Israel – Knesset Education Committee Chairman Alex Miller (Israel Beiteinu) gave cities in which haredi high school girls are not enrolled anywhere one month to change that situation or to provide a very good explanation for it, after a lengthy hearing on the situation of Sephardi teens who remain at home because the schools of their choice wouldn’t accept them.
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Miller also encouraged the Education Ministry to implement “budgetary sanctions” against institutions that practice ethnic discrimination, or even fire their principals.
MK Haim Amsalem (Shas) had demanded the meeting weeks ago, after hearing that Sephardi girls in Modi’in Illit had not been accepted to local schools.
Amsalem, along with Shas Party Chairman Interior Minister Eli Yishai, had written to their Ashkenazi colleagues at United Torah Judaism, imploring them to help resolve the problem, noting it reflects badly on the entire haredi sector.
While three Shas MKs – Amsalem, Nissim Ze’ev and Avraham Michaelshvili – attended the Tuesday meeting, no UTJ representative came. Faction leader Menahem Eliezer Moses informed the committee that he dealt with problems pertaining to elementary education, not high schools.
The meeting opened with representatives of the Jerusalem educational system informing the committee that of the 2,500 ninth-grade haredi girls in the capital, only 28 remained out of school at this stage.
This, the officials said, was due to the parents’ refusal to send their daughters to institutions offered by the city, and not on ethnic grounds.
Sometimes, a student simply is not suited for the school she applies to, said Itamar Bar-Ezer, who is in charge of the haredi education in the capital.
“You need to match apples with apples and pears with pears,” he noted, stressing later that the different types of fruit he mentioned did not imply different ethnicities.
Similar problems exist in Modi’in Illit and Bnei Brak, as relayed by parents of girls who were rejected from Ashkenazi schools. The official reason given never related to ethnicity, but according to the parents, there was no other feasible explanation.
Education Ministry director-general Dr. Shimshon Shoshani informed the committee that his ministry was boosting the number of inspectors in the haredi education system, and said that while haredi schools were entitled to have regulations that reflect the sensitivities of their lifestyle, “the rules must be clear and transparent.”
Shoshani also said that an appeals committee would be formed and its procedures made public.
“The ministry will accept no form of discrimination,” Shoshani said, and suggested that parents who encounter it, file a complaint with the police, as it is against the law.
Yoav Laloum of the Noar Kahalacha NGO, who was behind a petition last year to the High Court of Justice regarding the situation in an Emmanuel Beit Ya’acov school, said that haredi families fear to speak out against such phenomena, because it can lead to parents and siblings being shunned and persecuted.
“Parents who dared complain received threats at their synagogues and workplaces. They are afraid,” he said.
On Monday, the newly formed committee of rabbis convened under the auspices of Religious Affairs Minister Ya’acov Margi (Shas) to discuss discrimination against Sephardim in the haredi educational system. Shas is also formulating a bill to combat the phenomenon that they say is plaguing cities nationwide.
As a Syrian Jew I sometimes feel that we should not throw $$$ at these specific Ashkenazi Organizations who discriminate. Many of us here are very naive.
I guess Hashem wants us to continue giving because that’s what real Judiasm is all about.
How interesting! Reb Steinman recently lashed out also against this disgrace. Only problem is how to get those in charge to change their views. They certainly all feel they know best so you aren’t going to change their mind. I guess they only way is to force it down their throats by taking away govenment funding.
Can someone please explain to me why its NOT okay for a goy to discriminate against a jew, and we ‘shry chai vekayam’ when it DOES happen, but ashkenazis can discriminate against sephardim no problem? In fact, if in America, Canada, or any civilized part of the world, one would discriminate against an ethnic makeup like they do in Israel, he would go to jail!
While I agree that Ashkenazim shouldn’t discriminate Sephardic Jews, because we are all memebers of the same family, but on the other hand, who the hell the medinah thinks they are to give some lessons to Charedim about discriminating another Jew? The medinah is one of the countries where discrimination against other Jews is the strongest. The establishment discriminates against Sephardic and Mizrachic Jews, the medinah discriminates against Ethiopian Jews who converted (I’m not talking about those Ethiopians who refused tu undergo a Giur L’Chumrah), the medinah discriminates against Charedi Jews, etc. They should first mind their own business before giving lessons to Charedim.
I agree that the requirements to get accepted to any school should be very clear and based on actual practices like wearing certain stuff or not going to certain places, and not on race. This would assure that the argument the parents had in Emanuel about bad influence would have been more black and white. Either they follow the rules and get accepted, or the school has a valid reason to reject them.
about time that someone stops it the discrimination against them goes back many years but now we are deciding who can go to a publicly financed yeshiva i thought yeshivas were there to educate not discriminate
It is not about sefardi vs. askenazi – all of these schools are integrated – the issue is level of observance – both ashkenazim and sefardim are denied if they do not live up to the school standards