Note: I generally do not edit posts after I write them (except to correct spelling errors etc.). I would like this weblog to be an honest diary, which includes my mistakes as well as (hopefully) some insights that are correct. Below is my original post, but please see the comments section for a correction - the hospital involved was evidently an Arab-run and not an Israeli-run institution, which may influence how some readers interpret the story.
I spent many years taking care of uninsured patients at a Latino clinic in Washington, DC before I moved to Massachusetts - so this story from the BBC caught my eye. Evidently a Jerusalem hospital tried to hold a newborn baby - one of three triplets - hostage to ensure that the mother, an Israeli Arab, would pay her bill.
Because the children’s father was a Palestinian resident of the West Bank, the hospital demanded payment of the bill as it was not certain of recovering the costs from the National Insurance Institute (NII).
When the woman said she was unable to pay, the hospital released only two of the babies, keeping the third as a “guarantee”.
The baby kept by the hospital was not in need of medical treatment.
The mom appealed to the Justice Ministry, which ordered the baby released and is considering prosecuting the hospital.
Obviously, the hospital’s behavior crossed a line (and got sufficient publicity to induce the Government to act). But it’s a clear illustration of the obstacles Arabs face in obtaining medical care in Israel. Jews have access to national health insurance - as, theoretically, do Arabs with Israeli identification cards.
But in this case, since the father was a Palestinian, several hospitals felt perfectly free to deny care to this woman (pricing it above what she could reasonably pay) despite the fact that she had a complicated pregnancy and needed medical attention:
The woman’s family told Haaretz that two other Israeli hospitals had turned her away because she could not pay a deposit of $72,500 (£40,000) before being admitted.
It seems to me that in medicine, we have a responsibility to care for people regardless of whether they can pay. Either of these hospitals could have admitted her, and then petitioned the NII for payment.
And, more importantly, what NII policies foster this sort of discrimination? Do they really consider that children born in Israel, of an Israeli mother, are not entitled to benefits if their father was a Palestinian - even though he is living in territory that Israel is occupying and settling?
I saw this item in Haaretz and was both depressed and horrified. It’s so antithetical to any Jewish value that I could imagine that I can only think that Israelis have devolved into a state of primitivism where anyone who is not fully a Jew is simply not human. I wonder if anyone in Israel really remembers the Holocaust — that is, as something other than a convenient buzz word that magically excuses and justifies anything Israel has done or is doing to its “enemies.”
In a similar although not as horrifying vein: I spoke with Shuli (an Israeli cousin, for those readers who are not in the Schamess family) today — she called from Israel — and although we usually stay clear of full-blown political discussions, I commented to her that I found the openly expressed prejudice (as reported in the press) against Labor party leader Peretz as a Moroccan Jew pretty disgusting. Shuli herself used to complain about the prejudice she encountered as someone of Iranian parentage. Her comment was that Israel isn’t as politically correct as we in America are — a sort of neutral comment. But she is clearly not happy with the current politics there either — she said she might not vote at all.
This is one of the stories that makes me seriously consider giving up Judiasm, and becoming … What I might become remains to be seen.
Did the hospital think it could sell the baby for $70,000.? Or … ?
Oh, goodness, guys. I don’t mean to depress you that much!
Keep in mind that, as I mentioned, the hospital’s action did cross a line. The mother was able to go to the Ministry of Justice, and the Israeli government intervened on her behalf.
There is racism in Israel as there is in the U.S. (in my experience, treatment of uninsured black and Latino patients here isn’t much different). There, as here, poverty and race combine to make people vulnerable to discrimination and dehumanization.
One difference is that racism here is officially unsanctioned, and the government and courts have legislated against it. In Israel, however, the state is built on a fundamentally racist premise - that Jews should have rights in the State of Israel that others do not. There’s a whole ideology to reinforce this and it is a part of Israeli education and information and what not - so, I think, fewer people in Israel question whether it is right.
On the other hand, most Israelis are Jews - and they have another ethical tradition to draw on than nationalist ideology. And the Jewish tradition as it has evolved fundamentally opposes discrimination and oppression, the use of power to harm and to divide.
If you want to see real Jewish values in action, look at groups like Gush Shalom and Machsom Watch, which I know you know.
That’s kind of the whole point of this blog, to show that Judaism is not Zionism, and that Jews can take an anti-Zionist position. Part of the point, anyway.
Assuming the story is accurate, it is really just another example of how Israeli society has lost any real senses of borders, not just regarding land. I think Warchowski’s (sp?) book about Borders rings true when you hear these bizarre stories of how Palestinian Israelis are treated. The very concept that a child could be held as ransom is only possible because Israelis view Palestinians as less than human. I am convinced that Israeli society fosters racism because it lies at the heart of the foundation of the State. That is why I have no love for Israel.
Yes, that’s a good way to put it.
For my part, I don’t dislike Israel per se but I think Zionism as conceived and practiced there has created deep moral problems for Israel, and practical ones for its neighbors, for the people in the territory it has conquered, for world Jewry and the world community in general.
The U.S. had its civil war and its civil rights movement and perhaps, even though the task is monumental, Israel can change fundamentally to become a country that truly reflects Jewish and humanitarian values.
I don’t see that change on the horizon, though.
I do need to read that Warchofski book. Thanks for mentioning it.
Heh. Nice job distorting the truth.
Good thing I actually bothered checking the link -
The ministry intervened last week following reports that East Jerusalem’s al-Muqassad hospital held the girl, Israeli press reports say.
al-Muqassad, eh? doesn’t sound very Israeli to me. Let’s see what else the article can tell us about this case:
The al-Muqassad hospital is an charitable Arab-run hospital in East Jerusalem.
ARAB run hospital?! No way! I thought it was an evil zionist organization!
On the hand, the guy who did help her out was an Israelly.
I stand corrected.
I checked my cached version of the BBC piece. When it was first posted, the name of the hospital was not included in the piece. Presumably the BBC updated the story later to include this information.
Would I change anything in my post, knowing that it was an Arab-run hospital? Probably not. I still think that hospitals have a responsibility to care for patients regardless of the ability to pay; and that the hospital should have admitted the patient and petitioned the national health service later for payment.
But I must retract my later comment, that this was an example of Israeli racism. My apologies for jumping to that conclusion.
It would appear that hospital “bottom-line-ism” is a phenomenon that cuts across racial lines - and I give the Israeli Justice Ministry full credit for taking on this mother’s case.
Oh My God!!! The BBC and you and all of the initial posts got the story (”Sophie’s Choice”) ABSOLUTELY wrong. 100% backwards. And yes, I recognize that you’ve ran a correction. But the damage is done. And you haven’t had the–what’s the word–courtesy? decency? to edit your initial story. So…anybody reading your website will continue to think the story is accurate, i.e. that a typical Israeli hospital forced this horrendous choice on a Palestinian woman.
Please pay close attention. This “Sophie’s Choice” does NOT occur at Israeli hospitals. Hospitals are open to all. Pure and simple. Period. Full stop.
It was an Arab hospital in East Jerusalem, which operates under the guidelines of the Israeli Ministry of Healthy (and which BROKE these guidelines), which inflicted the “Sophie’s Choice” dilemma on a Palestinian Arab woman. (And according to news reports, she is not the only victim of this practice by the hospital in question).
The initial, unedited version of the story is tendentious and false: Israeli Jews impose incredibly cruel dilemma on Palestinian woman.
The correct version is: Arab hospital imposes incredibly cruel dilemma on Palestinian woman. And the cruel dilemma was brought to light and resolved by the Israeli Ministries of Health and Justice.
Please please please edit your story. As it stands, it is worse than a lie. It is a libel.
I’ve added an addendum in response to your comment, at the top of the story. Generally I do not change my posts after I’ve written them - for reasons of intellectual honesty, i.e. not wanting to cover up my mistakes. But your point is well taken and I did not leave the original story up there with the aim of misleading readers. I hope the addendum addresses your concern.
The whole dialogue has been quite interesting to me, and a lesson that in a highly racially polarized situation, it’s easy to interpret everything in racial terms - but inaccurate.