Israel: Hundreds of Orthodox Jews attend funeral of 4 Meron stampede victims

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Hundreds of Orthodox Jews gathered to lay four victims of the Meron crush to rest in Jerusalem on Friday. Shragee Gestetner, a successful Hasidic singer was among the four victims who were buried in the funeral ceremony. "His family can't take part in the funeral, so people from the general public attended. The public is so devastated so even people who don't have connections to the people who died want to take part," said a relative of the deceased singer. Shmuel Zvi Klagsbald, Aliezer Goldberg, and Yehuda Rubin were the other three victims who were laid to rest in the Jerusalem ceremony. At least 45 people died in a stampede at a religious festival near Mount Meron, in northern Israel, in the early hours of Friday morning, after a structure collapsed at the festival and several people slipped, causing dozens more to fall as a consequence. The incident took place as tens of thousands of primarily ultra-Orthodox Jews participated in the annual event, around the tomb of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, a 2nd-century Tannaitic sage. The festival was the largest event taking place in the country since the beginning of the pandemic.