Top Israeli rabbi urges restraint amid reports of Jews attacking Arab citizens

One of Israel’s two chief rabbis appealed for restraint on Wednesday as media reported a spread of street attacks by Jews on members of the country’s Arab minority, some of whom have mounted violent protests in solidarity with Gaza Palestinians.

“We must not be dragged into provocations and inflicting harm on people or property,” Sephardi Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef said in a statement.

“The Torah of Israel grants no license for taking the law into one’s hands and acting violently.”

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On Wednesday, hostilities between Israel and Hamas escalated on Wednesday, with at least 35 killed in Gaza and five in Israel in the most intensive aerial exchanges for years.

Israel carried out hundreds of air strikes in Gaza into Wednesday morning, as the Islamist group and other Palestinian militants fired multiple rocket barrages at Tel Aviv and Beersheba.

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