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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is also the leader of the right-wing Likud party, has come in for significant criticism, vowing to support the surrogacy rights of gay men before voting against them. More than 200 rabbis have signed a joint statement in support of the surrogacy law, declaring that "the aggressive terrorism, accompanied by media brainwashing to turn the perverts into heroes will not work." The surrogacy bill will make this year's events especially charged, as debate continues to rage between mainstream Israeli society, which is generally pro-LGBT rights, and the country's religious and right-wing establishment.
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Participants attend a demonstration in Tel Aviv on July 22, 2018, to protest a new surrogacy law that does not include gay couples. Lehava founder Bentzi Gopstein branded LGBT activists "terrorists" in an online video published Tuesday, and said the Lehava protest would take place under a banner reading, "Jerusalem is not Sodom"-a reference to one of the biblical towns supposedly destroyed by god for being sinful. The Orthodox Liva group will also be holding another event.
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One will be held by the ultra-nationalist Lehava group, a member of which set fire to a bilingual Hebrew-Arabic school in Jerusalem in 2014. Police have given permission for two counter marches in Jerusalem on Thursday. Memorial events for Banki as well as Nir Katz and Liz Troubishi-killed in a shooting at a gay support center in Tel Aviv in 2009-will also be held Thursday. Schlissel had only just been released from prison having served a 10-year sentence for a knife attack on the 2005 pride parade. In 2015, teenager Shira Banki was killed and five others injured by a knife-wielding ultra-Orthodox Yishai Schlissel during the march. Previous Jerusalem Pride events have been targeted by the right wing. If you have the intention to disturb the peace, then that's not good." The officer added, "We are talking about your intentions. One recording of a conversation between police and an activist captured the officer warning, "I am asking you to be careful, to obey the law, not to come to the area there," Haaretz reported. Numerous right-wing and anti-LGBT figures have been summoned to police stations and warned to stay away from Thursday's event. A huge protest against the law took place in Tel Aviv on June 22 attracting around 100,000 people, shutting down several roads in the downtown area of the city. This year's march comes as tensions mount over new legislation barring gay men from surrogacy parenthood rights. Thank god for the struggle and for the parades." "It doesn't matter one bit how many fathers or mothers it's composed of. "Every safe, warm, loving family is a good and natural one," Gelbfish continued. In our natural family we were three helpless hostages to two young parents who got married because they couldn't have an abortion." "In our natural family, we were beaten to an inch of our lives. "In our natural family, Dad cheated on Mom and Mom cheated on Dad," she explained. Gelbfish wrote on social media that she had grown up in a so-called "normal family," but this was no guarentee of a happy life. Israeli author Roni Gelbfish was among those criticizing the posters. This anti-LGBT graphic is being spread on social media ahead of the Jerusalem Pride Parade, calling on Israelis to “Say Yes To Natural Families,” which it depicts as a heterosexual couple and three children.