Ethiopian Jews account for 3% in Israel population and they were brought from Ethiopia with false promises.
Yesterday’s protest came three days after a stormy demonstration in Jerusalem sparked by footage showing two policemen beating a uniformed Israeli soldier of Ethiopian origin.
Scores of other Israelis also joined yesterday’s rally, chanting and holding up signs reading: “A violent policeman must be put in prison” and “We demand equal rights”.
As they marched through Tel Aviv, some held their arms up in the air, wrists crossed as if handcuffed.
Demonstrators earlier blocked the Ayalon expressway during rush-hour, causing huge traffic jams on one of Israel’s central highways before police forcefully evacuated them.
“Being black, I have to protest today,” 34-year-old Eddie Maconen told AFP before the clashes outside the municipality.
“I never experienced police violence against me personally, but it is aimed at my community which I have to support,” he said.
Last week video clip showed two police officers violently shoving and punching a black uniformed Israel Defense Forces soldier sparking a wave of anger within the community.
There were “many cases” where Israeli-Ethiopians have been beaten by the police. Ethiopian community has protested against police brutality on several occasions.
“The fact that we’re black doesn’t mean that we’re Baltimore,” one of the organizers.
“In Jerusalem we didn’t ‘do a Baltimore’ as people are saying, that’s not what it was about,” she said.
“We’re part of a community that has experienced and is experiencing these things, that’s hurting and wants to cry out, to go out to the streets together and to protest against the way we are treated,” said another organizer.
“Enough of racism!” they chanted, “In Europe they kill Jews because they’re Jews, here they kill Jews for being black,” read one placard.
Removing the police officer from duty who beat up the black soldier would not please the community. “You have to recognize that they committed a crime and should be punished, not only dismissed.”
Ethiopians Jews were brought with lots of motivation, but they are not accepted. Impoverished neighborhoods, soaring unemployment, and the highest high-school dropout rate of any Jewish group in Israel are evident. They were discriminated against in jobs, in education because they are black. It was also revealed that Israeli hospitals even thrown out all blood donated by Ethiopians. The gap between black and white Israelis seems, with some exemption, to be on the rise.