A large disturbance in a small world

Revelations that a pedophile ring has been allegedly operating in Nahlaot have sent shock waves through the community.

By SETH J. FRANTZMAN
Nahlaot playground 521 (photo credit: SETH J. FRANTZMAN)
Nahlaot playground 521
(photo credit: SETH J. FRANTZMAN)
Itai and Ortal, an Anglo couple who immigrated to Israel several years ago and live in Nahlaot with their children, were shocked when they heard the news. Ortal remembers, “We used to live on his street, and he was part of the community, an odd part maybe. My children talked to him, and they were excited to see him. He gave them toys, and once he even brought me photos he had taken of them. I would try to avoid him. He was a classic description of a pedophile, so stereotypical that we used to joke about it.”
Several months ago, four men were arrested on suspicion of pedophilia and another was arrested two weeks ago, according to a Jerusalem police spokesman.
On September 7, the writer of the blog Jewishmom.com published an entry entitled “My neighbor, the pedophile.” She described a community living in a nightmare. “Earlier this year, four...
residents, all single men in their 50s, were arrested for luring young children with candy and then molesting and raping them. And then this past Sunday, the man accused of leading this neighborhood network of pedophiles was arrested as well.”
Israel Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld was able to provide the following details: “Over the last few weeks there were five male suspects that were arrested who were involved in a large-scale investigation, involving a pedophile ring that acted within Nahlaot and the center of Jerusalem. The victims were haredi children who were apparently sexually abused by the five men. Arrests were made immediately when an official complaint was made and all five appeared before the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court and they were remanded… These are the main suspects… In general we work closely with the social services [in cases like this and this is] one of the largest cases [not only] within the haredi community but in Israel [as a whole].”
Nahlaot is an eclectic neighborhood. Built in the 19th century, it was constructed around a series of courtyards where different Jewish groups, such as those from Syria, Iraq and Morocco, lived. Today it combines the remnants of those groups with a mixture of haredim, hippies, students, painters, intellectuals and many Anglos. Despite the diversity, Nahlaot is still a small world where many people know each other, where fewer people even know the names of the countless small alleyways, and where children, until recently, roamed freely without a worry by their parents.
Another resident, Shira, remembers that she was “shocked that it could happen here in this neighborhood… There are pedophiles loose in here… After the [suspected] perpetrator was arrested, then all the people I know suddenly began talking about it. They were talking about it in synagogue, they talked about it among themselves… I think now parents will be more proactive and speak to their children in a different way, warning them that the people involved could look just like their neighbors.”
One of the issues that most of those interviewed stressed was that they felt the police have not done a thorough job. Itai is intense when he explains, “There is gross neglect by the police. It seems that laws of this sort are in some gray area. The courts seem to be especially harsh in excluding the testimony of most of the child victims.”
Shira says that people feel helpless and feel that the police are not serving them. “I don’t understand why people who were arrested and, as I heard, confessed, are released to house arrest. And it isn’t real house arrest; they are still walking the streets.”
Those who have heard about the case and have been personally affected by it are still doing soul searching.
Some fear that their own children were harmed and don’t know how to approach them. They are frustrated that the police haven’t interviewed them.
“I think the police are out of their element. They admit that they haven’t come across this kind of thing before on such a scale. They have confiscated the computers of the [suspected] pedophiles, and there has been talk that there were films made of the victims, but no one is going around trying to inform people if their children’s photos were on the computers,” says Ortal.
One issue people are confronting is how to organize the community. Shira is angry. “I want to know why we are not apprised of the fact that there are pedophiles in our midst. I think if a pedophile moves into a community, then the community has to know, like it is in America. Once someone serves time and is out, it is a mental disease,” she says.
Itai and Ortal agree that the community has reacted well to what happened. “Some of the children affected come from a very religious community. The children couldn’t even describe, they didn’t know the words to describe, what happened, what they saw.
But the community has done a great job in confronting this issue.”
The accused was well known in the courtyard where he lived. Ruthi Cohen, who lived across the courtyard from him, recalls that “He was able to obtain a small garden in the courtyard, next to a kindergarten and a small basketball or soccer court… He used us in the neighborhood to help him further his aims. He used to do sports. He came to me and said, ‘I’m making a garden in memory of Moses Montefiore,’ and in that way he got people to help and support him.”
After people heard that the suspect had been arrested, several residents decided to destroy the garden that he had maintained. As part of the decoration in the garden were a child’s chair, a bicycle and other things associated with children. It was seen as a symbol and something that would continue to remind children of what had happened to them.
Working through the night, one resident dismantled the garden. Itai says, “I want to burn the garden.
I saw what this woman was doing who destroyed it; it was important from a standpoint of vengeance.”
But some people are not convinced that the latest arrest was justified. While they know that the other men arrested are being held by the police, they worry that gossip may be leading people to think and do the wrong things. One woman who runs a small clothing shop shows me where the ruined garden is: “I used to see him often here and I just heard that this man has been released by the police.
He is scared now to show his face. The police let him go so, there is a good chance his connection to this was based on gossip and these people maliciously took it into their hands to ruin this place, some of these things that he devoted his time to, like the garden and a wall near it. All of it were destroyed and the area totally cleared by people that live around here. And it is based, it seems to me, on rumors, nothing else concrete. It could turn out to be a shame.”
She shrugs her shoulders, her downcast eyes and grim expression illustrating painful doubts.