The First Amendment, and the freedom of expression it promises without preference for one religion over another, has fostered American Jews’ love for their adoptive home for over a century, and rightly so. It is no accident that the United States of America has been the safest and most welcoming place for Jews in the whole, long history of diaspora, not only because of the protection for religious minorities enshrined in the Constitution, but also due to deep ideological affinities for the Hebrews and their Bible harbored by various Founding Fathers and other American greats.
In this context, the average American might be surprised—and possibly outraged—to learn that, in the free society of Israel, one religious group bears greater restrictions on its right to public worship than any other.
Last spring, I took my two eldest sons to visit the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. The smooth paving stones felt cold under bare feet as our small, closely guarded group of Jews walked slowly around its perimeter before stopping to face the Holy of Holies and pray together discreetly. Perhaps I lifted my hands too much in supplication at some point, because the gesture caught the watchful eye of an Israeli police officer supervising our visit; he warned us that if we continued to pray too openly, we would be arrested.
