Case of Rabbanit Bruria Keren
(AKA: Rebbetzin Keren, Case of the Burka Wearing Mother)
 |
| Rabbanit Bruria Keren |
Beit Shemish, Israel
Bnei Brak, Israel
Safed , Israel
Elad, Israel
54-year-old, Bruria Keren, was arrested on charges of child sexual abuse and physical abuse of her twelve children, back in 2008.
Keren
has also been accused of cult like practices. Police suspect that the
children were violently abused over the course of many years, including
whippings with belts and electric cables. According to the Jerusalem
Post, Keren is "the leader of a fringe sect of Jewish women with a
Taliban-like dress code. . . The women who adhere to a dress code more
stringent than that of the most extreme Muslim sects and a rigorous
health food diet.
The
followers of this sect/cult number as many as 50 in Beit Shemesh and
are also scattered around Safed and Jerusalem. According to reports the
women do not speak with men, even by telephone. The vast majority of the
women who belong to the sect have secular backgrounds.
According
to a Jerusalem Post article "Even in Beit Shemesh, made up of some of
the most religiously extreme sects in Orthodoxy, such as Satmar, Toldot
Aharon and Shomrei Hachomot, this group of women was considered
ridiculously - even psychotically - zealous. .. The women who belong to
the sect lack any recognized rabbinic backing. They rarely leave their
homes. When they do, their female children, dressed in long robes,
accompany them. The women's extensive face coverings make it dangerous
for them to cross the street unattended."
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Table of Contents:
Table of Contents:
2008
- Jewish Burqa Trend: The Frumka
- Unveiled: the Israeli women in `burkas' (01/02/2008)
- The Jewish Burka Comes to Brooklyn (01/02/2008)
- Woman arrested today for abusing (some of) her 12 children (03/12/2008)
- Sexual responsibility (03/14/2008)
- אם ל-12, וגם מנהיגה של נשים מתבדלות Haaretz Article (Hebrew) (03/20/2008)
- Mother of 12 suspected of abusing kids (03/25/2008)
- Police probe father of 12 in child abuse case (03/26/2008)
- 'Haredi code of silence must be broken in abuse cases' (03/27/2008)
- Beit Shemesh 'Burka' cult unveiled (03/27/2008)
- Arrested for `child abuse', the veiled queen of modesty (03/28/2008)
- 'Haredi silence must be broken in abuse cases (03/28/2008)
- To tell or not to tell, that is the question (03/30/2008)
- Netivot woman accused of raping sons (04/01/2008)
- Beit Shemesh 'Taliban Mother' indicted for allegedly abusing her six children (04/02/2008)
- Behind the veil (04/03/2008)
- Rise in child abuse or a media creating 'moral panic'? (04/03/2008)
- "Frumka" Group Leader Arrested on Charges of Child Abuse: Reactions (04/04/2008)
- Abuse scandal: Accused mother says allegation a vicious lie (05/04/2008)
2011
Also see:
_________________________________________________________________________________- Jewish sect girls sent back to Israel (05/04/2008)
Also see:
Jewish Burqa Trend: The Frumka - Part 1
Jewish Burqa Trend: The Frumka - Part 2
_________________________________________________________________________________
Unveiled: the Israeli women in `burkas'
Modesty among some strictly Orthodox women can now mean wearing 10 skirts and seven robes.
Modesty among some strictly Orthodox women can now mean wearing 10 skirts and seven robes.
By Michal Levertov
Jewish Chronical - January 2, 2008
 |
| Bruria Keren, Convicted Sex Offender |
The unofficial leader of the trend, often practised in defiance of husbands and in the face of rabbinical reluctance, is Bruria Keren, who lives in Ramat Beit Shemesh, an strictly Orthodox neighbourhood south-west of Jerusalem.
In a rare interview, Mrs Keren recently told the Ma'ariv newspaper: "The Holy Mothers and the women of Jerusalem used to wrap their bodies and to hide their faces. It is even written in the Torah that Tamar did not see the face of Judah since she was covered.
"The Torah does not change. The body should be concealed so its shape won't be seen. The face and the body-shape of a woman might be an obstacle to men. The more layers of clothes, the women's modesty is higher regarded."
Rebbetzin Keren, a mother-of-ten and a practitioner of alternative medicine, devotes much of her time to silence and prayer, but is also a charismatic preacher to her growing flock.
Her outfit consists of 10 thick skirts, seven long robes, five kerchiefs knotted at the chin, three knotted at the back of the head, and her face hidden behind a knitted linen veil.
The whole costume is covered head-to-toe by several thin shawls. According to Maariv, Rebbetzin Keren's community consists of about 50 followers in Beit Shemesh, 70 in Jerusalem, and dozens more in Safed and in the Orthodox settlements of Beitar Illit and Elad.
But such extreme devotion does not appeal to the Orthodox establishment, in spite of its own support for tzniut, or modesty.
According to the Ha'aretz newspaper, the Rabbinical Court in Jerusalem forced a couple to a divorce — even though the husband appealed for a matrimonial reconciliation — because the woman was totally covered by a veil. They also awarded custody to the husband, in spite of his wife's complaints of violence, and issued a warrant for a psychiatric examination for her.
One of Mrs Keren's closest disciples, a convert to Judaism known only as Anne, told Ma'ariv she hopes "that men will demand that their wives would wear the robes and the veil. That in a few years all the men in the Orthodox public would discover the sweetness of the clothes' layers and the modesty that is behind the veil."
The women apparently do not feel any solidarity with their Muslim counterparts.
Another follower interviewed by the newspaper, Miriam, 32, said: "People are asking: `Who is it? A Muslim? An Arab?' But there are people in the Orthodox public who insult us, and that hurts us most. Only an Orthodox person knows what an insult it is for a woman to be told that she's a Christian or an Arab."
Professor Tamar Elor, a scholar of Charedi society at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, told the JC that there was a strong element of feminine defiance in the phenomenon.
"The decision over the modesty issue, and obsessive discussion about the body, was all in the hands of the rabbis.
"And here, the women took over it and brought it to the edge, just like a former trend in which women gave birth to more children than their spouse wanted.
"It's as if they say, `If that's my expertise — I'll excel at it'. Thus, they move the power to their own hands".
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The Jewish Burka Comes to Brooklyn
by Daniel Treiman,
Forward - March 12, 2008
In
Israel, as I noted earlier this year, a renegade group of Haredi women
has taken to one-upping the already increasingly severe modesty
standards of their community by donning Muslim-style burkas. The trend
was apparently initiated by a female spiritual leader in the
ultra-Orthodox stronghold of Ramat Beit Shemesh Bet. The fashion trend,
which has reportedly dismayed husbands and rabbis alike, has spread to
other ultra-Orthodox enclaves in Israel.
Now, Hasidic rapper/blogger Y-Love reports they've made their way to Brooklyn:
Not too long ago, I had my first abaya-sighting.
For
the first time, I saw one of the followers of veil advocate Rabbanit
Bruria Keren decked out in hijab sal and abaya...in Boro Park, walking
down 13th Avenue with her friend, chatting and schmoozing in frumspeak.
Sexual responsibilityMatthew Wagner
Jerusalem Post - March 14, 2008
Note: Does Judaism really believe that humans are nothing but walking libidos, lascivious products of their circumstances?
Understanding Tzniut By Yehuda Henkin Urim 141 pages; $19.50
Sex is a hot issue. But for Orthodoxy the preoccupation with illicit sexual attraction has taken on an all-encompassing centrality.
Concern that men will be enticed by women while they make their way through the public sphere has provoked religious leaders to take radical measures.
Dozens of public bus lines, catering to a predominantly haredi population, regularly separate the two sexes, placing women at the back of the bus while men are seated up front.
Increasingly more demanding standards of dress are being adopted by haredi women. A small fringe group headed by Bruria Keren of Ramat Beit Shemesh has even chosen to adopt the dress code of radical Islam, including total face coverings and multiple layers of clothing that totally hide the curves and shapes of the female anatomy. There are small groups of these women in Jerusalem, Bnei Brak and other places.
In the haredi media the situation is the same. Female images of any kind are conspicuously absent from all haredi newspapers. Haredi sensitivities to the dangers of lascivious influences are so developed that even a young male singer whose voice sounded uncannily female was banned from the haredi airwaves.
The sacrifice made by religious women to adhere to the strictures of chastity and modesty imposed by the norms of their communities is enormous.
Some women are willing to burn wigs made of human hair worth thousands of dollars in deference to rabbinic opinion. Others opt to search out new women-only job settings created especially for the haredi public in towns such as Modi'in Illit and Betar, thus forgoing socioeconomic upward mobility.
Even the more modern circles of Orthodoxy have been affected by this trend. Just recently a group of religious Zionist soldiers were thrown in military prison for refusing to take part in a lecture given by a female soldier. A list of leading religious Zionist rabbis signed a petition demanding that the IDF accommodate modern religious soldiers' demands for separation of the sexes.
Understanding Tzniut: Modern Controversies in the Jewish Community, written by Yehuda Henkin, former rabbi of the Beit She'an Valley and author of the Bnei Banim compilation of halachic responsa, provides a framework for understanding religious communities' attempts to bundle up, segregate and generally desexualize the public sphere.
The book, a series of articles published previously in modern Orthodox journals of Jewish law such as Tradition and Hakirah lacks a single cohesive theme. It even includes chapters that have nothing whatsoever to do with tzniut (roughly translated as modest and chaste behavior and dress), such as one titled "After Gush Katif: May One Oppose Israel's Government?" and "A Memorial Day for European Jewry - Did its Rabbis Err?" But the bulk of the book is a discussion of Jewish legal sources dealing with women's dress codes and the mingling of the sexes and how they are implemented by contemporary halachic authorities.
Henkin might get too technical and bogged down by the intricacies of Jewish law for the taste of the general reader. But it is precisely here, amid the legalistic nitty-gritty of the centuries-old halachic discourse among rabbis, where Henkin stages his argument against extreme trends in Orthodoxy.
His most central argument against the religious community's obsessive preoccupation with tzniut is habituation. Quoting extensive halachic sources, Henkin shows that sexual arousal is culturally dependent. Centuries ago the rabbis understood that in cultures that condoned the free mingling of the sexes, dress codes and strictures against socializing with the opposite sex could be loosened.
"Where women walk around in halter tops or less, a short sleeved blouse is minimally provocative and when pornography is rampant, viewing a woman's face is not titillating." Henkin never explains why this is so. Perhaps it is a type of conditioning. If a man is bombarded with sexuality, he gradually loses his sensitivity. His threshold rises. He becomes numbed.
Another possibility is that in cultures where speaking with a woman, shaking her hand, seeing her hair is the norm there is no reason to read into these encounters a sexual connotation. The range of platonic relations between men and women widens. Women's dress or behavior is not given a lascivious interpretation by men. Whatever the reason, rabbis have cited habituation as a justification for permitting a number of practices which some halachic sources prohibit. For instance walking behind a woman, inquiring about a married woman's welfare, mixed seating at weddings and being exposed to women's hair during prayer.
For Henkin, habituation is a force for potential leniencies in Judaism. In communities and cultures where men and women mingle freely, certain strictures can be abandoned. He is careful to point out that it is forbidden to introduce the mingling of the sexes in communities where it does not already exist. Rather Halacha can only legitimize an existing practice.
But Henkin never fully examines the possibility of how habituation could work in the opposite direction to introduce ever more stringent behavior - a phenomenon that exists today. What happens if communities become accustomed to covering up and segregating their women? Devoid of contact with members of the opposite sex from an early age, would men become hypersensitive sex maniacs? Would every movement by a woman, even the most innocent, trigger uncontrollable sexual excitement?
To say that men are solely a product of conditioning like a sexually crazed version of Pavlov's dog is a degrading view of human nature. Where is free will? Does Judaism really believe that humans are nothing but walking libidos, lascivious products of their circumstances? One would be hard pressed to find an answer to this question in Henkin's book. But, thankfully, if one looks hard enough one can find it. In a footnote to a subsection entitled "Limits to Enactments," Henkin does offer a short explanation. He cites a Jewish law that prohibits a man from gazing at the colored clothes of a woman he knows because it is liable to spark sexual fantasizing.
"That being the case," asks Henkin, "why didn't the Sages forbid the wearing of colored clothing altogether, at least outside the home?" Good idea. Why not institute a sweeping black-only apparel policy for women like the one adopted by haredi men? After explaining that women would never accept such a policy since they "seek to be attractive," unlike men, apparently, who seek to be repulsive, Henkin points out as an afterthought an incisive insight that does not even warrant being included in the main body of his book: "...it is the responsibility of the man not to look, and not the responsibility of the woman to avoid affording the man something to look at."
Too bad Henkin's insight does not have a more central position in halachic discourse. If it did, expectations would be higher that men exercise their free will. And men would be expected to solve their sexual hang-ups on their own without thinking so much about what women should be doing to help them. Then, to borrow a phrase from Henkin, there would not be a danger of "being so concerned about not thinking about women that one can think of nothing else."
_________________________________________________________________________________
Sexual responsibilityMatthew Wagner
Jerusalem Post - March 14, 2008
Note: Does Judaism really believe that humans are nothing but walking libidos, lascivious products of their circumstances?
Understanding Tzniut By Yehuda Henkin Urim 141 pages; $19.50
Sex is a hot issue. But for Orthodoxy the preoccupation with illicit sexual attraction has taken on an all-encompassing centrality.
Concern that men will be enticed by women while they make their way through the public sphere has provoked religious leaders to take radical measures.
Dozens of public bus lines, catering to a predominantly haredi population, regularly separate the two sexes, placing women at the back of the bus while men are seated up front.
Increasingly more demanding standards of dress are being adopted by haredi women. A small fringe group headed by Bruria Keren of Ramat Beit Shemesh has even chosen to adopt the dress code of radical Islam, including total face coverings and multiple layers of clothing that totally hide the curves and shapes of the female anatomy. There are small groups of these women in Jerusalem, Bnei Brak and other places.
In the haredi media the situation is the same. Female images of any kind are conspicuously absent from all haredi newspapers. Haredi sensitivities to the dangers of lascivious influences are so developed that even a young male singer whose voice sounded uncannily female was banned from the haredi airwaves.
The sacrifice made by religious women to adhere to the strictures of chastity and modesty imposed by the norms of their communities is enormous.
Some women are willing to burn wigs made of human hair worth thousands of dollars in deference to rabbinic opinion. Others opt to search out new women-only job settings created especially for the haredi public in towns such as Modi'in Illit and Betar, thus forgoing socioeconomic upward mobility.
Even the more modern circles of Orthodoxy have been affected by this trend. Just recently a group of religious Zionist soldiers were thrown in military prison for refusing to take part in a lecture given by a female soldier. A list of leading religious Zionist rabbis signed a petition demanding that the IDF accommodate modern religious soldiers' demands for separation of the sexes.
Understanding Tzniut: Modern Controversies in the Jewish Community, written by Yehuda Henkin, former rabbi of the Beit She'an Valley and author of the Bnei Banim compilation of halachic responsa, provides a framework for understanding religious communities' attempts to bundle up, segregate and generally desexualize the public sphere.
The book, a series of articles published previously in modern Orthodox journals of Jewish law such as Tradition and Hakirah lacks a single cohesive theme. It even includes chapters that have nothing whatsoever to do with tzniut (roughly translated as modest and chaste behavior and dress), such as one titled "After Gush Katif: May One Oppose Israel's Government?" and "A Memorial Day for European Jewry - Did its Rabbis Err?" But the bulk of the book is a discussion of Jewish legal sources dealing with women's dress codes and the mingling of the sexes and how they are implemented by contemporary halachic authorities.
Henkin might get too technical and bogged down by the intricacies of Jewish law for the taste of the general reader. But it is precisely here, amid the legalistic nitty-gritty of the centuries-old halachic discourse among rabbis, where Henkin stages his argument against extreme trends in Orthodoxy.
His most central argument against the religious community's obsessive preoccupation with tzniut is habituation. Quoting extensive halachic sources, Henkin shows that sexual arousal is culturally dependent. Centuries ago the rabbis understood that in cultures that condoned the free mingling of the sexes, dress codes and strictures against socializing with the opposite sex could be loosened.
"Where women walk around in halter tops or less, a short sleeved blouse is minimally provocative and when pornography is rampant, viewing a woman's face is not titillating." Henkin never explains why this is so. Perhaps it is a type of conditioning. If a man is bombarded with sexuality, he gradually loses his sensitivity. His threshold rises. He becomes numbed.
Another possibility is that in cultures where speaking with a woman, shaking her hand, seeing her hair is the norm there is no reason to read into these encounters a sexual connotation. The range of platonic relations between men and women widens. Women's dress or behavior is not given a lascivious interpretation by men. Whatever the reason, rabbis have cited habituation as a justification for permitting a number of practices which some halachic sources prohibit. For instance walking behind a woman, inquiring about a married woman's welfare, mixed seating at weddings and being exposed to women's hair during prayer.
For Henkin, habituation is a force for potential leniencies in Judaism. In communities and cultures where men and women mingle freely, certain strictures can be abandoned. He is careful to point out that it is forbidden to introduce the mingling of the sexes in communities where it does not already exist. Rather Halacha can only legitimize an existing practice.
But Henkin never fully examines the possibility of how habituation could work in the opposite direction to introduce ever more stringent behavior - a phenomenon that exists today. What happens if communities become accustomed to covering up and segregating their women? Devoid of contact with members of the opposite sex from an early age, would men become hypersensitive sex maniacs? Would every movement by a woman, even the most innocent, trigger uncontrollable sexual excitement?
To say that men are solely a product of conditioning like a sexually crazed version of Pavlov's dog is a degrading view of human nature. Where is free will? Does Judaism really believe that humans are nothing but walking libidos, lascivious products of their circumstances? One would be hard pressed to find an answer to this question in Henkin's book. But, thankfully, if one looks hard enough one can find it. In a footnote to a subsection entitled "Limits to Enactments," Henkin does offer a short explanation. He cites a Jewish law that prohibits a man from gazing at the colored clothes of a woman he knows because it is liable to spark sexual fantasizing.
"That being the case," asks Henkin, "why didn't the Sages forbid the wearing of colored clothing altogether, at least outside the home?" Good idea. Why not institute a sweeping black-only apparel policy for women like the one adopted by haredi men? After explaining that women would never accept such a policy since they "seek to be attractive," unlike men, apparently, who seek to be repulsive, Henkin points out as an afterthought an incisive insight that does not even warrant being included in the main body of his book: "...it is the responsibility of the man not to look, and not the responsibility of the woman to avoid affording the man something to look at."
Too bad Henkin's insight does not have a more central position in halachic discourse. If it did, expectations would be higher that men exercise their free will. And men would be expected to solve their sexual hang-ups on their own without thinking so much about what women should be doing to help them. Then, to borrow a phrase from Henkin, there would not be a danger of "being so concerned about not thinking about women that one can think of nothing else."
_________________________________________________________________________________
אם ל-12, וגם מנהיגה של נשים מתבדלות
החשודה: "צדקת גדולה" שמדברת רק שעה בשבוע
מאת תמר רותם
אחת מחברות הקבוצה, בי-ם
תצלום ארכיון: אלכס ליבק
Haaretz - March 20, 2008
האשה שנעצרה בחשד להתעללות בילדיה בבית שמש (ראו ידיעה למטה) נחשבת לצדקת דגולה בעיני
קבוצה של נשים חרדיות מתבדלות בבית שמש ובירושלים, הרואות בה את מנהיגתן. היא מחמירה מאוד בחוקי הצניעות: מכסה את גופה ואת ראשה בשכבות של בדים בצבעי כחול ובורדו, את פיה ואפה מכסה חתיכת בד ורק עיניה נראות מבעד לחריץ ברעלה. כפות ידיה עטופות בגרבי גברים. הנשים בקבוצה לבושות בהשראתה, מקוות שיום אחד יגיעו למעלתה. הן נרדפות ברחוב וזוכות לקריאות בוז בשל מראן.
הרבנית מתפרנסת מעבודתה כמטפלת הומיאופטית שמדריכה את הנשים בתזונה הומיאופטית ובטיפול בעצמן ובילדיהן. רוב הנשים בקבוצה לא נוהגות ללכת לרופאים עם ילדיהן וגם לא לחסנם.
האקסצנטריות של הרבנית לא ניכרת בבגדיה בלבד. היא נמנעת כבר שנים מדיבור, למעט פעם בשבוע למשך שעה, וגם אז רק עם נשים. ביקרתי בביתה כמה פעמים בשיעורים שנתנה לתלמידותיה. בבית שררו עזובה ודלות, אך האווירה בין הנשים היתה חמה והן הרבו לצחוק ולהתלוצץ עם הרבנית. ניכר כי הן מעריצות אותה. במשך השיעורים שהתמשכו עד מעבר לשעה 11 בלילה הסתובבה תמיד בחדר ילדה בשמלה ובשכמייה (גם היא מטעמי צניעות) שנראתה בת שש. הילדה לא הראתה כל סימני עייפות ואמה לא חשבה לשלוח אותה לישון. לעתים קרובות נשלחה הילדה להביא משהו מהשכנים, או לבצע
מטלה אחרת בבית. הנשים הרבו לפנק אותה תוך כדי השיעור, לסרק אותה או להחמיא לה.
בשיחה עמה התברר שהיא מעט מבוגרת יותר ממה שנראתה לי. באחד מביקוריי הראשונים נאמר לי שהילדה לא הולכת לבית ספר כי האם אינה מאמינה שבנות צריכות לצאת מהבית. אך מאוחר יותר התברר שהילדה התחילה לבקר בבית ספר לבנות של זרם העדה החרדית בבית שמש. היא הראתה לי ילקוט מסודר ורוד, מחברות נקיות ושיעורי בית ביידיש ובעברית. היא אמרה: "אמא שלי לא יכולה לקחת אותי כי היא לא יוצאת מהבית. וחוץ מזה אני מתביישת שהיא נראית ככה".
בזמן השיעורים היה בבית מלבד הילדה גם ילד שנראה מעוכב התפתחות כבן 13. הבעל יצא ונכנס מהבית ונראה שלא נוח לו בקרב הנשים. הרבנית לא דיברה כמעט עם בני המשפחה, אך היא תיקשרה בעיקר עם הילדה הקטנה בהמהומים. ניכר שהיא השולטת במשפחה ביד רמה גם בלי לדבר.
שלושה מקרים בשבועיים
1 נחלאות: הורים נעצרו ב-12.3 בחשד שהתעללו בשניים משמונת ילדיהם
2 בית שמש: מעצרה של האם החשודה בהתעללות הוארך אתמול ב-6 ימים
3 אור יהודה: זוג נעצר בחשד להתעללות בבנם. היום צפוי האב להשתחרר
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Woman arrested today for abusing (some of) her 12 children
Israel Television - March 25, 2008
Newscast in Hebrew
Israel Television - March 25, 2008
Newscast in Hebrew
_________________________________________________________________________________
Mother of 12 suspected of abusing kids
By ETGAR LEFKOVITS
Jerusalem Post - March 25, 2008
A 54-year-old mother of 12 is under arrest for allegedly severely abusing her children, police said Tuesday.
A woman who allegedly abused her children arrives in court.
The Beit Shemesh resident is also suspected of failing to report multiple cases of incest among her children. She was remanded for six days by the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court on Tuesday.
It is the latest in a spate of cases of alleged child abuse in Israel, and comes less than two weeks after a haredi US immigrant couple living in Jerusalem were arrested for seriously abusing their two small children, aged three and four. One of them remains hospitalized in critical condition.
The suspect, who cannot be named by order of the court, was arrested last month after neighbors heard a child crying for help and objects being broken in the home, a police investigator told a Jerusalem court at a remand hearing on Tuesday.
It took police two hours to gain entry to the home, with the intervention of local rabbis. Officers and social workers soon uncovered brutal physical abuse of several of the children, including whippings with both belts and electric cables, according to a police officer's court testimony.
The mother is also suspected of breaking one daughter's nose with a rolling pin, leaving her children to sleep outside in a locked shed when they came home late, and preventing them from receiving medical treatment for their injuries. The mother said it was all part of their "education," according to court documents.
The father of the family was abroad at the time of the arrest, seeking charity donations, and had not returned for the court hearing on Tuesday.
When the abuse was discovered last month, only two of the couple's 12 children, who range in age from eight to 33, lived at home.
The two clearly abused children, including a disabled teenager, have since been removed from the home by social workers, the police investigator told the court.
When the children of the family were treated by social workers, it emerged that the teenagers had committed incest with each other, over a long period of time, the police officer said.
The teenage boy who was removed from the house told social workers that he had had sexual relations with his 18-year-old sister, and that he had told his parents and his rabbis, and that the latter told him not to tell anybody else.
The defendant, who was covered in several layers of clothing, did not speak in court.
Her attorney, who obtained a court order barring publication of his client's name, over the opposition of police, said the woman "did not speak with men," according to a court protocol of the proceedings.
The judge rejected the attorney request to place her under house arrest instead of keeping her in police detention, citing investigative material that presented "a very difficult web of physical violence and even abuse."
_________________________________________________________________________________
Police probe father of 12 in child abuse case
Jerusalem Post - March 26, 2008
A father of 12 children who were allegedly abused for years by their mother was arrested after getting off a plane at Ben-Gurion Airport on Wednesday, police said.
Ramat Beit Shmesh woman who is suspected of abusing her children in court on Wednesday.
His 54-year-old wife is also suspected of failing to report multiple cases of incest among her children. On Tuesday, she was remanded in custody.
Police are now trying to determine if the father knew of - or participated in - the alleged abuse and incest at the family's home in Ramat Beit Shemesh.
"The question we are investigating is, did he know [what was going on], and if he knew, why was he silent," said Supt. Roni Markovitch, head of investigations at the Beit Shemesh police station.
The father has spent the last month in the US, seeking charitable donations for his family.
Police suspect that the children were violently abused over the course of many years, including whippings with belts and electric cables.
According to a police representative at the mother's remand hearing in Jerusalem Magistrate's Court on Tuesday, the family avoided police detection - despite years of reports of neglect and violence - by repeatedly moving around the country, and by refusing to cooperate with social workers and community officials.
Neighbors in Ramat Beit Shemesh said Wednesday that they had known that "bad things" were going on in the household, even as they expressed shock over the extent of the alleged abuse.
A teenage friend of one of the family's children, who lives next door, told Israel Radio how one of the teens was tied up for seven hours in the yard of the house as punishment, and was forced to urinate and defecate in his pants, his mother oblivious to his pleas to let him go to the toilet.
"What this woman did was an abomination of God," a neighbor said. "She did the exact opposite of what 'religious' is."
The mother of the family, who cannot be named because of a court order, appeared in court on Tuesday covered from head to toe in black.
She has confessed to some of the allegations against her.
For the past several months, only two of the couple's 12 children, who range in age from eight to 33, lived with the mother.
They have since been removed from the home by welfare authorities.
The case is the third recent known case of severe alleged child abuse in Israel, and comes less than two weeks after a haredi immigrant family from the US living in the capital's exclusive Wolfson apartment complex, were arrested for allegedly seriously abusing their two boys, aged three and four.
The three-year-old remains in critical condition, with severe head injuries.
The father, who had not lived at the family's home for some time, has since been released from detention, while the mother remains in police custody. Police are searching for another suspect in that case.
'Haredi code of silence must be broken in abuse cases'By Ruth Eglash
Jerusalem Post - March 27, 2008
The code of silence that exists in ultra-Orthodox communities regarding physical and sexual abuse against children must be broken, and ordinary citizens as well as professionals should be prosecuted for not reporting such cases to the authorities, Welfare and Social Services Ministry officials and child activists told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday.
In light of at least two cases of extreme child abuse and incest exposed in the last two weeks - both of which took place in ultra-Orthodox families - those working with children told the Post that there must have been signs these atrocities were being committed, but neighbors, extended family, educational professionals and rabbis did nothing to alert the authorities.
"I don't believe that no one knew what was going on in these families," Hannah Slutzky, national supervisor for child affairs in the Welfare and Social Services Ministry, said in an interview. "It is not only the perpetrators of the acts who need to be brought to justice, but also the people who fail to report such crimes."
Children's rights activist Dr. Yitzhak Kadman, director of the National Council for the Child, commented: "Since the law [known as the Good Samaritan Law, obligating both professionals and citizens to report cases of suspected child abuse] was enacted 18 years ago, I think only about five people have been brought to justice for not speaking out."
He continued, "It is not just that it is not nice to keep quiet - people are actually breaking the law."
He added that one did not have to be certain that abuse was taking place in order to report it; even a slight suspicion should warrant the most basic call to action.
The most recent case that came to light this week - that of a 54-year-old ultra-Orthodox Beit Shemesh woman accused of brutal physical abuse, including whippings with belts and electric cables, as well as allowing sexual activity to take place among her 12 children - is an extreme example, said Slutzky.
"There is a lot of abuse in the haredi community, and the people there are not willing to cooperate with the authorities," she said, adding that a committee was established by the ministry within the past year to work together with community rabbis to encourage the population to be more open to the authorities.
"It should be made clear to the people that protective services are there to help families and children in order to provide them with solutions to their problems," she said.
Dina Hahn, chairwoman of women's organization World Emunah - which was selected Wednesday as a recipient of this year's Israel Prize for, among other things, its work with children at risk - pointed out that there was a "code of silence" within the haredi world.
"People [in the haredi community] prefer to turn to their own professionals," she said. "But we are beginning to see that this is not enough."
Hahn also noted that there was a clear lack of trust between the authorities and the haredi community.
"We must call on the rabbis to tell their population to be more open about what is going on. It is not lashon hora [the sin of gossip and other harmful speech]," added Kadman. "People who keep quiet are partners in the abuse."
Asked whether the case in Beit Shemesh and the one two weeks ago of a US immigrant family accused of severely abusing their six children indicated a rise in abuse within the haredi community, both Slutzky and Kadman concurred that it was more a case of increased awareness and reporting.
"There has not been a rise," stated Slutzky. "People are just more willing to talk about it than in the past."
Kadman noted that child abuse cases have gone up in recent years, but that this was the case in all of society, not particularly in the haredi community.
"It is not fair to point the finger only at that community," he said. "There is a clear rise in violence against children in general. Sadly our society is more violent toward children than ever before."
Beit Shemesh 'Burka' cult unveiled
Jerusalem Post - March 27, 2008
A fringe sect of Jewish women with a Taliban-like dress code will be overcome by a major spiritual crisis after the arrest of the group's leader on charges of child abuse, haredi sources in Beit Shemesh predicted Wednesday.
According to haredi media and a well-informed source in Beit Shemesh, the 54-year-old mother of 12 who is suspected of serious child abuse and failing to report multiple cases of incest among her children, is none other than the head of a sect of women who adhere to a dress code more stringent than that of the most extreme Muslim sects and a rigorous health food diet.
"We always knew those women were crazy," said Shmuel Poppenheim, a spokesman for the Eda Haredit - one of the most zealously religious groups in Israeli Orthodoxy - who lives in Beit Shemesh. "Now we have been vindicated, and those women will have to stop their insane behavior."
Another Beit Shemesh resident and haredi journalist, who preferred to remain anonymous, predicted that the arrest of their leader would send the sect spiraling into a "major spiritual tailspin that would lead to its demise."
"I do not envy those women," said the source. "They are going to be facing some major soul-searching."
None of the sect's members, who reportedly number as many as 50 in Beit Shemesh and are also scattered around Safed and Jerusalem, could be reached by The Jerusalem Post for comment. They do not speak with men, even by telephone.
On Tuesday, police announced that they had arrested a woman last month whose name could not be divulged. Police suspicions were aroused after neighbors complained they had heard a child crying for help and objects being broken in the home, a police investigator told a Jerusalem court at a remand hearing on Tuesday.
The Beit Shemesh resident is also suspected of failing to report multiple cases of incest among her children. She was remanded for six days by the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court on Tuesday.
Until the arrest was publicized, the small Beit Shemesh community of women who wear burkas, multiple layers of clothing and full face coverings, was regularly ostracized by the local haredi community.
"We pulled them off buses and yelled at them, 'Desecrators of God's name!'" said a Beit Shemesh source.
Until now, these women sought comfort in one another and in their leader.
Even in Beit Shemesh, made up of some of the most religiously extreme sects in Orthodoxy, such as Satmar, Toldot Aharon and Shomrei Hachomot, this group of women was considered ridiculously - even psychotically - zealous.
The women who belong to the sect lack any recognized rabbinic backing. They rarely leave their homes. When they do, their female children, dressed in long robes, accompany them. The women's extensive face coverings make it dangerous for them to cross the street unattended.
Every week, these women met in their leader's apartment to hear her speak and receive her teachings.
A female Ma'ariv reporter who was allowed to participate in one of the lessons described the leader of the group as "a pile of clothing lumped in the middle of the small living room."
The reporter said the leader wore 10 skirts, seven long robes, five head scarves tied on the front of her head and three more tied on the back of her head.
The vast majority of the women who belong to the sect have secular backgrounds.
"As newcomers to the intricacies of Orthodoxy, they lack the kind of grounding and feeling for tradition enjoyed by most religious people who grew up in religious families," said Poppenheim. "Even the strictest rabbis who require women to wear black head coverings and black stockings understand that a woman must allow herself to be a woman."
Beit Shemesh 'Taliban Mother' indicted for allegedly abusing her six children
By Etgar Lefkovits
The Jerusalem Post - April 2, 2008
A 54-year-old woman suspected of severely abusing six of her 12 children for years was indicted Tuesday in the Jerusalem District Court, in one of the most shocking child abuse cases uncovered in the country in years.The woman, who was arrested last month in her Ramat Beit Shemesh home after neighbors summoned police, allegedly abused her young children "at least" 25 separate times, the charge sheet said.
The suspect, who has been dubbed "the Taliban Mother" since she appeared in court dressed from head to toe in black, was remanded in custody on Tuesday for the duration of her trial.
According to the two-page indictment detailing the abuse, the woman repeatedly beat and otherwise physically abused her children, giving them electric shocks and hitting them with belts and sticks.
In one instance, the charge sheet said, the woman beat one of her daughters in the face with a rolling pin and slammed her face into the marble kitchen countertop.
She was also accused of forcing her children to sleep outside in a locked shed when she felt they had come home late, tying up her mentally impaired son for hours at a time and ignoring his cries for help, cutting her daughters' hair as punishment, and throwing water on her children to wake them up.
In addition, the physically and psychologically abused children committed incest when they were locked up in the shed, the indictment stated.
The woman was not charged with failing to report the incest.
During her arraignment, the suspect refused the judge's request that she remove her facial covering, and the court was forced to make do with a declaration by her attorney, Vered Berger, that she "recognizes the eyes of the accused."
The woman's husband, who is under house arrest in northern Israel, is suspected of knowing of and taking part in the abuse, though on a lesser scale than his wife.
The close-knit extremist family managed to evade law enforcement officials - despite years of reports of neglect and violence - by repeatedly moving all over the country and by refusing to cooperate with social workers, the police said.
Until police were summoned to the house last month, the couple's children never told authorities of the abuse, even after some of them moved out of the home. Only after their mother was arrested did all the children tell police what they had suffered.
The woman, who has confessed to some of the allegations against her, said that she was simply "educating" her children, police said.
Behind the veil
By Tamar Rotem
Haaretz - April 2, 2008
"It's necessary to dress like the holy matriarchs. To wear a shawl, a skirt and a petticoat. Longer, looser garments. There is no end to making oneself stronger in faith. Be modest and you will receive a reward from Heaven. It is explicitly written that redemption will come only by virtue of women. Modesty is the woman's commandment and there is no rabbi who will say that it is forbidden to dress this way. On the contrary - this is how women will dress when the Messiah comes." (This quotation and others are from an interview conducted by the author with the mother accused of abusing her children, Haaretz, November 2007)
The woman at the center of the Beit Shemesh abuse scandal wraps herself in a length of black cloth, which she also clings to stubbornly in the courtroom. The covering eradicates any inkling of sexuality and conceals her face - her identity - in the name of modesty. At the same time it provides a metaphor for the screen she has put up, impermeable to any kind of rationality or feeling. Her sisters, her mother and even her children have provided testimony to the police, and the indictment filed against her at the beginning of the week discloses harsh evidence of the mother's abuse of her children and of incest between the siblings.
Through the wall of concealment emerges the murky substance of emotional and psychological neglect that is concealed by messianic-religious fervor. The veil is a motif that flows through the woman's tragic story. In recent years, while acts of incest were being performed in her home, she preached to women to cover themselves beneath their veils with more and more layers of clothing, to cover every exposed part of their body including their face and hands, on which they wear men's socks, following her example. In the fanatic circles of Beit Shemesh, the idea caught on and she became a female "rabbi." Her disciples spread the word of her righteousness.
Religious strengthening
"There is nothing worse than a married womans' hair showing. A married woman should have her head covered and not by some other hair, as women's hair catches the eye and leads a man looking at her astray. It is impudence to dress up and lead a man astray... I had the privilege to make many women cast off their wigs... I have lectured in halls in front of hundreds of women and they just tear off their wigs."
On a Wednesday evening in the summer of 2006, intrigued by the chance sighting of ultra-Orthodox women dressed like Muslim women, I knocked on the door of her home. For a considerable number of months afterward I continued to attend her lessons, which were both repelling and fascinating. Marginal religious groups are happy for any new member and the "rabbi" greeted me without question and with inviting gestures. To me, the leader of the small group of women seemed a bizarre, rather colorful type, wrapped as she was in many layers of colored cloth. As a sign of her extreme righteousness, the women told me, she would observe speech "fasts" and talk only once a week, during the lesson.
When she began to speak, her voice sounded grating to me, and chilling. I attributed this to her long periods of silence. Yet, the women's laughter and gay chatter made me ignore the feeling that presaged ill. She was a guru, a healer and a spiritual advisor all in one. Her most devoted disciples refrained from going to conventional doctors and they and their children were treated only by her.
The lesson meandered spontaneously from one topic to the next, without any logic: an exhortation about matters of modesty followed by an apocalyptic description of the punishment for licentiousness, and homeopathic instruction. One by one, the women received advice about various aches and pains, what kind of bread to eat (whole wheat), how to read a certain chapter in the Book of Psalms, and - as a bonus - a recommendation to tighten their sphincter muscles when using the toilet.
The women talked about the difficulties of carrying out the tasks of prayers. They seemed to feel hot and they sat facing electric fans. They drew encouragement from their "rabbi" and the other group members. They admire the "rabbi."
To whom have they not compared her? To Queen Esther, to Ruth the Moabite and of course to Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah. All the women in Jewish history came to the fore to defend the thesis that it is necessary to wear long clothing as baggy as a tent. Like Muslim women. Nothing prepared the disciples for the harrowing turn the story would take. Ever since their "rabbi" was arrested, they have been in a state of total shock.
The woman who is under arrest is 54 years old, the mother of 12 children, four of whom are under the age of 18. She was raised in a remote moshav in the South, in a national religious family. After she and her husband, who was in the air force, married, the couple's religious faith strengthened. They became ultra-Orthodox and moved to Bnei Brak. About seven years ago they moved to Beit Shemesh, west of Jerusalem, where she began to wage a stubborn fight, in the form of lectures and assemblies, against the norm of ultra-Orthodox women wearing wigs in public.
About three years ago she began wearing a veil. Her husband did not follow in her path, but he did not stop her either. His lawyer would later depict him as a "present absentee," and as someone who is totally under his wife's control. During the lessons, he was always in the house, behind curtains that covered the open spaces.
In the wake of her move toward religious extremism, she married off her four older children - the ones who are now being spoken about in the context of incest - to spouses from the most hermetic and extreme stream of ultra- Orthodoxy. The matches of three out of the four did not work out well, and they divorced a short while later. Members of Beit Shemesh's ultra-Orthodox community related this week that those matches had been default choices for both sides. The girls were pretty, they explained, but the family was problematic. That is why they married the girls off when they were only 17, to older men or young men with disabilities, including mental illness. Two of the children who divorced have become secular.
About half a year ago, at the wedding of one of the daughters, who married for the second time, S., a sister of the accused, saw her for the first time with a group of her disciples, who were dressed like her. "They held her arms because she wasn't managing with the veil and she wasn't able to walk," relates the sister. "They kept rearranging the cloth on her head. She simply enjoyed being served by them. From time to time, she would get up to button up the bride or to put a shawl on her."
Ticking social bomb
"For 10 years now I have been observing a speech fast. This causes prayers to be better accepted. At home they are very accustomed to this and they live with me in joy and peace. It also prevents a lot of insolence from the children. People very much admire the relationship between me and my husband and the children."
S. is several years younger than the accused. She lives in a religious locale in the center of the country, and is married with children. For more than 10 years, S. stood on the sidelines, observing her sister's gradual move toward extremism, which was accompanied by neglect of her children. She says she could not remain indifferent to this. Although she was not aware of the extent of the children's abuse - as described in the indictment - she suspected that it existed. She learned of the incest only recently, but her descriptions indicate that the whole family was a ticking social bomb.
But no one wanted to hear about it. Over the years, S. alerted the Beit Shemesh municipality that the children were not attending school, that they were not being taken care of and that they were roaming the streets neglected and hungry, but in vain. "Fourteen years ago, when I visited her home in Bnei Brak, I was already alarmed. The house was a mess, totally wrecked. I saw a little boy sitting under the table. You could see he was suffering from cerebral palsy, but he wasn't being cared for. I tried to hug the girls and they recoiled. It looked like they weren't getting any attention from their parents."
Several years later, when she realized that four of the children weren't attending school at all, she contacted the municipality. "They sent a truant officer, who handed in a comprehensive report on how the children were neglected and really weren't going to school," says S. "But they didn't enforce his recommendations. After yelling and yelling, I'd get worn out. Months later I'd start sending letters again."
Twice she spoke about the neglect on the part of the Beit Shemesh welfare authorities on the Arutz Sheva station radio. In the wake of her becoming involved, the accused cut off all contact with her sister, apart from rare meetings at family weddings.
In 2006, the other children, especially the sons, contacted their grandmother and through her, got in touch with their two aunts, S. and E. They started spending Shabbat alternately with the grandmother and the aunts and, above all, they began to talk. "They'd simply grown up and were no longer under her control," says S.
The grandmother noticed abnormal behavior, especially between one brother and one sister. According to S., the sister started doing drugs and at some point she met a man who brought her into prostitution. S. again began to sound the alarm and to write letters. In the wake of great efforts, she managed to get her 17-year-old nephew into a therapeutic yeshiva in the North, with the father's agreement. The boy began talking with the yeshiva's social worker, who later revealed the entire scandal.
The boy told his grandmother and his aunts about his visits in Beit Shemesh and how he saw the younger children roaming around hungry, neglected and filthy in the streets. S. immediately contacted the town's education and welfare departments. The head of the welfare department wrote to her that a social worker would be in touch with the family and that "we will make an effort to help the children with every means at our disposal." Additionally, a truant officer was sent, who paid a visit to each of the schools the children were enrolled in, and found that the children were attending.
In August 2007, S. complained to the Welfare Ministry's appeals committee that the Beit Shemesh municipality had not involved any agency that could examine the mother's ability to parent and care for her children. The director of the Welfare Ministry's Jerusalem district responded: "Because of the right to privacy, we will not be able to continue to share information about the treatment of that family." It should be noted that nothing at all was done.
The father of the accused died on the same day the mentally disabled son was found wandering outside the home, hungry and dizzy, after he had spent the entire night outside the house, crying, while his mother refused to let him in. S. believes there is a connection between this incident and her father's death. She says the root of the abnormal behavior should be sought in their nuclear family (eight siblings - five sisters and three brothers). "Our father used to beat us all. My mother was a weak woman who did not manage to protect us." Of her sister she says: "All these years she has been looking for love. She fantasizes about greatness. She tried to become an outstanding homeopath and it didn't work. Then she became a saint."
'Her day has come'
"It is very difficult for me, all this. Not to leave the house. Not to talk. To cover myself up. But all those years I was guided from Heaven. And anyway I always hated leaving the house... I am not a female rabbi. They decided to call me a 'rabbi,' and no matter how much I explain to them that I am not a rabbi, it doesn't help. I always pray that people will not honor me and will not say that I am a saint, because that isn't true at all."
At court and in jail, the accused is mostly wrapped in total darkness, spending most of the time under the blanket that covers her. She is neither eating nor drinking, because of her vegan diet, which the jail has a hard time accommodating. But she is not cut off. She speaks freely with her lawyer, Vered Birger from the Public Defender's Office. Birger relates that at their very first meeting the woman gave her a detailed lecture on the subject of modesty. But Birger says she respects her. "I came in a skirt that stops above the knee. She asked me to change it. I didn't wear it again when I went to see her."
Does she feel that her client is manipulating her? "I respect her beliefs," Birger replies. But the accused does stipulate conditions through the veil. During interrogations, she refused to speak if a male investigator was present. On Tuesday she did not speak in the District Court, in the presence of the male judge.
"She enjoys being in control," says her sister S. "Why do they believe her? After all, she is continuing to deceive and it's impossible to deceive people all of the time. Her day has come," she continues. "And I hope for her sake that they will help her and give her treatment."
None of the women from the veiled circle came to see their leader at court. "The lying media are out to get us, the women with the cloth," T., one of her most fervent disciples, told me. "I am afraid that they will attack me. In the street, too, they are pointing at us. But are we going to stop going outside? Let them hide. I walk down the street with a wonderful feeling of who I am. And I have chosen to dress this way not only because of our rabbi."
This week she came to the courthouse to sign bail for the accused and collected small donations from fans of the "rabbi," amounting to NIS 20,000 - an astronomical sum for predominantly poor people. She has also offered to host the "rabbi" under house arrest in her home. However, the group's leading spokeswoman has refrained from taking such a step. In fact, a conversation with her seems to indicate that she is dissociating herself from the "rabbi," even though, like T., she has denied the charges against the accused.
Dr. David Green, a clinical psychologist from the Green Institute for Advanced Psychology, in Tel Aviv, and an expert on cults, believes the arrest and the charges will not break up the group. Another and larger wave of women will join what he calls a cult. "We are becoming stronger in our faith," says T. She tells of modesty assemblies in Beit Shemesh, Acre and Ramle. "Everything in this world is a disguise; you should know that," she tells me at the end of a conversation, during which she condemned the media, the police and the court. "Just as some people disguise themselves as police and judges, we have chosen to disguise ourselves as the holy matriarchs and to cover ourselves. Behind the mask hides a saintly woman. In the war of Gog and Magog everyone will ask her forgiveness. And she will forgive."
By Ruth Eglash
Jerusalem Post - April 3, 2008
The scarf-covered heads of observant women shielding their identities from the media is becoming a common image in our national consciousness as each passing day we hear of more and more sickening child abuse stories from within our society, especially from inside the ultra-Orthodox community.
First it was the religious, Anglo-immigrant family in Jerusalem, where the mother stood accused of physically abusing her two young sons; next the burka-clad woman - apparently part of a Beit Shemesh religious cult - indicted Tuesday by the Jerusalem District Court for inflicting untold violence on six of her 12 children and allowing incest to continue unabated in her family.
These two gruesome cases were closely followed by reports of a Ramle couple, where the father routinely stubbed his cigarettes out on his children, and now the Netivot mother of eight, also observant, arrested Tuesday on suspicion of having sex with two of her sons, aged eight and 10.
Shocking, shocking and shocking.
What is happening to Israeli society and to the haredi community in particular, that people must hurt their children in this way? Has all sense of morality been lost? Have the ultra-Orthodox given up on the stringent family values they were once so proud of?
Secular people might even be wondering - when it suddenly seems as though every ultra-Orthodox person is abusing their kids - if something has gone wrong with the religious experiment.
But is there anything actually wrong?
Of course, one can neither ignore the terrible effects of physical and sexual abuse on these children, nor cast blame for the evils of certain individuals on outside sources, but do all these reports add up to a sudden rise in the number of children being abused? Could the explanation more likely be that we are just allowing the media to stir up our senses?
After all, their aim is to sell newspapers, and throughout history, humankind has always enjoyed a good public flogging, hasn't it? Is it that these reports also give us the opportunity to cast our own moral judgments and make us feel good about our own lives?
If the answer to these questions is yes, then it is possible that we are in the midst of a "moral panic."
Coined in 1972 by sociologist Stanley Cohen, "moral panic" refers to the reaction of a population based on false or exaggerated perceptions that certain behavior - frequently by a minority group or subculture - is dangerous, deviant and poses a menace to society.
In his work, Cohen discussed the way in which the media amplifies these feelings, turning them into a national issue.
"We have to study [these reports] in more depth to determine if this is a moral panic situation," states Prof. Nachman Ben-Yehuda, from the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, who has written extensively on the topic of moral panic both here and abroad.
"There has always been abuse of children," he continues, "So do these four or five cases mean there is more abuse, or that the abuse is gaining more media attention?"
According to Hannah Slutzky, national supervisor for child affairs at the Welfare and Social Services Ministry, there has been no official increase in the number of actual abuse cases, although the type of abuse might be becoming more extreme than in the past.
So that leaves us with the moral panic argument, which can best be illustrated by the 1993 murder of three-year-old James Bulger in Liverpool, England, by two 10-year-olds emulating scenes from the 1991 film Child's Play 3.
While it was not the first time that children had killed other children, what made Bulger's case into a classic example of moral panic was the national reaction to it and the role of the media in instigating that reaction.
At the time, the case was used by print and broadcast journalists to symbolize everything that was wrong with British society, from increasing levels of violence to the effects of television and movies on young children.
As the public debate increased, so the moral panic spread to academics and politicians who called for increased legislature and social policy on the subject.
When the debate on violence among children eventually slowed down and all talk of the phenomenon disappeared from the public sphere, did that mean child violence had been successfully stamped out? Certainly not - it still comes and goes just like any other hot issue.
"There are waves in media reporting," claims Prof. Tamar Liebes from the School of Communication at the Hebrew University. "And the same way these stories explode, they suddenly vanish again without much follow-up."
However, in the case of the current wave of public and media interest in child abuse stories, the obsession is unlikely to abate that quickly, observes Ben-Yehuda.
"My belief is that we will start to see experts and moral people call for a return to old ideas and values, suggest parenting classes and such - but of course, we've already been in that movie before."
And we will most likely see that movie again sometime in the future.
'Haredi silence must be broken in abuse cases'By Ruth Eglash
THE JERUSALEM POST - March 26, 2008
The code of silence that exists in ultra-Orthodox communities regarding physical and sexual abuse against children must be broken, and ordinary citizens as well as professionals should be prosecuted for not reporting such cases to the authorities, Welfare and Social Services Ministry officials and child activists told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday.
In light of at least two cases of extreme child abuse and incest exposed in the last two weeks - both of which took place in ultra-Orthodox families - those working with children told the Post that there must have been signs these atrocities were being committed, but neighbors, extended family, educational professionals and rabbis did nothing to alert the authorities.
"I don't believe that no one knew what was going on in these families," Hannah Slutzky, national supervisor for child affairs in the Welfare and Social Services Ministry, said in an interview. "It is not only the perpetrators of the acts who need to be brought to justice, but also the people who fail to report such crimes."
Children's rights activist Dr. Yitzhak Kadman, director of the National Council for the Child, commented: "Since the law [known as the Good Samaritan Law, obligating both professionals and citizens to report cases of suspected child abuse] was enacted 18 years ago, I think only about five people have been brought to justice for not speaking out."
He continued, "It is not just that it is not nice to keep quiet - people are actually breaking the law."
He added that one did not have to be certain that abuse was taking place in order to report it; even a slight suspicion should warrant the most basic call to action.
The most recent case that came to light this week - that of a 54-year-old ultra-Orthodox Beit Shemesh woman accused of brutal physical abuse, including whippings with belts and electric cables, as well as allowing sexual activity to take place among her 12 children - is an extreme example, said Slutzky.
"There is a lot of abuse in the haredi community, and the people there are not willing to cooperate with the authorities," she said, adding that a committee was established by the ministry within the past year to work together with community rabbis to encourage the population to be more open to the authorities.
"It should be made clear to the people that protective services are there to help families and children in order to provide them with solutions to their problems," she said.
Dina Hahn, chairwoman of women's organization World Emunah - which was selected Wednesday as a recipient of this year's Israel Prize for, among other things, its work with children at risk - pointed out that there was a "code of silence" within the haredi world.
"People [in the haredi community] prefer to turn to their own professionals," she said. "But we are beginning to see that this is not enough."
Hahn also noted that there was a clear lack of trust between the authorities and the haredi community.
"We must call on the rabbis to tell their population to be more open about what is going on. It is not lashon hora [the sin of gossip and other harmful speech]," added Kadman. "People who keep quiet are partners in the abuse."
Asked whether the case in Beit Shemesh and the one two weeks ago of a US immigrant family accused of severely abusing their six children indicated a rise in abuse within the haredi community, both Slutzky and Kadman concurred that it was more a case of increased awareness and reporting.
"There has not been a rise," stated Slutzky. "People are just more willing to talk about it than in the past."
Kadman noted that child abuse cases have gone up in recent years, but that this was the case in all of society, not particularly in the haredi community.
"It is not fair to point the finger only at that community," he said. "There is a clear rise in violence against children in general. Sadly our society is more violent toward children than ever before."
The Globe ad Mail - October 6, 2011
Spiritual leader says teens not coerced to come to Lev Tahor community in the Laurentians, north of Montreal
It is an enclave of ultra-Orthodoxy in the midst of the Laurentian mountains of Quebec, and its family practices have sparked an international tug-of-war with Israel.
Lev Tahor, a community of religious Jews on the edge of the forest north of Montreal, has carried on largely away from the glare of public scrutiny for years.
Women and even little girls dress head to toe in chador-like veils and marry as young as the age of 16. Residents have limited contact with outsiders.
But now the Hasidic sect in Sainte-Agathe-des-Monts has become the focus of attention since two teenaged girls headed here were stopped by Canadian authorities and sent back home.
The girls, aged 15 and 13, were detained by Canadian immigration officials in Montreal and returned to Israel apparently under order of an Israeli court.
The girls' great-uncle had petitioned for the writ out of concern that the girls would be harmed by the group in Canada, that their property would be taken, and that they could be forced to wed male members of the Lev Tahor sect.
In Israel, the sect is sometimes called the Jewish Taliban because of the way the women dress.
The spiritual leader of Lev Tahor in Canada, Rabbi Shlomo Elbarnes, opened his study to a journalist on Wednesday to deny that he is coercing anyone to come to his community.
He insisted anyone is free to leave.
"Use force? We want everybody who is not 100 per cent happy ... to leave us," Mr. Elbarnes said in an interview on Wednesday in the book-lined room, about 100 kilometres north of Montreal.
He said girls typically marry as teenagers, and partners are "suggested" for them. But he said marriages are not forced. "The women here choose of their own will."
Mr. Elbarnes was convicted in 1994 by a U.S. court of kidnapping a 13-year-old boy studying with him.
He fled to Canada in 2001 on a temporary visa and later obtained refugee status.
He eventually brought followers of his anti-Zionist sect to the Laurentians, and the group in Sainte-Agathe has grown to about 50 families.
The goal is to recreate strict religious observance in an "old-fashioned" way of life, he said. "It is necessary to keep our traditions."
Girls and women walk amid the partly unpaved roads and modest homes in flowing black robes, with head scarves tied tightly under their necks and capes covering long dresses. Only the women's faces and hands are visible.
Two years ago, the woman leader of the sect in Israel, Bruria Keren, was convicted of severely abusing her mentally-retarded son and sentenced to four years in prison.
When social welfare agents accompanied by police arrived to take the child away, a small riot broke out in the community.
A majority of Beit Shemesh's 72,000 people are ultra-Orthodox Jews from a variety of Hasidic sects. Lev Tahor is one of the most extreme.
While Hasidic men, noted for their curled sidelocks, dress in black suits and formal black hats, and Hasidic women wear black head scarves, black skirts, black stockings and black shawls over white and grey tops, in Israel the women of Lev Tahor are dressed totally in black, including their faces.
The group believes that the sight of women may excite men into sinning and the responsibility for preventing such sins rests with the women.
Even in Israel, where almost everyone wears black, the "Taliban women," as they are called, stand out.
They are not popular.
"One of the families lived in this building," said Yitzhak Frankel, a real estate agent. "I'm glad they moved out."
"Nobody here liked them; the rabbi was very opposed to what they were doing," he said. "They're not normal."
Much of the criticism of the group focuses on the women's dress, described by most people here as being Islamic-style. However, a booklet distributed by the group argues that Jewish women were covered in this way long before Muslim women. "They copied it from us," the literature says.
Israeli Judge Rivka Makayes found "there is some defect in the parents' perception of ways of life," and ordered that the girls be returned to Israel.
The writ, the judge said, would remain in effect until an Israeli family court holds a hearing next week to determine whether the extremely pious lifestyle practised by the parents involves such a defect and whether the court should intervene in the affairs of the children.
The judgment of the court could have implications for other members of the sect, most of whose 300 or so members live in Beit Shemesh, about 40 minutes west of Jerusalem, not far from where David is believed to have fought Goliath.
If the court rules the lifestyle is illegal or inappropriate, social welfare agencies would be empowered to remove children in the Lev Tahor community from their parents' care.
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'Haredi code of silence must be broken in abuse cases'By Ruth Eglash
Jerusalem Post - March 27, 2008
The code of silence that exists in ultra-Orthodox communities regarding physical and sexual abuse against children must be broken, and ordinary citizens as well as professionals should be prosecuted for not reporting such cases to the authorities, Welfare and Social Services Ministry officials and child activists told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday.
In light of at least two cases of extreme child abuse and incest exposed in the last two weeks - both of which took place in ultra-Orthodox families - those working with children told the Post that there must have been signs these atrocities were being committed, but neighbors, extended family, educational professionals and rabbis did nothing to alert the authorities.
"I don't believe that no one knew what was going on in these families," Hannah Slutzky, national supervisor for child affairs in the Welfare and Social Services Ministry, said in an interview. "It is not only the perpetrators of the acts who need to be brought to justice, but also the people who fail to report such crimes."
Children's rights activist Dr. Yitzhak Kadman, director of the National Council for the Child, commented: "Since the law [known as the Good Samaritan Law, obligating both professionals and citizens to report cases of suspected child abuse] was enacted 18 years ago, I think only about five people have been brought to justice for not speaking out."
He continued, "It is not just that it is not nice to keep quiet - people are actually breaking the law."
He added that one did not have to be certain that abuse was taking place in order to report it; even a slight suspicion should warrant the most basic call to action.
The most recent case that came to light this week - that of a 54-year-old ultra-Orthodox Beit Shemesh woman accused of brutal physical abuse, including whippings with belts and electric cables, as well as allowing sexual activity to take place among her 12 children - is an extreme example, said Slutzky.
"There is a lot of abuse in the haredi community, and the people there are not willing to cooperate with the authorities," she said, adding that a committee was established by the ministry within the past year to work together with community rabbis to encourage the population to be more open to the authorities.
"It should be made clear to the people that protective services are there to help families and children in order to provide them with solutions to their problems," she said.
Dina Hahn, chairwoman of women's organization World Emunah - which was selected Wednesday as a recipient of this year's Israel Prize for, among other things, its work with children at risk - pointed out that there was a "code of silence" within the haredi world.
"People [in the haredi community] prefer to turn to their own professionals," she said. "But we are beginning to see that this is not enough."
Hahn also noted that there was a clear lack of trust between the authorities and the haredi community.
"We must call on the rabbis to tell their population to be more open about what is going on. It is not lashon hora [the sin of gossip and other harmful speech]," added Kadman. "People who keep quiet are partners in the abuse."
Asked whether the case in Beit Shemesh and the one two weeks ago of a US immigrant family accused of severely abusing their six children indicated a rise in abuse within the haredi community, both Slutzky and Kadman concurred that it was more a case of increased awareness and reporting.
"There has not been a rise," stated Slutzky. "People are just more willing to talk about it than in the past."
Kadman noted that child abuse cases have gone up in recent years, but that this was the case in all of society, not particularly in the haredi community.
"It is not fair to point the finger only at that community," he said. "There is a clear rise in violence against children in general. Sadly our society is more violent toward children than ever before."
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Beit Shemesh 'Burka' cult unveiled
Jerusalem Post - March 27, 2008
A fringe sect of Jewish women with a Taliban-like dress code will be overcome by a major spiritual crisis after the arrest of the group's leader on charges of child abuse, haredi sources in Beit Shemesh predicted Wednesday.
According to haredi media and a well-informed source in Beit Shemesh, the 54-year-old mother of 12 who is suspected of serious child abuse and failing to report multiple cases of incest among her children, is none other than the head of a sect of women who adhere to a dress code more stringent than that of the most extreme Muslim sects and a rigorous health food diet.
"We always knew those women were crazy," said Shmuel Poppenheim, a spokesman for the Eda Haredit - one of the most zealously religious groups in Israeli Orthodoxy - who lives in Beit Shemesh. "Now we have been vindicated, and those women will have to stop their insane behavior."
Another Beit Shemesh resident and haredi journalist, who preferred to remain anonymous, predicted that the arrest of their leader would send the sect spiraling into a "major spiritual tailspin that would lead to its demise."
"I do not envy those women," said the source. "They are going to be facing some major soul-searching."
None of the sect's members, who reportedly number as many as 50 in Beit Shemesh and are also scattered around Safed and Jerusalem, could be reached by The Jerusalem Post for comment. They do not speak with men, even by telephone.
On Tuesday, police announced that they had arrested a woman last month whose name could not be divulged. Police suspicions were aroused after neighbors complained they had heard a child crying for help and objects being broken in the home, a police investigator told a Jerusalem court at a remand hearing on Tuesday.
The Beit Shemesh resident is also suspected of failing to report multiple cases of incest among her children. She was remanded for six days by the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court on Tuesday.
Until the arrest was publicized, the small Beit Shemesh community of women who wear burkas, multiple layers of clothing and full face coverings, was regularly ostracized by the local haredi community.
"We pulled them off buses and yelled at them, 'Desecrators of God's name!'" said a Beit Shemesh source.
Until now, these women sought comfort in one another and in their leader.
Even in Beit Shemesh, made up of some of the most religiously extreme sects in Orthodoxy, such as Satmar, Toldot Aharon and Shomrei Hachomot, this group of women was considered ridiculously - even psychotically - zealous.
The women who belong to the sect lack any recognized rabbinic backing. They rarely leave their homes. When they do, their female children, dressed in long robes, accompany them. The women's extensive face coverings make it dangerous for them to cross the street unattended.
Every week, these women met in their leader's apartment to hear her speak and receive her teachings.
A female Ma'ariv reporter who was allowed to participate in one of the lessons described the leader of the group as "a pile of clothing lumped in the middle of the small living room."
The reporter said the leader wore 10 skirts, seven long robes, five head scarves tied on the front of her head and three more tied on the back of her head.
The vast majority of the women who belong to the sect have secular backgrounds.
"As newcomers to the intricacies of Orthodoxy, they lack the kind of grounding and feeling for tradition enjoyed by most religious people who grew up in religious families," said Poppenheim. "Even the strictest rabbis who require women to wear black head coverings and black stockings understand that a woman must allow herself to be a woman."
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Arrested for `child abuse', the veiled queen of modesty
by Anshel Pfeffer
London Jewish Chronicle - March 28, 2008
Jerusalem--A mother-of-twelve belonging to a small strictly Orthodox sect was arrested on Tuesday in Bet Shemesh, on the suspicion that she had not reported cases of sibling incest, had beaten her children and prevented them from receiving medical treatment.
The 54-year old woman, whose name has not been published, was arrested following numerous complaints by neighbours and reports of children screaming within the house — and at least one case in which a young child was forced to spend the night outside the house wearing only a vest. When brought before the court, the mother denied the charges but said that she believed in beatings as an "educational punishment". The woman refused to speak to the judge, saying that her beliefs forbade her to speak to men.
The woman, covered from head to toe in shawls and cloaks, was reported to be Rabbanit Bruria Keren, the leader of a small female sect practising an extreme version of the religious strictures of tzniut (modesty). Last month, the JC reported how this group of women believed in obscuring the shape of their bodies, covering their faces and having no contact with a man not their husband, practices frowned on by most Charedi rabbis.
According to police, most of the children had already left home, including at least one removed by the social services. Only a boy of 16 and an eight-year-old girl lived permanently at home. This week, they were also taken into care.
During the investigation, the boy allegedly told police that he had had sexual relations with one of his older sisters and tried to do the same with his younger sister. Police suspect that the mother knew but refrained from notifying authorities. At the court, she said that she was being persecuted for her religious beliefs.
People who know the family say that the mother was the dominant figure, with the father working mostly outside Israel as a fundraiser for religious organisations. On Wednesday he returned to Israel and was detained at Ben Gurion Airport for questioning.
by Anshel Pfeffer
London Jewish Chronicle - March 28, 2008
Jerusalem--A mother-of-twelve belonging to a small strictly Orthodox sect was arrested on Tuesday in Bet Shemesh, on the suspicion that she had not reported cases of sibling incest, had beaten her children and prevented them from receiving medical treatment.
The 54-year old woman, whose name has not been published, was arrested following numerous complaints by neighbours and reports of children screaming within the house — and at least one case in which a young child was forced to spend the night outside the house wearing only a vest. When brought before the court, the mother denied the charges but said that she believed in beatings as an "educational punishment". The woman refused to speak to the judge, saying that her beliefs forbade her to speak to men.
The woman, covered from head to toe in shawls and cloaks, was reported to be Rabbanit Bruria Keren, the leader of a small female sect practising an extreme version of the religious strictures of tzniut (modesty). Last month, the JC reported how this group of women believed in obscuring the shape of their bodies, covering their faces and having no contact with a man not their husband, practices frowned on by most Charedi rabbis.
According to police, most of the children had already left home, including at least one removed by the social services. Only a boy of 16 and an eight-year-old girl lived permanently at home. This week, they were also taken into care.
During the investigation, the boy allegedly told police that he had had sexual relations with one of his older sisters and tried to do the same with his younger sister. Police suspect that the mother knew but refrained from notifying authorities. At the court, she said that she was being persecuted for her religious beliefs.
People who know the family say that the mother was the dominant figure, with the father working mostly outside Israel as a fundraiser for religious organisations. On Wednesday he returned to Israel and was detained at Ben Gurion Airport for questioning.
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Netivot woman accused of raping sons
By Yaakov Lappin
THE JERUSALEM POST - April 1, 2008
A 38-year-old mother of eight was arrested on Tuesday in Netivot on suspicion of having sex with two of her sons, aged 8 and 11.
The mother confessed to raping her sons, citing "revenge" against her former husband as the motive when interrogated by police, Acting Netivot Station Commander, Superintendent Ron Yehuda, said.
During the time of the alleged abuse eight months ago, the couple was in the middle of divorce proceedings.
"We brought her into the station today, where she confessed to one act of sexual abuse," Yehuda added. "We hope to gather more evidence, and to pass the case onto the prosecution by the start of next week."
All eight of the mother's children had already been removed from the woman's home and sent to foster homes and boarding schools a year ago, due to neglect and previous (non-sexual) incidents of abuse by the mother, police said.
When her children came home to visit, the mother led them into a room in the house at night and carried out full sexual acts with them.
"I've never seen anything like this," Yehuda said, reflecting on the severity of the case.
Suspicions were raised only after the children returned to boarding school, where one of the boys reenacted sexual scenes on another child, leading welfare services to suspect that the child had been sexually abused.
Welfare services passed on the information to the police, which launched an investigation resulting in Tuesday's arrest.
News of the case came just five days after the Ministry of Welfare and Social Services released a report that shed light on the extent of sexual abuse cases in the country. Some 421 children under the age of 14 were questioned by welfare officials over incestuous relations in 2007, according to the report.
"The difficult consequences of incestuous relations turn the child into a victim which faces existential dangers and emotional terrorism," Welfare and Social Services Minister Isaac Herzog said last week, commenting on the report.
Tuesday's arrest comes as a mother of 12 children and a suspected religious cult leader was indicted in a Jerusalem District court for severely abusing her children.
Netivot woman accused of raping sons
By Yaakov Lappin
THE JERUSALEM POST - April 1, 2008
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| Bruria Keren - Convicted Sex Offender |
The mother confessed to raping her sons, citing "revenge" against her former husband as the motive when interrogated by police, Acting Netivot Station Commander, Superintendent Ron Yehuda, said.
During the time of the alleged abuse eight months ago, the couple was in the middle of divorce proceedings.
"We brought her into the station today, where she confessed to one act of sexual abuse," Yehuda added. "We hope to gather more evidence, and to pass the case onto the prosecution by the start of next week."
All eight of the mother's children had already been removed from the woman's home and sent to foster homes and boarding schools a year ago, due to neglect and previous (non-sexual) incidents of abuse by the mother, police said.
When her children came home to visit, the mother led them into a room in the house at night and carried out full sexual acts with them.
"I've never seen anything like this," Yehuda said, reflecting on the severity of the case.
Suspicions were raised only after the children returned to boarding school, where one of the boys reenacted sexual scenes on another child, leading welfare services to suspect that the child had been sexually abused.
Welfare services passed on the information to the police, which launched an investigation resulting in Tuesday's arrest.
News of the case came just five days after the Ministry of Welfare and Social Services released a report that shed light on the extent of sexual abuse cases in the country. Some 421 children under the age of 14 were questioned by welfare officials over incestuous relations in 2007, according to the report.
"The difficult consequences of incestuous relations turn the child into a victim which faces existential dangers and emotional terrorism," Welfare and Social Services Minister Isaac Herzog said last week, commenting on the report.
Tuesday's arrest comes as a mother of 12 children and a suspected religious cult leader was indicted in a Jerusalem District court for severely abusing her children.
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| Rabbanit Bruria Keren |
By Etgar Lefkovits
The Jerusalem Post - April 2, 2008
A 54-year-old woman suspected of severely abusing six of her 12 children for years was indicted Tuesday in the Jerusalem District Court, in one of the most shocking child abuse cases uncovered in the country in years.The woman, who was arrested last month in her Ramat Beit Shemesh home after neighbors summoned police, allegedly abused her young children "at least" 25 separate times, the charge sheet said.
The suspect, who has been dubbed "the Taliban Mother" since she appeared in court dressed from head to toe in black, was remanded in custody on Tuesday for the duration of her trial.
According to the two-page indictment detailing the abuse, the woman repeatedly beat and otherwise physically abused her children, giving them electric shocks and hitting them with belts and sticks.
In one instance, the charge sheet said, the woman beat one of her daughters in the face with a rolling pin and slammed her face into the marble kitchen countertop.
She was also accused of forcing her children to sleep outside in a locked shed when she felt they had come home late, tying up her mentally impaired son for hours at a time and ignoring his cries for help, cutting her daughters' hair as punishment, and throwing water on her children to wake them up.
In addition, the physically and psychologically abused children committed incest when they were locked up in the shed, the indictment stated.
The woman was not charged with failing to report the incest.
During her arraignment, the suspect refused the judge's request that she remove her facial covering, and the court was forced to make do with a declaration by her attorney, Vered Berger, that she "recognizes the eyes of the accused."
The woman's husband, who is under house arrest in northern Israel, is suspected of knowing of and taking part in the abuse, though on a lesser scale than his wife.
The close-knit extremist family managed to evade law enforcement officials - despite years of reports of neglect and violence - by repeatedly moving all over the country and by refusing to cooperate with social workers, the police said.
Until police were summoned to the house last month, the couple's children never told authorities of the abuse, even after some of them moved out of the home. Only after their mother was arrested did all the children tell police what they had suffered.
The woman, who has confessed to some of the allegations against her, said that she was simply "educating" her children, police said.
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By Tamar Rotem
Haaretz - April 2, 2008
"It's necessary to dress like the holy matriarchs. To wear a shawl, a skirt and a petticoat. Longer, looser garments. There is no end to making oneself stronger in faith. Be modest and you will receive a reward from Heaven. It is explicitly written that redemption will come only by virtue of women. Modesty is the woman's commandment and there is no rabbi who will say that it is forbidden to dress this way. On the contrary - this is how women will dress when the Messiah comes." (This quotation and others are from an interview conducted by the author with the mother accused of abusing her children, Haaretz, November 2007)
The woman at the center of the Beit Shemesh abuse scandal wraps herself in a length of black cloth, which she also clings to stubbornly in the courtroom. The covering eradicates any inkling of sexuality and conceals her face - her identity - in the name of modesty. At the same time it provides a metaphor for the screen she has put up, impermeable to any kind of rationality or feeling. Her sisters, her mother and even her children have provided testimony to the police, and the indictment filed against her at the beginning of the week discloses harsh evidence of the mother's abuse of her children and of incest between the siblings.
Through the wall of concealment emerges the murky substance of emotional and psychological neglect that is concealed by messianic-religious fervor. The veil is a motif that flows through the woman's tragic story. In recent years, while acts of incest were being performed in her home, she preached to women to cover themselves beneath their veils with more and more layers of clothing, to cover every exposed part of their body including their face and hands, on which they wear men's socks, following her example. In the fanatic circles of Beit Shemesh, the idea caught on and she became a female "rabbi." Her disciples spread the word of her righteousness.
Religious strengthening
"There is nothing worse than a married womans' hair showing. A married woman should have her head covered and not by some other hair, as women's hair catches the eye and leads a man looking at her astray. It is impudence to dress up and lead a man astray... I had the privilege to make many women cast off their wigs... I have lectured in halls in front of hundreds of women and they just tear off their wigs."
On a Wednesday evening in the summer of 2006, intrigued by the chance sighting of ultra-Orthodox women dressed like Muslim women, I knocked on the door of her home. For a considerable number of months afterward I continued to attend her lessons, which were both repelling and fascinating. Marginal religious groups are happy for any new member and the "rabbi" greeted me without question and with inviting gestures. To me, the leader of the small group of women seemed a bizarre, rather colorful type, wrapped as she was in many layers of colored cloth. As a sign of her extreme righteousness, the women told me, she would observe speech "fasts" and talk only once a week, during the lesson.
When she began to speak, her voice sounded grating to me, and chilling. I attributed this to her long periods of silence. Yet, the women's laughter and gay chatter made me ignore the feeling that presaged ill. She was a guru, a healer and a spiritual advisor all in one. Her most devoted disciples refrained from going to conventional doctors and they and their children were treated only by her.
The lesson meandered spontaneously from one topic to the next, without any logic: an exhortation about matters of modesty followed by an apocalyptic description of the punishment for licentiousness, and homeopathic instruction. One by one, the women received advice about various aches and pains, what kind of bread to eat (whole wheat), how to read a certain chapter in the Book of Psalms, and - as a bonus - a recommendation to tighten their sphincter muscles when using the toilet.
The women talked about the difficulties of carrying out the tasks of prayers. They seemed to feel hot and they sat facing electric fans. They drew encouragement from their "rabbi" and the other group members. They admire the "rabbi."
To whom have they not compared her? To Queen Esther, to Ruth the Moabite and of course to Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah. All the women in Jewish history came to the fore to defend the thesis that it is necessary to wear long clothing as baggy as a tent. Like Muslim women. Nothing prepared the disciples for the harrowing turn the story would take. Ever since their "rabbi" was arrested, they have been in a state of total shock.
The woman who is under arrest is 54 years old, the mother of 12 children, four of whom are under the age of 18. She was raised in a remote moshav in the South, in a national religious family. After she and her husband, who was in the air force, married, the couple's religious faith strengthened. They became ultra-Orthodox and moved to Bnei Brak. About seven years ago they moved to Beit Shemesh, west of Jerusalem, where she began to wage a stubborn fight, in the form of lectures and assemblies, against the norm of ultra-Orthodox women wearing wigs in public.
About three years ago she began wearing a veil. Her husband did not follow in her path, but he did not stop her either. His lawyer would later depict him as a "present absentee," and as someone who is totally under his wife's control. During the lessons, he was always in the house, behind curtains that covered the open spaces.
In the wake of her move toward religious extremism, she married off her four older children - the ones who are now being spoken about in the context of incest - to spouses from the most hermetic and extreme stream of ultra- Orthodoxy. The matches of three out of the four did not work out well, and they divorced a short while later. Members of Beit Shemesh's ultra-Orthodox community related this week that those matches had been default choices for both sides. The girls were pretty, they explained, but the family was problematic. That is why they married the girls off when they were only 17, to older men or young men with disabilities, including mental illness. Two of the children who divorced have become secular.
About half a year ago, at the wedding of one of the daughters, who married for the second time, S., a sister of the accused, saw her for the first time with a group of her disciples, who were dressed like her. "They held her arms because she wasn't managing with the veil and she wasn't able to walk," relates the sister. "They kept rearranging the cloth on her head. She simply enjoyed being served by them. From time to time, she would get up to button up the bride or to put a shawl on her."
Ticking social bomb
"For 10 years now I have been observing a speech fast. This causes prayers to be better accepted. At home they are very accustomed to this and they live with me in joy and peace. It also prevents a lot of insolence from the children. People very much admire the relationship between me and my husband and the children."
S. is several years younger than the accused. She lives in a religious locale in the center of the country, and is married with children. For more than 10 years, S. stood on the sidelines, observing her sister's gradual move toward extremism, which was accompanied by neglect of her children. She says she could not remain indifferent to this. Although she was not aware of the extent of the children's abuse - as described in the indictment - she suspected that it existed. She learned of the incest only recently, but her descriptions indicate that the whole family was a ticking social bomb.
But no one wanted to hear about it. Over the years, S. alerted the Beit Shemesh municipality that the children were not attending school, that they were not being taken care of and that they were roaming the streets neglected and hungry, but in vain. "Fourteen years ago, when I visited her home in Bnei Brak, I was already alarmed. The house was a mess, totally wrecked. I saw a little boy sitting under the table. You could see he was suffering from cerebral palsy, but he wasn't being cared for. I tried to hug the girls and they recoiled. It looked like they weren't getting any attention from their parents."
Several years later, when she realized that four of the children weren't attending school at all, she contacted the municipality. "They sent a truant officer, who handed in a comprehensive report on how the children were neglected and really weren't going to school," says S. "But they didn't enforce his recommendations. After yelling and yelling, I'd get worn out. Months later I'd start sending letters again."
Twice she spoke about the neglect on the part of the Beit Shemesh welfare authorities on the Arutz Sheva station radio. In the wake of her becoming involved, the accused cut off all contact with her sister, apart from rare meetings at family weddings.
In 2006, the other children, especially the sons, contacted their grandmother and through her, got in touch with their two aunts, S. and E. They started spending Shabbat alternately with the grandmother and the aunts and, above all, they began to talk. "They'd simply grown up and were no longer under her control," says S.
The grandmother noticed abnormal behavior, especially between one brother and one sister. According to S., the sister started doing drugs and at some point she met a man who brought her into prostitution. S. again began to sound the alarm and to write letters. In the wake of great efforts, she managed to get her 17-year-old nephew into a therapeutic yeshiva in the North, with the father's agreement. The boy began talking with the yeshiva's social worker, who later revealed the entire scandal.
The boy told his grandmother and his aunts about his visits in Beit Shemesh and how he saw the younger children roaming around hungry, neglected and filthy in the streets. S. immediately contacted the town's education and welfare departments. The head of the welfare department wrote to her that a social worker would be in touch with the family and that "we will make an effort to help the children with every means at our disposal." Additionally, a truant officer was sent, who paid a visit to each of the schools the children were enrolled in, and found that the children were attending.
In August 2007, S. complained to the Welfare Ministry's appeals committee that the Beit Shemesh municipality had not involved any agency that could examine the mother's ability to parent and care for her children. The director of the Welfare Ministry's Jerusalem district responded: "Because of the right to privacy, we will not be able to continue to share information about the treatment of that family." It should be noted that nothing at all was done.
The father of the accused died on the same day the mentally disabled son was found wandering outside the home, hungry and dizzy, after he had spent the entire night outside the house, crying, while his mother refused to let him in. S. believes there is a connection between this incident and her father's death. She says the root of the abnormal behavior should be sought in their nuclear family (eight siblings - five sisters and three brothers). "Our father used to beat us all. My mother was a weak woman who did not manage to protect us." Of her sister she says: "All these years she has been looking for love. She fantasizes about greatness. She tried to become an outstanding homeopath and it didn't work. Then she became a saint."
'Her day has come'
"It is very difficult for me, all this. Not to leave the house. Not to talk. To cover myself up. But all those years I was guided from Heaven. And anyway I always hated leaving the house... I am not a female rabbi. They decided to call me a 'rabbi,' and no matter how much I explain to them that I am not a rabbi, it doesn't help. I always pray that people will not honor me and will not say that I am a saint, because that isn't true at all."
At court and in jail, the accused is mostly wrapped in total darkness, spending most of the time under the blanket that covers her. She is neither eating nor drinking, because of her vegan diet, which the jail has a hard time accommodating. But she is not cut off. She speaks freely with her lawyer, Vered Birger from the Public Defender's Office. Birger relates that at their very first meeting the woman gave her a detailed lecture on the subject of modesty. But Birger says she respects her. "I came in a skirt that stops above the knee. She asked me to change it. I didn't wear it again when I went to see her."
Does she feel that her client is manipulating her? "I respect her beliefs," Birger replies. But the accused does stipulate conditions through the veil. During interrogations, she refused to speak if a male investigator was present. On Tuesday she did not speak in the District Court, in the presence of the male judge.
"She enjoys being in control," says her sister S. "Why do they believe her? After all, she is continuing to deceive and it's impossible to deceive people all of the time. Her day has come," she continues. "And I hope for her sake that they will help her and give her treatment."
None of the women from the veiled circle came to see their leader at court. "The lying media are out to get us, the women with the cloth," T., one of her most fervent disciples, told me. "I am afraid that they will attack me. In the street, too, they are pointing at us. But are we going to stop going outside? Let them hide. I walk down the street with a wonderful feeling of who I am. And I have chosen to dress this way not only because of our rabbi."
This week she came to the courthouse to sign bail for the accused and collected small donations from fans of the "rabbi," amounting to NIS 20,000 - an astronomical sum for predominantly poor people. She has also offered to host the "rabbi" under house arrest in her home. However, the group's leading spokeswoman has refrained from taking such a step. In fact, a conversation with her seems to indicate that she is dissociating herself from the "rabbi," even though, like T., she has denied the charges against the accused.
Dr. David Green, a clinical psychologist from the Green Institute for Advanced Psychology, in Tel Aviv, and an expert on cults, believes the arrest and the charges will not break up the group. Another and larger wave of women will join what he calls a cult. "We are becoming stronger in our faith," says T. She tells of modesty assemblies in Beit Shemesh, Acre and Ramle. "Everything in this world is a disguise; you should know that," she tells me at the end of a conversation, during which she condemned the media, the police and the court. "Just as some people disguise themselves as police and judges, we have chosen to disguise ourselves as the holy matriarchs and to cover ourselves. Behind the mask hides a saintly woman. In the war of Gog and Magog everyone will ask her forgiveness. And she will forgive."
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Rise in child abuse or a media creating 'moral panic'?By Ruth Eglash
Jerusalem Post - April 3, 2008
The scarf-covered heads of observant women shielding their identities from the media is becoming a common image in our national consciousness as each passing day we hear of more and more sickening child abuse stories from within our society, especially from inside the ultra-Orthodox community.
First it was the religious, Anglo-immigrant family in Jerusalem, where the mother stood accused of physically abusing her two young sons; next the burka-clad woman - apparently part of a Beit Shemesh religious cult - indicted Tuesday by the Jerusalem District Court for inflicting untold violence on six of her 12 children and allowing incest to continue unabated in her family.
These two gruesome cases were closely followed by reports of a Ramle couple, where the father routinely stubbed his cigarettes out on his children, and now the Netivot mother of eight, also observant, arrested Tuesday on suspicion of having sex with two of her sons, aged eight and 10.
Shocking, shocking and shocking.
What is happening to Israeli society and to the haredi community in particular, that people must hurt their children in this way? Has all sense of morality been lost? Have the ultra-Orthodox given up on the stringent family values they were once so proud of?
Secular people might even be wondering - when it suddenly seems as though every ultra-Orthodox person is abusing their kids - if something has gone wrong with the religious experiment.
But is there anything actually wrong?
Of course, one can neither ignore the terrible effects of physical and sexual abuse on these children, nor cast blame for the evils of certain individuals on outside sources, but do all these reports add up to a sudden rise in the number of children being abused? Could the explanation more likely be that we are just allowing the media to stir up our senses?
After all, their aim is to sell newspapers, and throughout history, humankind has always enjoyed a good public flogging, hasn't it? Is it that these reports also give us the opportunity to cast our own moral judgments and make us feel good about our own lives?
If the answer to these questions is yes, then it is possible that we are in the midst of a "moral panic."
Coined in 1972 by sociologist Stanley Cohen, "moral panic" refers to the reaction of a population based on false or exaggerated perceptions that certain behavior - frequently by a minority group or subculture - is dangerous, deviant and poses a menace to society.
In his work, Cohen discussed the way in which the media amplifies these feelings, turning them into a national issue.
"We have to study [these reports] in more depth to determine if this is a moral panic situation," states Prof. Nachman Ben-Yehuda, from the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, who has written extensively on the topic of moral panic both here and abroad.
"There has always been abuse of children," he continues, "So do these four or five cases mean there is more abuse, or that the abuse is gaining more media attention?"
According to Hannah Slutzky, national supervisor for child affairs at the Welfare and Social Services Ministry, there has been no official increase in the number of actual abuse cases, although the type of abuse might be becoming more extreme than in the past.
So that leaves us with the moral panic argument, which can best be illustrated by the 1993 murder of three-year-old James Bulger in Liverpool, England, by two 10-year-olds emulating scenes from the 1991 film Child's Play 3.
While it was not the first time that children had killed other children, what made Bulger's case into a classic example of moral panic was the national reaction to it and the role of the media in instigating that reaction.
At the time, the case was used by print and broadcast journalists to symbolize everything that was wrong with British society, from increasing levels of violence to the effects of television and movies on young children.
As the public debate increased, so the moral panic spread to academics and politicians who called for increased legislature and social policy on the subject.
When the debate on violence among children eventually slowed down and all talk of the phenomenon disappeared from the public sphere, did that mean child violence had been successfully stamped out? Certainly not - it still comes and goes just like any other hot issue.
"There are waves in media reporting," claims Prof. Tamar Liebes from the School of Communication at the Hebrew University. "And the same way these stories explode, they suddenly vanish again without much follow-up."
However, in the case of the current wave of public and media interest in child abuse stories, the obsession is unlikely to abate that quickly, observes Ben-Yehuda.
"My belief is that we will start to see experts and moral people call for a return to old ideas and values, suggest parenting classes and such - but of course, we've already been in that movie before."
And we will most likely see that movie again sometime in the future.
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THE JERUSALEM POST - March 26, 2008
The code of silence that exists in ultra-Orthodox communities regarding physical and sexual abuse against children must be broken, and ordinary citizens as well as professionals should be prosecuted for not reporting such cases to the authorities, Welfare and Social Services Ministry officials and child activists told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday.
In light of at least two cases of extreme child abuse and incest exposed in the last two weeks - both of which took place in ultra-Orthodox families - those working with children told the Post that there must have been signs these atrocities were being committed, but neighbors, extended family, educational professionals and rabbis did nothing to alert the authorities.
"I don't believe that no one knew what was going on in these families," Hannah Slutzky, national supervisor for child affairs in the Welfare and Social Services Ministry, said in an interview. "It is not only the perpetrators of the acts who need to be brought to justice, but also the people who fail to report such crimes."
Children's rights activist Dr. Yitzhak Kadman, director of the National Council for the Child, commented: "Since the law [known as the Good Samaritan Law, obligating both professionals and citizens to report cases of suspected child abuse] was enacted 18 years ago, I think only about five people have been brought to justice for not speaking out."
He continued, "It is not just that it is not nice to keep quiet - people are actually breaking the law."
He added that one did not have to be certain that abuse was taking place in order to report it; even a slight suspicion should warrant the most basic call to action.
The most recent case that came to light this week - that of a 54-year-old ultra-Orthodox Beit Shemesh woman accused of brutal physical abuse, including whippings with belts and electric cables, as well as allowing sexual activity to take place among her 12 children - is an extreme example, said Slutzky.
"There is a lot of abuse in the haredi community, and the people there are not willing to cooperate with the authorities," she said, adding that a committee was established by the ministry within the past year to work together with community rabbis to encourage the population to be more open to the authorities.
"It should be made clear to the people that protective services are there to help families and children in order to provide them with solutions to their problems," she said.
Dina Hahn, chairwoman of women's organization World Emunah - which was selected Wednesday as a recipient of this year's Israel Prize for, among other things, its work with children at risk - pointed out that there was a "code of silence" within the haredi world.
"People [in the haredi community] prefer to turn to their own professionals," she said. "But we are beginning to see that this is not enough."
Hahn also noted that there was a clear lack of trust between the authorities and the haredi community.
"We must call on the rabbis to tell their population to be more open about what is going on. It is not lashon hora [the sin of gossip and other harmful speech]," added Kadman. "People who keep quiet are partners in the abuse."
Asked whether the case in Beit Shemesh and the one two weeks ago of a US immigrant family accused of severely abusing their six children indicated a rise in abuse within the haredi community, both Slutzky and Kadman concurred that it was more a case of increased awareness and reporting.
"There has not been a rise," stated Slutzky. "People are just more willing to talk about it than in the past."
Kadman noted that child abuse cases have gone up in recent years, but that this was the case in all of society, not particularly in the haredi community.
"It is not fair to point the finger only at that community," he said. "There is a clear rise in violence against children in general. Sadly our society is more violent toward children than ever before."
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By Neta Sela
YNET - May 4, 2008
Mother-of-12 accused of severe child abuse goes on record for first time since her arrest, categorically denies all accusations against her
Ynet exclusive: Beit Shemesh mother-of-12 accused of severe child abuse speaks out for the first time since the horrendous affair was revealed.
K. has been under house arrest in Jerusalem for two weeks. She is awaiting trial for abusing her children and for failing to report incest among the children.
In her first interview to the media, she insists all the accusations against her are a vicious lie: "Nothing of the kind ever happened. I never abused my children. If I hit them, it was nothing more than spanking, and even that didn't happened more than once every couple of months, educational spankings."
Just over a month ago, the state filed a severe indictment against her, for aggravated assault and abusing a minor. The indictment included multiple counts detailing years of abuse and neglect, as well as graphic details of the ways she used to beat her children using belts, sticks and a rolling pin; smash their faces into her kitchen countertop, wake them up by pouring cold water on them, throw bleach at them, put out matches on her son's chest and cut her daughter's hair as means of punishment.
But K. is sure she will be vindicated, even from the allegations that she knew of incestuous relations among the children and said nothing: "I don't believe any of these lies. I'm well aware of the lies being told about me and this too is a lie," she said.
Nothing more than a game
"There's a proverb – 'He who spares the rod hates his son'," she said when confronted with the allegations she used to chain her children to a chair and hit them. "It tells of how Solomon's mother tied him up and bit him until the Messiah emerged. The kids read it and decided to act is out. It was a game."
While in prison, those around her began fearing for her life. Being a vegan, she stopped eating almost completely. She spends her days praying, reading the Book of Psalms and saying very little. According to reports, she used to communicate with her children by passing them notes.
"After I realized I was wasting my time with them, that they just won't listen to me I decided it was better to spend my time praying," she explains – on paper.
Faced with her radical chastity, we asked how could it be, that she of all people is suspected of committing such unchaste acts. She believes God is testing her, saying the experience has made her faith even stronger: "I know the heavens are testing me, to see if I'll break and give up my chastity.
"Every day I tell the lord how much I love him and when they respected my chastity in prison I saw the good lord hasn't abandoned me... on the contrary, my faith is stronger. I realize the heavens have sent me to see how miserable the people of Israel are. It's like they told me – 'You have to see what's really going on and who needs you to pray form them.
"The women here began reading Psalms and even the wardens are dressing more modestly... I have seen that Israel is holy and now I pray every day, as hard as I can, for God to have mercy on all of Israel, to help them find their faith, so that everyone can see the coming of the Messiah and be redeemed."
'Mother Taliban'
Supported by the mass wave of modesty sweeping over ultra-Orthodox Jerusalem, K. has found support in many women who have began attending her lessons and following her lead – wearing layers upon layers of clothes. Those layers have dubbed her "Mother Taliban". Her piety seems endless and the women surrounding her tell of devotion to the mitzvas of faith.
The last few years have seen many women begin radically covering themselves up, so much so that the ultra-Orthodox community has expressed some real concern about this eccentric behavior.
K. on her part, insists the dress was acceptable among Jewish women throughout history, and that it is secularism and education that have led to the change: "There is a prophecy saying that before the coming of the Messiah you will see women covering themselves completely and that will be the sign that the Messiah in on his way... there's nothing anyone can do. It is written in the heavens and no one can fight their will."
Supreme Court judge Hanan Melzer, who allowed K. to be released to house arrest, forbade her from having any contact with her children. She still cannot understand where the allegations against her came from.
"If I could talk to men I'd ask the judge where's his self respect, how can he even bring himself to ask me such things," she said.
Is there anything she would like to tell her children? "My sweet children, I love you very much," she wrote on a piece of paper, "and I'm not angry at any of you. I love God more than anyone."
To tell or not to tell, that is the question
By STEWART WEISS
Jerusalem Post - March 30, 2008
It's the season for Orthodox scandal. From New York to Jerusalem, from Beit Shemesh to Melbourne, shocking tales of adultery and child abuse, infidelity and incest within the Jewish world are making front-page headlines. The latest incidents - a mother of eight beating her two youngest to the point of hospitalization, with no recovery predicted for the toddler; a mother of 12, practicer and preacher of an extreme form of female modesty, allegedly whipping and humiliating her children, several of whom admitted to incestuous relationships; the principal of a prestigious Orthodox Melbourne school dismissed for sexual molestation - remind us once again that the Orthodox community is not immune to the plagues of the larger one.
Is it right and proper - constructive or destructive - to air this dirty linen in public, to name names, to splash the story for all to see? Or should we adopt the sha-shtill posture which castigates the whistle-blower?
The observant are fearful of transgressing the prohibition of lashon hara - gossiping, rumor-mongering and character assassination that provides passing prurient pleasure to the perpetrator but causes untold, indelible damage to the victim.
Rabbi Israel Meir HaCohen was known as the Chofetz Chaim, from the verse, "Who is a lover of life? He who guards his tongue from speaking evil." He popularized the notion that tight lips and forbearance - that is, not everything that can be said should be said - provides a sure path to integrity, kindness and Jewish unity. Often, the word not spoken is the truest word of all.
On other side of the equation is the public's right to know and the need to protect society from those perverse individuals who prey upon the young or vulnerable. Protecting others from being cheated by a con man or abused by a serial molester is a societal need that overrides the individual's right to privacy. Even the Chofetz Chaim permitted the release of information that protects a potential spouse or future employer from being victimized.
IN A FAMOUS incident, a well-known American rabbi was visited by a man who confessed that he had just murdered his wife. The rabbi asked the man to wait in his study while he instructed his secretary to hold all calls. He then promptly phoned the police and informed them that there was a killer in his synagogue.
Sanctuary? Rabbi-client confidentiality? "None of these apply," he explained, "when there is a menace to society on the loose. Our first responsibility is to take this killer off the streets before he kills someone else."
The cover-up can be even more disgraceful than the crime. In many cases, the abuses are widely known for some time before anything is done about them.
In the infamous Lanner case in New Jersey, numerous rabbinic officials were aware that this youth adviser was abusing young people, but were reluctant to come forward. They either "did not want to get involved," or felt the rabbi was too effective in his position to let him go. Only when someone of great courage stepped forward did the news come out; only when the story was picked up by a courageous editor - Gary Rosenblatt, in this case - did the case go to court, and justice, of a sort, was done.
THE PROBLEM with taking a hush-hush attitude is two-fold: Many sexual offenders will move on to a new city, a new job, and repeat their abuses there. The fox always tends to find a new hen-house. Secondly, without publicity, the victims may never be identified and helped.
Long ago, the Talmud (Moed Katan 17) discussed just this issue. A prominent scholar was alleged to have committed various sexual improprieties. While the rumors about him were widespread, the scholar was also an important member of the community who influenced budding young scholars.
The sage Rabbi Yehuda agonized over whether or not he should publicly condemn the man and ostracize him. Though this would justly punish him for his actions, it would also rob the community of a valuable asset and could create a hilul Hashem (desecration of God's name) when it became public. Rabbi Yehuda chose condemnation, and refused to repeal his decision.
Years later, on his deathbed, Rabbi Yehuda faced the scholar, and smiled.
"Do you now mock me as well as having condemned me?" asked the scholar.
"No," said the sage. "I smile because I had the courage to condemn you for your crime and to hold fast to my convictions. In heaven, that will hold me in good stead, and the angels will smile upon me, too."
There is little to laugh about in these lurid events. Let us just ponder, as we consider whether to reveal or conceal, whether the ultimate Judge will smile upon us for the path we take.
By STEWART WEISS
Jerusalem Post - March 30, 2008
It's the season for Orthodox scandal. From New York to Jerusalem, from Beit Shemesh to Melbourne, shocking tales of adultery and child abuse, infidelity and incest within the Jewish world are making front-page headlines. The latest incidents - a mother of eight beating her two youngest to the point of hospitalization, with no recovery predicted for the toddler; a mother of 12, practicer and preacher of an extreme form of female modesty, allegedly whipping and humiliating her children, several of whom admitted to incestuous relationships; the principal of a prestigious Orthodox Melbourne school dismissed for sexual molestation - remind us once again that the Orthodox community is not immune to the plagues of the larger one.
Is it right and proper - constructive or destructive - to air this dirty linen in public, to name names, to splash the story for all to see? Or should we adopt the sha-shtill posture which castigates the whistle-blower?
The observant are fearful of transgressing the prohibition of lashon hara - gossiping, rumor-mongering and character assassination that provides passing prurient pleasure to the perpetrator but causes untold, indelible damage to the victim.
Rabbi Israel Meir HaCohen was known as the Chofetz Chaim, from the verse, "Who is a lover of life? He who guards his tongue from speaking evil." He popularized the notion that tight lips and forbearance - that is, not everything that can be said should be said - provides a sure path to integrity, kindness and Jewish unity. Often, the word not spoken is the truest word of all.
On other side of the equation is the public's right to know and the need to protect society from those perverse individuals who prey upon the young or vulnerable. Protecting others from being cheated by a con man or abused by a serial molester is a societal need that overrides the individual's right to privacy. Even the Chofetz Chaim permitted the release of information that protects a potential spouse or future employer from being victimized.
IN A FAMOUS incident, a well-known American rabbi was visited by a man who confessed that he had just murdered his wife. The rabbi asked the man to wait in his study while he instructed his secretary to hold all calls. He then promptly phoned the police and informed them that there was a killer in his synagogue.
Sanctuary? Rabbi-client confidentiality? "None of these apply," he explained, "when there is a menace to society on the loose. Our first responsibility is to take this killer off the streets before he kills someone else."
The cover-up can be even more disgraceful than the crime. In many cases, the abuses are widely known for some time before anything is done about them.
In the infamous Lanner case in New Jersey, numerous rabbinic officials were aware that this youth adviser was abusing young people, but were reluctant to come forward. They either "did not want to get involved," or felt the rabbi was too effective in his position to let him go. Only when someone of great courage stepped forward did the news come out; only when the story was picked up by a courageous editor - Gary Rosenblatt, in this case - did the case go to court, and justice, of a sort, was done.
THE PROBLEM with taking a hush-hush attitude is two-fold: Many sexual offenders will move on to a new city, a new job, and repeat their abuses there. The fox always tends to find a new hen-house. Secondly, without publicity, the victims may never be identified and helped.
Long ago, the Talmud (Moed Katan 17) discussed just this issue. A prominent scholar was alleged to have committed various sexual improprieties. While the rumors about him were widespread, the scholar was also an important member of the community who influenced budding young scholars.
The sage Rabbi Yehuda agonized over whether or not he should publicly condemn the man and ostracize him. Though this would justly punish him for his actions, it would also rob the community of a valuable asset and could create a hilul Hashem (desecration of God's name) when it became public. Rabbi Yehuda chose condemnation, and refused to repeal his decision.
Years later, on his deathbed, Rabbi Yehuda faced the scholar, and smiled.
"Do you now mock me as well as having condemned me?" asked the scholar.
"No," said the sage. "I smile because I had the courage to condemn you for your crime and to hold fast to my convictions. In heaven, that will hold me in good stead, and the angels will smile upon me, too."
There is little to laugh about in these lurid events. Let us just ponder, as we consider whether to reveal or conceal, whether the ultimate Judge will smile upon us for the path we take.
The writer is director of the Jewish Outreach Center of Ra'anana.
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"Frumka" Group Leader Arrested on Charges of Child Abuse: ReactionsBy Rebecca Honig Friedman
Lilith Magazine - April 4, 2008
The news broke last week, and the public, especially the Orthodox community, has been struggling to make sense of the whole thing and who is at fault for the shocking turn of events.
The leader of a bizarre sect of fervently Orthodox women in Israel, who cover every inch of their flesh and face in burka-like layers of clothing, was arrested "on charges of assaulting and neglecting her 12 children, some of whom are believed to have committed incest." (JTA). The Rabbanit Bruriah Keren, as she is called, has postured herself as a kind of guru to her followers, acting as their spiritual guide. She has taken on herself extreme measures of modesty in the name of serving God and encouraged her followers to do so as well. Even to those who considered her methods insane, the news of a self-proclaimed holy woman allegedly abusing her children is a shock.
The defense for Keren claims the charges are part of a conspiracy against her, waged by the ultra-Orthodox establishment who do not approve of her extreme ways. Honestly, it wouldn't be that surprising if there was some truth to that, but whether or not the religious-powers-that-be have had a hand in her demise, clearly something was very wrong in that household.
Still, there's also something wrong with the way certain parties have been reacting to the news, laying blame where little, if any, is due.
There's a general feeling of "I told you so" amongst those who have been following, disapprovingly, the whole frumka story since it was first featured in Israeli newspapers a while back. Keren and her followers' extreme displays of modesty have struck many as abnormal, even psychotic. How perfect that the leader of this sect is now shown to be, allegedly, a depraved individual, harmful in a way that is more concrete — not to mention criminal — than the fuzzy, harmful psychological influence she's had on her followers. Now everyone can agree she's a bad egg.
There's nothing wrong with that, per se, except for the hint of satisfaction (a-ha, I knew it!) such thinking lends to hearing about the abuse of children.
More disturbing even is the perspective of Life in Israel blogger Rafi G, who, after acknowledging that it would not be fair to demonize the whole frumka group just because one of their members is a "sicko," writes:
But now I have just come into more information. The woman arrested, it turns out, was none other than Rabbanit Bruriah keren, herself. The founder and leader of the group. So the group is not just an eccentric group with on sicko as a member. the group is rotten from the core."
Rafi G.'s statement touches on a larger philosophical debate about whether a message can be valid if the messenger's authority has been invalidated (can one can learn Torah from a sinner?), but it doesn't specify that the group's principles are rotten; rather, he insists that the group's members are.
Questioning the sincerity and basic goodness of an entire group of people because of its leader is wrong.
More likely, Keren's followers are more distraught and confused about this news than the rest of us. This more compassionate view was the focus of a recent JPost article: "A fringe sect of Jewish women with a Taliban-like dress code will be overcome by a major spiritual crisis after the arrest of the group's leader on charges of child abuse, haredi sources in Beit Shemesh predicted Wednesday." That sounds just about right. And, interestingly, The Awareness Center, which specializes in combating rabbinic sexual abuse, has taken a similar view, posting a note that treats Karen's followers as potential victims rather than potential perpetrators: " If you or anyone you know is involved Bruria Keren or any other group like her's there is a great deal of information that you might find as helpful. ... Please feel free to contact us if there's anything we can do to help," it reads.
But to go back to those "haredi sources in Beit Shemesh" who predicted an oncoming spiritual crisis for Keren's followers. With that understanding comes another implication of I-told-you-so — that following an "independent" spiritual leader rather than the established spiritual authorities will lead to crisis. Said Shmuel Poppenheim, spokesman for the "zealously religious" Eda Haredit group, "We always knew those women were crazy ... Now we have been vindicated, and those women will have to stop their insane behavior."
But wait, there's more: "Even the strictest rabbis who require women to wear black head coverings and black stockings understand that a woman must allow herself to be a woman," Poppenheim said.
As long as she's a woman in the precise way the rabbis prescribe, that is.
While it is in some ways refreshing to see ultra-Orthodox authorities acknowledging that there are positions too extreme to be psychologically healthy, it's also maddening to see them putting the blame for such extremism on others rather than acknowledging that, just perhaps, their own preachings might have something to do it. Writes the JTA:
Established Orthodox communities, including the fervently Orthodox Chasidim and haredim, have dubbed the sect "the Taliban" and described it a Jewish aberration. Some believe its members were secular women who in embracing religion took it to an unusual extreme.
Sure, blame it on the baalot teshuvah who don't know how to keep their newfound zeal for religion within the "normal" boundaries of Jewish practice. Indeed, most of us know newly religious people who go to greater extremes in their observance or religious philosophy than we might think normal or healthy, but these extreme ideas don't come out of thin air.
What the Orthodox authorities aren't acknowledging is that these women have been taking the establishment's own severe teachings about modesty to their most extreme conclusions: Women should cover their elbows, throats, legs, and hair — but covering their faces is crazy! Women should not be publicly acknowledged because it's not modest — but women who choose to stay at home and take themselves completely out of the public sphere are insane! Women's voices should not be heard by men lest they arouse desire, but a woman who refuses to talk to a man on the phone is a total nut job!
If it weren't so sad and so real, this whole thing could be viewed as a kind of satire — a group of women holding a mirror up to the society in which they live and showing the reality of the ideals being preached to them. The ideal of moderation, of striking a balance between taking part in the bodily/secular world and yet being apart/ from or above it, is one most consider central to the practice of Judaism, yet it is no where to be seen in that reflection. I
If the Beit Shemesh community can recognize Rabbanit Bruriah Keren and her followers as a distorted reflection of themselves, even if they can't publicly acknowledge it, perhaps they can find a way to restore some of that balance, and some good could come out of all this.
Abuse scandal: Accused mother says allegation a vicious lie"Frumka" Group Leader Arrested on Charges of Child Abuse: ReactionsBy Rebecca Honig Friedman
Lilith Magazine - April 4, 2008
The news broke last week, and the public, especially the Orthodox community, has been struggling to make sense of the whole thing and who is at fault for the shocking turn of events.
The leader of a bizarre sect of fervently Orthodox women in Israel, who cover every inch of their flesh and face in burka-like layers of clothing, was arrested "on charges of assaulting and neglecting her 12 children, some of whom are believed to have committed incest." (JTA). The Rabbanit Bruriah Keren, as she is called, has postured herself as a kind of guru to her followers, acting as their spiritual guide. She has taken on herself extreme measures of modesty in the name of serving God and encouraged her followers to do so as well. Even to those who considered her methods insane, the news of a self-proclaimed holy woman allegedly abusing her children is a shock.
The defense for Keren claims the charges are part of a conspiracy against her, waged by the ultra-Orthodox establishment who do not approve of her extreme ways. Honestly, it wouldn't be that surprising if there was some truth to that, but whether or not the religious-powers-that-be have had a hand in her demise, clearly something was very wrong in that household.
Still, there's also something wrong with the way certain parties have been reacting to the news, laying blame where little, if any, is due.
There's a general feeling of "I told you so" amongst those who have been following, disapprovingly, the whole frumka story since it was first featured in Israeli newspapers a while back. Keren and her followers' extreme displays of modesty have struck many as abnormal, even psychotic. How perfect that the leader of this sect is now shown to be, allegedly, a depraved individual, harmful in a way that is more concrete — not to mention criminal — than the fuzzy, harmful psychological influence she's had on her followers. Now everyone can agree she's a bad egg.
There's nothing wrong with that, per se, except for the hint of satisfaction (a-ha, I knew it!) such thinking lends to hearing about the abuse of children.
More disturbing even is the perspective of Life in Israel blogger Rafi G, who, after acknowledging that it would not be fair to demonize the whole frumka group just because one of their members is a "sicko," writes:
But now I have just come into more information. The woman arrested, it turns out, was none other than Rabbanit Bruriah keren, herself. The founder and leader of the group. So the group is not just an eccentric group with on sicko as a member. the group is rotten from the core."
Rafi G.'s statement touches on a larger philosophical debate about whether a message can be valid if the messenger's authority has been invalidated (can one can learn Torah from a sinner?), but it doesn't specify that the group's principles are rotten; rather, he insists that the group's members are.
Questioning the sincerity and basic goodness of an entire group of people because of its leader is wrong.
More likely, Keren's followers are more distraught and confused about this news than the rest of us. This more compassionate view was the focus of a recent JPost article: "A fringe sect of Jewish women with a Taliban-like dress code will be overcome by a major spiritual crisis after the arrest of the group's leader on charges of child abuse, haredi sources in Beit Shemesh predicted Wednesday." That sounds just about right. And, interestingly, The Awareness Center, which specializes in combating rabbinic sexual abuse, has taken a similar view, posting a note that treats Karen's followers as potential victims rather than potential perpetrators: " If you or anyone you know is involved Bruria Keren or any other group like her's there is a great deal of information that you might find as helpful. ... Please feel free to contact us if there's anything we can do to help," it reads.
But to go back to those "haredi sources in Beit Shemesh" who predicted an oncoming spiritual crisis for Keren's followers. With that understanding comes another implication of I-told-you-so — that following an "independent" spiritual leader rather than the established spiritual authorities will lead to crisis. Said Shmuel Poppenheim, spokesman for the "zealously religious" Eda Haredit group, "We always knew those women were crazy ... Now we have been vindicated, and those women will have to stop their insane behavior."
But wait, there's more: "Even the strictest rabbis who require women to wear black head coverings and black stockings understand that a woman must allow herself to be a woman," Poppenheim said.
As long as she's a woman in the precise way the rabbis prescribe, that is.
While it is in some ways refreshing to see ultra-Orthodox authorities acknowledging that there are positions too extreme to be psychologically healthy, it's also maddening to see them putting the blame for such extremism on others rather than acknowledging that, just perhaps, their own preachings might have something to do it. Writes the JTA:
Established Orthodox communities, including the fervently Orthodox Chasidim and haredim, have dubbed the sect "the Taliban" and described it a Jewish aberration. Some believe its members were secular women who in embracing religion took it to an unusual extreme.
Sure, blame it on the baalot teshuvah who don't know how to keep their newfound zeal for religion within the "normal" boundaries of Jewish practice. Indeed, most of us know newly religious people who go to greater extremes in their observance or religious philosophy than we might think normal or healthy, but these extreme ideas don't come out of thin air.
What the Orthodox authorities aren't acknowledging is that these women have been taking the establishment's own severe teachings about modesty to their most extreme conclusions: Women should cover their elbows, throats, legs, and hair — but covering their faces is crazy! Women should not be publicly acknowledged because it's not modest — but women who choose to stay at home and take themselves completely out of the public sphere are insane! Women's voices should not be heard by men lest they arouse desire, but a woman who refuses to talk to a man on the phone is a total nut job!
If it weren't so sad and so real, this whole thing could be viewed as a kind of satire — a group of women holding a mirror up to the society in which they live and showing the reality of the ideals being preached to them. The ideal of moderation, of striking a balance between taking part in the bodily/secular world and yet being apart/ from or above it, is one most consider central to the practice of Judaism, yet it is no where to be seen in that reflection. I
If the Beit Shemesh community can recognize Rabbanit Bruriah Keren and her followers as a distorted reflection of themselves, even if they can't publicly acknowledge it, perhaps they can find a way to restore some of that balance, and some good could come out of all this.
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By Neta Sela
YNET - May 4, 2008
Mother-of-12 accused of severe child abuse goes on record for first time since her arrest, categorically denies all accusations against her
Ynet exclusive: Beit Shemesh mother-of-12 accused of severe child abuse speaks out for the first time since the horrendous affair was revealed.
K. has been under house arrest in Jerusalem for two weeks. She is awaiting trial for abusing her children and for failing to report incest among the children.
In her first interview to the media, she insists all the accusations against her are a vicious lie: "Nothing of the kind ever happened. I never abused my children. If I hit them, it was nothing more than spanking, and even that didn't happened more than once every couple of months, educational spankings."
Just over a month ago, the state filed a severe indictment against her, for aggravated assault and abusing a minor. The indictment included multiple counts detailing years of abuse and neglect, as well as graphic details of the ways she used to beat her children using belts, sticks and a rolling pin; smash their faces into her kitchen countertop, wake them up by pouring cold water on them, throw bleach at them, put out matches on her son's chest and cut her daughter's hair as means of punishment.
But K. is sure she will be vindicated, even from the allegations that she knew of incestuous relations among the children and said nothing: "I don't believe any of these lies. I'm well aware of the lies being told about me and this too is a lie," she said.
Nothing more than a game
"There's a proverb – 'He who spares the rod hates his son'," she said when confronted with the allegations she used to chain her children to a chair and hit them. "It tells of how Solomon's mother tied him up and bit him until the Messiah emerged. The kids read it and decided to act is out. It was a game."
While in prison, those around her began fearing for her life. Being a vegan, she stopped eating almost completely. She spends her days praying, reading the Book of Psalms and saying very little. According to reports, she used to communicate with her children by passing them notes.
"After I realized I was wasting my time with them, that they just won't listen to me I decided it was better to spend my time praying," she explains – on paper.
Faced with her radical chastity, we asked how could it be, that she of all people is suspected of committing such unchaste acts. She believes God is testing her, saying the experience has made her faith even stronger: "I know the heavens are testing me, to see if I'll break and give up my chastity.
"Every day I tell the lord how much I love him and when they respected my chastity in prison I saw the good lord hasn't abandoned me... on the contrary, my faith is stronger. I realize the heavens have sent me to see how miserable the people of Israel are. It's like they told me – 'You have to see what's really going on and who needs you to pray form them.
"The women here began reading Psalms and even the wardens are dressing more modestly... I have seen that Israel is holy and now I pray every day, as hard as I can, for God to have mercy on all of Israel, to help them find their faith, so that everyone can see the coming of the Messiah and be redeemed."
'Mother Taliban'
Supported by the mass wave of modesty sweeping over ultra-Orthodox Jerusalem, K. has found support in many women who have began attending her lessons and following her lead – wearing layers upon layers of clothes. Those layers have dubbed her "Mother Taliban". Her piety seems endless and the women surrounding her tell of devotion to the mitzvas of faith.
The last few years have seen many women begin radically covering themselves up, so much so that the ultra-Orthodox community has expressed some real concern about this eccentric behavior.
K. on her part, insists the dress was acceptable among Jewish women throughout history, and that it is secularism and education that have led to the change: "There is a prophecy saying that before the coming of the Messiah you will see women covering themselves completely and that will be the sign that the Messiah in on his way... there's nothing anyone can do. It is written in the heavens and no one can fight their will."
Supreme Court judge Hanan Melzer, who allowed K. to be released to house arrest, forbade her from having any contact with her children. She still cannot understand where the allegations against her came from.
"If I could talk to men I'd ask the judge where's his self respect, how can he even bring himself to ask me such things," she said.
Is there anything she would like to tell her children? "My sweet children, I love you very much," she wrote on a piece of paper, "and I'm not angry at any of you. I love God more than anyone."
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Jewish sect girls sent back to IsraelThe Globe ad Mail - October 6, 2011
Spiritual leader says teens not coerced to come to Lev Tahor community in the Laurentians, north of Montreal
It is an enclave of ultra-Orthodoxy in the midst of the Laurentian mountains of Quebec, and its family practices have sparked an international tug-of-war with Israel.
Lev Tahor, a community of religious Jews on the edge of the forest north of Montreal, has carried on largely away from the glare of public scrutiny for years.
Women and even little girls dress head to toe in chador-like veils and marry as young as the age of 16. Residents have limited contact with outsiders.
But now the Hasidic sect in Sainte-Agathe-des-Monts has become the focus of attention since two teenaged girls headed here were stopped by Canadian authorities and sent back home.
The girls, aged 15 and 13, were detained by Canadian immigration officials in Montreal and returned to Israel apparently under order of an Israeli court.
The girls' great-uncle had petitioned for the writ out of concern that the girls would be harmed by the group in Canada, that their property would be taken, and that they could be forced to wed male members of the Lev Tahor sect.
In Israel, the sect is sometimes called the Jewish Taliban because of the way the women dress.
The spiritual leader of Lev Tahor in Canada, Rabbi Shlomo Elbarnes, opened his study to a journalist on Wednesday to deny that he is coercing anyone to come to his community.
He insisted anyone is free to leave.
"Use force? We want everybody who is not 100 per cent happy ... to leave us," Mr. Elbarnes said in an interview on Wednesday in the book-lined room, about 100 kilometres north of Montreal.
He said girls typically marry as teenagers, and partners are "suggested" for them. But he said marriages are not forced. "The women here choose of their own will."
Mr. Elbarnes was convicted in 1994 by a U.S. court of kidnapping a 13-year-old boy studying with him.
He fled to Canada in 2001 on a temporary visa and later obtained refugee status.
He eventually brought followers of his anti-Zionist sect to the Laurentians, and the group in Sainte-Agathe has grown to about 50 families.
The goal is to recreate strict religious observance in an "old-fashioned" way of life, he said. "It is necessary to keep our traditions."
Girls and women walk amid the partly unpaved roads and modest homes in flowing black robes, with head scarves tied tightly under their necks and capes covering long dresses. Only the women's faces and hands are visible.
Two years ago, the woman leader of the sect in Israel, Bruria Keren, was convicted of severely abusing her mentally-retarded son and sentenced to four years in prison.
When social welfare agents accompanied by police arrived to take the child away, a small riot broke out in the community.
A majority of Beit Shemesh's 72,000 people are ultra-Orthodox Jews from a variety of Hasidic sects. Lev Tahor is one of the most extreme.
While Hasidic men, noted for their curled sidelocks, dress in black suits and formal black hats, and Hasidic women wear black head scarves, black skirts, black stockings and black shawls over white and grey tops, in Israel the women of Lev Tahor are dressed totally in black, including their faces.
The group believes that the sight of women may excite men into sinning and the responsibility for preventing such sins rests with the women.
Even in Israel, where almost everyone wears black, the "Taliban women," as they are called, stand out.
They are not popular.
"One of the families lived in this building," said Yitzhak Frankel, a real estate agent. "I'm glad they moved out."
"Nobody here liked them; the rabbi was very opposed to what they were doing," he said. "They're not normal."
Much of the criticism of the group focuses on the women's dress, described by most people here as being Islamic-style. However, a booklet distributed by the group argues that Jewish women were covered in this way long before Muslim women. "They copied it from us," the literature says.
Israeli Judge Rivka Makayes found "there is some defect in the parents' perception of ways of life," and ordered that the girls be returned to Israel.
The writ, the judge said, would remain in effect until an Israeli family court holds a hearing next week to determine whether the extremely pious lifestyle practised by the parents involves such a defect and whether the court should intervene in the affairs of the children.
The judgment of the court could have implications for other members of the sect, most of whose 300 or so members live in Beit Shemesh, about 40 minutes west of Jerusalem, not far from where David is believed to have fought Goliath.
If the court rules the lifestyle is illegal or inappropriate, social welfare agencies would be empowered to remove children in the Lev Tahor community from their parents' care.
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Some of the information on The Awareness Center's web pages may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc.
We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml . If you wish to use copyrighted material from this update for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
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