ISRAEL: Riots in Jerusalem after religious woman’s arrest

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For the last few weeks, Jerusalem has been burning on weekends. Protesting the city’s decision to open a municipal parking lot on the Sabbath to serve tourists, ultra-Orthodox residents have been demonstrating in the streets several Saturdays in a row, rioting and torching dumpsters after the end of the Sabbath.

On Wednesday, Jerusalem burned once more as ultra-Orthodox protesters set city property ablaze and clashed with the police -- but for a different reason. The new wave of rioting was sparked by the arrest of a member of Neturei Karta, a small but feisty group in Israel’s ultra-Orthodox community, on suspicion that she starved her child to near-death.

The 3-year-old had been in and out of hospitals for two years, but doctors couldn’t determine the cause of what seemed like chronic and severe malnutrition. The absence of a medical explanation suggested the problem resided elsewhere and surveillance cameras eventually confirmed the suspicions of hospital staff and welfare workers.

The footage showed the mother repeatedly disconnecting the toddler’s feeding tubes. She is believed to suffer from Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a psychiatric condition in which an individual -- most often a mother -- fabricates or even induces sickness upon a young charge, typically their own child, for attention, compassion and possibly control.

The hospital reportedly refused the police’s request to arrest the mother on the premises; she was arrested outside a Jerusalem welfare office after she had met with a staff member, and disturbances have gone on since. A protest outside the welfare office turned into a rampage and resulted in destroyed computers, toys and other equipment on site. A demonstration Wednesday escalated into full-blown riots, complete with dumpster burning, rock throwing and calling police ‘Nazis,’ and resulted in the arrest of at least 26 protesters and suspension of municipal services such as welfare and sanitation until city employees would not be at risk or under threat in the ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods of Geula and Mea Shearim.

Posters on the bulletin boards in those neighborhoods told a different story, of a mother devoted to her sick child whose doctors had been tempted to try experimental treatments after failing to find the cause for his condition. The mother suspected the treatment was not in the child’s interest and reportedly was told she would not see him for three years if she continued to intervene. The posters called the affair a modern version of a Middle Ages blood libel and called on the public to avoid seeking treatment at Hadassah hospitals, where Judaism haters are said to lurk.

The family accused the authorities of setting the mother up for arrest. Even if it is proved beyond a doubt that she suffers from a psychiatric condition, they said in a statement, she should not have been treated as a criminal but instead given help. They expressed concern that the affair would erase the hard-earned trust between the welfare authorities and the community. For the most part, the ultra-Orthodox communities don’t take matters outside if they don’t have to.

The child, 3 1/2 years old, weighed only about 15 pounds at the time of the mother’s arrest. Sources at the Hadassah Ein Kerem hospital said the child’s condition has improved since then and his symptoms are gradually disappearing. Rioting had spread to the town of Beit Shemesh and continued well into the night in Jerusalem.

-- Batsheva Sobelman in Jerusalem