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60,000 Chickens are Swung and Slaughtered on Public Streets During Ritual Sacrifice

October 10, 2017 by Leave a Comment


The News

Before Yom Kippur (the Jewish Day of Atonement), a subset of Orthodox Jews in New York City slaughtered an estimated 60,000 baby chickens as part of an annual ritual sacrifice called Kaporos. During the ritual, participants typically pin the chickens’ wings behind their backs and swing them around their heads three times while reciting a prayer to transfer their sins to the chickens, who they then deliver to makeshift slaughterhouses where butchers slice their throats.

In spite of the video footage of showing the Department of Sanitation hauling the dead chickens away after the ritual,  ritual participants claim that the animals are donated to the poor.  This year, activists for the first time discovered garbage bags filled with hundreds of chickens who weren’t used in the ritual sacrifice because they died of heat exhaustion, hunger and thirst in the crates in which they are intensively confined for several days leading up to the ritual.

Thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jewish children pour into the streets to participate in the ritual and challenge the activists who are protesting.

Activists estimate that they saved several hundred chickens from the massacre. The survivors have been sent to sanctuaries around the country where they are receiving specialized care to rehabilitate them after the trauma of having been intensively confined in crates for several days with no food or water.

In Brooklyn, butchers slice the throats of approximately 60,000 chickens and bleed them out in upside down cones on public sidewalks.

In 2015, The Alliance to Ban Chickens as Kaporos sued the NYC Department of Health and NYPD for failing to enforce the 15 public health, sanitation and anti-cruelty laws and regulations that are violated during Kaporos. The case is pending in New York’s Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court.

The Alliance to End Chickens as Kaporos sued NYC in 2015. The case has made its way to the highest court in NY, The Court of Appeals.

Your Turn

The Alliance to End Chickens as Kaporos is raising money to pay for the long-term care of the rescued chickens and for the groundbreaking lawsuit against NYC for failing to enforce the laws that are broken by Kaporos practitioners. If you have the means, please contribute to the INDIEGOGO campaign, Justice for the Roses.

After Kaporos, activists found dozens of discarded chickens in the streets who were still alive. These and the other rescues will live out their lives on sanctuaries.



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TheirTurn.net Comments

  1. Emmanuel says:

    Stop this insanity

  2. LYN & PETER MCDONALD says:

    THIS BRUTAL AND ARCIAC RITUAL IS BLOODY DISGUSTING, SHAME O. THE JEWIS=H COMMUNITY FOR ALLOWING THIS TO CONTINUE…….

  3. Alaric Hannibal Barca says:

    If you read your scripture God finds this appauling. Sure he mandated a way to atone. But there are vast numbers of scripture that indicate your goal should be to have mercy on all of animals and God’s creation. What you are doing is an abomination to GOD.

  4. Marla says:

    Disgusting and vile – worthless

  5. Barbara says:

    Hypocrites as they continue to talk about how they were treated by Nazis. They are no better torturing animals in the name of religion

Comments are closed.