Israel turns on itself (article about the ultra-orthodox riots)

[shaayecanaan]

Doctors discover that a woman from a small, anti-Zionist ultra-Orthodox sect, probably suffering from Münchausen by proxy syndrome, has been starving her 3-year-old, who has dwindled down to an emaciated 15 pounds. Social workers scoop up the kid and place him in intensive care at Hadassah hospital, and police scoop up the mother and put her in jail.

And then all hell breaks loose. A rabbi of the sect declares the event a blood libel, comparing the police to Cossacks. Immediately, young men in black robes and fur hats take to the streets, setting bus stops and dumpsters ablaze, pelting police with stones, and decrying the doctors of Hadassah as latter-day Josef Mengeles. Someone sets aflame the government welfare and social services building in the ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of Me’ah Shearim; others enter the building, smashing computer screens as they go. In the first three days after the toddler is taken for treatment, dozens more are sent to the hospital with wounds from stones and broken glass, and hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of city property are burned or smashed.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2009/07/20/israel_turns_on_itself

[billyoc]

1. Mentl.

[National Steel 27]

2. This could prove interesting.

Not wanting (or intending) to sound any any-thing, this looks as if it is on the round road to a circular firing squad.

[henank]

3. Nothing nearly so exciting

This happens every year on some pretext or other. The haredim don't have TVs, computers, don't go to movies or the mall or the beach or any of the other fun summer stuff. It's holiday time even for the yeshivas now, and they're bored. Eventually the Rabbis will step in and get their people to cool it, the police and/or welfare authorities will negotiate with the Rabbis and it will all be over until the next episode.