religious bigotry of Jerusalem’s Muslim authorities in 1929. The pogrom then was the Muslim response to such “offenses” as shofar blowing at the Western Wall.
© IJN 2026
