Facing up to the fear

Figures on domestic violence in haredi community are increasingly mirroring those among secular Israelis; but for religious women, speaking out about it is the greatest challenge

By RUTH EGLASH
Religions woman hiding her face 311 (photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem)
Religions woman hiding her face 311
(photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem)
Within hours of being attacked and beaten by her husband in front of customers at the supermarket where she worked, Rachel (not her real name) put herself and her three-year-old daughter in a taxi and headed to a battered women’s shelter.
A few days earlier, she had walked out on her husband after he’d tried to strangle her.
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“I was getting ready for work one day when my husband burst in; he said he did not like that I was going,” says the soft-spoken 26- year-old. “He told me, ‘You’re not going to work today,’ then he locked the front door, hid the keys and said, ‘This is the last day of your life.’”
Rachel recounts that her husband grabbed her daughter, scratched her face and started swearing at both of them.
“He hit me really hard across my face, and then I ran with my daughter into our bedroom and locked the door,” she says, her matter-of-factness conveying her past few months of intensive therapy. “I started screaming and banging on the walls for my neighbor or someone to come and help me. Eventually, my neighbor called the police, and they came and got me out.”
Immediately after that, Rachel and her daughter went to live with her mother, but a few days later her husband arrived at the supermarket where she worked.
“He came in and walked straight over to the check-out counter where I was working,” she says. “He started shouting at me, calling me names, and then he pulled my hair and hit me in front of all the customers.”
Although there were numerous witnesses, the police have yet to issue a warrant against her husband, who is still living in the apartment they shared, says Rachel, adding that it was not the first time he was abusive to her but that it would be the last.
“I haven’t seen him since then, and I don’t want to see him,” she states, her voice growing shaky. “My mother had also been abused, and she knew exactly what to do for me. She put me in a taxi and sent me to the same shelter where she had been [eight years ago]. I’ve been here ever since.
“It’s so hard. My daughter still talks about when daddy hid the keys and when mommy cried.”
While Rachel’s story is indicative of many women in physically abusive relationships, what sets her apart from the majority of victims seeking help is that she was raised in a religious family, and the shelter where she sought refuge three months ago is Bat Melech, the only battered women’s shelter in the country for Orthodox and haredi women and their children.
IT’S A sunny day in mid-November when I visit Bat Melech. Apart from the small group of women wearing head coverings, little boys with sidelocks and religious paintings hanging on several walls, there is little that sets the place apart from the country’s 14 other battered women’s shelters.
Partially funded by the government, with additional money from international and local donors, Bat Melech (“King’s Daughter”) provides a home to up to 12 women and their children. Roughly 50 women and hundreds of children pass through the shelter’s doors every year, with some staying for up to a year but moving on with their lives after six months. All are seeking to escape violent or abusive husbands, and all share the courage to speak out about their situation and seek help.
“It’s all down to awareness,” says Sari Meir, a social worker who has managed the shelter since its inception. “In the past, this issue was swept under the rug in Orthodox and haredi circles, but now we are all hearing about it and, unfortunately, about the women being murdered by their husbands.”
The latest figures from the Women’s International Zionist Organization (WIZO), released in time for last Thursday, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, show that 17 women were murdered by their husbands or partners so far this year, up from the 15 murdered in 2009. Further figures show that up to 200,000 women and 600,000 children become victims of domestic violence every year.
“The figures in the religious community are similar to those in the secular community,” says attorney Noach Korman, who founded Bat Melech 15 years ago after being approached by a desperate young haredi woman who had been sent back numerous times to live with her violent husband.
“This is an issue that simply cannot be hidden any longer. We should not feel comfortable with these figures, and we have to make people realize that women do not have to live in violent marriages. There is another way for them.”
Korman, the center’s executive director, tells the story of a young woman who arrived at the shelter after fleeing her violent husband.
“One day, the rebbetzin from the girl’s community called me. She knew the husband’s family well and said she wanted to talk to the girl,” he recalls. “I asked her whether she was going to try to persuade the girl to return home and she said, ‘I would never tell a woman to get divorced.’ When I asked her if a woman should always return to her husband even if that husband beats her, she didn’t answer. I think she understood. We need to make people realize that violence is not normal. We have managed to change attitudes in the religious community a little, but more needs to be done and not everyone believes that things should change.”
WHILE THERE might be reluctance in the religious community to accept the growing awareness of this issue, figures provided by Korman, who also runs the Israel Center for Family Justice, which works hand in hand with the shelter to help more than 1,500 abused women each year seeking to end their marriages, reveal that the number of women requesting a refuge from violent husbands has increased in the last five years from 99 referrals in 2003 to 1,578 in 2008.
This means that, due to lack of space, many religious women in need of assistance must be turned away or sent to wait at one of the secular shelters.
“It is very important that these women go to a religious shelter, says Meir. “When they arrive here, they are very weak and need to be in an environment that is familiar to them. It is very important to them that they can keep kosher and observe Shabbat.”
For most of the women, says Meir, it is not their faith that has been shaken but their confidence in themselves and their ability to break away from their violent marriages.
In addition, Korman points out that many of the women are new immigrants from the US, France or Russia. He says most turn to the shelter because they have no close family or long-standing friends in the country that can be there to support them.
On the day of my visit, Meir and the other staff members are in a panic after receiving a phone call asking for help. They explain that something in the woman’s voice and the fact that her husband allegedly threatened her with a gun means they will have no choice but to take her in.
“Something in her story set off alarm bells for me,” explains Meir, who has worked with battered women for nearly two decades. “We have to take her in. Even though we don’t really have room, we will find somewhere for her to put her head. We must.”
FINDING ENOUGH space to house all the battered women who need help is not the only challenge facing Korman and his staff. Encouraging religious leaders to change their approach toward the battered women and persuading those women to come forward and seek help are other major battles where progress is slow.
Despite this, Korman is practical when he talks about the community’s spiritual leaders.
“I think the rabbis don’t really know what to do when an abused woman comes to them for help,” he says. “I think in most cases, violent men do not listen to their rabbis because these men are caught up in a world of power, and their wives are their punching bags. The rabbis cannot do much to stop them, and they need to find alternative help.”
Korman says this was made clear to him about 10 years ago when Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef turned to Bat Melech for help.
“A battered woman had arrived at the rabbi’s house with a suitcase,” he recounts. “The rabbi overheard her crying in the other room and didn’t know what to do. At first he said she should go back to her husband; but when he heard her story, he asked his daughter for advice. She suggested calling us. We gave him a solution, and he has been a great support to us ever since.”
With support slowly coming from religious leaders, the next big challenge according to Meir is encouraging religious women to come forward and seek help.
“Many women do not go to the social services,” says Meir. “They are scared and don’t trust social workers, so we have to advertise our service cautiously in the Yellow Pages [for the haredi community].”
Bat Melech also operates a hot line for women suffering violence, and in many instances cases are referred to the shelter by rabbis or family members.
It’s not easy, admit Korman and Meir.
In the religious community, there are many stigmas attached to a woman’s leaving her husband; and with large families, the financial burden for a single woman can be immense. While 75 percent of the women who leave Bat Melech go on to become independent, 25% end up returning to their abusive husbands because of financial fears. Some, says Korman, end up returning to the shelter at a later stage.
“The women who leave the shelter are the poorest people in society; we try to help them after they leave, but it is very hard for them,” he adds.
For Rachel, however, the chance to start a new life makes her sad eyes sparkle.
“When I arrived here, I felt warmth I cannot describe,” she says. “There was nowhere else I could go. Even my mother’s house was not safe, so for now this is the only place I can call home. However, I do hope that eventually I will be able to obtain a get and move out of here. Then I will hopefully find a job and an apartment. It will be difficult I know, but I think I will manage.”
For more information, visit the website www.batmelech.org. The hot line for religious women facing domestic violence is 1-800-292-333.