Police, Haredim, City Reach Deal Over Forced Gender Segregation – But Is the Deal Legal?

After talks between senior haredi community leaders, police and the Jerusalem city government, leaders of the Toldos Aharon hasidic dynasty – the leading drivers behind forced public gender segregation in Jerusalem’s Mea Shearim neighborhood during the Sukkot holiday – reportedly agreed that Toldos Aharon won’t use “ushers” to gender segregate Mea Shearim’s streets this year or to impose the sect’s “modesty rules” on passersby.

Originally published at 9:27 pm CDT 9-29-2012

Police, Haredim, City Reach Deal Over Forced Gender Segregation – But Is the Deal Legal?
Shmarya Rosenberg • FailedMessiah.com

After talks between senior haredi community leaders, police and the Jerusalem city government, leaders of the Toldos Aharon hasidic dynasty – the leading drivers behind forced public gender segregation in Jerusalem’s Mea Shearim neighborhood during the Sukkot holiday – reportedly agreed that Toldos Aharon won’t use “ushers” to gender segregate Mea Shearim’s streets this year or to impose the sect’s “modesty rules” on passersby.

But police and the city agreed that a “safety fence” would be set up on the street to maintain order.

"The road and sidewalks will be open to the entire public (apart from an 8-meter section at the exit from a yeshiva); there will be no ushers during the event; a 2.2-meter (7.2 feet) fence will be set up on the southern side of the road.

"The fence will be built for safety purposes only. It will not be covered with jute cloth or any other cover preventing or blocking the view from both sides of the fence…

"The event will be held between 9 pm-12:30 am. At the end of the event the fence will be dismantled, and reinstalled starting 8 pm the next day,” Ynet reports that police said.

In other words, the city and police have apparently agreed to allow Toldos Aharon to set up a fence that will almost certainly be used as a mechitza, a separation between men and women, which according to Jewish law does not have to be opaque.

Police finally updated Jerusalem City Council Member Rachel Azaria, whose petition to the High Court of Justice complaining about the forced gender segregation (and police refusal to do anything about it) resulted in a High Court ruling banning the practice and specifying guidelines that must be followed to prevent such forced gender segregation in the future. Azaria’s repeated requests to police for details of their plans to enforce the High Court’s ruling had gone unanswered.

"There will be no separation between men and women," the police reportedly wrote in a letter to Azaria's lawyer, explaining the deal with haredim. "The Israel Police and Jerusalem Municipality will have representatives in the area to guarantee that the details of the agreement are being upheld."

"We hope the police keep their promise to enforce the law, so that Jerusalem can restore its role as the capital of all its residents, both men and women, allowing them to rejoice together in the city streets during the Sukkot holiday,” Azaria’s lawyer told Ynet.

If the fence is used to gender segregate, this would be another in a long line of attempts by haredim to skirt Israeli law. But it would also be another in a long line of craven deals made by police and politicians to placate haredim and allow them to violate that law by creating a quasi-legal fiction or by outright deception.

Comments

[David]

If there is to be no gender segregation, of what possible use is the "safety fence"?

If it is there however, there is no doubt it will be used for the purpose of gender segregation.

Again the frumma prove themselves to be disingenuous liars and fools.

And following Moslem law and customs rather than Halacha.

[David]

Don't keep trying to understand the Charedim in terms of Halacha or Judaism. It just leads to frustration and confusion.

Their behavior is fully explicable if you simply interpret them as Moslem wannabes.

[Bob Guthrie]

"Police, Haredim, City Reach Deal Over Forced Gender Segregation."

Yes, the Charedim get their face saving, 33 feet long separating "safety fence", the Police and the rest of Jerusalem get it in the shorts.

Deal with it.

[Shoshi]

It actually sounds a little dangerous to me, because in an emergency a fence like that could make it hard to evacuate a large number of people.

[David]

It actually sounds a little dangerous to me, because in an emergency a fence like that could make it hard to evacuate a large number of people.

Posted by: Shoshi | September 30, 2012 at 07:35 AM

True. Safety is of no concern to the frumma. All that counts is their perverted interpretation of Halacha. That, for example, is one of the reasons they are happy to let children look after other slightly younger children, often with deadly results.

[Blima]

Police, Haredim, City Reach Deal Over Forced Gender Segregation – But Is the Deal Legal?

Yes.

[I can't think of a name yet]

It's very funny, not one person here knows the layout of the streets of mesh shearim, or the details of the security fence, yet we're already coming to conclusions.

The frumma are for sure doing something illegal, right? Without any information, right?

[Gevezener Chusid]

if you don't like the way they do things in Meah Shearim, then stay in a different neighborhood. Jerusalem is a big city.

Simple.

[seymour]

if you don't like the way they do things in Meah Shearim, then stay in a different neighborhood. Jerusalem is a big city.

Simple.

Posted by: Gevezener Chusid | September 30, 2012 at 10:05 AM

if you do not like the ban on fur in isreal leave and stay in a different county and wear your stremeil

[dh]

Bob Guthrie! Yay!

[I can't think of a name yet]

Maybe the frumma should go to tel aviv and protest all the Russians who sell pork illegally.

[John Nagle, Silicon Valley, CA]

Somebody should change the sign to indicate a "no-hat zone".

[Alter Kocker]

One of these fine days the deity will appear to these mindless fools and plainly point out that their arbitrary rules and regulations are nothing but spurious. The deity will point out that segregation of the sexes is not what is wanted, neither is the consumption of animals in the prescribed way, and segregation of Jews vs other religions is clearly against the deity's wishes.

At which point the Chareidim will declare that the deity is null and void. They will continue their odd ways and multitude of arbitrary rules in appeasement of a g-d that they have made up. It is the only thing that they have to justify their existence. Not a deity, but a long list of foolish and arbitrary rules set up by and for them with less meaning than a nursery rhyme.