Officer injured as haredim protest arrest of abusive mother [more rioting]

[MicroBalrog]

Officer injured as haredim protest arrest of abusive mother

Neturei Karta mother accused of starving her toddler son refuses to cooperate in investigation, while ultra-Orthodox protestors take to streets in her defense. Demonstrators block streets near Shabbat Square, setting trash cans ablaze. Cars, buses damaged by stones; 15 rioters arrested
Efrat Weiss

Dozens of ultra-Orthodox demonstrators torched garbage bins Wednesday in Jerusalem's Shabbat Square in protest against the arrest of the haredi mother accused of starving her three-year-old son.


Police arrived on the spot, and arrested 15 people. A Border Guard officer was injured by a stone thrown at him, and cars and buses were damaged.
 
Rioters have also taken to the streets in Beit Shemesh. Police are on location. 

The allegedly abusive mother was arrested as she left welfare offices. She continues to refuse to cooperate with investigators.

 
The abuse affair, which was cleared for publication Tuesday, led to mass riots Tuesday in the capital as hundreds of haredi protestors took to the streets, burning trash bins on Bar-Ilan Street and at Shabbat Square.

The woman, who apparently suffers from Munchausen by proxy, allegedly abused her three-year-old son, refusing to feed him until his weight dipped to a mere 7 kilograms (about 15 pounds). The boy was transferred to Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital in February and has been there ever since.

It was later revealed that the woman is a member of the Neturei Karta community. She has other children and is currently pregnant.
 
Police initially asked to arrest the mother at the hospital, but the hospital's management would not allow it. Following pressure from the police, welfare officials were compelled to hand over details of the time and place of the woman's next appointment at their offices. She was eventually detained during a meeting with a social worker.
 
Rioters broke into the welfare offices near the ultra-Orthodox Mea Shaarim neighborhood in Jerusalem on Sunday and proceeded to wreak havoc on the office, breaking things and shouting, "Nazis! We will burn you." On Monday, unknown rioters arrived at a different welfare office in the city and set one of its doors on fire.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3746998,00.html

More detai about the alleged child abuse found here: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3746520,00.html

Micro Sez:

1. When you are burning trash cans and beating up police, it is not a protest. It is a riot.

2. I don't like welfare offices either. But come on. People are trying to HELP you worthless louts and you're attacking them and burning their offices? REALLY?

[HankB]

Micro Sez:

1. When you are burning trash cans and beating up police, it is not a protest. It is a riot.

2. I don't like welfare offices either. But come on. People are trying to HELP you worthless louts and you're attacking them and burning their offices? REALLY?

1. Quite correct. And arson (setting the door of the welfare office on fire) is a crime that justifies the use of deadly force.

2. Close the welfare offices and discontinue all welfare services in that area.

[Rudy Kohn]

I'm dumbfounded.  What exactly are they rioting for?  The fact of her arrest?  The allegations that she abused her child?  I'm assuming that they're not trying to argue that starving a three-year-old is okay, so what are they so angry about?  I read the article linked about the Neturei Karta, but don't see the connection, or why her membership in that community matters.

It sounds from the article like the kid is doing better now, so that's good, at least.

[BridgeRunner]

I'm dumbfounded.  What exactly are they rioting for?  The fact of her arrest?  The allegations that she abused her child?  I'm assuming that they're not trying to argue that starving a three-year-old is okay, so what are they so angry about?  I read the article linked about the Neturei Karta, but don't see the connection, or why her membership in that community matters.

It sounds from the article like the kid is doing better now, so that's good, at least.

The Prime Directive:  Outsiders are not to be involved.  No matter what.

Better the child should die than be cared for by chilonim (secular Israelis).

Most would not phrase it that strongly, but I have read plenty of writings from the Holocaust wherein members of similar communities argued that children should be allowed to be starved to death or executed rather than saved in a manner likely to sever their connections with the community.  Orthodox Judaism, while strongly encouraging/requiring large numbers of children, does not have the same "for the children!" culture that has developed in the US. 

The community is the most important thing.  Then the leaders of the community (iow, rabbis and to a lesser degree parents).  Then the children. 

[AJ Dual]

Micro, has anyone in Israel ever tried a coordinated effort to penetrate and expose the Haredim to the rest of the more moderate and secular Israeli culture?

Obviously it would be a difficult task, such hyper-orthodox/fundamentalist cultures already see their "culture war" in very defined terms already. They view innocuous activity by the outsiders (like a parking lot operating on the sabbath) as willful transgressions. The reaction to a coordinated effort would be apopolectic, obviously.

It seems like a micrososm or a potential test case of vauge half-formed ideas I have about culture battles in general, and how it applies to other things humanity may be better off without, such as authoritarian liberalisim/leftism, militant Islamisim etc...

[freedom lover]

Police initially asked to arrest the mother at the hospital, but the hospital's management would not allow it.

What were they going to do? Shoot the police? I could understand the police respecting the rights of a privately owned hospital to a certain extent, but the woman is a criminal who would be punished by death in an ideal world.

[Zardozimo Oprah Bannedalas]

What were they going to do? Shoot the police? I could understand the police respecting the rights of a privately owned hospital to a certain extent, but the woman is a criminal who would be punished by death in an ideal world.

The hospital probably didn't want their place burned down.

[AJ Dual]

IIRC, Micro has also said that while the Haredim are a political/social minority, the Israeli style of parlimentary government and the need to form a coalition govt. with them makes it very difficult to pass any laws/legislation against their interests.

What I also find interesting about them, and other similar sub-cultures is that they could not form a functional nation comprised soley of themselves. By their nature, they won't engage in certain businesses, or social roles. They have to live as a parasite/symbiosis with another culture (that the profess to disdain) that serves those larger functions.

[MicroBalrog]

Micro, has anyone in Israel ever tried a coordinated effort to penetrate and expose the Haredim to the rest of the more moderate and secular Israeli culture?

The problem with this is that the haredim have an access to the political machine that's very difficult to understand for a non-American. Except for – I think – one term of office, no government had ever ruled without relying on their support as part of the coalition. While the members of the Shas party will not openly support such rioters, they support massive amounts of funding for the community (although of course, not directly to nutcases like Karta), and creation of administrative offices for them. The government funds most of their [nearly entirely sovereign] school system, allows them control of the divorce courts, the funeral industry (in Israel, there are only two legal ways of burial: religious, with a rabbi, or cremation. There's only one facility for cremation, and they keep trying to shut that down).

Bridgwalker is probably more knowledgeable than I on the Haredi community. There have been some graver examples of this rioting a way back. I believe last year a girl in my town died from malnutrition – so the local Haredi people staged a mini-riot in front of the police station. The police could not of course ignored it, and made with the  night-sticks and so forth. When the dust settled it transpired someone had used the occasion to break into the station's morgue and steal the infant's body. It was never found, and no investigation could be held since no autopsy could be conducted.

[AJ Dual]

I guess I was correct in what I thought then about the parliamentary coalition issue with them.

Maybe I'm going out on a limb here, but I think why this topic (Heredim riots) is so fascinating/surprising for the American APS'ers here, (Bridgewalker excluded, who lived growing up as one...) is that most of us have a particular mental "pigeon hole" for the ultra-orthodox Jew in America.

We tend to see the ultra-orthodox Jews as sort of a cultural affectation for America, a diversity milepost for places like New York City, or anywhere else that sports an ultra-orthodox community. We tend to think of a wizend old shopkeep, and little boys in with peyot ringlets and kippahs/yarmulkes running about.

As a group, I think Americans are also historically conditioned, especially since World War II to think of Jews as victims.  Nor do we think much about the issues faced by such insular communities, such as abuse, or things like limited opportunity for women like Bridgewalker suffered. The popular culture tends to associate such things more with the polygamist Mormon sect communities of the American South and central-West, and something that's not really possible in a large city.

So when I hear Micro's news of Haredim riots, burning trash dumpsters, it's just total cognitive dissonance.

[MicroBalrog]

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3746998,00.html

City suspends services to haredi neighborhoods

Dozens of ultra-Orthodox demonstrators torched garbage bins Wednesday in Jerusalem's Shabbat Square in protest against the arrest of the haredi mother accused of starving her three-year-old son.
 
Police arrived on the spot, and arrested 15 people. A Border Guard officer was injured by a stone thrown at him, and cars and buses were damaged. 

Rioters have also taken to the streets in Beit Shemesh. Police are on location. 

Following the riots Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat ordered all city services to the Meah Shearim and Geola haredi neighborhoods suspended "in an attempt to prevent the threat posed to municipal employees in the area".

The Jerusalem Municipality said that the services will not be renewed "until such time that providing them will not entail risking human life." The mayor said he regretted the harm done to those who had not participated in the uprising, and that he hoped services would be renewed soon.

Micro Sez: And that's a good start.

[Antibubba]

It's a good start, yes.  I still favor the increased application of nightsticks.  They call the Israeli police "Nazis"? 

I'll be glad to show them "Nazis".

[Strings]

Hmmm... don't want your kids taken "out of the community"? Don't let members of your community harm them.

Not a real difficult concept...

[K Frame]

Interesting how Jews now refer to other Jews as Nazis when it's convenient for them to make the sound bite...

[Strings]

Honestly Mike, the way so many make use of the term "Nazi", it's almost enough to make me wish we WOULD have another war like WWII. If for no other reason than to give us a new "villain"...

[Firethorn]

Micro, has anyone in Israel ever tried a coordinated effort to penetrate and expose the Haredim to the rest of the more moderate and secular Israeli culture?

Obviously it would be a difficult task, such hyper-orthodox/fundamentalist cultures already see their "culture war" in very defined terms already. They view innocuous activity by the outsiders (like a parking lot operating on the sabbath) as willful transgressions. The reaction to a coordinated effort would be apopolectic, obviously.

Like many such situations, I often want to show them what a REAL culture war would be like, that way when you back off they're a little politer.

[MicroBalrog]

Three more people have been injured today. One of them a municipality worker.

[MicroBalrog]

Rabbis have not done enough to contain ultra-Orthodox riots  in Jerusalem over the arrest of a mother who allegedly starved her son, a senior police official said Thursday.
 
"I have not heard an outcry by rabbis or dignitaries calling for an end to the riots," Jerusalem District Police Commander Major General Aharon Franco said. "There is no sane element in the ultra-Orthodox community that has stood up and spoke out against this phenomenon. Someone needs to wake up because eventually people will get hurt."

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3747936,00.html

[Strings]

It may be uncivilized of me to suggest, but maybe those rioting to protest the arrest of an unfit mother SHOULD get hurt...

[MicroBalrog]

It may be uncivilized of me to suggest, but maybe those rioting to protest the arrest of an unfit mother for any reason SHOULD get hurt...

FTFY.

[S. Williamson]

Is haredim rioting particularly common, or are these recent developments?

[MicroBalrog]

Is haredim rioting particularly common, or are these recent developments?

Welcome to Israel. They do this once a year or two. Recently they seem to have become... more agitated.

[Hawkmoon]

Would this be the same group that rioted a couple of weeks ago because of some parking lots being open on the Sabbath?

[MicroBalrog]

Would this be the same group that rioted a couple of weeks ago because of some parking lots being open on the Sabbath?

A subset of the same community. By the way, the parking lot people keep rioting every weekend.

[BridgeRunner]

I dunno if this is true or not, but the accepted reality when I was in Jerusalem was that "Sabbath Square" (the major intersection leading into the Meah Shearim/Geulah neighborhoods where this stuff generally takes place) is so called because of the regular stoning of cars daring to drive through there in Sabbath.

As much as this is allegedly a phenomenon of radical extremists like Neturei Karta, no one in the more mainstream (if you can call anything that isolationist and radical mainstream) Haredi community was ashamed enough or angered enough by the rioting/habitual stoning of drivers to NOT adopt the name for the intersection.  In this of course, it doesn't matter if the origin of the name is truth or haredi legend--people still use it, and talk about that as its origin.  I was surprised the first time I heard that.  There is a certain admiration among the haredi, mixed with faint condemnation, for the whole rioting phenomenon.