Charedi man pays for 83K NIS of beer and pizza being sold on Pesach Only to have it destroyed

An unusual incident that transpired at a spring fair at the Haifa Port Terminal on Passover set off an uproar on social media: a young haredi man came with his family, gave the owners of the stands the price of all the beer and pizzas (which are "chametz" and forbidden on Passover) at the stands, and demanded it all be destroyed in front of him.

According to a video making its rounds on social media and published by Walla, the haredi man paid those running the bar 83,200 shekels, made them sign a commitment not to sell chametz at all during the holiday, and personally oversaw that the beer was poured down the drain and that the pizza was thrown into a dumpster, where it was burned.

A video of the incident was sent around on haredi messaging groups with the headline "destroying the chametz."

Many at the fair criticized the move. Assaf Danieli, 43, from Ramat Meir, who came to the fair with his family, complained: "When we returned from sailing, the bartender refused to sell me wine because they were busy spilling out the beer. He told me that something crazy happened, pointed at a haredi guy, and said that he bought all the beer, some 30 kegs, and demanded that they spill it out."

Danieli added furiously: "In principle, I think it's stunning that someone is investing nearly a hundred thousand shekels to save me from my own free will, when that money could actually save people for real. After all, anyone who wanted to drink beer and eat pizza did so a short distance away."

The organizers of the event chose not to address the claims: "This is a totally private event," the organizer, Asaf Ben-David, stated. The Haifa Municipality and Haifa Port stressed that the event was not connected to them."

Tempo Beer Industries, the producer of Goldstar Beer, which sponsored the venue, commented: "Goldstar Beer provides an annual sponsorship to the Haifa Terminal, which hosted the spring fair this year. We have no control over the Terminal's events, and this was not a sponsorship for the aforementioned event. If we had been aware of the event ahead of time, we would have worked for the removal of Goldstar from the invitation as a sponsor."