STOCKHOLM — Stockholm police on Friday stated they've licensed a protest this weekend by a person who has acknowledged that he needs to burn the Torah and the Bible outdoors the Israeli Embassy in Stockholm.

Israeli officers referred to as on the Swedish authorities to cease the protest, which is scheduled to happen Saturday outdoors the diplomatic mission.

Sweden lately confronted robust criticism from Muslim international locations for permitting protesters to burn the Quran at small anti-Islam demonstrations.

The man who filed the request for Saturday’s protest, stated he wished to burn the Torah and the Bible outdoors the Israeli Embassy in response to a Quran-burning outdoors a Stockholm mosque final month by an Iraqi immigrant.

Stockholm police authorized the protest in a choice obtained by The Associated Press, saying three individuals would take part within the demonstration outdoors the Israeli Embassy at 1 p.m. (1100 GMT) on Saturday.

The proper to carry public demonstrations is robust in Sweden and guarded by the structure. Blasphemy legal guidelines have been deserted within the Seventies. Police give permissions based mostly on whether or not they consider a public gathering might be held with out main disruptions or dangers to public security.

Stockholm police harassed that distinction in an electronic mail to the AP, saying they “do not give permission for different actions. We give permission to hold a public meeting! That’s an important difference.”

Israeli officers referred to as on Sweden to cease the occasion.

“As the President of the State of Israel, I condemned the burning of the Quran, sacred to Muslims world over, and I am now heartbroken that the same fate awaits a Jewish Bible, the eternal book of the Jewish people,” Isaac Herzog stated in a press release.

Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen stated that he was urging Swedish officers to “prevent this despicable event and not to allow the burning of a Torah scroll.”

Israel’s Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef even implored Sweden’s figurehead king to intervene, condemning the deliberate occasion in addition to the current burning of the Quran in entrance of a mosque in Sweden.

“By preventing this event from occurring, you would send a powerful message to the world that Sweden stands firmly against religious intolerance and that such acts have no place in a civilized society,” he wrote.

The Council of Swedish Jewish Communities deplored the police determination to permit the protest, saying, “our tragic European history links the burning of Jewish books with pogroms, expulsions, inquisitions and the Holocaust.”

Last month, an Iraqi Christian immigrant burned a Quran outdoors a Stockholm mosque in the course of the main Muslim vacation of Eid al-Adha, triggering widespread condemnation within the Islamic world. An identical protest by a far-right activist was held outdoors Turkey’s Embassy earlier this 12 months, complicating Sweden’s efforts to persuade Turkey to let it be part of NATO.

On Wednesday, the U.N.’s high human rights physique overwhelmingly authorized a measure calling on international locations to do extra to stop spiritual hatred within the wake of the Quran-burnings. It was authorized regardless of objections of Western international locations who worry harder steps by governments might trample freedom of expression.

• Olsen reported from Copenhagen, Denmark. Associated Press reporters Julia Frankel and Sam McNeil in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

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