An effort is under way to mobilize Jews around the world in an urgent effort to save the cemetery from a form of terrorism.

The deterioration of the 3,000-year-old burial site is a national disgrace

By Menachem Lubinsky

It was on an early Wednesday morning that I made one of my frequent visits to Har Hazeisim to be mispallel at the kevarim of my parents and at the tziyun of the Beis Yisrael and the Lev Simchah (the Admorim of Gur).

Since my late father, Harav Chaim Pinchas Lubinsky (the Hanover Rav, zt”l), was niftar 25 years ago, I always make sure to visit Har Hazeisim on my periodic visits to Yerushalayim. Although the huge cemetery, with approximately 60,000 graves, never looked particularly well cared for, and signs of neglect were always apparent, nothing prepared me for what I saw during this most recent visit.

Prior to leaving the United States, I had heard about the blistering report by State Comptroller Micha Linden­ strauss, who stressed the benign neglect of Har Hazeisim by successive governments: “Repair work proceeds at a snail’s pace, maintenance standards are inadequate, security is sorely lacking and vandalism and criminal acts continue unabated, accentuating the danger that funds and labor at the site will go down the drain.”

Over the past 25 years, security at the cemetery has deteriorated steadily. An army checkpoint at the foot of the cemetery was dismantled about six years ago. The police station that once stood opposite the cemetery was relocated, and the ransacked building stands as a stark reminder to the changed security situation at the site. A large watchtower is immediately visible as one drives up to the cemetery, but it is never manned. A source tells me that the watchtower was the result of an allocation for security that was never fully implemented. In any event, the large cemetery certainly requires more than one watchtower.

On this particular Wednes­ day, Arab schoolchildren make their way along the narrow passageway leading to the cemetery. They seem unfazed by the sanctity of the place and treat the area as an ordinary neighborhood. The cemetery is inhabited by several dozen Arab families, including the family of the killer of Cpl. Nachshon Waxman, Hy”d. There are piles of garbage everywhere. Cigarette butts and sunflower seed shells line the walkways even as Arab workers repair the stones that lead up to the section of Kollel Polin, Rabi Meir Baal Haness, just 300 or so feet from where the Admorim of Gur are interred and in the direction of the section where my parents lie.

Nearby is a section of the Sephardic chevrah kaddisha. The earth is parched, and several tombstones lie smashed. There is dog feces, and the entire section looks painfully neglected. I notice the charred remains of what was obviously a drug-laced cigarette. Special holes for candles in the matzeivos are broken, and the copper holders for yahrtzeit candles have been removed. I was told that the Arabs sell the copper, which is melted and reshaped into various objects.

In the Kollel Polin section there is more devastation, as a number of graves have been wantonly destroyed. Most in the section are Americans, with names like Fishoff, Klein, Segal and Fastag, families who coveted a cemetery plot in close proximity to the Admorim of Gur. A young Israeli who says he is a member of a private security force that has guarded the cemetery for years shows up. Although he says that he and a partner patrol the large cemetery (“we can’t be everywhere”), he seems surprised at the desecration. He wonders if the chevrah kaddisha is aware of the destruction of the graves. I have no clue, but am amazed that he did not know. He says that he understands that there will be additional units joining him, but he does not know when. (It is these “delays” that prompted the state comptroller to lambast the government over its neglect of Har Hazeisim.)

Just beyond the wall of the section are three protruding cables, which the security agent says will be part of an elaborate system of surveillance cameras. Again, he has no idea when. He agrees with me that the Arabs may well walk away with the cables before they are mounted on several waiting poles.

MK Rabbi Yaakov Litzman, the deputy health minister, says he is aware of the situation and that he has been promised additional police coverage. The security guard says he has seen a police cruiser here and there, but it is very sporadic. Again, no one seems to know when this additional police coverage will materialize.

Meanwhile at a hastily convened meeting on Sunday, June 6, at the home of Reb Meilich Fastag in Brooklyn, some of the participants tell even more horror stories. A prominent Rav relates how he witnessed Palestinians living in nearby villages and in the cemetery itself using picks, sledgehammers and other equipment to destroy tombstones. Some of the participants at the meeting were victims of stones being hurled at them by youngsters, and at least one participant had a Molotov Cocktail thrown at his car. The deterioration of the 3,000-year-old Har Hazeisim was called by a participant a “national disgrace,” as the cemetery is the burial place of the neviim Zecharia, Chaggai and Malachi, and of many Rabbanim and Admorim. It is also the burial place of former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin (whose vandalized grave site is repeatedly repaired by his son, MK Benny Begin) and a host of secular poets.

A delegation of Kollel Polin - Rabi Meir Baal Haness flew in for the meeting. Headed by Rabbi Moshe Betzalel Bozokowski, they too expressed frustration at the neglect and unresponsiveness of the government. They shared a map of some 20,000 kevarim that they had begun to document in recent years, a monumental piece of work in the face of the deteriorating security situation on Har Hazeisim.

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