Wizard Potter launch spells religious row

The figure responsible for Israel’s latest religious row is a bespectacled British teenager who is gifted with magical powers, world famous and entirely fictional.

The synchronised worldwide launch of Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows, the seventh and last instalment in the wildly popular series, falls at 2:01am local time on Saturday – on the Jewish Sabbath, when Israeli law requires most businesses to close.