Interior Minister Yosef Burg, overriding the recommendations of the police, rescinded the 14-day prison sentences imposed on three rock-throwing religious zealots yesterday.
The police had urged vigorous punishment for the three who hurled rocks at passing vehicles on the Ramot road last Saturday and attacked police officers who tried to stop them. Burg, a leader of the National Religious Party, ordered the men released so that they can spend their nights at home rather than in jail cells. They will serve their sentences by working days at the local police precinct.
According to Burg, the ultra-Orthodox Jews who have been harassing non-observant motorists for years on the Ramot road which passes near an Orthodox neighborhood, had threatened worse violence if the arrested men were kept in jail. By surrendering to their demands, he prevented more rock-throwing incidents, Burg contended.
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