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On Losing G, on Losing Our Way

September 9, 2015 by

 

By Lauren Dellar, ATZUM’s Grants Coordinator


On August 13, 2015, a young woman, G, took her life at the 98 Hayarkon Street, Tel-Aviv brothel where she was prostituted. She could no longer bear the torture and torment of being brutalized nightly. I spoke with Michal Leibel, Director of ATZUM’s Task Force on Human Trafficking, to discuss this tragic event.

Why do you feel that G’s suicide struck so responsive a chord with Israel society?

ML: G, who made aliyah from the former Soviet Union at 15, led a life of humiliation and agonizing pain as a prostituted/trafficked person. She had to drink and drug herself each night to steel herself in preparation to “service” 20-30 of the brothel’s johns who paid to repeatedly rape her. Given the fact that she was a prostituted woman and an addict, both carrying tremendous social stigma, it is really astonishing the Israel public has sympathized so deeply with her pain and mourned her death.  

Why such public outcry at this particular time? 

ML: It’s hard to know exactly, but first, the public has been exposed to increasing coverage of the sordid story of Einat Harel, 51, known as the Tel-Aviv Madam, who ran a brothel for a decade.  In July, 2015, she was indicted for pimping, soliciting for prostitution and money laundering on an unprecedented scale.  Soon after, Israel’s daily Yediyot Ahronot published an article about her which was followed by an interview with Guy Peled on the August 31 segment of Channel Two’s highly popular Friday night program regarding her most recent indictment.  Without compunction, Ms. Harel stuck to her story – prostitution empowers women and enables independence – and suggested the police pursue “real criminals” instead of hounding those who seek to facilitate free enterprise.

The public, however, wasn’t having any of it. There was huge online response, slamming the interviewer for giving this woman a platform to glamorize and legitimize prostitution as simply a lifestyle choice.  I am glad to say viewers saw through the lie and are starting to engage the evil of prostitution in a serious manner.

Second, the much respected Jerusalem Film Festival recently screened an important documentary – “Strung Out” (English title) or “Bat Zona” (“daughter of a whore”). The movie, exceedingly painful, relates in a very sensitive manner the story of a group of young women living on the streets of South Tel-Aviv, victims of heroin and prostitution.  Again, the public was challenged to consider their preconceptions about prostitution. The film went on to win the Van Leer Award for Israeli Cinema – Documentary Film.

What was TFHT’s initial response?

ML: When G’s story broke, we understood first and foremost the need to recognize her passing in a respectable manner. (G is a moniker initially used by the press; we continue to refer to her as G as she has family in Israel, including a sister she helped support, whose identity we seek to protect.) The Task Force initially posted a public death notice (customary practice in Israel upon the passing of a loved one or revered member of the community) in Hebrew, English, and Russian on social media platforms. We also wanted mainstream press to step up.  We asked Elem, Israel’s leading organization working with troubled youth, including prostituted teens, to approach Ha’aretz and use their influence to urge them to post the notice pro bono. They did. This was extraordinary, the first time notification of the death of a person identified as a prostitute was published.

death-notices

 

What happened next?

Soon the notice attracted social media attention. In response, the Coalitzia l’ Ma’avak Bznut (Coalition for the Fight Against Prostitution), facilitated by TFHT, sprang into action.  The Coalition is comprised of women who are victims of trafficking and have escaped prostitution, and NGOs working on issues related to ending prostitution and aiding prostituted persons. Our initial intent was to issue a collective statement to the authorities and appeal in writing for closure of the brothel on 98 Hayarkon Street, the decrepit brothel where G worked and took her life.

Did the Coalition make any formal appeals in this regard?

ML: A letter penned by the Task Force in the name of the Coalition was addressed to Gilad Erdan, Minister of Public Security, Shlomo Lamberger, Tel-Aviv District Prosecutor, and Benzi Sau, Tel-Aviv Police Commissioner. In it we called for immediate closure of the brothel. The letter further demanded prosecution of its owners and management on charges of pimping and owning and running brothel. We also urged the authorities to consider adding another charge, negligent homicide, for inducing a person to commit suicide as there is precedent for such a charge in Israel.  

How else did the Coalition respond to the public outrage over G’s death?

ML: The Coalition partners also wanted to organize a public commemoration ceremony to give voice to people’s grief, and pay tribute to G and other women brutalized through prostitution and trafficking. We sought a public permit to gather in front of the brothel and were granted permission to assemble in a garden two houses away. Having opened a Facebook event, public interest grew at an amazing pace. Within hours, conventional media sought interviews with TFHT and Coalition partners for current commentary and insights. 

We thought 50-100 people would show up. However, once we understood that the death announcement had reached the Facebook accounts of more than 97,000 people, we saw that it was going to be a different type of event.  Requests to help started pouring in and we included everyone.

There has been so much written about the event which seemed to galvanize so many. Can you share more about it?

ML: TFHT facilitated the evening, which began with a minute of silence and was followed by a somber reading of a list of 42 people and their ages at the time of their deaths, all of which were related to being prostituted and trafficked. These women, and one young man, lost their lives over the last five years through murder, suicide, STDs, drug and alcohol addiction, and the physical and emotional toll of unrelenting abuse and exploitation. Some were killed by cars as they stood on the street to attract clients in order to meet their nightly quota required by their pimps. This practice of reading names in memoriam is an important Jewish tradition. People’s names are important. Their lives were important.

 

table

Partial list of those who have lost their lives to the violence of prostitution since 2011

All who so desired, spoke. Included were women who had escaped prostitution, Coalition members, MK Merav Michaeli (Zionist Union), and mayoral advisors. Beyond the speeches, the evening gave platform to those who sang and shared their poetry. Well-known artist Yuval Goldenberg sang some of her original pieces;  Adi Arnon sang the haunting “Alfonsina y el mar” in homage to one who has taken his or her life; and Michal Givony sang “Lean on Me” and “Blackbird”.  Two Israeli poetesses read their work created for the evening. Marva Zohar recited “In memory of G” and Inbal Eshel Cahansky read a poem about the experience of prostitution.  It was very powerful.

In the end, how many people attended?

ML: Nearly 900 men and women joined.  Others have since learned about the event, as it was filmed by Chen Peter of Social TV. Yuval Feder made a beautiful video of the evening.  After the ceremony, the crowd and passersby gravitated toward the brothel, blocking entry and protesting.  Two women prostituted in that brothel told one of the other organizers: “Kol hakavod, good that you woke up. It really says something to us that so many people came to honor G. You just can’t imagine how many other Gs there are.”

rally

What was the initial outcome of the event?

ML: I’m glad to say that the police issued a closure order to the brothel two days later and we hope that will hold and the relevant people will be charged. But much need be done: 98 Hayarkon, a place well known to the police, is but one of 200-250 brothels and “discrete” apartments in Tel-Aviv where women and girls are prostituted daily .

How will you pursue this goal and how will you continue to bring the press and public more deeply into the cause?

ML: There was a remarkable amount of media attention, which is great given how powerful the press is in shaping public opinion. People are beginning to understand that a civil, caring society cannot tolerate the systematic rape of women, men and transgender people.  Since G’s suicide, TFHT and other NGOs have been approached by print, radio and television journalists on a daily and sometimes hourly basis. The question is what will happen after this is no longer headline news? [List of links is available below.]

ATZUM, in partnership with the law firm of Kabiri-Nevo-Keidar, will continue to assert the urgent need for Israel to pass Nordic Model legislation, the international standard designed to criminalize pimps and johns and protect the prostituted person, nearly always a victim of past sexual abuse.  Since 2003, the Task Force has lobbied and called on all Members of Knesset and government ministers to pass such legislation, the best means of saving people from the brutality of prostitution and trafficking. In each successive government, the Task Force has secured increased support. However, given Israel’s unscheduled elections, we have had to remount our campaign every few years. I am hopeful that people, now outraged, will join in demanding that Israel’s lawmakers protect the prostituted person and support their reintegration into the workforce.

But not everyone supports Nordic Model legislation.

ML: The proposed law based on Nordic Model legislation is not a panacea and has its detractors. I was interviewed on August 23 by Attila Somfalvi on Ynet’s online news program with another lawyer, Noga Wiesel, who opposes Nordic Model legislation. She argued that entering prostitution is a personal choice. I understand the logic of such an argument yet it does not take into account that the vast majority of prostituted women are indeed victims of incest, rape and abuse in childhood and through adolescence. Further, too many young women may be drawn to prostitution, assuming it to be “easy money”, not comprehending its dreadful personal costs.

The notion of personal choice as a major factor discounts the massive number of women who are coerced, tricked and trafficked into prostituting themselves. In many cases, these young women are literally sex slaves, raped nightly with no means to change their situation. This is happening in our midst and, in some cases in plain sight of law enforcement officers. I can tell you, it’s easy to get into prostitution, nearly impossible to get out.

How easy is it?

ML: On August 20, Tzinor Lila, a TV show that examines trending social media issues tested it. On air, journalist Noa Zlotnik, identifying herself as someone with no prior experience in prostitution, answered an ad looking for women. When she asked about how she might find out more, the pimp responded, “I’m a little short on girls today.  Come now.  The others will show you what to do.” The entire conversation took a few minutes!  It’s about time we all understand that purchasing sex is not legitimate, that for every hour a john pays for sex with a woman they are financing a tragic exploitation of another human being’s body and soul.

What do you take away from these past few weeks?

ML: The cause itself has greater credibility, more legitimacy. TFHT, the only Israel NGO solely focused on legislative change (and other NGOs working to shelter prostituted women and seek their reintegration into society) has increased public support.  For the first time, the individual and social cost of prostitution is now part of the public discourse.  In Israel, where political and existential crises demand our daily attention, it is not easy for issues of social relevance to become and remain part of the public agenda.

Also, it seems that something had changed. If three years ago ninety percent of media talkbacks were hostile towards prostituted women, judging them and assuming prostitution to be a profession one chose on par with being an accountant, a nurse, or a lawyer, we now see a shift. We are starting to realize the fruits of our long sustained efforts (with thanks to those who have supported us with their time and financial resources) and believe that together we now make a stronger case addressing the critical issue of demand, and gaining ground in passing legislation to protect women from G’s fate.

Public comments like, “G was a person…she doesn’t deserve our condemnation and judgment.” “I am so sorry for this poor woman who was prostituted out of distress. We should all respect her memory – RIP” suggest we are entering a new era.

The Knesset is now in recess so we don’t have an immediate opportunity to lobby its members and government ministers. However, we are in ongoing contact with Shuli Moalem Rafaeli (Ha Bayit Hehudi), Zehava Gal-On (Meretz) and Merav Michaeli (Zionist Union), who support our cause and are dedicated to promoting the bill TFHT recently authored.


Additional Links

 

 

Filed Under: Blog, Task Force on Human Trafficking

Important Update from ATZUM’s Task Force on Human Trafficking

September 3, 2015 by

TFHT-rally for G

For the last two weeks, Israel society has been deeply engaged in a dialogue about the evils of prostitution. The intensive public discourse on the exploitation of vulnerable, prostituted girls and women was triggered by a tragic event.

On August 13, G, a 36-year-old woman who made aliyah from the FSU at age 15 and had been prostituted for half her life, committed suicide in the brothel in which she was raped and abused nightly by 20-30 johns, six nights a week.

The place where this tragedy took place, located at 98 Hayarkon Street in the heart of Tel-Aviv, and in operation for a decade, is one of the area’s 200-250 brothels and “discrete” apartments well known to law enforcement agencies. It is also where nearly 900 Israelis gathered on August 22 to mourn G’s death, urge society to confront the brutal cost of prostitution, and act to assure its abolishment.

The event in G’s memory was organized by ATZUM-TFHT and a national coalition of NGOs working on related issues. The aim was to bring public awareness to the many other nameless, faceless women suffering the same debasement, who too often feel that they have no choice but to take their own lives in order to escape.

The evening began with somber reading of a list of 42 women who died in the last five years due to prostitution and trafficking. A moment of silence followed. NGO coalition members, Members of Knesset (MKs), and mayoral advisors spoke, as did women who had escaped prostitution. The mourners eventually moved to block the entrance to the brothel where G died and where johns were seen still entering the building. Two women prostituted in the same brothel joined the memorial service and told one of the other organizers, “Kol hakavod, good that you woke up. It really says something to us that so many people came to honor G. You just can’t imagine how many other G’s there are.”

TFHT has been in the Hebrew and English-language news (print, radio, and television) daily since publishing a public death notice in G’s name, a customary practice in Israel upon the passing of a loved one or revered member of the community. This itself was extraordinary—the first time that respectful notification of the death of a person identified as a prostitute was published.

G’s tragic end is important, a defining moment which insists Israel society open its eyes and take action. Her death lifts the veil that cloaks the public’s misconception that women choose prostitution, a falsehood perpetrated by those who claim it to be a harmless personal choice, and one that facilitates a woman’s independence. And who is actually claiming this to be true but the johns whose demand for sex finances prostitution and the pimps and traffickers who are the true beneficiaries of the flesh trade.

Einat Harel, 51, known as the Tel-Aviv Madam, who ran a brothel for nearly a decade, was interviewed on the August 31 segment of Channel Two’s highly popular Friday night program regarding her most recent indictment on charges of pimping, soliciting for prostitution and money laundering.  Without compunction, Harel suggested the police pursue “real criminals” instead of hounding those who seek to facilitate free enterprise. The public outcry was tremendous.  The interviewer was slammed for giving this woman a platform to glamorize and legitimize prostitution as a simple lifestyle choice. 

“I am glad to say viewers saw through Harel’s lie and are starting to engage in a serious manner,” said Michal Leibel, a lawyer and TFHT Director. Speaking in an August 24 interview in Media Line, Leibel argued that “Legalization has been shown to increase demand for prostitution, as the trade becomes legal and therefore no longer taboo…[failing] in its attempts to improve the lives of [the prostituted person]…Violence and sexual attacks towards [the] prostitute[d], and women as a whole across society, may increase in a culture where women can be purchased freely.”This is intolerable.

ATZUM, its TFHT co-founder the law firm Kabiri-Nevo-Keidar, and our philanthropic partners mourn G whose suicide prompts us to redouble efforts to ensure passage and enactment of law based on Nordic Model legislation, the international standard designed to criminalize pimps and johns and protect the prostituted person.

As the Knesset is currently in recess, our continuing lobbying efforts of MKs and government ministers must wait a few more weeks. However, we are in ongoing contact with Shuli Moalem Rafaeli (Ha Bayit Hehudi), Zehava Gal-On (Meretz) and Merav Michaeli (Zionist Union) who support our cause and are dedicated to promoting the bill the Task Force recently authored.

Hopefully, G’s death will be written in Israel history as the pivotal moment in the cause of criminalizing johns and supporting survivors of prostitution; hopefully, one day her real name will be known as a source for pride and respect.

Note: An in depth interview with Michal Leibel will follow in the coming days and an update from P119 will soon be issued. Recent English-language posts:

Filed Under: Blog, Current and Past Events

Paying the Price

August 8, 2015 by

JCast

July 15, 2015

By Rebecca Hughes

At least once a week, someone mistakes me for a prostitute. It started two years ago when I moved to south Tel-Aviv. At first I didn’t understand why cars were pulling up alongside me as I walked home, trailing me for a few moments and then driving away. After a few months I casually mentioned this strange behavior to one of my neighbors.

“They think you’re a prostitute,” she stated matter-of-factly. I must have looked offended, because she quickly added, “Don’t worry, it’s not just you. It happens to me too.”

Suddenly, many odd interactions began to make sense. For instance, the man who stopped me on street, insisting that he knew me.

“Don’t I know you?” he asked, looking me up and down.

“I don’t think so.”  I responded.

“Ahh…” he hesitated.

“Can I help you with something? Do you need directions?”

“Yes, yes. I need directions.”

“Where to?”

“Ahh…never mind,” he mumbled over his shoulder as he walked quickly away.

paying-the-priceMen would approach me in the middle of the day when I was on my way to a meeting, or at night when I was coming back from the gym. Sometimes I was able to laugh about it, but mostly I was annoyed and angry. Annoyed that I had to interact with sex-buyers who just assumed that a woman walking alone was a prostitute, and angry that they were permitted to purchase the sexual services they felt entitled to from women who lacked my privilege. Yes, I was annoyed and angry. But I wasn’t frightened until March 19, 2015.

It was a perfectly ordinary Thursday morning in south Tel Aviv. People were going to work, or walking to the market, or on their way to the bus stop.  On the corner of Har-Zion and Salame, less than 100 meters from my apartment, a 37-year-old woman was walking her dog. Suddenly, a man ran up to her, slammed her against the wall of an apartment building, threw her to her knees, pulled down his pants, and sodomized her.

The attack lasted for ten minutes. For ten minutes, the woman tried to fight him off. For ten minutes, she struggled and screamed as people walked by, glanced at her and then looked away, and continued along their way. For ten minutes, dozens of people who passed her on their way to work and school paid her no notice. Taxis pulled up next to where she was kneeling and then drove off. Buses drove by.

After ten minutes, one person stopped and called the police. As the sirens approached, the attacker pulled up his pants and casually strolled away.

Now let us consider why, in the warm daylight of an ordinary Thursday morning, dozens of people witnessed a vicious sexual assault in progress, but averted their gazes, closed their ears to the victim’s screams, continued texting or talking on their cell phones, and kept walking. Let us consider why no one called out to the woman to ask if she needed help. Why no one shouted at the attacker, even from a distance. Why the rape continued for ten long, horrific minutes, before one person decided to call the police.

I’ve asked a lot of people this question, and it made all of them uncomfortable. Several surmised that it was due to the “bystander effect,” a theory which proposes that when there are many witnesses to an attack, people tend to assume that “someone else” will help, or are afraid to be the first to intervene; and thus watch but don’t act, or walk away.

It’s an interesting theory to ponder. But let’s consider something even more interesting: people witnessing an attack are less likely to intervene if they think the attacker is the victim’s husband or boyfriend. In controlled experiments, researchers found that when the woman yelled, “Get away from me; I don’t know you,” onlookers intervened more often than not. But if the woman instead yelled “Get away from me; I don’t know why I ever married you,” most people just walked by. The assumption is that there are circumstances in which a man has a right to assault a woman.

And, of course, if the passers-by assume the woman is a prostitute…well, then, it’s to be expected. Normal. All in a day’s work. It’s an understandable assumption, because paying for sex is legal in Israel; and researchers have long demonstrated that in areas where prostitution is legal or tolerated, a “culture of prostitution” takes root, strengthening the idea that men’s “needs” entitle them to women’s bodies. It’s no surprise that in areas where prostitution is tolerated, rates of gender-based violence rise. A man may have to pay for the right to sexually assault a woman today, but tomorrow he may just assault her.

In Israel, the law and the associated culture have helped to create and sustain an enormous industry built on human trafficking. Thousands of women and girls—poor immigrants, runaway teens, women fleeing abusive homes, Jews and Arabs alike—are lured by traffickers. They’re recruited personally by individuals, strangers or friends, or they respond to newspaper ads promising high-paying jobs. When they meet with the prospective “employer,” they’re sold to pimps and brothel owners. Hotels provide special deals to the pimps, who hire drivers to transport the women to and from “clients.” Impoverished and imprisoned in brothels and discreet apartments, the typical victim is forced to submit to being raped by as many as 15 men a day.

For the past three years, I served as a coordinator for the Task Force on Human Trafficking, a joint project of ATZUM – Justice Works and Kabiri-Nevo-Keidar law firm.  TFHT works to engage and educate the public and government agencies, lobbies for reform in the areas of prevention, border closure, protection of escaped women, and prosecution of traffickers and pimps. The effort to confront and eradicate modern slavery in Israel has proven to be an uphill battle. Recent allegations that a member of the Knesset has been involved in pimping and drugs only underscore the complexity and deep roots of Israel’s human trafficking industry.

On March 19th a woman was violently attacked in broad daylight, and dozens of witnesses did nothing. Unfortunately, I’m not surprised. Israelis in general, and residents of Tel-Aviv in particular, have determined that the monetized sexual assault of prostituted women is acceptable. But it is not just the women in prostitution who suffer society’s callousness and apathy. All women will pay the price. What happened that Thursday morning in March in my neighborhood happens every day, and in many neighborhoods: people looked at a woman, and saw a commodity.

 

Rebecca Hughes, an avid blogger whose work has been published in the “Times of Israel” and the “Jerusalem Post”, served as Coordinator for ATZUM’s Task Force on Human Trafficking Project from 2012 – 2015. She is now studying towards a Master of Science in Foreign Service at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., from where she coordinates TFHT’s international online lobbying initiative, Project 119.”

Filed Under: Blog, In the Press, Task Force on Human Trafficking

Rabbi Levi Lauer: Condemning recent violence, translating words into deeds

August 3, 2015 by
ATZUM mourns with every decent person the murder of the infant Ali Dawabsheh and decries the arson which destroyed his family home and severely injured three of his family. With every decent person, and with all force words can muster, we call upon the State of Israel and its enforcement agencies to find the terrorists who perpetrated this murder. We urge the police, army and intelligence services to apply to them, and to their families if complicit, and if they be minors, to their instigators, the same standards of arrest, interrogation and lengthy imprisonment applied to all terrorists, for this terror threatens the fabric of Israel society no less that that which claims the lives of its Jewish citizens. 
 
We mourn too the death of Shira Banki (zihrona livrakha) and hope and pray for the healing of body and soul of those gay pride participants stabbed on the streets of Yerushalayim by a proponent of ultra-Orthodox sinat hinam/senseless hatred. We urge the State of Israel redouble its surveillance of those individuals, and the organizations which advocate and support their hate and violence, and apply to them the same standards of restraint and sentencing brought against all who murder and who urge violence against citizens of the State.
 
For today we have only words. Tomorrow and beyond, every decent person will ask how to translate those words to deeds in demanding justice be served.
 
Rabbi Levi Lauer
Founding Executive Director of ATZUM
Filed Under: Blog

Eye on Education

June 12, 2015 by

If Jews exclusively devote themselves to even the best Torah study, they risk becoming recluses within universities, libraries, classrooms and the beit midrash. Alternatively, if they only seek to become social activists without grounding such activism in traditionalist learning, their voices and actions often lack Jewish resonance.

To remedy social injustice and inequity in Israel society and encourage individuals to become agents of change, ATZUM-Justice Works synthesizes formal learning with activism towards resolving severe community crises. Whether working in Israel, locally or around the globe, ATZUM urges those committed to Jewish learning to take the Torah to the streets and act decisively to help “the other”.  

In this issue of our newsletter, we focus on the following educational and service-learning programs.

TAKUM logoBeit Midrash TAKUM

International Street Torah: The TAKUM (tikkun u’mishpat/restoring justice) International Social Justice Beit Midrash is a ten-month program combining in-depth study of Jewish texts with social activism. The initiative was founded by ATZUM in partnership with Yeshivat Talpiot, an Israel NGO that encourages engagement in critical and open discussion of religious life and politics as a means to enrich activist endeavor.

TAKUM was launched in 2014 in Israel, the U.K. and the U.S. In 2015, 58 TAKUM Fellows are participating in two cohorts in both Jerusalem and London. TAKUM is also teaching a small group working with the Gabriel Project Mumbai, an NGO providing hunger and medical relief and basic education to vulnerable children living in that city’s most deprived slums.

What’s in a Name? By claiming Jewish text as a touchstone for improving society, TAKUM brings together learning and action. TAKUM embodies the following principles:

  • Takum (raising consciousness and engaging street activism): TAKUM inspires young activists to wake up to the resources available within Jewish tradition to inform grassroots outreach. Be it working to protect human rights or the environment; eradicating poverty or illiteracy; or assisting at-risk individuals who lack power or a voice to act and speak for themselves, TAKUM motivates activists to address social problems and stand up for others.

  • Tikkun (forging a connection between learning and action): How do I prioritize projects? Where do I spend my energies? Who most needs my help? Though constantly asked by activists, if not systematically confronted, such questions can blur focus and frustrate the search for best practices. TAKUM’s program of text study helps activists clarify issues of power, privilege, responsibility, gender politics, and community boundaries. By learning while doing, TAKUM encourages the individual to enjoin rhetoric with action.

  • U’Mishpat (restoring justice and sustaining social change): Studying classical Jewish sources helps activists imagine creative solutions to contemporary problems such as how to divide water resources, secure gender equality, or integrate “the other,” such as asylum seekers, within society. Through learning, TAKUM participants arrive at new ideas and acquire the language and structures necessary to re-frame the issues dealt with in the field. Attention to Jewish law, in particular, provides TAKUM Fellows radical mechanisms for deep and lasting change.

ImageTAKUM Fellows: The TAKUM community consists of experienced social-change professionals and grassroots volunteers. Fellows learn weekly in havruta (partnered learning) and in formal shiurim (group lessons) in TAKUM’s open, respectful and critically engaged environment.  In lieu of tuition, Fellows are obligated to volunteer five hours weekly on behalf of some of their communities’ most at-risk residents.

Current participants include individuals who have already taken to the streets to address local and global issues, among them educators; lawyers; local and visiting rabbinic students; musicians (including one professional involved in Heartbeat, a music dialogue organization for Israeli and Palestinian youth activists); and those aiding girls and women in distress, including one Fellow who spent two years working with Ultra-Orthodox girls with eating disorders, now a volunteer at the Jerusalem Rape Crisis Center. A number of Fellows have volunteered their time helping distressed populations around the world working in a rural village in Nepal, and as part of the American Jewish World Service volunteer corps in La Ciudad Romero, El Salvador.

To find out more about becoming a TAKUM fellow, or to invite Rabbi Levi Lauer of ATZUM and Shoshana Cohen of Yeshivat Talpiot to your community, please contact Kayla Rothman-Zecher.

Related Blog Postings:

From Mumbai: In the words of Rose Pollard, Gabriel Project Mumbai/JDC Entwine Fall 2014 Fellow.

From London: In the words of Maytal Kuperard, JHub Communications and Community Animator.

 
Working with Visiting Diaspora Young Leadership

In the fall of 2014, ATZUM launched a year-long service-learning program for a group of students in their 20’s and 30’s affiliated with the Jerusalem-based Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies. In addition to their formal learning, these young adults from different Jewish backgrounds and Diaspora communities are volunteering with ATZUM’s  Task Force on Human Trafficking.

Participants take part in a weekly course focusing on the connection between human trafficking and sexual servitude through prostitution with the aim of encouraging informed activism towards their abolishment. ATZUM’s Rebecca Hughes, who developed and teaches the course, notes its objectives are: “…to provide future Jewish leaders with the tools to intelligently and thoughtfully discuss and act upon these issues.”   Like their Israeli counterparts, most students had no idea that trafficking and prostituting girls and women are part of the narrative of the Jewish State. 

Hughes adds, “I’ve been impressed with the group’s willingness to learn about and discuss these difficult, abhorrent issues and bring them to the attention of their peers at Pardes and beyond. For them, studying the issues have not been enough; they want to act, to be a part of the solution. This is a huge part of what we hoped would transpire. I’m confident that at the end of this year they will continue their activism on these issues.”  Indeed, one participant who blogged about the program notes: “I think my newly acquired knowledge and that of my fellow volunteers can only help the world as we seek to further educate our communities.”  Most recently, participants organized an evening of learning at Hebrew University in partnership with Rabbis for Human Rights and Hillel.

Related Blog Postings: 

In the words of Darya Watnick, Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies program participant and Task Force on Human Trafficking volunteer.

 

 

Filed Under: Blog

Human Trafficking Into Israel: The Return of a Trend in the Guise of Tourism?

June 7, 2015 by

While Israel changed its policies at the urging of the international community and NGOs such as ATZUM, distancing itself from its previous disregard of cross-border human trafficking, trafficking in persons into and within Israel continues.

Indeed, Israel’s failure to address trafficking and prostitution within its own borders is clearly outlined in the American State Department 2014 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report, which calls for increased investigation of prostitution of Israeli nationals and stronger sentencing for convicted traffickers.

However, after ATZUM helped lead a successful campaign to reduce trafficking into Israel over the Sinai border, a new phenomenon has emerged. Traffickers and pimps, undeterred by the obstacle of a 245-mile fence now dividing the two countries, are getting creative.

In April 2015, police investigated complaints of individuals suspected of raping and pimping young women in a Holon apartment. The investigation exposed a sophisticated network that systematically “imported” women from Eastern Europe to Israel to work as prostituted sex slaves. The suspects allegedly brought women from Eastern Europe to Israel on tourist visas, but soon forced them into sexual slavery. Often the case, such women are duped and at the mercy of their abusers. This incident comes on the heels of a 2014 extended undercover police operation which revealed the existence of an Israeli-Ukrainian-Russian crime ring that trafficked women into Israel to work as sex slaves. The cover story was that the women were arriving for medical tourism.

If Israel is serious about reducing sex trafficking, closing its borders is a critical but not exhaustive strategy. To be sure, trafficking and pimping are only profitable as long as customers are able to purchase prostitution services, making it imperative Israel criminalize such behavior. ATZUM will reassert its past efforts to assure public attention is redirected to this issue and those responsible for anti-trafficking enforcement are held accountable.

Filed Under: Blog, Task Force on Human Trafficking

Post-Election Implications for Passing Nordic Model Legislation

June 1, 2015 by

Israel’s 20th Knesset was sworn in on March 31, 2015 with 40 first-time MKs, a record 28 women, and new political parties. Of particular concern to the Task Force on Human Trafficking (TFHT) is whether this government will support or thwart TFHT’S multi-year campaign to pass legislation based on the Nordic Model, the international standard designed to criminalize the procurers and purchasers of sexual services and protect the prostituted person.   

Unfortunately, two of TFHT’s dedicated partners in the 19th Knesset, MK Shuli Moalem-Refaeli (HaBayit HaYehudi) and MK David Tzur (HaTnua), were not re-elected, though MK Zehava Gal-On (Meretz), unwavering in her commitment to eradicate demand for trafficking and prostitution, and a past sponsor of legislation based on the Nordic Model, was again elected.

Prior to the elections, TFHT partnered with Mythos and The Jerusalem Institute for Justice to survey political party positions on the Nordic Model: the Zionist Union, Yesh Atid, HaBayit HaYehudi, and Meretz each publicly declared their support, signaling hope as we address the challenges ahead.

Between the folding of the previous Knesset and the formation of the current government, TFHT worked to redraft more comprehensive legislation than previously proposed. The new bill, more holistic in its approach to reducing sex trafficking and prostitution, calls for appreciable assistance to be provided to people exiting prostitution.

Simultaneous to our legislative activities, we are ramping up the work of our 383-strong Project 119 grassroots volunteer corps. Project 119 volunteers from around the world, who kept the issue front and center between governments, are now accelerating their weekly online advocacy campaign with MKs and ministers to push the new Knesset to act.

Having urged passage of Nordic Model legislation in Israel during three consecutive governments, TFHT remains the lead organization focused on bringing about sustained change at the policy level and holding accountable those tasked with implementing the bill when it becomes law. In this effort, we are pleased our long-term relationships with law firm Kabiri-Nevo-Keidar, TFHT co-founder, and advertising company Y&R-Israel remain strong. What we know for sure: however long and rutted the road to change, it is unacceptable for Israel society to accept the current reality in which the purchase of sexual abuse of girls and women continues.

NOTE: Those curious about how voting works in Israel can learn more here; results of the country’s March 2015 elections can be found here (English) and here (Hebrew).

Filed Under: Blog, Task Force on Human Trafficking

ATZUM: Engaging Pardes Students in Service-Learning Program

April 20, 2015 by

For the past several months, a group of students from the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies has been volunteering for the Task Force on Human Trafficking, an initiative of ATZUM-Justice Works whose professionals have prepared an informative orientation course for social activists. As newcomers to the issues of prostitution and trafficking addressed by the Task Force, we initially sought to understand and ultimately enlighten others about these problems.

Since the fall of 2014 we’ve learned and accomplished a great deal.  Our group prepared a short presentation for the Social Justice class at Pardes, screened documentary clips highlighting the issues, and facilitated a probing discussion for the larger Pardes community. Later this month we will be hosting a Trivia Night focusing on women’s issues.  Our most significant undertaking has been to create a series of lesson plans to help educators introduce students to the topics and to encourage them to work towards remedies. Many of us spent countless hours watching documentaries, reading articles and planning activities in order to compile the best resources and methods to teach about these difficult issues.

Tackling and digesting these issues has not been easy. I have come away from some meetings feeling thoroughly disheartened. Without initially realizing it, I now see that my discussions surrounding trafficking and prostitution have changed. I used to keep quiet, feeling as if I had nothing worthy to contribute to the conversation and no obligation to take a stance. But now, because of the course, I have the confidence to state my opinion and the language and statistics to back it up. Even if my short time working with the Task Force is only a blip on the screen of the larger struggle, I think my, and my fellow volunteers’, greater knowledge can only help further educate our communities. 

Darya Watnick

Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies program participant

Task Force on Human Trafficking volunteer

Filed Under: Blog, Task Force on Human Trafficking

Israel Elections and “Hyde Park” Discourse

March 13, 2015 by

For the past three years, ATZUM’s Task Force on Human Trafficking (TFHT) has worked to gain passage of legislation based on the Nordic Model, the international standard designed to criminalize the purchase of sexual services and protect the prostituted person, nearly always a girl or woman victim of childhood rape and/or incest. In February 2015, in partnership with the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel, TFHT organized a panel discussion in which candidates for the upcoming Knesset (to be elected March 17) outlined their plans for addressing all forms of sexual violence, including prostitution and trafficking.  

Eighty people came on a blustery winter night to attend the Jerusalem event billed as a “Hyde Park” discussion, referencing the iconic “Speakers’ Corner” in London. Candidates from nine parties of disparate political positions vying for Knesset seats participated, including:

Rachel Azaria (Kulano)

Dr. Anat Berko (Likud)

Ruth Colian (B’Zhutan)

MK Yifat Kariv (Yesh Atid)

MK Orly Levi-Abekasis (Yisrael Beitenu)

MK Shuli Moalem-Refaeli (HaBayit HaYehudi)

Ayelet Nahmias-Verbin (Zionist Camp)

MK Michal Rozin (Meretz)

Aida Touma-Sliman (The Joint List)

The candidates spoke of the need for the next Knesset to combat sexual violence and prostitution in Israel society. Indeed, multi-partisan collaboration will be key to ensuring that legislation is passed protecting girls and women from sexual servitude through prostitution. Notably, during the previous Knesset, TFHT successfully created an alliance of three MKs from different parties across the political spectrum firmly committed to advancing the Nordic Model.

Michal Leibel, lawyer and TFHT Director, said at the event: “The understanding that prostitution is a form of sexual violence and that it should be treated as such is now beginning to enter Israeli discourse. This leads to the only possible conclusion:  to truly reduce prostitution, society must act as decisively against sex-buyers as against pimps.”

Hyde Park

PHOTO. Hyde Park Event: Front row (right to left) MK Candidate, Aida Touma Sliman (the Joint List); Liat Klein, legal advisor of the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel; MK Shuli Moalem-Refaeli (HaBayit HaYehudi); MK Yifat Kariv (Yesh Atid); MK Michal Rozin (Meretz) and MK Orly Levi-Abekasis (Yisrael Beytenu)

TIP Report

TFHT was invited to contribute to the U.S. State Department’s Trafficking in Persons (TIP) 2015 Report, a process which allowed us to share our concerns related to the policies and actions of the Ministry of Interior and its adjunct bodies, and their need to act further to protect victims of trafficking. 

The annual TIP Report evaluates and ranks governments based on perceived efforts to acknowledge and combat human trafficking. The report assigns countries tiers according to compliance with standards outlined in the Trafficking Victims Protection Act. Israel should take pride in the progress made since 2001, when it received the report’s lowest ranking. Since then, with the help of NGOs such as ATZUM, various forms of trafficking, especially sex trafficking, have decreased.

Yet, while Israel has succeeded in drastically reducing sex trafficking originating in other countries, it has failed to address the prostitution that occurs within its own borders. This is clearly outlined in the 2014  TIP Report, which calls for the need for increased investigations of prostitution of Israeli nationals and stronger sentencing for convicted traffickers.

Filed Under: Blog, Task Force on Human Trafficking

Surviving a Terror Attack – Two Personal Stories

March 9, 2015 by

A total of 1,265 people have been killed as a result of terrorism since September, 2000; thousands more have been injured. For the bereaved and the physically and psychologically wounded, the trauma persists.

These are the stories of a young woman who lives with the haunting memory of how life changed in a split second when she survived a brutal terror bombing; and of a young boy whose severe trauma following Operation Pillar of Defense (2012) was retriggered during the 2014 Gaza War.  ATZUM, through the Roberta Project for Survivors of Terror, provides assistance to these people, and many others whose needs are insufficiently met by public and/or private resources. 

Surviving a Suicide Bus Bomb Attack

It began early Sunday, February 22, 2004. I was 13 years old. That morning I was getting my little brother ready for kindergarten. My father offered to give me a lift to school. Not wanting to hold him up, I told him to leave without me and I’d catch a bus as usual. Once on my way, rushing to school, I saw bus number 14 pass and waited for the next one.

That period of the second intifada was a time of many terror attacks. Three weeks prior, 11 were killed and 51 wounded in Jerusalem’s Rehavia neighborhood when a suicide bomber exploded himself aboard a bus. Such news had become routine.

After boarding the next bus, I noticed another passenger whose appearance seemed suspicious. Wearing a large green coat and jeans, he was clutching a big black bag. I turned to the gentleman sitting next to me and told him I thought I’d sighted a bus bomber. He told me to get off the bus as soon as possible. When I made the move to stand up, the terrorist pushed me back onto the seat, forced the bag filled with explosives onto me, held me with one arm and detonated the bomb with his other.

I remained fully conscious. All I could see was blood; then I began to focus on the other passengers, some dead, others shouting. Oddly, despite the screams, for a time it was deafeningly quiet.

I tried to stand, but fell, not sure if I’d lost my legs or if they just would not respond. I attempted unsuccessfully to lift myself up to escape through the window. Cutting myself on the shattered glass, I dragged myself forward. Though I’d only made it a few feet, I ran out of strength, finding myself next to a soldier who placed his head on me and closed his eyes forever.

As soon as Magen David Adom emergency teams arrived, a paramedic lifted me and tried to find out how to contact my parents. Their reiterated, at first irritating, questions kept me conscious, and probably saved my life. I was rushed by ambulance to the hospital where I was in a coma for two weeks.

Over time I came to understand that my injuries, defined as extremely critical (the most serious of the attack), included collapsed lungs, shrapnel in my head and hands, a fractured skull, third degree burns on my face and hands, and two torn eardrums. Recovery and hospitalization would be difficult and long. Once I was stable, I was transferred to the surgery department for continuing treatment. 

After a month, I was finally released from the hospital. I then underwent eight months rehabilitation, re-learning how to speak, eat on my own, crawl and eventually walk without falling; in short, everything learned during the first years of life. As I had also missed two years of education owing to my extensive rehabilitation, I eventually returned to my studies.

Today, the worst of the injuries are behind me.  I finished my schooling and my national service, worked at a variety of jobs and recently began my B.A. in human resources.  The support received from the National Insurance Institute helps, but does not enable me to pursue the studies of my choice.  I am fortunate ATZUM filled this gap, providing me with direction and a much needed computer. I have greatly benefitted from ATZUM’s determination to aid people like me who have not received sufficient assistance elsewhere. 

Terror times two*

Single parent Moran and her two sons, Yossi, serving in the IDF, and Ami, in second grade, live in Sderot, a town in Israel’s south that has been recurrently bombarded by Kassam rocket and mortar fire from Gaza since April, 2000. Moran, with a minimum-wage job, does her best to support her children financially and emotionally, though their lives are very difficult. November 14, 2012, marked the beginning of “Operation Pillar of Defense”, a military response to extreme escalation of rocket fire into the region. That day the family’s situation took a turn for the worse.

Ashdod synagogue hit by rocket fire - July 22, 2014As Moran was walking Ami to school, a rocket landed near them. They quickly ran to a neighbor’s home and hid in his shelter until the all-clear signal sounded.  It took considerable effort for his mother and the neighbor to calm down Ami and get him to agree to exit the shelter.

Though accustomed to such routine, this near-miss proved devastating. Ami developed severe anxiety, suffered numerous physical ailments, and refused to leave the house or his mother’s side. He was diagnosed with PTSD, for which he was professionally treated.

Less than two years later, July 8, 2014, Operation Defensive Shield (the 2014 Gaza War) was launched to again halt rocket fire from Gaza into Israel. Ami’s PTSD retriggered and worsened, rendering him emotionally unstable and incapable of starting the school year. Today, more than six months after the conclusion of the war, Ami still receives intensive therapy and medication to help tackle life’s daily challenges and treat the chronic bladder and bowel dysfunction connected to his PTSD. Moran also receives parental guidance and social support to develop tools to deal with the situation.

While receiving assistance from many sources, a number of critical needs remain unattended. ATZUM is providing emotional as well as financial support to buy clothing and school supplies and to enable Ami to participate in a number of social and after-school activities. We will remain closely connected to the family to respond to other needs that may arise.

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Since 2002, ATZUM’s Roberta Project for Survivors of Terror has facilitated the transfer of $1.25 million in aid, grants and loans to meet subsistence, educational and dental care needs of terror survivors and family members. The Project provides direct assistance to families whose lives have been irreparably shattered, particularly those whose main provider or child was the victim.  While we also assist survivors of the most recent violence, ATZUM specifically works to identify survivors from long-forgotten attacks who are not receiving adequate assistance and are often overlooked by programs of assistance focused on more recent cases.

Filed Under: Blog, Roberta Project for Survivors of Terror
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