Israeli Officials Had a Plan to Prevent Tragedy at Mt. Meron. It Was Ignored. Years of negligence preceded the stampede that killed 45 people. But patchwork religious oversight and the state’s reluctance to intervene sunk efforts to bring order to the site. A vigil in Tel Aviv on Sunday in memory of the 45 ultra-Orthodox Jews killed in the stampede.Credit...Oded Balilty/Associated Press May 4, 2021Updated 12:28 p.m. ET JERUSALEM — A week before the annual Jewish pilgrimage to Mount Meron in northern Israel, officials from six government departments, hoping to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, agreed on a plan to limit attendance at the most popular parts of the site to just 3,000 pilgrims at a time.