Girl at center of debate on zealot Jews
Source: Agencies |
December 28, 2011, Wednesday
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A SHY eight-year-old schoolgirl has unwittingly found herself on the front line of Israel's latest religious war.
Naama Margolese is a ponytailed, bespectacled second-grader who is afraid of walking to her religious Jewish girls school for fear of ultra-Orthodox extremists who have spat on her and called her a whore for dressing "immodestly."
Her plight has drawn new attention to the simmering issue of religious coercion in Israel, and the increasing brazenness of extremists in the insular ultra-Orthodox Jewish community.
"When I walk to school in the morning I used to get a tummy ache because I was so scared ... that they were going to stand and start yelling and spitting," the pale, blue-eyed girl said in an interview with The Associated Press. "They were scary. They don't want us to go to the school."
The new girls school that Naama attends in the city of Beit Shemesh, to the west of Jerusalem, is on the border between an ultra-Orthodox neighborhood and a community of modern Orthodox Jewish residents, many of them American immigrants.
The ultra-Orthodox consider the school an encroachment on their territory. Dozens of black-hatted men jeer and physically accost the girls almost daily, the students say.
Televised images of Naama sobbing en route to school have shocked many Israelis, elicited statements of outrage from the country's leadership, sparked a Facebook page with nearly 10,000 followers dedicated to "protecting little Naama" and plans for a demonstration later yesterday in her honor. As the case has attracted attention, extremists have heckled and thrown eggs and rocks at journalists descending on town.
"Who's afraid of an eight-year-old student?" said Sunday's main headline in the leading Yediot Ahronot daily.
Beit Shemesh's growing ultra-Orthodox population has erected street signs calling for the separation of sexes on the sidewalks, dispatched "modesty patrols" to enforce a chaste female appearance and hurled stones at offenders and outsiders. Walls of the neighborhood are plastered with signs exhorting women to dress modestly in closed-necked, long-sleeved blouses and long skirts.
Naama's case has been especially shocking because of her young age and because she attends a religious school and dresses with long sleeves and a skirt. Extremists, however, consider even that outfit, standard in mainstream Jewish religious schools, to be immodest.
This week Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke out against the violence. "The Israel police are taking, and will take, action to arrest and stop those who spit, harass or raise a hand. This has no place in a free and democratic state," he told his Cabinet.
Thousands of people were expected at yesterday's demonstration. Ahead of the gathering, President Shimon Peres urged the public to attend.
"All of us ... must defend the image of the state of Israel from a minority that is destroying national solidarity and expressing itself in an infuriating way," Peres said.
Naama Margolese is a ponytailed, bespectacled second-grader who is afraid of walking to her religious Jewish girls school for fear of ultra-Orthodox extremists who have spat on her and called her a whore for dressing "immodestly."
Her plight has drawn new attention to the simmering issue of religious coercion in Israel, and the increasing brazenness of extremists in the insular ultra-Orthodox Jewish community.
"When I walk to school in the morning I used to get a tummy ache because I was so scared ... that they were going to stand and start yelling and spitting," the pale, blue-eyed girl said in an interview with The Associated Press. "They were scary. They don't want us to go to the school."
The new girls school that Naama attends in the city of Beit Shemesh, to the west of Jerusalem, is on the border between an ultra-Orthodox neighborhood and a community of modern Orthodox Jewish residents, many of them American immigrants.
The ultra-Orthodox consider the school an encroachment on their territory. Dozens of black-hatted men jeer and physically accost the girls almost daily, the students say.
Televised images of Naama sobbing en route to school have shocked many Israelis, elicited statements of outrage from the country's leadership, sparked a Facebook page with nearly 10,000 followers dedicated to "protecting little Naama" and plans for a demonstration later yesterday in her honor. As the case has attracted attention, extremists have heckled and thrown eggs and rocks at journalists descending on town.
"Who's afraid of an eight-year-old student?" said Sunday's main headline in the leading Yediot Ahronot daily.
Beit Shemesh's growing ultra-Orthodox population has erected street signs calling for the separation of sexes on the sidewalks, dispatched "modesty patrols" to enforce a chaste female appearance and hurled stones at offenders and outsiders. Walls of the neighborhood are plastered with signs exhorting women to dress modestly in closed-necked, long-sleeved blouses and long skirts.
Naama's case has been especially shocking because of her young age and because she attends a religious school and dresses with long sleeves and a skirt. Extremists, however, consider even that outfit, standard in mainstream Jewish religious schools, to be immodest.
This week Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke out against the violence. "The Israel police are taking, and will take, action to arrest and stop those who spit, harass or raise a hand. This has no place in a free and democratic state," he told his Cabinet.
Thousands of people were expected at yesterday's demonstration. Ahead of the gathering, President Shimon Peres urged the public to attend.
"All of us ... must defend the image of the state of Israel from a minority that is destroying national solidarity and expressing itself in an infuriating way," Peres said.
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