State Expropriation of Our Uteruses, Israeli Style

It just get more and more blatant.

Israel's two chief rabbis, Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger and Sephardi Chief Rabbi Shlomo Moshe Amar, have come out in support of the controversial Efrat organization, which opposes abortion in Israel.
. . .
Organizers of the right-wing Jerusalem Conference, sponsored by Israel National News and the B'Sheva newspaper, recently announced their plan to award their "Jerusalem Prize" to Efrat.
. . .
The Efrat organization achieved notoriety in October after an 18-year-old, Raz Atias, threatened to kill his pregnant girlfriend and commit suicide. Atias was killed in a shootout with police on Oct. 19, while his girlfriend survived, in shock, but unharmed. It later turned out that the couple had been suffering great emotional distress after the girl was pressured by the Efrat organization not to have an abortion.
. . .
Two weeks ago, Israel Hayom published an investigative report describing the emotional manipulation that the organization's volunteers employ against vulnerable girls and women considering abortions.

The investigation found that Efrat receives extensive cooperation from municipal welfare services and hospitals, and that Efrat volunteers even work inside hospitals to persuade girls and women not to have abortions. Efrat has an army of 3,000 volunteers, and a budget of more than 12 million shekels [$3.2 million US] per year received from contributions in Israel and abroad.

Typical anti-choice tactics.

And the motive is pretty clearly political pronatalism.
Here's EFRAT's mission.

EFRAT, The Organization to Save Israel's Babies, receives no government assistance and is dependent upon private donations and contributions. Dr. Eli Schussheim, President of EFRAT firmly believes that our children are our future. "Saving our children is the answer to those who wish to destroy all Jews; adults, children and babies, born and unborn. By assisting women we are doing our part to increase the Jewish population in Israel."

Feminists plan to protest the award.

“The worst part is that they’re using the woman for demographics,” said protest organizer Tzaphira Allison Stern. “Why shouldn’t a woman have an abortion? Because we need the baby so there are more Jews, and so there are more Israeli soldiers, so we can defend the land and continue the occupation.”

Stern added that the organization works only with Jewish women, rather than with Arab, Druse or Christian women, which illustrates that they care only about politics and not about women’s health.

Have a look at all the cute presumably Jewish children on its website.

Jewish perhaps, but not many (any?) Ethiopian Jewish children.

Here is an account of what it's like to get an abortion in Israel.

I experienced this firsthand a few years ago, and I can confirm that a single woman in Israel seeking an abortion experiences a bureaucratic tangle of dizzying proportions that is nothing short of Kafkaesque.

And she's in a relationship but not married. How it is for married women?

But what happens to women who don’t get approval to abort? While waiting in one of the endless lines during the process, other good Jewish women carrying unwanted pregnancies told me that married women never get authorization. They have to prove nothing less than insanity or significant physical disability to get approval for an abortion.

Everywhere, it seems, women's uteruses are being expropriated by the state.

Pronatalism in Israel?

From the Jerusalem Post, a straightforward account of falling abortion rates in Israel.

The rate of legal abortions in Israel – among the lowest when compared to the countries of Western Europe for both women under 20 and women over 35 – has declined since 2000 after being steady from 1995 until then.

This emerges from the abortion report issued by the Health Ministry for publication on Monday. The report does not explain the reasons for these trends.

Details of the numbers follow, then:

But when The Jerusalem Post suggested that it could be a result of the decline in aliya [immigration of Jews to Israel] and the aging of women who arrived from the former Soviet Union – where abortions were widely used instead of contraception – and the improved access to birth control among these immigrants – ministry official Dr. Yoram Lotan said it “sounded very logical.”

Now, another story on the same topic from a source I'd never seen before, Israel Today.

Israel Today has written several times before about how Israel has an abortion problem. Since the founding of the State of Israel in 1948, more than one-and-a-half million babies have been aborted - more than the number of Jewish children killed in the Holocaust. Going by current birth rates, had those children been allowed a chance at life, there could be 5-10 million more Israelis today.

Alarm bells going off? Specifically the 'demographic winter' aka 'THEY-are-outbreeding-US!' SHRIEEEEK alarm?

Israel Today notes and dismisses the JPost's 'very logical' supposition for the causes of falling abortion rates and instead points to the work of 'a handful of pro-life organizations'.

One of those organizations is the Messianic-run Be'ad Chaim (Hebrew for "Pro Life"). With centers around the country, Be'ad Chaim is able to provide assistance and teaching to hundreds of women who may otherwise have aborted their children every year.

While the work of Be'ad Chaim and other such organizations may only be scratching the surface of Israel's abortion problem, it is making a difference. The latest Ministry of Health report revealed that women with a higher education or from better socioeconomic conditions are already far less likely to have an abortion today. Most abortions today are performed on mothers with low socioeconomic status, or, in other words, crisis pregnancies, the very ones being targeted by Be'ad Chaim and others.

Hoookay, crisis pregnancy centres in Israel.

So what is Be'ad Chaim?

Be’ad Chaim (Pro Life) is a registered Israeli non-profit
organization dedicated to the protection of mothers and unborn children. (Registered in 1989) We are a national organization with offices and Hotlines throughout Israel. All women are eligible for our assistance, regardless of nationality or religious beliefs.

We have no reason to doubt that last bit, but . . .

Next, what the heck is Messianic Judaism? (That link comes with a warning: 'Article contains weasel words: vague phrasing that often accompanies biased or unverifiable information. Such statements should be clarified or removed.')

Messianic Judaism is a syncretic religious movement that arose in the 1960s and 70s.It blends evangelical Christian theology with elements of Jewish terminology and ritual.

Our next question is posed by Israel Today.

Israel Today: How many Messianic Jews are in Israel today?

Asher Intrater: When we speak of Messianic Jews in Israel, we are speaking of people who are Jewish and Israeli citizens and who believe in Yeshua as their messiah. This is the Messianic Remnant, and it numbers about 15,000. In addition, there are many Arabs who believe in Yeshua, and there are many international Christians who make their home here.

Are we creeped out yet?

I went looking for other Israeli anti-choice organizations and found EFRAT.

Efrat is an Israeli pro-life group which tries to convince Jewish women not to perform an abortion. To this end, the organization distributes explanatory materials and offers economic aid to pregnant women considering abortion.

Let's see what it has to say about itself.

Since 1977, EFRAT has saved over 34,000 children. Through a combination of education and economic assistance, EFRAT has helped establish a new generation of Jewish families.

Hm. Not quite so non-denominational. . . But to its credit, there's little of the USian-style lies and fear-mongering. No links between abortion and mental health and/or breast cancer, for example.

So, what the heck is going on here?

Last week, deBeauxOs blogged on the Israeli Ministry of Immigration Absorption's campaign to discourage Israelis from marrying or befriending American Jews for fear of losing their identity.

Taken together, it sure seems some Israelis are flirting with notions of nativism and pronatalism.

They really want to go there?

I'm definitely creeped out.

(Gee. Look where I found that image from 'Demographic Winter'. Yup, Big Nurse Jill Stanek's. Quelle surprise.)