CAIRO: Egyptian members of parliament and activists are campaigning to prevent thousands of Israeli Jews from flocking to Egypt every year to visit the grave of a famous rabbi. Thousands of Israelis make annual trips to the neighboring Egypt to celebrate the birthday of Rabbi Ya aqov Abu Ha seira, a 19th-century Moroccan Jew who was considered a holy man and is buried in Egypt about 156 km north of Cairo. Locals say Israeli visitors behave in a way they find offensive. Campaigners say the visitors dance and wear provocative clothing and that the locals suffer from the tight security measures applied throughout the festivities. The campaigners also say the farmers who live in the area around the tomb are being pressured into selling their land so that investors can build a resort in the area to accommodate the annual visitors. Offers have so far been turned down, reports said. The celebrations are scheduled to take place on Jan. 14, 2009, coinciding with the rabbi s Hebrew birthday. Campaigners are hoping to collect a million signatures to have the government cancel the festivities altogether. The Egyptian Ministry of Culture has listed the area of the tomb, in the village of Demito north of Cairo, as an antiquity area. An Egyptian court revoked this ruling in 2004, but the government has yet to comply with the decision. Egypt and Israel signed a peace deal in 1979. There are no open hostilities between the two countries and both have ambassadors, but the relationship has been described as a cold peace. Many Egyptian groups reject normalization with Israel and urge that diplomatic relations be conditioned on a resolution to the Palestinian issue. Most Egyptian Jews immigrated to Israel in the late 1950s leaving a small community of fewer then 100 Jews here today. Ya aqov Yehudayoff, a fifth-generation descendant of Rabbi Abu Ha seira, organizes annual trips to the grave, and said the opposition to the festivities was nothing new. Every year we hear complaints, he told The Media Line. As far as the Egyptian authorities are concerned, the resort was closed by a court order a few years ago. That year the festivities coincided with Ramadan and they said at the time that we didn t respect their feelings. They went to court and closed it down. Since then, every year it s opened by a temporary court order and even then, they make things very difficult for us. In the past, some 25,000 Jews headed for the festivities every year. In recent years the numbers have dropped to several thousand. As of Wednesday, around 260 people have made reservations. Yehudayoff estimated that around 1,500 Jews would eventually make the trip in January. The Egyptian authorities, he said, had a tough situation to balance because they were interested in maintaining good relations with Israel. The Egyptian authorities don t want Israeli interests to be damaged, he said. They want to show they re on good terms with us. He said the compound is owned by Jews and has recently been renovated with money donated by Jews from overseas. As to claims of indecent behavior, Yehudayoff said part of the festivities included praying, drinking and being happy, but insisted they were not interfering with the locals. -The Media Line
