Israeli authorities called an early close on Thursday to a religious bonfire festival after dozens of ultra-Orthodox Jews rampaged against crowd-control measures meant to prevent a repeat of a crush that killed 45 people last year.
TV stations showed pilgrims knocking down safety barricades and scuffling with police at the Meron tomb of second-century sage Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, site of annual two-day celebrations that can draw as many as 200,000 people.
