BBC News
11 April 2013
Last updated at 05:12 ET
The women say they should have the right to wear religious items at the Wall like men
The women are part of a movement seeking to overturn the prohibition, issued by the High Court in 2003.
Authorities are working on a compromise to try to resolve the dispute.
The Western Wall - a relic of the Biblical Temple compound - currently has separate sections where men and women are allowed to pray.
At sunrise on Thursday morning, about 120 women gathered inside their section at the wall to pray.
The BBC's Erica Chernofsky, who was at the scene, said five of the women from the Women of the Wall (WoW) movement wore phylacteries, kippot and colourful prayer shawls, religious items traditionally worn by Orthodox Jewish men.
About 100 men on the other side of the division heckled the group, while an ultra-Orthodox woman unfurled an umbrella with slogans on it denouncing the women, our correspondent says. The woman, and an ultra-Orthodox man who set fire to one of the WoW's prayer books, were also detained.
However, a compromise could see a new area for mixed-gender and women-led prayer.
The proposal has come from Natan Sharansky, chairman of the Jewish Agency - a government-backed organisation that facilitates the immigration of Jewish people to Israel.
"One Western Wall for one Jewish people," said Mr Sharansky, expressing hope that the site "will once again be a symbol of unity among the Jewish people and not one of discord and strife".
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to consider Mr Sharansky's proposals, an Israeli official told Reuters news agency.
Correspondents say the proposal risks upsetting Israel's powerful ultra-Orthodox community as well as Muslims who worship near the Western Wall, reflecting the complex religious sensitivities in the area.
In a boost for the plan, the Western Wall's Orthodox Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz endorsed the new prayer section.
"I want everyone to pray according to Orthodox Jewish religious law, but I don't interfere," he told Israel's Army Radio.
"If these things can be done at the Western Wall without hurting others, and this can bring about compromise and serenity, I don't object."
Women of the Wall say their central mission is to be able to "wear prayer shawls, pray, and read from the Torah collectively and out loud at the Western Wall".
One of the big reasons we suffer continuous Abrahamic religious warfare is due to the fact that Abrahamic religions put into social practice are defined by their most conservative or fundamentalist practitioners, not the most liberal ones. And because Abrahamic religions are all territorial control oriented theologies, this translates into continuous friction between Abrahamic fundamentalists be they Jewish, Pauline Christians or Muslims. Certainly Israel's so-called "democracy" is a farce in this situation when ultra-Orthodox Jews control the politics of the nation. You may wonder how a Christian can bash Abrahamic religions. Well, that is due to the lack of cultural information about "my" people, the early Jewish Christian Gnostics who actually started Christianity but were ousted from history by the successful efforts of the Roman Catholic Church to ban and banish all Gnostic Christian Gospels and all Gnostic interpretation of the New Testament Gospels. I am a Jewish Gnostic Christian and our beliefs were never Bible centered, actually never Yahweh centered. I follow God Most High and the Spirit of Christ which is true to the Celestial Torah that was lost in the earthly Jewish Torah.
The women say they should have the right to wear religious items at the Wall like men
Five
women have been detained at Jerusalem's Western Wall for breaching a
ban on performing religious rituals Orthodox Jews say are reserved for
men.
Authorities are working on a compromise to try to resolve the dispute.
The Western Wall - a relic of the Biblical Temple compound - currently has separate sections where men and women are allowed to pray.
At sunrise on Thursday morning, about 120 women gathered inside their section at the wall to pray.
The BBC's Erica Chernofsky, who was at the scene, said five of the women from the Women of the Wall (WoW) movement wore phylacteries, kippot and colourful prayer shawls, religious items traditionally worn by Orthodox Jewish men.
About 100 men on the other side of the division heckled the group, while an ultra-Orthodox woman unfurled an umbrella with slogans on it denouncing the women, our correspondent says. The woman, and an ultra-Orthodox man who set fire to one of the WoW's prayer books, were also detained.
“If these things can be done at the Western Wall without hurting others, and this can bring about compromise and serenity, I don't object” Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz Rabbi of the Western Wall
The group have vowed to lead
prayer services at the site every month, and members have previously
been arrested there for violating the ban.
The proposal has come from Natan Sharansky, chairman of the Jewish Agency - a government-backed organisation that facilitates the immigration of Jewish people to Israel.
"One Western Wall for one Jewish people," said Mr Sharansky, expressing hope that the site "will once again be a symbol of unity among the Jewish people and not one of discord and strife".
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to consider Mr Sharansky's proposals, an Israeli official told Reuters news agency.
Correspondents say the proposal risks upsetting Israel's powerful ultra-Orthodox community as well as Muslims who worship near the Western Wall, reflecting the complex religious sensitivities in the area.
In a boost for the plan, the Western Wall's Orthodox Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz endorsed the new prayer section.
"I want everyone to pray according to Orthodox Jewish religious law, but I don't interfere," he told Israel's Army Radio.
"If these things can be done at the Western Wall without hurting others, and this can bring about compromise and serenity, I don't object."
Women of the Wall say their central mission is to be able to "wear prayer shawls, pray, and read from the Torah collectively and out loud at the Western Wall".
One of the big reasons we suffer continuous Abrahamic religious warfare is due to the fact that Abrahamic religions put into social practice are defined by their most conservative or fundamentalist practitioners, not the most liberal ones. And because Abrahamic religions are all territorial control oriented theologies, this translates into continuous friction between Abrahamic fundamentalists be they Jewish, Pauline Christians or Muslims. Certainly Israel's so-called "democracy" is a farce in this situation when ultra-Orthodox Jews control the politics of the nation. You may wonder how a Christian can bash Abrahamic religions. Well, that is due to the lack of cultural information about "my" people, the early Jewish Christian Gnostics who actually started Christianity but were ousted from history by the successful efforts of the Roman Catholic Church to ban and banish all Gnostic Christian Gospels and all Gnostic interpretation of the New Testament Gospels. I am a Jewish Gnostic Christian and our beliefs were never Bible centered, actually never Yahweh centered. I follow God Most High and the Spirit of Christ which is true to the Celestial Torah that was lost in the earthly Jewish Torah.
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