Jews spitting on the ground beside Christian pilgrims in the Holy Land sparks outrage

By ISABEL DEBRE
Associated Press

JERUSALEM (AP) — A video that shows ultra-Orthodox Jews spitting on the ground beside a procession of foreign Christian worshipers carrying a wooden cross in the holy city of Jerusalem has ignited intense outrage and a flurry of condemnation in the Holy Land. The city’s minority Christian community lamented the spitting incident as the latest in an alarming surge of religiously motivated attacks. It drew rare censure on Tuesday from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other senior officials. Concerns have mounted among religious leaders over the increasing harassment of the region’s 2,000-year-old Christian community since Israel’s most conservative government in history came to power late last year.