Extremism is a growing phenomenon in Orthodox Judaism, and this is perhaps most obvious in the Israeli city of Beit Shemesh. What can be done to counteract extremism? Is the excuse that, “The extremists are a tiny minority of our community” valid? And are we as vocal about extremism in our own sub-communities as we are when it appears elsewhere? Join Rachel Stomel, Anne Gordon, and Shoshanna Keats-Jaskoll for a discussion of this crucial issue. (Please note: this podcast was recorded several months ago, and makes reference to specific events that took place at that time.)
Rabbi Chuck Davidson explains to Chochmat Nashim the ins and outs of conversion in the State of Israel, with its large population of non-halakhically Jewish Jews. Yes, really.
“There’s no greater value for a Charedi woman than modesty.”
So said the former chief of staff for the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, Rabbi Dov Halbertal. He was explaining why posters raising awareness of breast cancer screening in Charedi society were inappropriate for the very population they were crafted to reach. No matter how carefully posters talking about women’s health are worded, he explained, the fact that they address women at all makes them inherently immodest.
How, then, does one convey a message about women’s health to those who have no access to the internet or television, and where “kosher” radio stations won’t utter the words “breast cancer”? Doesn’t the very absence of information in these women’s lives mean that they are the ones who most need to hear it?
Three major Israeli medical studies in the past decade have revealed that, despite the fact that Charedi women develop breast cancer at a lower rate than the general population, they suffer a 30 per cent higher mortality rate from the disease.
There are numerous unofficial theories as to why they are disproportionately dying from breast cancer. Ashkenazi Jews have a one in 40 chance of carrying a BRCA mutation, which significantly increases the risk and aggressiveness of the disease. Socioeconomic, health and lifestyle factors, such as poverty, poor diet and lack of exercise increase risk. In addition, too many are diagnosed in later stages due to lack of awareness about screening.
Charedi society values modesty as a high priority. The word “breast” is rarely uttered, even in women-only settings. When heightened modesty is coupled with a cultural reluctance to discuss “negative things” plus the need to appear as healthy as possible for potential marriage matches, and compounded by an overall reluctance to medical testing, it creates a population unaware of the risks and signs of a disease whose survival rate decreases rapidly the longer it is left undiagnosed. I’ve written about this extensively and lectured about it at the JOFA (Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance) conference in New York. It will be the topic of one of my upcoming UK lectures in July.
Ruth Colian of U’Bizchutan, a movement to get Charedi women into the Knesset, embarked on a campaign to raise awareness of breast cancer screening within her community two years ago. Recognising the sensitivity of the subject, she created a campaign designed to meet the needs of Charedi society.
Her billboard poster — a pashkevil, as they are known in Yiddish — called on women to “perform the Torah commandment of guarding one’s health” and to call a number for more information about mammography. She got rabbinic approval for her wording and set to work hanging the posters in Charedi neighbourhoods. Chochmat Nashim, an organisation of religious women that spotlights issues facing the Jewish community, raised funds for the campaign.
This year, 2,000 posters, 2,000 fliers and an enormous highway billboard broadcast the message. So far, Colian reports that 250 calls have come in, with men and women calling in nearly equal numbers. She tells them about the issue and gives them the current medical guidelines appropriate for their age.
When Colian tried to bring her campaign to the city of Bnai Brak, the majority of whose 182,000 residents are Charedi, she was told the posters would create panic and were immodest and inappropriate.
Halbertal echoed these claims in a television appearance with Colian, saying that public streets are not the place to discuss women’s issues but failed to suggest a viable alternative. Previous campaigns had attempted to raise awareness with brochures placed in mikvahs, that most private and feminine space, but were nixed by rabbis who claimed women would become fearful about their health, which in turn would ruin the mood on a night when husbands and wives were meant to be together.
In a segment of society where women’s health cannot be discussed, where internet campaigns don’t exist, where pink ribbons mean nothing, where health care clinic pamphlets are censored to remove women, where there are no women MKs and none of the male MKs attend women’s health committees, and where Charedi women from within the community like Colian are blocked from disseminating life-saving information, how exactly are women supposed to discover the need for the proactive, preventative care that can save their lives?
We need to make education and awareness accessible to all.
Though charedi women develop breast cancer less often than the general population, their mortality rate is 30% higher. Among the reasons for this is a lack of awareness of the disease and how to spot it. To counter this, Ruth Colian of Ubizchutan (a charedi women’s political party that ran for Knesset) decided to create ‘pashkevelim’ in modest language and post them in charedi areas.
For the second year running, Chochmat Nashim has joined with Ruth to raise funds for the campaign which reaches out to charedi women calling on them to ‘guard their lives’ (a Torah commandment) and to go for certain medical checks. The posters are written in the charedi style and in very modest language.
Unfortunately, when Ruth contacted the municipality of Bnai Brak- a very large charedi city, she was denied the right to hang posters there for fear of ‘creating panic in the city’. You can see the news story (in Hebrew) here.
This is the silence we are up against. The notion that a breast cancer awareness campaign (which never mentions the word breast or cancer out of sensitivity to the population) is suppressed by a municipality on the basis of creating panic…
With your help, we raised enough funds to create 2,000 posters and to rent a billboard at a major intersection (the Coca Cola intersection) of Bnai Brak (owned by a private individual). Posters were hung in Bet Shemesh, Jerusalem, El Ad and 2,000 fliers with the same message were given out in Bnai Brak and Jerusalem.
Last year the campaign brought in over 200 phone calls from men and women asking what they should do and what a mammogram is. We will continue to raise funds and awareness and collaborate with other organizations working within these populations to reduce these horrible statistics and save lives.
But most shocking of all that Rabbi Shafran writes is the question he asks rhetorically. “Are religious Zionists to be expected to condemn every outrage committed by a “hilltop youth?” YES, Rabbi Shafran. YES they are! That is what it means to be a moral and responsible person.
I wrote these words on Yom Hashoah and this is the number one lesson that I have taken from the Holocaust. Not that people hate us, not that we must circle the wagons, not that we should make excuses for extremism and say it’s only a few crazies, but that when people do bad things, it is our moral and religious obligation to stand against them — every time. I honestly cannot believe this is something I need to explain to a rabbi.
I invite Rabbi Shafran to come and spend some time in Beit Shemesh since he appears not to believe its residents. He will see children tearing Israeli flags off cars, soldiers being physically attacked and called Nazis, and young boys with payot calling Jewish mothers ‘shiksas’.
Come ride the Number 11 bus and you can hear Jewish men telling Jewish women and girls to go to the back of the bus. This is the next generation of Haredi Jews here, Rabbi. Our town is the canary in the coal mine of Jewish extremism. That you care more about the reputation of your community than its actual health and future says more about its decay than any additional evidence I might bring.
What was once called “extremism” is the new normal. It is not, as Shafran writes, a phenomenon of a small group of “outliers” who throw things or call people names, while the majority “fully embrace all Jews, including those estranged from observance or mired in the milieu.” Rather, both the political and religious establishments in the Haredi world are increasingly intolerant of anything but the Haredi worldview.
