On my murdered daughter's birthday, a request

Last week's terror bombings that took the life of Jerusalem teen Aryeh Schupak, and, a few days later, of Tadese Tashume Ben-Ma’ada, 50, father of six, who succumbed to his wounds on November 26, 2022, jolted the nation. 

They also stirred up the horror right beneath the surface of my soul. Horror that has lingered there since 2001, when my daughter Malki was murdered in the Jerusalem Sbarro pizzeria bombing on a hot, summer's afternoon. 

Like the twin bus-stop bombings of last week, the 10 kg bomb that destroyed Sbarro was also packed with nails to maximize the casualties it would inflict. And the Sbarro bomb's target was also a site that children, specifically, would be frequenting at that hour.

A Jerusalem bus stop, one of the two attacked on

November 23, 2022 [Image Source]

Now another innocent Jewish teen - kind, generous, earnest, industrious full of dreams and plans like our child - did not return to his parents.

When I say my heart goes out to his family, those are not just formulaic words. I really do know what they are enduring.

Malki would have celebrated her 37th birthday today, November 27, 2022, if not for that evil act of Hamas operative, Ahlam Tamimi. 

But unlike the terrorists who murdered Aryeh and Ben-Ma'ada, Ahlam Tamimi's whereabouts are known to all. She lives free and protected by Jordan's King Abdullah II. She was indicted by the United States Department of Justice in 2013. Her extradition from Jordan was subsequently demanded under a 1995 treaty signed and ratified by both countries. The U.S. has explicitly deemed that treaty valid despite Jordan's years-late insistence to the contrary.

But there the U.S.'s pursuit of justice for our Malki - a U.S. citizen - has come to a screeching halt.

The very same administration that declared on November 23, 2022, that "We condemn unequivocally the acts of terror overnight in Jerusalem. The United States has offered all appropriate assistance to the Government of Israel as it investigates the attack and works to bring the perpetrators to justice" is doing nothing, I repeat nothing, to bring the fugitive Sbarro perpetrator, Ahlam Tamimi, to justice. 

She has boasted of murdering fifteen men, women and children in the bombing she orchestrated at Sbarro but remains free as a lark.

My husband and I have been struggling since early-2012 to garner attention for our fight. The persistent silence and indifference that have met our pleas is not something we could have anticipated. It crosses all religious, political and geographic lines and is utterly confounding.

But without a doubt, the most disconcerting has been the silence and indifference of American Jewish activists, leaders, politicians and organization heads who claim to be concerned with causes precisely like ours: justice for Jewish victims. 

Many have close personal relationships with Jordan's ruler, Abdullah, often to the absurd point of adulation. His country's blatant anti-Semitism doesn't faze them.

Their hypocrisy has been a bitter pill for us to swallow.

If you too are incensed by this outrage, and are in a position to promote our cause, we are currently preparing a campaign where your help can be instrumental. Please contact us by email at thisongoingwar@gmail.com

Even if you feel you cannot take part, please do consider signing our petition addressed to the U.S. Secretary of State (you do not need to be an American to sign it): change.org/ExtraditeTamimi

Politicians, justice and missing the point

Shai visits Aleh Jerusalem 2018

I was first introduced to Knesset member Dr Nachman Shai when Bizchut (“Promoting the rights of people who have disabilities in Israel”) paired me up with him to pay a joint surprise visit to a large, closed Jerusalem institution for children and adults with disabilities.

Across the country on that same day, other such facilities were similarly inspected. The reason for having activists accompanied by Knesset members was that the latter can legally insist on admittance to those institutions. Civilians, like me, are almost always denied entry.

I certainly was, anytime I previously tried.

After the tours, each Knesset member's impressions were recorded on video. Shai astounded me with his praise for the institution. He was well aware that Bizchut and other activists, some with disabilities themselves, were intent on replacing institutionalization with in-community living for everyone.

Nevertheless he emerged with this reaction: 

"I believe I am leaving with a good impression, a positive impression... We toured from top to bottom, the institution was open... We were not prevented from viewing anything, everything we requested we received and I leave as much as possible with a good feeling." (My translation of his Hebrew as recorded at the time.)

Shai had entirely missed the point.

People with disabilities are often locked up in “gilded prisons”.  Their human rights are denied, the love of family and home stolen from them. Funding which our government could and should channel to parents and children with disabilities is lavished on institution operators.

The rest of the Western world has, as a universally agreed matter of strategy, abandoned the institutionalization of people with disabilities over the past two decades. But Israel persists in supporting, funding and promoting it for its population with disabilities.

Standing outside that institution on the day of that visit, Shai briefly related to that "debate", as he called it, and said he intended to leave it at that.

On April 20, 2022, a demonstration will be held at Tel Aviv's Kikar Habima at 16:00. In the Passover spirit, it is being called "Our Exodus to Freedom - From Institutions into the Community".  

Nachman Shai just didn't get it.

Last week, he missed another crucial point again. And just as egregiously. 

Here is how he is quoted by Michael Freund in an opinion piece [source: The Jerusalem Post]:

In an interview on Army Radio on March 30, he asserted that “hungry people turn to terrorism. Without food and water, they will disrupt our lives... this contention simply does not stand up under further scrutiny. To begin with, consider the fact that according to the World Bank, there are approximately 700 million people on the planet living in what is described as “extreme poverty,” which is defined as earning less than $1.90 a day. That is nearly 10% of the world’s population...

If the simple equation that suggests that poverty directly gives rise to terrorism were true, one would expect to find millions of people, if not more, taking up arms worldwide and launching terrorist attacks. But that is clearly not the case.

Simply put, most hungry people are not violent nor are they terrorists. They might be desperate, embittered or dissatisfied, but that is a far cry from joining the ranks of terrorists...

Numerous academic studies over the years clearly demonstrate this to be the case. As MIT Prof. Alberto Abadie concluded in a groundbreaking 2006 study titled “Poverty, Political Freedom and the Roots of Terrorism,” published in American Economic Review, there is “no significant association between terrorism and economic variables, such as income, once the effect of other country characteristics is taken into account.”

The same holds true vis-à-vis Palestinian terrorism. Studies have repeatedly found that those who engage in it are generally better off economically than most Palestinians… The resulting evidence on the individual level suggests that both higher standards of living and higher levels of education are positively associated” with the likelihood of a Palestinian joining Hamas or Islamic Jihad, Hebrew University's Professor Berrebi wrote in 2003...

Indeed, Berrebi discovered that Palestinian suicide bombers “tend to be of higher economic status and higher educational attainment than their counterparts in the population.

My child's murderer, Ahlam Tamimi, reinforces the above findings. Neither poor nor uneducated, she was a middle-class student of journalism working as a TV news anchor who thirsted for Jewish blood. Released in the tragically lopsided Shalit Deal in 2011 along with several hundred other convicted murderers, she maintains her previous comfortable standard of living today in her city of refuge, Amman.

She continues to boast of her "successful operation" in which fifteen Jews perished and urges others to emulate her.  

It may be ignorance that lies behind Dr Shai’s recent responses - or rather, non-responses - to me. As we parted after that visit to the Jerusalem institution, he handed me his card inviting me to contact him if I ever needed his help.

My husband and I have been eager to take him up on that offer. Our quest for justice for our daughter is blocked by many, including Israeli politicians. The U.S. Department of Justice indicted Tamimi in 2017 and has asked Jordan to extradite her to Washington where she faces terrorism charges. But King Abdullah's regime has rejected those requests and she remains free, sheltered by the Hashemite kingdom.

The State Department has throughout all our years of effort been uncooperative. So have U.S. politicians on both sides of the aisle. We have learned that the Israeli government has signaled American Jewish leaders know they would prefer our requests for their support to be ignored. 

We approached Dr Shai in the naïve hope that he would speak up in support of our quest for justice. But he has never responded to my emails and his spokesperson has repeatedly advised me to direct my pleas elsewhere.

Here’s how she framed the brush-off:

While I understand that this response is not satisfactory for you, I will keep you posted if something more concrete develops. I am deeply sorry that I cannot help you further at this moment in time… I will continue to explore how we can be of support - particularly through other diplomatic means."

It’s been months and the exploring is presumably still underway.

Perhaps I should not have been surprised. Public figures who don’t respond when the massive problems of institutionalization of the disabled are under discussion are probably not that tuned in to justice either.

On Covid and institutions

My RAT result

I wrote (but didn't post) the following two weeks ago:

As my kids say, "bummer". I had a positive result on my at-home Covid rapid antigen test last night. I administered it because of fever and a cold. Now, I am a scrupulous mask wearer, a Covid recoverer, had two vaccines, scored 2,000 + on a serological antibodies test four months ago and have, to my family's chagrin, grown extremely anti-social during the last two years.  

So, we're stumped as to where and how I caught this.

On the off chance that this is a false positive, I will go do a PCR test this evening.

I am particularly disappointed because the pool to which we bring Haya for hydro has been broken all week. It only recovered and reached the desired 32 degrees Celsius (about 90 Fahrenheit) this morning. I did a lot of Whatsapping to land a cancellation of one hour by one of the teachers for this morning. 

So Haya will miss her hydro this week. As I have often noted: It's the highlight of her life...

Haya, in a recent drawing of mine

Since then, Haya has thankfully had two magnificent sessions of hydro. The second one was this past Sunday which we did in 30 degree (Celsius) water, instead of the usual 32 degrees. With her wetsuit on, Haya appeared as comfortable as usual. But I really missed those extra two degrees.

All the Whatsapp groups I'm in for people with disabilities and their families have been abuzz with talk of forming inspection groups. Clearly, the recent uptick in accounts of abuse in institutions here in Israel triggered that.

The idea is for those groups of volunteers to visit unannounced Israel's institutions for people with disabilities. I just volunteered for the Jerusalem area. Hopefully we will visit ADI Jerusalem and uncover whatever there is to uncover.

This time we won't be accompanied by politicians as we were the last time such visits were made ["Notes from an Aleh visit"]. 

My "partner" back then in 2018 was Knesset member and now Israel's Minister of Diaspora Affairs, Dr Nachman Shai, who in my opinion was utterly deceived by our guide's slick spiel. Sadly, Shai's reactions were confined to unadulterated praise.

Pompeo, justice and betrayal

What we published last November

I promised to prove that our struggle is apolitical. 

My last post [Fear Uncertainty and Doubt at the State Department, August 9, 2021] lambasted the U.S. State Department, and especially Secretary Antony J. Blinken, for honoring - no, idolizing - Jordan's ruler King Abdullah II during his recent visit to DC and a full day at the State Department. 

It noted State's omission of Abdullah's refusal to extradite mass murderer Ahlam Tamimi despite the US Department of Justice's demand he do so. Our daughter Malki was murdered in the bombing she orchestrated and for which she has claimed credit for years.

Many readers have critiqued my husband Arnold Roth and me for "squandering" the "golden opportunity" that ex-President Trump's administration offered us. They insist that had we approached him and his team in some other, better way, Tamimi would now be in US custody.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The truth is we made strong and repeated attempts to reach out to them right through the Trump years. All of this effort was in vain.

Here below is a summary of the pleas we directed specifically at Secretary of State Mike Pompeo as it appeared in the blog we have produced together for the past fifteen years. The blog is called This Ongoing War and we published this post which was authored by Arnold, nine months ago. 

We published it at the time because we felt it important to let people know we had tried, and failed again totally for the last time, to get Pompeo's attention. From the reactions we're hearing now. it failed to be seen or understood widely enough.

19-Nov-20: Putting justice back on the agenda

We did something yesterday that we have never done before.

We ordered a display advertisement in a mainstream newspaper: today's (Thursday’s) Jerusalem Post. Our message appears on its front page.

The timing of our ad is intended to coincide with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s visit to Israel that began yesterday afternoon (Wednesday November 18). 

Our hope is that he will see it at breakfast. And that perhaps he will think about the images we included, as well as the scriptural quote at the top of the text: “Justice, justice thou shalt pursue”.

The words from Deuteronomy (the Biblical book called Devarim in Hebrew) will be recited in the Jewish world's annual cycle of Torah reading when we get to Parshat Shoftim, the weekly portion called “Judges”. 

That happens next in August 2021. By coincidence, the same week will include the twentieth anniversary of the Sbarro pizzeria massacre.

There are two images in our Pompeo advertisement. One shows Malki. The other is of the devastated Sbarro pizzeria in the center of Jerusalem, minutes after a bomb placed by Ahlam Tamimi exploded inside. 

Tamimi, a Jordanian woman who arrived from her homeland alone, soon joined Fatah. And then, in June 2001 and aged 21, she switched to Hamas. She was evidently in search of something and found it that summer: the opportunity to kill Jews on a satisfyingly large scale. It was an opportunity she grabbed.

On the morning of July 27, 2001, a Friday, Tamimi carried a smallish made-by-Hamas bomb embedded inside a beer can and surreptitiously placed it on a shelf in what was then a Co-op Supermarket. This was located in the basement of a building on Jerusalem’s King George Street that locals knew as Hamashbir. It's an office building today with some shops at street level. She quickly left the scene.

The bomb fizzed with no serious damage except to the ambitious bomber’s pride. 

By her own account, she raged in fury at her Hamas handlers right afterwards and demanded something much larger. She got it ten days later: a diabolical exploding guitar case and a young religious fanatic eager to carry it on his back into whatever target Tamimi chose.

Tamimi scoured Jerusalem and chose Sbarro. The busy pizzeria with the good hashgacha (certificate of being kosher) was popular among religiously observant youngsters like Malki. Tamimi has for years wanted it to be known that her choice was based on the large number of Jewish children reliably inside at that hour. We don't know why this single fact does not lead every report ever published about this exceptionally cold-blooded murdering Islamist. It should.

Mostly behind the scenes, we have pressed the United States to insist Jordan extradites Tamimi since 2012. She has faced serious federal terror charges since they were unsealed by a team of senior department of Justice officials in a public event in March 2017. They had been issued secretly by a judge four years earlier.

This evidently was known to the senior members of Jordan’s political and royal power structure. That’s because secret – and entirely unsuccessful - efforts were made by high-level American officials for several years to persuade Jordan to hand Tamimi over to the FBI. They knew Tamimi was charged even before we (or even the US Congress) did. And to be clear about this central element: there's been an active and totally valid treaty between Jordan and the US since 1995 for the extradition of fugitives like Tamimi. The State Department said nothing for years about the way Jordan breaches that treaty in the Tamimi case (though not in other cases). It started being open and explicit about it late last year ["03-Nov-19: In Washington, a step towards bringing the Sbarro bomber to justice"]

Why should US charges and American justice even enter the Tamimi story? 

The simple answer: Because Malki had American citizenship via her New York-born mother. And there’s an American law that gives it the right and the obligation to go after terrorists who kill American nationals outside the territorial United States. Once taken into custody, the fugitive terrorist can be flown to the US and tried in a US court under US law. It’s what ought to have happened to Tamimi.

But first the FBI has to get its hands on the fugitive terrorist. 

The good news is the US and Jordan signed a treaty to facilitate extradition in both directions. That was in 1995, and in the years that followed extraditions were carried out on request just as the treaty stipulated. But something about the Tamimi case made it different for the Jordanians. They started refusing as soon as the requests arrived and have continued refusing right up until today [see "16-Nov-20: Justice, the Tamimi extradition and what Jordan tells Arabic media but not the world"]. The US has made clear its view that Jordan is wrong,

Tamimi not only lives in complete freedom under the patronage of the Jordanian government but has become a media celebrity there and in large parts of the Arab world. The details are chilling - almost beyond comprehension.

Our Jerusalem Post ad is a call to action to the Trump administration and specifically to its Secretary of State. There’s no political dimension to it - just a call to compel Jordan to abide by a bilateral treaty to which it is a party. And for pure and simple justice to be done.

We have made repeated efforts to recruit politicians to give our campaign some clout but they have borne no fruit. And it’s not that we’re on the wrong side of politics because we’re not on any side.

It’s also not that people actually refuse our request or argue with us or give us cogent reasons why Tamimi ought to be left alone. That’s of course not true about Jordan. There its media, some of its public officials and citizens enthusiastically stand with her.

What mostly happens is we’re ignored. Many of those we approach don’t return our calls or emails or look right through us if we happen to be speaking face to face.

How likely is it that this time will be different? Hard to know but it doesn’t matter to us. Tzedek tzedek tirdof, as the scripture says. Justice, justice though shalt pursue.

That’s our role.

We’re not alone. As our ad says, we have a petition (here - and it's not too late to sign if you haven't already). Thousands of people from everywhere – a not insignificant number of them from Arab countries and even from Jordan – have signed. Their support encourages and empowers us.

“Secretary Pompeo, it’s not too late to act” reads our banner headline. “We ask that you do what needs to be done so that Tamimi is at last brought to justice in Washington.”

Next week, after the American visitor leaves, we will go, just the two of us, to Malki’s grave. We do that every year on her birthday. This next time, we are going to have to deal with the reality that she would have become 35 years old that day - but instead she was ripped from our grasp and will not come back. 

We remember her precious life when we get together with our children and grandchildren. And we feel gratified and proud when we look at the exceptional work done daily by the Malki Foundation, the charitable organization that for the past nineteen years has served as a non-sectarian memorial to Malki's short but remarkably impactful life.

And at night when we dream that she is alive and hug her lovingly.

Secretaries of State come and go as do ambassadors and presidents, prime ministers and kings. What never goes away is the absolute need to keep justice at the center of our lives as families and as a society. Our advertisement comes to deliver that message to the breakfast table of movers and shakers as well as to the hearts of ordinary people everywhere.

UPDATE December 5, 2020: Not a word of media comment from any of the many reporters traveling with the Secretary of State. And no response from Secretary of State Pompeo or any of his spokespeople, advisers or assistants.

So, for the record: Label us apolitical. Or at least non-partisan.

Here below is our paid Jerusalem Post front page advertisement, the one that Pompeo's entire retinue and the Great Man himself have ignored totally from November 18, 2020 until right up to this morning.

Click to see it larger. 

With ambassadors like this…

Malki with me on the right; the US Embassy in Tel Aviv on the left

[My blog post below originally appeared in Times of Israel on January 15, 2021. This version includes some changes.] 

“Love him or hate him” began a recent New York Times farewell article ["Strong Views and ‘Close to the Boss’: How U.S. Envoy Reshaped a Conflict", January 10, 2021] about US ambassador to Israel, David M. Friedman. 

And we are left in no doubt which is the NYT’s sentiment.

It’s also abundantly clear that Friedman himself is a huge fan of Friedman. He can’t stop tooting his own horn, to the point where the reader is left cringing.

“There’s no going back on what we’ve been able to do,” he says in the interview. “I’m frankly somewhere between addicted and intoxicated with what I’ve been able to do, and how much joy it gives me.”

And the adulation he has won from Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law, no doubt enhanced that swelled ego:

He set a very ambitious agenda,” said Kushner. “Quite frankly, toward the end we were almost running out of things to accomplish, because David had gotten done so many things that were unthinkable.

In fact, Friedman is so high on the glorified role he has played in the Trump administration that he says he won’t be immigrating to Israel yet:

“I’m going to stay American-only for at least four years,” he said. “I want to give myself every opportunity to return to government.”

Of course, he said that before Trump’s impeachment and expected disqualification from running for the presidency in 2024.

Click the image to enlarge:
My husband I bought and placed this advertisement on the front

page of the Jerusalem Post on the day US Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo ate breakfast in our city this past November. He never
troubled himself to respond: not then. not before, not since

With all those idealistic accomplishments, it is noteworthy that Mr. Friedman was utterly deaf to our many approaches to his office which spanned over two and a half years. These, of course, concerned our efforts to have the US press Jordan to extradite the terrorist charged with bombing the Sbarro pizzeria where our daughter Malki was one of the many victims.

His office staff repeatedly assured us that our emails had been received and would be dealt with. At times, the response was slightly more detailed: “We are looking into the points you raised and will respond to you when I have more information.”

In 30 months of efforts, it never progressed beyond that stage. We never heard from the ambassador; not directly, not indirectly. Silence.

My husband and I placed this ad on the Jerusalem Post’s front page so that Secretary of State Pompeo would see it at breakfast in his Jerusalem hotel on November 19, 2020. We never heard from him or his entourage.

We had hoped that Friedman would conduct himself as an ambassador should. That he would help clarify for us — the parents of a US national murdered in a terror attack — why the State Department which he represented here in Israel these past four years — was so mystifyingly unresponsive to our approaches.

Charges were unveiled against Ahlam Tamimi, a Jordanian bomber, in March 2017. She was added that month to the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorist list.

That’s also when King Abdullah’s regime came out of the closet as her defender and protector, steadfastly shielding from US justice the accused mass murderer and admitted Hamas terrorist.

The 1995 extradition treaty between the two countries, and which the US insists is valid, has not fazed the king in the least. And luckily for him, little evident pressure is being exerted to elicit his compliance.

Tamimi, the mastermind of the 2001 Sbarro massacre, the Hamas operative who selected the target – a bustling eatery crowded with women and children – and transported the bomb to its door, has emerged as an honored celebrity in her place of refuge, Amman, the capital of Jordan.

Fifteen men, women and children were murdered in that massacre of which Tamimi has boasted repeatedly to her huge fan base.

The US has not permitted any of that to affect its much-touted “partnership against terrorism” with Jordan. Nor its generous funding.

And even Mr. Friedman was unperturbed by that reality. The many emails we sent him, every one of which he ignored, detailed the travesty of justice we are fighting to correct.

To the numerous friends and contacts who over the years have directed us to Friedman for support, confident that he would be an avid ally, I have this to say: Nothing could be further from the truth.

Let’s hope that Mr. Friedman’s replacement will be blessed with a bit more modesty and a lot more morality.

Forever fifteen, forever missed

The last photo taken of Malki as she took part in a birthday party of
a classmate on the night of August 8, 2001. Malkiwas murdered at
2:00 pm the next day. 

A slightly different version of this essay was first published on the Times of Israel website a few days ago under the title "Forever fifteen". Malki's birthday is November 27.

---

Today we mark yet another agonizing birthday. 

My sweet daughter Malki would now be thirty-five years old if Hamas operative Ahlam Tamimi had made some misstep on August 9, 2001.

But Tamimi was and still is a seasoned, determined, efficient and blood-thirsty terrorist.

In the Sbarro bombing which she confesses she masterminded and which she calls “my operation”, seven babies and children perished with nine adults - some parents alongside their offspring. It was an unmitigated massacre.

Never could we have imagined that her murderer would now be free as a bird - and protected by a ruler who is coddled by both the United States and Israel – King Abdullah II of Jordan.

Tamimi's stated determination to kill Jews is matched only by the determination of world leaders to ignore our pleas to correct the travesty of justice that Tamimi's freedom embodies.

Our letters, phone calls, op-eds, tweets and front-page advertisement have fallen on deaf ears. They have only elicited excuses, evasive double talk, or total silence from most of the people who could easily assist us if they cared to.

There are no obstacles in their path: 

• Legislation has existed for years empowering the US to arrest, try and convict terrorists in US courts under US law if they kill a US national, which Malki was. 
• In 1995, an extradition treaty was signed and ratified between the US and Jordan and accepted valid by both countries. The State Department still takes that view. 
• Tamimi was added to the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorists list in 2017. A $5 million State Department reward for her capture and conviction was announced in 2018. 
• Legislation enacted in 2019 empowers the US to impose a foreign aid sanction on any country failing to abide by its treaty obligation to the US, a measure likely directed at Jordan.

June 2001 - the last family celebration we ever had
with Malki present

None of the steps that could be taken to right this moral wrong has been taken.

It is demoralizing to realize that politicians, religious leaders, community figureheads and journalists across the board just don't care about seeking justice when doing so is unlikely to win them kudos.

Of course, we nevertheless intend to continue this fight. 

On this birthday, we cannot embrace Malki or the family we dreamed she would be blessed with by now. We can only write the next email or make the next phone call with the prayer that it will hasten Tamimi's long awaited extradition.

Aleh vs ADI

Here's my update re the slugfest underway at Aleh. And my bet is it's the only update you'll get!

Neither side is clarifying what is going on or why. For now, I can only add that Doron Almog and his cronies have staked out the Aleh branches in the Negev and Jerusalem as well as the "Neuro Orthopedic Rehabilitative Hospital" alongside Aleh Negev which is slated for completion in 2021. 

He posts his PR material on a Facebook page under the name ADI - Advancement of People with Disabilities and Rehabilitation for All. From there he links to a new website: ADI-Israel.org 

Rabbi Marmorstein, his apparent adversary, has staked out Aleh Bnei Brak and Aleh Gedera. As he states here https://aleh.org/branches/

"The rehabilitative village in the Negev (“Nahalat Eran”) and the residential center in Jerusalem are no longer part of the ALEH network and have join forces under a new organization named ‘ADI.’ For more information about ADI Negev-Nahalat Eran and ADI Jerusalem, please use the following contact information [followed by a list of phone numbers in Israel, USA, Canada and UK]

On his Hebrew Facebook page, Marmorstein also claims to have opened a "new campus" which, he boasts, was recently visited by a couple of dignitaries from Ariel University. Here is my English translation of his report of that tour. There is no official translation anywhere of that since Aleh no longer seems to have an English language Facebook page:

"The CEO of Ariel University, Mr. Yoram Shai and our dear friend, Yehudah Drasinover, the Internal Controller of the University visited the new campus of the "Aleh" chain, In the course of the tour they saw up close the devoted care and huge investment in the dear children.
Yoram Shai said on the tour that the registered patent of Aleh is the professionalism and the faith in the special child. 
From Aleh comes the call to the entire world to do everything to improve the quality of life of everyone who is dependent on others 
Rabbi Yehuda Marmorstein told them that this is an emotional day for him and the beginning of cooperation between the "Aleh" chain and Ariel University."

The post elicited one comment from someone who asked: "Where is this new campus located?"

No response from Aleh.

However today Aleh's Facebook page mentions some "emotional installation" created by resident children which is situated "at the entrance to the new Aleh campus in Bnei Brak". No further details were provided.

The above report did not appear anywhere in English. That's because there no longer is an English Aleh Facebook page. It was removed last week when Doron Almog announced that he was taking over two of the Aleh branches - Aleh Negev and Aleh Jerusalem - and renaming them ADI - Advancement of People with Disabilities and Rehabilitation for All

Shortly afterwards an English language Facebook page under that name was posted: https://www.facebook.com/adiisraelrehab/

There he offers a long winded version of the split, his own accomplishments and a fantasmical summary of his institution's accomplishments replete with catch phrases like "multiple disabilities and complex medical issues", "fully inclusive", "to reach their fullest potential", and all the usual Aleh jargon.

I fear that this slug-fest may evolve into a tug of war over residents. Each camp may resort to more aggressive "recruitment" tactics to enlarge its number of residents and government funding. Marmorstein has been known to to call at least one parent urging him to hand over his child - that was related on an Aleh PR video clip!

Back at home, we have finally hooked up with a circle of SCN2A families In Israel. 

I had been hunting for just this sort of support ever since we received the news of Haya's genetic mutation in August, 2019. I found them via the global support group about which I've written in the past.

We are six families scattered around Israel and I've already exchanged a flurry of Whatsapps with them in the 24 hours since joining. We plan to have a Zoom gathering tomorrow night. 

Their children are all much younger than Haya and I hope when they hear how profoundly disabled she is they won't be horrified. I'll try to reassure them with the knowledge that medicine is better equipped today to treat our children's symptoms than it was 24 years ago when our nightmare with Haya began.

Anybody interested in joining can contact me at frimet.roth@gmail.com. for details.

Topsy-turvy state: Is the head of a closed institution an "inclusion icon"?

Image Source: Israel National New

Live and learn.

It seems a person who champions the separation of children with disabilities from their families and locks them up in large institutions is none other than an "inclusion icon" ["Corona Cocoon: Inclusion icon shares her quarantine practices"].

No, that was no typo. The Aleh PR team actually dubbed the chief administrator of its Jerusalem branch with that moniker. It's akin to labeling a totalitarian leader "Defender of Democracy" or a drug lord "anti addiction". etc. You get my drift.

Around that time, Bizchut, the Israel Center for the Rights of People With Disabilities, circulated a newsletter which detailed two instances of its intervention to help individuals with disabilities escape institutions. Here is one [my translation from Hebrew]: 

"Dan, 26, has cognitive disabilities, autism and challenging behavior. He shuttled between various residential settings but didn't manage to settle in at any of them. Life in a big, remote institution disconnected him from his family and his community. In sheltered living, he resided with five others and needed to accommodate himself to a strict daily routine. Consequently, he experienced fits of rage or was pumped with psychiatric drugs. Dan's parents returned him to the community. They designed an independent, flexible program suited to his needs and abilities. His medical and emotional conditions improved. His attacks of rage have disappeared. He has friends in the neighborhood. He attends synogogue. He enjoys classes in arts and crafts, sport and gardening. But the subsidies that Dan receives only cover half the cost of the program. His parents have been paying for the rest. How much is that, you ask? Well, interestingly, it's less than his living expenses were at the institution. We approached the Ministry of Welfare with a request to supply people like Dan with services supporting life in the community or, alternatively, to cover the costs of a personal program which is, as stated, lower than the cost of life in an institution. This is the correct way to provide a person with services: funding or a personal basket which he can choose to implement. We will continue to update!"

But the struggle confronting Bizchut is constantly obstructed by our own government, one that encourages, praises and supports institutionalization.  

As we have grown to expect, yet another couple of government officials trotted off to Aleh last week to praise the denial of equal rights to our most vulnerable citizens. Aleh's Facebook page and website informed us that 

"Michael Biton, Minister for Civil and Social Matters in the Ministry of Defense visited the "Rehabilitation Village of Aleh Negev/Nahalat Eran". The chairman of the village, Doron Almog and CEO Avi Wurtzman conducted the visit to the site during which the Minister heard about the endeavors at the village and the educational and rehabilitative activities that are carried out there. He was also impressed by the rehabilitation day center and spoke to a patient who progressed extraordinarily thanks to the dedicated therapy and care of the staff there. The minister visited the therapeutic pool. horse farm, amphitheatre and the site of the rehabilitation hospital which will serve the needs of thousands of Negev residents. Minister Biton praised the employees of ALEH Negev-Nahalat Eran and their dedicated service and listened intently as he was told about the village’s history, its development over the years, its future vision and present challenges. Before departing, the Minister signed the village guest book, writing that, “a visit to ALEH Negev-Nahalat Eran is an obligation for every Israeli. A special thank you for all that you do to benefit IDF veterans with disabilities and the residents of Yerucham and the Negev, so close to my heart.”

Source: Screen Cap

And just two days later another government official, Minister of Diaspora Affairs Omer Yankelevich, enjoyed a repeat performance by PR chief Doron Almog, and CEO Avi Wurtzman. The Minister heard about the major projects, ranging from the construction of that much-touted rehabilitation hospital to the volunteerism of "hundreds of diaspora youths" - you know, to make it all relevant to her domain. 

We learn from Aleh that afterwards the Minister 

"praised the endeavors of the Village... blessed the administration of the place and the staff in the guest book and wrote 'To the warmest, most special, moral and humane home in the world. Thanks to you we learn what a person's role is in the world...Thank you for nurturing values the merits of which take center stage in Israeli society and in the Diaspora...Thanks to you the next generation will be different..." [Source]

The Minister obviously has a soft spot for hyperbole.. And she is also obviously ignorant about the global view of institutions like Aleh. Here is what the COVID-19 Disability Rights Monitor ("the world’s only systematic international shadow monitoring report focusing on disability rights") had to say just one month ago:  

"While the institutionalization of persons with disabilities has always been a human rights abuse,[emphasis added] our survey demonstrates that the emergency measures that were implemented by governments to control the spread of COVID-19 have accelerated the pre-existing abuses of the rights of persons with disabilities in institutions. These abuses include violations of the right to life itself. For instance, persons living in smaller group homes in the USA are contracting and dying of COVID-19 at a much higher rate than the rest of the population. Institutional residents who have contracted COVID-19 were denied access to the same quality of health care that was provided to other citizens."  

I would advise her to peruse this post of mine ["The case for de-institutionalization in the COVID-19 era"] too.

In the meantime, I am still anxiously awaiting a response from the Israeli government's Ministry of Welfare's Freedom of Information section (mentioned here). I requested a break-down of the number of COVID-19 victims with disabilities according to the individual institutions.

Human beings and Haaretz

The Mahane Yehuda shuk in Jerusalem [Image Source]

I found the following Hebrew article from last weekend's Haaretz very moving. So I translated it (without anyone's permission) to share with my English-language readers. Apparently I wasn't alone in my appreciation because it generated 313 comments (so far) on Haaretz' website, most of them adulatory. 

I've translated a sampling of them which appear below after the article.

It's a Human Being, You Must Help
Alon Idan - published in Haaretz Magazine, June 26, 2020

(The title on the Haaretz website translates to "A Large Man Falls in the Middle of Mahane Yehuda. Here's What Happened Next")

Translated by Frimet Roth

The man simply fell. 

Actually"fell" isn't accurate. Everybody falls. He didn't simply fall. He collapsed. He exploded. He was sprawled on the ground like a sack thrown from a truck. It was horrible. Truly horrible. Everybody stood nearby. 

It happened next to "The Best Falafel in the Land" stall. Every city has a "Best Falafel in the Land". It happened beside "The Falafel of the Levi Brothers" in the Mahane Yehuda shuk which is the best in the-land-called-Jerusalem and he was a large man, tall, broad, impressive, mustachioed, dressed in light brown pants, a light brown buttoned shirt, shiny black shoes and he wore what looked like a luxury watch and in both his hands he held white bags with the shopping he had done at the shuk, and in one bag were all sorts of items that were hard to discern while in the second bag was a large tray of eggs, the old fashioned kind with, I believe, 30 eggs or maybe even 36, in any case it doesn't matter anymore because all the eggs were now broken and had become one huge yellow batter.

And what happened is that there were many metal blue barriers, the sort the police set up in order to close off streets when there's a demo, only this time they closed the entrances to the shuk so it would be possible to measure people's temperature. But there were several barriers that they hadn't used and these were placed on the road, one next to the other, with the edge of one of them, the last in the row, simply protruding toward the sidewalk such that, if by chance a large, broad, impressive, mustachioed man holding two white bags and rushing home, didn't notice it, he was likely to encounter it, slip, fly in the air and then when he would attempt to place his other foot on the sidewalk in order to block his expected fall, he'd discover that there isn't a sidewalk, just a road on which he is now spread out, in pain, shocked, with blood covering the upper part of his face.

And this is what happened afterwards: 

Everyone who was near this large man lying on the ground came over to help. People left their shopping, their bags, their plans - and helped raise him. And afterwards they sat him on a red chair near The-Best-Falafel-in-the-Land. Then they gave him a drink, and then a fellow from the neighboring stall, a too-thin person with a white undershirt, arrived with a litre and a half bottle of water and offered to rinse the large man's flow of blood that leaked from the upper part of his nose. The large man felt uncomfortable and said "It's OK, it's OK, I'm OK". But the thin man with the white shirt told him it was not OK and that he should stop arguing and allow him to rinse the blood. And he stood beside him and rinsed off his blood. 

And in the meantime a rather elderly woman who had two minutes earlier helped the large man stand up from the road whispered something in her daughter's ear. The daughter heard the words and left the place. When the large man looked like somebody who was considering standing up and trying to walk, the woman approached him and said: "What are you doing? Sit, you aren't moving from here, you got a strong knock, rest". And she stood beside him to make sure that that would actually happen.

Simultaneously, another man arrived, with grey hair and glasses, took the large man's hand and asked whether he was alright, and whether he needed anything and how to help. The large man said with a stammer diluted with embarrassment, "I'm OK. Everything's OK." Another man, with a stubble and slicked-back black hair, meandered nervously near the blue barriers and tried to understand what had happened. He too works in the shuk and now he kicks the rebellious barrier that caused the fall as one avenging the large man, and mutters "Look at this, because of this Corona look what's happened to a person. It's not alright."

He was so angry that the only way for him to be rid of the anger was to approach the large man and console him: " It's OK, everything will be OK."

After around ten minutes, when the large man again tried to stand, the too-thin man with the white undershirt simply wouldn't let him. "You might have a concussion, you musn't stand, sit, there's no reason for you to hurry, we'll bring you what you want," he said.

The large man nodded embarrassedly, he knew the too-thin man was right. The other people also remained in their places, waiting, watching with concern, from the corners of their eyes, the large man who sat on the chair.

He finally rose. His left leg was in great pain. He limped. People supported him. They said maybe he should rest a bit more. but this time he insisted on walking. "I'm fine", he said, " Believe me, I'm fine." He wasn't fine. You could see he was in pain. And that woman who had whispered something in her daughter's ear stopped him. "Wait just a moment," she pleaded "just a moment." He didn't understand why but he waited. After several seconds, she said "Here, she's coming." And her daughter indeed came. With a white bag and in it was a new, large tray of eggs. 30 eggs. Maybe 36.

The man didn't want to take them - "There's no need, really no need" - but he had no choice. "Take, take," the woman told him, "It's yours, take." So he took. And then he hobbled in the direction of the street. A large man, dark, mustachioed, with a large, Muslim skullcap on his head. And when somebody approached the woman and told her "Bravo to you, really. Bravo to you," she replied: "What's this Bravo? Bravo for what? It's a human being, you have to help".

END

This story elicited 313 comments!

Here's a sampling:

• Nice to read something a bit positive. A bit of respite from the columns and articles that arouse endless despair
• Thanks for the lovely and touching column. This is the beauty of humanity in the most direct, simple and pure form. I always had the sense that people in Israel are good as individuals and something is lost when we expand the picture and reach politics and other systems on whose bases we live.It's really a good and important question for sociologists of Israeli society. In addition I'd be happy to translate this piece into Chinese, there, in similar situations people flee and don't reach out because of the (real) fear that the person requesting help is pretending and liable to ultimately harm you.
• Excellent writing. Reminds me of Etgar Karet.

And beyond the moving story, written in a really excellent manner, this from a nurse in the pediatric hematology unit at Hadassah hospital:

Thanks Alon. I work in a place where Jews and Arabs lift one another up every day. An hour ago, a photo was posted on our department's Whatsapp of R., a girl from Gaza, blind from a cancer called Retinoblastoma. The NGO "Salimatcom" organized a trip to the zoo for her the "see" the animals. The photo also shows R.'s mother, Sh. who is very attached to her, H., who just got married a week ago and I. The latter are all "Kosher Jews" who work in our department. They went voluntarily. This morning one of our doctors, also a "Kosher Jew", (she's even with a head covering) wrote an email in which she described the efforts of the staff to send one needy family from East Jerusalem, from your united capital, for a special treatment in New Jersey. [Working together are] an Israeli NGO, the patient's health fund, and the social worker who is ours (also with a head covering but not a kosher one - a hijab) and the coordinator of our department - all united in a race against time, against faxes, American regulations and against bureaucracy - in order to fly them there. It's strange to me that compassion is mostly revealed when a child has cancer or a man is bleeding in the shuk and his tray of eggs has broken. One of our staff members once suggested that Palestinian and Israeli politicians should be obligated to volunteer with us for a week, say every six months. All the best.

Low expectations are the key

As I  mentioned [here], November was Epilepsy Awareness Month.

But nothing can be as stark a reminder of the tragedy of epilepsy as a death that results from it. Because while most people are aware that epilepsy is a debilitating ailment, and that the treatments available have many serious side effects, few view it as lethal. Even those of us whose loved ones suffer from it.

So the horrific death this week of a beautiful, vibrant Jerusalem teenager after an epileptic fit landed her under the light rail ["Jerusalem light rail strikes, kills 19-year-old woman"] warrants publicizing.

Haya, of course, is not in any danger of dying from her epilepsy in a similar manner. She never even stands independently. But SUDEP is a constant threat.

In the meantime, we struggle to reap the most minor achievements from her through therapies.

Occasionally, thanks to our rock bottom expectations, we find cause for celebration. Here she is in the video clip above impressing us all during her Occupational Therapy session this past week.

Where's the progress for the profoundly disabled?

Well, it's been a while so I'll update regarding that protest demo I publicized here ["For Israelis with disabilities, two divergent paths"] a couple of weeks ago.

To put it bluntly: a disappointment. 

Meager turnout and infuriating response from the Ministry of Welfare, the building outside of which we protesters stood. A number of people with disabilities participated and expressed their anger. 

The mother of Effie Ben Baruch, the young man who recently died from physical abuse by his caregivers, was there. I approached her asking how she was connected to Effie - I had a hunch she was his mother from her grieving demeanor:

When we first approached the building's entrance gates, a guard asked the man in the wheelchair leading us: "Who is your representative?"

The wheelchair-bound man was duly infuriated: "We represent ourselves!" he responded.

After the protesters were refused entry, they demanded that the director of the Ministry's department for disabilities come down to speak to us. He did not deign to do that.

Instead, some other employee from an unrelated department eventually emerged from the "fortress" and promised that the director will be visiting Effie's bereaved family soon.

Hmmm. I call that a slap in the face.

As I overheard one protester in a wheelchair telling his friend: "This protest takes me back 30 years!"

Precisely. The baby steps of progress for the severely disabled actually feel more like deterioration in comparison with every other area of social welfare.

That impression has been reinforced since joining the Facebook page "Special Needs Mama's in Israel". I hoped to find camaraderie, a common cause, etc. Instead, I sense that parents of children with profound disabilities aren't even on that page's - or society's - radar. We're invisible. The gripes and venting posted on the page make me feel so isolated. 

I fairly pray for the sorts of problems that those parents bemoan. For instance, one mother related how her daughter sat on the curb and cried after waiting three hours for a bus to go to a movie with friend. Several buses had passed her by. As one commenter noted: "I'd have cried too!"

At my husband's urging, I'm considering starting a Facebook page for parents in my boat.

Any of you caring at home for children with serious disabilities, physical/cognitive, and craving such a forum please comment here. If you prefer privacy, I can provide my email address at your request.

BTW, once again, and unfortunately, that protest only received coverage in the Hebrew language media, so I will translate the following piece asap. 

For now, I've done the headline and the intro:

"I am not prepared to be stashed away in an institution": Will the resident who died from abuse advance the closure of institutions for people with disabilities"
The death of Ephraim Ben Baruch in an institution highlighted that the era of institutions for people with disabilities, mostly in private and barely supervised hands - has ended. But the transition to in-community living is happening at a slow pace, thousands live in danger, and the State continues to violate the law. This week families protested against additional neglect from outgoing Minister of Welfare Chaim Katz.

More to come.

Let's get the Tamimi facts right

The Jerusalem Post is currently circulating a news item whose sub-title correctly asks "How does a terrorist who killed two Americans have an active Twitter account?"

That terrorist murdered my child.

The photo accompanying the piece is of my child and me.

The source of the revelation of that account is my husband's research.

Thus I feel compelled and justified in critiquing that Jerusalem Post item.

Just as most Arab language news services do, the Jerusalem Post has diminished Tamimi's role in the 2001 Sbarro Pizzeria bombing to just barely this side of criminal.

Tamimi is described as the one who "drove the suicide attacker to the restaurant" and adding that the "perpetrator himself was killed in the explosion".

In fact, Tamimi, was the mastermind of that attack. She was the perpetrator.

According to her own account, she scoured the center of Jerusalem for a venue offering the highest number of women and children as potential victims. She coached her human weapon, the suicide bomber. She accompanied him on their journey from Ramallah and as he carried the 10 kg. explosive-filled guitar case from East Jerusalem to West Jerusalem. She escorted the human bomb to the target she had selected. She instructed him to wait fifteen minutes before detonating to enable her to escape unharmed.

At no time did she drive. They came by bus and cab.

This evil mass murderer of fifteen men, women and children lives under the protection of Jordan’s King Abdullah II. She is free to incite admiring fellow Muslims to follow in her footsteps by hosting TV programs, guest appearances on talk shows and her Twitter account which my husband and I have requested be shut down immediately.

Tamimi was indicted in 2017 and her extradition from Jordan requested by the US Department of Justice. Her name was added at the same time to the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorists list.

Despite Jordan flatly refusing the US extradition request, the White House persists in hosting King Abdullah and hailing him as a loyal partner in the fight against terrorism.

When covering this travesty of justice, I urge reporters to stick to the facts. Let’s leave the misrepresenting to our enemies.

Notes from an Aleh visit

One of the cribs I saw at Aleh

I promised more transcribed info from my visit to Aleh Jerusalem ["Making history: After the raid"] and here it is.

Our guide was a senior staff member of Aleh Jerusalem whose position entails a variety of organizational responsibilities.

But on this particular day, what she did a lot of was "blow smoke in our eyes". Before the tour began, while we were congregated in somebody's office, she regaled us with tales of Aleh as champion of the family. I found this ironic, given that Aleh is in the business of taking children away from their families.

"We don't come to replace the family" was one of her memorable lines. "The family is an entire world" was another. "We try hard to keep contact going between residents and families", yet another.

Next, an anecdote: 

"One mother had no relationship with her son. The father was the only legal guardian. After years of efforts by Aleh's social worker, the mother finally came to visit him two years ago and now sees him - he's 21 years old - once every few weeks."

"Each family chooses what it wants and we follow its lead", we heard. Next we were told the tale of a mother who brings home her child's laundry and returns the clothes freshly washed and dried. I wondered how this devotion to her child's clothes could be relevant to her relationship with her child but didn't pursue that. 

"Every educational decision, every medical decision is reached with the involvement of the parents. We have long and meaningful dialogues and joint discussions beforehand."

Afterwards, there was prattle about parties to which parents and siblings are invited: "We want the siblings to see the positives of Aleh and not just to think of it as a hard place. It was just Chanukah, and we had a full party." Now how a "full party" differs from a "partial party" wasn't clarified. I didn't pursue that either. But it was implied that this was a significant party which somehow benefited the residents greatly.

We were then taken to the floors where the residents live. Two of the five floors are devoted to housing the 82 residents who range in age from babies to 40 years old. They were housed three or four to a bedroom and at 12:45 pm we found many in their cribs. Yes, even the young adults are relegated to cribs.

In one room, three of the four were wide awake and one, who was sitting up, smiled warmly when I approached and spoke to him. Why they were in bed - and our guide told us activities would not resume until 4 pm - is anyone's guess. We were told that normally they are put to bed slightly later but that because this was a fast day - it was the 10th of Tevet - the schedule had been slightly altered. Again, the connection between the two is anyone's guess.

I was particularly interested in learning how much para-medical therapy each resident receives. Therapies are a basic need for those with severe disabilities - precisely the population that Aleh invites. (Nearly all of the 82 residents are wheelchair bound, the guide told us). 

Many years ago, my daughter's physiotherapist told me that "therapy is oxygen for these children". And as I have learned from experience, the more severe the disabilities, the more crucial is individualized, intensive input of private therapy sessions.

But extracting information about such therapies proved challenging. Or, rather, impossible.

So, for example, when we visited the beautiful new therapy pool - empty - I asked how many times the residents receive hydrotherapy. The answer: "Once a week; once a fortnight. It's a relatively new pool. Just opened this year. The problem is with the logistics". 

I raised it again a few minutes later and was told: "Once a fortnight - or once a week". 

When I asked about the pool being open in the afternoons for a fee, she told me "Yes, it's open to the public." Apparently no logistics problem in the "for-profit" context.

I then pursued the question of other para-medical therapies, namely physiotherapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy. After getting a general answer, "It depends on the child", I pressed for a range of numbers of therapies or for the number that a typical child would receive. Still stone-walled. "It's very difficult to say. Because it's very dependent on the specific child" was her response, adding, "We very much believe in group therapies. For example, the physiotherapist works with groups. And the occupational therapist as well. If there's a specific child who needs something specific then, yes. Everybody with his own needs. That's why it's so hard to say. With physiotherapy there are those who receive it four times a day". 

I interjected, "Oh, you mean the respiratory physiotherapy?" It had been mentioned earlier. The guide said, "Yes, the respiratory physio." She reiterated: "That's why it varies a lot."

Now for those who are unfamiliar with it, respiratory physiotherapy is primarily concerned with developing, maintaining and restoring an individual's maximum movement and functional ability. In patients with respiratory conditions, physiotherapy includes, but is not limited to, chest physiotherapy or clearance of secretions, and breathing exercises. 

It is by no means the physiotherapy that children with functional disabilities, children unable to walk, stand or sit independently, need in order to progress. It is simply administered to keep the patient breathing.

Realizing that our guide may have been referring only to resident children, I asked about therapies for the young adults. They have a "different program", she said. "They get a combination of work and social activities. The work session is two hours long and its nature depends on the individual capabilities of each resident. They work with paper, clay, etc. It is very much personally adapted." 

As for therapies, "We try to weave them into the daily program, for instance, the walking." 

Well, you have to hand it to our guide: she's a champion waffler.

Coming up: the results of a follow-up phone call to that guide in which I try to elicit specific answers about therapies in Aleh.