On Wednesday, January 29, 2003, one day after the Zionist parliamentary
elections, two Jews - a father and son - Rabbi Yarchi, age 65-70, and his
son, R. M. Yarchi of Haifa, set up a booth to sell a book, Likutei
Amarim-Vayoel Moshe containing the writings of Rabbi Yoel Teitelbaum (the
Satmar Rabbi who was a vociferous opponent of Zionism) among the small
synagogues in the Zichron Moshe neighborhood of Jerusalem between afternoon
and evening prayer services.
They had sold some eighty books when suddenly two armed policemen approached
their booth and informed the Yarchis that they were under arrest! The
Yarchis asked the policemen why they were under arrest, and they were told
that it was because they were selling books condemning the State of Israel.
The police opened the book and pointed to the introduction where Rabbi
Teitelbaum wrote against the Zionist State (it was obvious that these
policemen could never have understood anything about the subject without
some Israel supporter having told them about it).
The Yarchis stated that the Zionist State, which always brags about being a
"democracy" with "freedom of speech," was really like the former Soviet
Union. The police responded by warning them that if they uttered another
word they would be handcuffed.
The police wanted to seize all the books and threatened the Yarchis with
jail. After the police took information such as the Yarchis' identity card
number, warned them not to sell these books again and tried to interrogate
them about who was behind selling these books.
When word got out in Jerusalem a number of G-d-fearing men began selling the
holy books without fear or concern of being imprisoned. Currently a group of
men are visiting synagogues in the Holy Land to disseminate the book, which
is extremely relevant to today's situation.
It should be noted that there is a huge demand for this book, which was
reprinted, but is now out of print again. They are planning to reprint it
again in response to the unending demand.