Jerusalem—Recently, when Women of the Wall (WoW) heard what Naftali Bennett—Minister of Industry, Trade, and Labor, Minister of Religious Services, Minister of Jerusalem and Diaspora Affairs, and a Member of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee—had engineered at Robinson’s Arch, they held a 24-hour sit-in at the Kotel to protest the attempt to kick them off the plaza, even though they had been praying at the Kotel for 24+ years and many of them are Modern Orthodox.

Numerous sources have reported that two weeks ago, Bennett announced that the area south of the main Kotel plaza, Robinson’s Arch, had a new platform for egalitarian/mixed services for non-Orthodox Jews, although he did say that he was NOT referring to WoW, “but to the Jewish people as a whole.” (He posted his rationale to his Facebook page.) The area is supposed to accommodate 450 people, and will provide them with Sifrei Torah, talitot, siddurim or machzorim and be available 24/7. It is basically an expansion of a lower platform built for non-Orthodox Jews in 2004, and he dismissed criticism from WoW that Robinson’s Arch was not the same as davening in the Kotel plaza, and that this creates difficulties for their Modern Orthodox members.

The group believes the renovated site represents the basis for what a committee headed by Cabinet Secretary Avichai Mandelblit will recommend as a permanent solution for all non-Orthodox prayer at the Western Wall. A WoW spokeswoman told The Jerusalem Post that the group was concerned that Bennett could issue regulations creating a new legal reality that once again prevents the group from praying at the Kotel. The group also asked Minister of Justice Tzipi Livni to prevent such an eventuality.

According to Haaretz, the committee charged with finding a permanent solution to accommodate Women of the Wall and the non-Orthodox streams has yet to complete its work. A “well-placed government source with knowledge of the committee’s activities,” told the paper, “It is not clear who authorized Bennett to do this, but what does seem obvious is that he wanted to create facts on the ground.”

Haaretz also reported that “neither the Prime Minister’s Office nor the office of Jewish Agency Chairman Natan Sharansky was prepared to comment publicly on what appears to have been an attempt by Bennett to bypass the cabinet.” The much-touted Sharansky Plan will take years to complete, but will be adjacent to the Kotel.

At the sit-in, WoW leader Anat Hoffman said the Bennett plan “cannot be an excuse to throw us out. The government of Israel, is trying to break the bonds between the Women of the Wall and the [Reform and Conservative] movements,” which have been “very supportive.”

She told Haaretz that if the government planned to abide by the court’s decisions, “it should have told us that until the full Sharansky plan is implemented, you could pray as you please. Instead we’re being told, ‘Get the hell out of here, out of sight and out of mind.’”