Israeli homosexuals held their annual "gay pride" parade through the streets of downtown Jerusalem on Thursday with surprising little opposition.

In previous years, Orthodox Jewish groups have led sometimes violent demonstrations against the gay pride parade, and Muslim and Christian groups have voiced strong verbal opposition.

But religious leaders this year said they did not want to expose their young protestors to the depravity present at the parade, nor did they want to provide the homosexual groups with unwarranted publicity.

As a result of religious groups ignoring the event, a mere 1,600 police officers were deployed to secure the parade, compared to 12,000 during the 2006 march.