This past weekend, around 2,000 people marched in Tel Aviv to commemorate the night anniversary of the deadly shooting at the city’s Barnoar gay youth center.
According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency or JTA, the 2009 attack was by a single man killed two young people and injured dozens more. Unfortunately, the shooter was never caught. That said, police say the motivation was a personal grudge and not pushed by homophobia.
The organizers of Saturday’s march also issued a statement about the event and the progress LGBTQ rights have made since then.
“Nine years ago an armed man entered the Barnoar center and murdered boys and girls only because they were different,” the statement said. “Nine years have passed and not much has changed. In recent weeks there has been a public outcry against the inequality and discrimination of the LGBT community in Israel. We are calling to put a stop to the violence towards the LGBT community.”
This comes right off the heels of Israel’s Pride March as well as protests, both peaceful and violent, against the Israeli government after it blocked gay couples from surrogacy rights but tried to market towards LGBTQ tourists.
As JTA states, a 19-year-old marcher at this past weekend’s event, named Nitay Nedivi, stated how the country still “discriminates against the LGBT community.”
“The law makes it very difficult for people from a transgender community to undergo medical procedures, the connection between religion and state prohibits us from getting married, there is systematic discrimination towards same-sex couples,” he said. “The education system has almost no content on sex, gender, or anything else that deviates from their norm.”
h/t: JTA
