Antony Lerman, in today’s New York Times, notes “the disgraceful antics of the anti-democratic forces that are setting Israel’s political agenda,” and notes also (this blog is interested in education and women’s rights) its social agenda. He touches on Israel’s “strictly Orthodox,” and no doubt has in mind, among other influential and populous communities, the notoriously ignorant haredim. Again and again Israel attempts to get this increasingly demographically dominant group to adopt even a small portion of the country’s national education standards; again and again haredim schools refuse to teach their students mathematics, the use of computers, science, English. It was the same thing recently in Belgium, whose government also insisted that their haredim teach their children how to function and qualify for employment in the modern world. Amazingly, the haredim there responded by arguing
that the restrictions limit their freedom to educate their children according to their beliefs and asked the court to fine the government $6,780 per child for every day the limitations are in place, according to a report by Belga, the Belgian news agency.
You read that right. Make the government pay for every day that the education of one of their children is threatened. Understand? Make the government pay for every day that the government threatens to educate their children.
Lerman writes that in Israel as in all countries “[t]he indivisibility of human, civil and political rights has to take precedence over the dictates of religion,” but he perceives that – as in the example of the Israeli state’s inability to do anything about the growth of an ignorant, illiberal, anti-modern, sexist, and messianic group within it – the understanding of and commitment to this indivisibility is vanishing.
August 23rd, 2014 at 4:51AM
All anyone need do to understand how schizoid Israel actually is, visit Tel Aviv, then wander over to Jerusalem. Damn hard to believe they’re in the same country….
August 23rd, 2014 at 2:14PM
Dear Margaret,
Well, you knew I had to weigh in on this one. Since your blog is interested in education and women’s rights, I won’t address Antony Lerman’s politics. But his reading of the charedi community is way off. There are certainly large areas of that society that remain resistent to Western education, primarily for boys. (You might note that charedi society is more open to education for women, since they are often the bread-winners for the family.) I know about this since I am actually involved in the education of charedi women; my ward is used as a clinical rotation for a charedi nursing school. And guess what? The school will soon be opening a section for male nurses, so I look forward to training male charedi nurses before I retire.
And as to Charlie’s comments – I don’t know what you saw when you visited Jerusalem. Perhaps you missed the high tech area in Har Hotzvim, the Jerusalem and Khan Theatres, the world-class health center in Ein Kerem, the bars and clubs around the Russian Quarter and Nachalat Shiva, and the LGBT Open House on King George Street.
Next time you visit Jerusalem let me know, and I’ll make sure you get a better picture of the most interesting city in the world.
Janet
August 23rd, 2014 at 9:56PM
No Janet, I saw a bunch of Hasidic dudes protesting that the city was becoming too secular. I know of women who have been harassed and demeaned because they weren’t pious according to some deranged religious benchmark. I saw a bunch of supposed rabbinical students who swallow up ever growing amounts of dwindling public resources, all in order to study some form of religion. What I saw, as a contrast to Tel Aviv, was a city pretty much being held hostage to a group of fanatical religious nutjobs, who have no tolerance to secular thinking or living.
This is common knowledge among Israelis, but was pretty much a revelation to a guy like me. You can do your Chamber of Commerce schtick for somebody else….
August 24th, 2014 at 1:34AM
Charlie,
If you spent time as a tourist in New York City prowling around a housing project in the Bronx instead of visiting the Met and Central Park, you’d come away with a pretty poor impression of the city. It’s common knowledge that Jerusalem is a fascinating city, and it is entirely possible to see all the historical, cultural and religious sites without setting foot in Haredi neighborhoods. I don’t know what your agenda was when you visited Jerusalem or who was showing you around, but you chose a peculiar way of seeing the city.
Thank you for enlightening me about what is common knowledge among Israeli. Personally, I wouldn’t presume to make such a comment, but after living in Israel for almost forty years, my understanding of the country might just be a bit more nuanced than the average American’s.
August 25th, 2014 at 6:20PM
Sorry Janet, but it seems as if YOU are the one with a very, ahem, constrained view of what is taking place within Israel. I don’t have a poor impression of the city, I have a poor impression of recidivist, intolerant, religious fanatics, and if you want to ignore it, if you want to paper that over, that is your problem, not mine. Not only is this a religious problem, but a political/economic one, where many secular Jews are asking why are we having to subsidize a religious sect which has no tolerance for what we believe or how we act.