The arrest of a Messianic Jewish evangelist in Israel reflects the strife that often confronts Messianic Jews despite Israel’s guarantees of religious liberty and without any repercussion from law enforcement officials, the leader of a Messianic congregation told Baptist Press.
Messianic evangelist Eddie Beckford was arrested outside his business, the Chess and Bible Shop in Arad, after a mob of ultra-Orthodox Haredim Jews surrounded his van and beat him Feb. 25.
“Over the years here in the south in the Negev, in Arad and in Beer Sheva, there has been some form of harassment or persecution,” Howard Bass, leader of the Nahalat Yeshua congregation in Beer Sheva, said.
Groups of ultra-Orthodox Jews seem to have a difficult time accepting the fact that some Jews would believe Jesus is the Messiah and want to evangelize other Jews, Bass said. So those anti-Messianic groups work to stop the people they consider “missionaries” through various degrees of persecution.
“In Arad, for instance, for almost three years they have been hounding the believers there at their services, in front of their homes,” said Bass, an American Jew with Israeli citizenship.
Beckford’s arrest followed a call to police when the confrontation with the ultra-Orthodox mob broke out. The Haredim complained that Beckford attacked them, according to Beckford’s wife, Lura.
“[The police] blame us for the disturbances the Haredim cause,” Lura Beckford wrote in a message posted at israelprayer.com.
“They tell us, ‘If you weren’t here, we wouldn’t have to deal with this trouble.’ So, they arrested Eddie and put him in leg irons and took him to jail. They completely ignored the Bedouin’s testimony that Eddie did nothing and the Haredim attacked him. He spent the night in a small filthy cell with five other men, and in the middle of the night, they transferred him to another filthy cell.”
Eddie Beckford, an American, was arraigned before a judge in Beer Sheva Feb. 28 and was offered a plea bargain of spending 45 days in jail or agreeing not to return to Arad for 45 days. He chose to stay with friends outside Arad rather than serve a prison sentence, and his wife was trying to retrieve his identification card, which was confiscated by police in Arad.
“This is a culmination of a week of horror as far as the Haredim are concerned. Just this week, ‘A’ was harassed by them four different times — They blocked his car and pounded on it, etc. ‘R’ has been harassed while walking her child from school by these grown men,” Lura Beckford wrote, using initials in place of names. “She and I have been harassed several times in public areas while walking. All of us have put in complaints with the police on assault charges.
“I had the privilege of being hit by the chief [rabbi] of Arad. Why? Just because I believe in Y’shua (Jesus) as the Savior of the Jewish people and the world,” she wrote.
Eddie Beckford’s arrest preceded the introduction of a bill by an Orthodox political party seeking to sentence proselytizers in Israel to one year in prison.
“Whether it’s Christians coming from abroad or Jewish converts working in Israel, they all have the same agenda — to destroy every trace and memory of the people of Israel, and they plan to do this by converting Jews,” the proposal by the Shas group said, according to ynetnews.com March 14. “These bodies are operating mainly among the Jewish population which is under physical, social and spiritual distress.” (BP)
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