Jerusalem, tourist destroys two statues at Israel Museum. Contrary to my religion

A 40-year-old American tourist destroyed two Roman statues kept at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, one of the country’s major museums, because they were allegedly images contrary to his religion, according to the man told police who arrested him. The man, who is Jewish, hurled two sculptures from the second century A.D. to the ground because they were “idolatrous and contrary to the Torah,” as the Associated Press reports. The events date back to yesterday.

However, according to the tourist’s lawyer, the man did not act in the grip of religious fanaticism, but was seized by a disorder that has been described in psychiatric literature as the “Jerusalem syndrome”, that is, a series of symptoms that are manifested by those who visit the Israeli capital and that involve the externalization of delusional behavior similar to religiously motivated psychosis (there are, for example, those who believe they are a figure from the Bible or those who manifest signs of fanaticism), triggered precisely by visiting the city. However, this is not a condition recognized by the International Classification of Diseases (ICD) classification of the World Health Organization. The man, in any case, will undergo a psychiatric examination.

The Israel Museum called what happened a “disturbing and unusual event” and said it “condemns all forms of violence” and “hopes that such incidents will not be repeated.” Instead, it is “shocking of destruction of cultural property,” said Eli Escusido, director of the Israel Antiquities Authority. “We are concerned that cultural property is being destroyed by extremists based on religious grounds.” In fact, this is not the first time something similar has happened: in February, another American Jewish tourist had damaged a statue of Jesus in the Old City, and in January some youths defaced Christian tombstones in one of the city’s cemeteries.

The Israeli police photo shows the result of the tourist’s action.

Jerusalem, tourist destroys two statues at Israel Museum. Contrary to my religion

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