Adv. Mickey Givati (Source)
A very unusual situation has arisen in Israel. Adv Mickey Givati, an Israeli lawyer, is standing up against child welfare services and sticking up for a little girl.
His public post on social media has caused outrage, particularly as the child is American, writes Jewish journalist and activist Marianne Azizi.
“Shame on the state of Israel, shame on the ministry of welfare…shame to the system of courts and shame on the police in the State of Israel,” writes Givati.
This shame, of course, also applies to the governments of Australia, Sweden, UK and the many other countries that are operating the same - sinister - system of secret family courts. The State of Israel, stealing around 10 000 children a year, is in all likelihood no worse than the UK, for example, where more than 30 000 children are stolen every year and a massive 140 000 go missing. Forever. Sometimes children really do need to be separated from parents but more often than not, happy families are destroyed by increasingly tyrannical regimes.
So why, given these numbers, is this situation so unusual? Why don't more lawyers and professionals in other countries speak out? Fear! Not only are these processes sickeningly lucrative but beleaguered families and the people who help (or harm) them throughout these secret processes are gagged and threatened with prison for speaking out: few have been as brave as Givati. And few children get the chance to speak out like this brave little girl, pictured below with her father.
"Of course it is a difficult position to publish about a child,” says the lawyer, “But this poor girl has been running for 3 years and cannot get to her family. I fight for many kids, and something needs to be done about the system. To fill a child with drugs instead of addressing the matters of her soul and well being is unimaginable. I have children of my own and believe more should be done to keep children with their biological family."
When this little girl (let’s call her Shari - not her real name) and her brothers, US citizens all, were abandoned by their mother in the US, their father was given custody and took them to live in Israel.
When Shari was just ten years old, a woman with mental health problems who knew her father made anonymous calls to the Israeli welfare services, who arrived at school to take Shari and her brother away. The family court slapped a (delusional, according to Givati) restraining order on her father.
Shari didn’t even speak the language! She knew nothing of the culture. Stranded alone in emergency centres, the little girl developed eating disorders as a coping mechanism.
Forcibly hospitalised and medicated, Shari was moved from pillar to post. When she protested, she was locked into solitary confinement and physically punished. Adults would stand on her back and stretch her arms and legs.
Desperate to see her father, the little girl tried to escape more than 100 times. The first time, she was terrified. But escaping was better than being incarcerated so she learned to survive on the streets until she was found and dragged back into institutional hell.
On 10 December 2017, Shari’s dream came true. Having jumped onto two buses and a train, she made it close to her father's house in Jerusalem. That evening, police reported her missing to her brother so the family went out looking for her. She was found by her father frozen with cold, hungry and exhausted….but happy. She was home. After three long years she was back with her family.
Still terrified by the authorities, her father called his lawyer immediately. Givati called the police and it was agreed that rather than turn Shari over to the police, he could return her straight to “boarding school”. The family met at Givati’s house, where they shared pizza and Shari was given candy and warm clothes.
Shari didn’t want to go back to boarding school. She wept and wept. It’s obvious that she had been sexually assauted, too…..although she seems too ashamed to talk about it.
But there was no choice for her. Shari was dragged back to “school”.
To be drugged. And assaulted.
Because that is the law.
“All in the best interests of the child.”
Before Shari was torn away, Marianne Azizi was able to film a video interview.
Marianne writes (this text has been slightly edited - the original can be found here):
“Incarcerated since she was 10, this little girl has fought the authorities, running away time after time. With a mixture of vulnerability and a streak of defiance, she is finally warm and safe. But not for long. She must be returned to the police very soon. It is a golden opportunity to film her testimony.
Her short life in Israel has turned into a fight for her freedom.… the perpetrators – social workers and a judiciary which has decided against all the facts that this child is better in the care of the private institutions who profit $5,000 a month for keeping her away from normality.
…All this child needs is love, and a hug. That is only a memory for her these days. She is not comfortable with men – and avoids questions of her being hurt or “tampered” with. She refuses to answer – yet her body language says otherwise…..
It is not the first time a child has mentioned these isolation rooms. She was locked up and talks of having her food is passed through to her. …Banging on the door and screaming for help led to more “holdings” and punishments. There were no toilet facilities - she is embarrassed to describe how she managed.
She has received little education. Now, she can just about speak Hebrew. But she can’t read or write in English. She was just 10 when she was forcibly medicated. Three years on, the court has decided that the best option was further drugging! These drugs will have long lasting effects (she currently finds it difficult to remember all the details of her assaults and the names of the perpetrators). Yet her main problem is simple: that she hates being incarcerated and separated from her family!
She is now streetwise. She hides the pills under her tongue whenever she can and throws them away, knowing instinctively that they are bad for her.
She dreams of a normal life, back with her family as before. But she does not expect a normal life because Israeli welfare services want to lock her in a secure facility, closed to the outside world.
The lawyer at times is overcome with emotion. He is powerless to help. The evidence is overwhelming. She wants to go home. There was no reason to take her in the first place. Even after countless hearings and appeals, the welfare authority will not admit it was wrong. Its actions have wrecked a young girl’s life.
The money rolls in – over 1m Israeli shekels ($293,000) have been made on this girl. The same applies to other countries - child welfare is a gravy train. Have all our societies lost the ability to stand in tchildren’s shoes and stop this preventable child snatching and abuse?
What has Israel become in 2018, that funding is given to these American Institutions who act with impunity against children?
The full video will be sent to law-enforcement agencies in the USA but there is little optimism that anything will be done in Israel or internationally to stop this daily abuse of children. Only the public can exert pressure.
The Schusterman Foundation mentioned in the video was contacted for comment, but did not respond. However, coincidentally, after a sample of video was sent, the authorities in Israel claimed the girl did not mean what she said in the video. (Which is another common tactic used in hearings.)"
If there are any international organisations or law enforcement agencies who can bring public pressure to enable the little girl to return to America, please get in touch, writes Marianne, whose website can be found here.
