Health officials in Israel have confirmed the death of not less than 44 people in a stampede at an Israeli religious event.
According to a statement released by the Health Ministry on Friday, April 30, 150 more people were taken to six separate hospitals.
The stampede happened at Mount Meron, where a large crowd gathered to commemorate the Lag B’Omer, an annual religious festival characterized by all-night bonfires, prayer, and dancing.
The town was said to contain the tomb of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, a second-century sage, which is regarded as one of the holiest sites in the Jewish world.
Authorities set a limit of 10,000 applicants, but media sources suggested that there may have been up to ten times that amount.
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According to reports, the stampede began as people started to slip down a sloping ramp with a metal floor and corrugated metal partitions on all sides, allowing the heavily packed revellers to collide.
Witnesses, on the other hand, accused the police of allowing crowds into a cordoned-off area that was still overcrowded and of failing to open the exits on either side fast enough after panic broke out.
