Anger Over Israeli Mayor Who Says There Are No Gays In His Town
Moshe Abutbul, the ultra-Orthodox mayor of Beit Shemesh, says no gays live in his town and homosexuality should be a police matter, amid debate in Israel over a proposal to allow same-sex unions
By Robert Tait, Jerusalem 3:10PM GMT 11 Nov 2013
Israel's gay community has filed a criminal complaint against an ultra-Orthodox mayor after he said there were no homosexuals in his town and that homosexuality should be dealt with by the health ministry or the police.
Moshe Abutbul, the Haredi mayor of Beit Shemesh, near Jerusalem, made the inflammatory remarks during an interview on nationwide television.
"We have none of those things [gays] here. Thank God, this city is holy and pure," he told Israel's Channel 10. Asked how his town handles the gay community, he replied: "There's the Health Ministry, let them handle it. The Health Ministry, the police."
Mr Abutbul, a member of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, made his comments in a programme segment that featured an interview with a gay man living in Beit Shemesh, a town of 75,000 that has become a flashpoint for tensions between conservative religious and secular residents.
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/israel/10440627/Anger-over-Israeli-mayor-who-says-there-are-no-gays-in-his-town.html
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