Jeremy
D. Morley
www.international-divorce.com
Below are extracts
from a lengthy article on legal problems that arise in Israel from divorce in
the ultra-orthodox Jewish community. We have represented several clients in
similar matters, especially religious American Jewish clients with children in
Israel or who have left Israel with their children. (We usually work as lead
counsel in collaboration with local lawyers as appropriate).
I have included some
statements in the article that I do not fully agree with.
Politico Magazine
‘They … Do Whatever They Want to Do Towards Women Like Me’
The
ultra-Orthodox in Israel are allowed to live by their own rules. Which is why
Sara Murray, a U.S. citizen, hasn’t been allowed to see her children freely in
4 years.
The full article is available at: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/03/haredi-women-orthodox-israel-213747#ixzz48vGaR0oM
Once a week, Sara Murray
puts on a headscarf to cover her hair, and a billowing shirt and pants to cover
her ankles and wrists, and takes a bus to a small public building near the
ultra-Orthodox Haredi community where she once lived, before the divorce that
changed her life.
There, she checks in
with two religious social workers, charged by the rabbinical courts with
supervising her visits with her six children, now aged 8 to 18. She tries in
every way she can to reach out to the four boys and two girls who’ve been
taught that she’s brought shame to their family. When she brings them food,
they’re scared to eat it. When she offers them gifts, they refuse to take them.
Murray, who was born in
the United States and has joint U.S.-Israeli citizenship, isn’t a criminal. Nor
has she engaged in any behavior that would cause her shame in a modern,
Westernized society like the United States or Israel. Her only offense was
seeking a divorce in an ultra-religious community whose repressive policies,
particularly on the role of women, are deeply offensive to most Israelis and
other Westerners.
"The government doesn’t
stand up to cases like mine because they don’t want to go against the
rabbinical court.”
But, for having once
joined the Haredi, she can’t break free of its laws. Israel’s government,
seeking to appease the ultra-Orthodox parties that now make up a key part of
Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition, has only empowered its religious
courts. And, by both law and treaty, the United States must honor the rulings
of Israel’s rabbinical courts whose domain includes marriage and divorce.…
“They have so much strength to be able to do
whatever they want to do towards women like me,” Murray said, referring to
Netanyahu’s coalition government and the policies of the ultra-Orthodox that it
adopted. “The government doesn’t stand up to cases like mine because they don’t
want to go against the rabbinical court.”
Professor Ruth
Halperin-Kaddari, a Yale Law School Fulbright Scholar who chairs Israel’s
Rackman Center, which advocates for an end to discrimination against women,
says that there is clear bias in divorce cases against the non-religious parent
within the rabbinical court.
“We know of many stories
like [Murray’s],” she said. “There is a phenomena of children being given by
the rabbinical courts to the parents who are most observant.”
Naomi Paiss of the New
Israel Fund, a U.S.-based non-profit, committed to social change within Israel,
agreed.
“They want control of
the personal sphere—marriage, divorce, burial,” she said, speaking of the
ultra-Orthodox parties. “No matter who you are, your personal life is held
hostage to your religion.”
And there’s an extra
source of outrage in the fact that the United States, under the Hague treaty
governing family law in most advanced countries, is obliged to enforce the
judgments of religious courts in Israel; the only exception is for “grave harm”
to the child, which rarely gets invoked.
Michael Helfand,
associate professor at Pepperdine School of Law and associate director of
Jewish Studies, said even American citizens who become involved in groups like
the Haredi become subject to their laws.
“There are supposed to
be safeguards, and sometimes they don’t seem to be working,” he said, of the
protections U.S courts are supposed to impose before rubber-stamping religious
agreements. “There are some pretty awful stories out there about parents who
are unable to see their children because they left the faith. It pricks your
insides out.” …
The result of this
bifurcated form of governing—part civil, part religious—is an inevitable clash.
It is most profoundly seen around issues of marriage. In order for Jewish
people to be legally married in Israel, they must do so within the
rabbinical—not civil—courts. This applies to all Israelis, whether they
consider themselves to be religious or not. As a result, many Israelis—about 17
percent—marry outside of Israel. The marriages are then recognized as legal
once they return. It’s a religious work-around.
The religious laws also
apply to divorce. Jewish divorce laws are thousands of years old, but are still
followed today. In order for a divorce to be recognized, it requires the
consent—or the “get”—of the husband. Without that consent, a woman remains in a
state of limbo—technically married under religious law, but still estranged
from her husband. While most husbands provide the required get, some do not.
The women who are caught waiting for their husband’s consent have a name—they
are called “agunot,” or chained women.
For Murray, when she
eventually decided to leave the Haredim and her husband in 2012, 16 years after
her marriage, she was allowed the get. But her decision cost her so much
more—her children.
In a 2012 posting on
Facebook, the use of which is forbidden by the Haredi, Murray told her story:
“I was shocked when I
was prohibited to take my children with me. … They were not allowed to come to
my home or spend more than a few hours with me. … They were ashamed of me
despite my respective and modest attire during the visits. Food that I gave
them they would fear to eat although it followed the consumption laws. Clothes
that I bought them they would return even though they were just like the
clothing I always bought them. They were forbidden to have a discussion of any
sort with me or speak about their feelings. They robotically obeyed.”
Murray’s legal attempts
to gain custody of her children proved futile. While she continues to visit her
sons as much as she is allowed, her two daughters, whom she has not met with in
over three years, no longer want to see her. Murray believes that they have
been brainwashed by the adults of the community. Recently, her 8-year-old son
told her that when the Messiah comes, she will perish.
"They were ashamed of me
despite my respective and modest attire during the visits. ... They were
forbidden to have a discussion of any sort with me or speak about their
feelings. They robotically obeyed.”
Through translated
emails, Murray’s ex-husband, Uri, said he is unable to share the details of his
divorce and custody case due to confidentiality issues, and concerns for
defamation. However he defended the end result.
“The legal system in
Israel acts in the child’s best interest,” he wrote. ”There is no religious
consideration here.”
But this, counters
Professor Halperin-Kaddari, of the Rackman Center, is a specious argument.
“The huge question is,
‘what is in the best interest of the child?’ If this means spiritually, and in
terms of the soul, as perceived by the ultra-Orthodox’s own definition—OK [in
their mind] they are telling the truth,” she said.
She also believes that
ultra-Orthodox women are choosing to remain in bad marriages for fear of being
ostracized and losing the rights to see their children.
“They know the danger,
they know the risk, and they make a rational choice to stay within abusive
marriages—abusive in many ways,” she said. “For a grounded fear of losing their
children, they make that choice—if you can call it a choice.” …
For Murray, who now
lives an hour from her children, her focus is not on politics—but on trying to
hold on to her relationship with her family.
“I’m constantly missing
being their mother,” she said. “I’m trying to start over. I’m working now as a
waitress in Tel Aviv. But I’m devastated and I don’t know how to go on from
here.”
Ironically, she misses
the very religious life that pushed her away. “I miss the faith. Having faith
like that is very empowering—the feeling that you think you know the code of
life,” she said. But with it, she said, came something that she hopes others
will not have to live with.
“Families are ripped
apart because of religion instead of being brought together,” she said. ”It’s going
against everything you devoted yourself to.”