Four years ago, a Jewish mother lacked the financial means to raise her two children, and gave the younger one to a Christian-Arab foster family in Jerusalem "until she was able to take him back." When she came to reclaim her son last year, however, the foster family refused to return him. This past week, Jerusalem District Court Judge Moshe Drori ordered justice served - and the child returned to his mother. "The mother has a right to raise her own child," Drori wrote, "and all the more so in the case of a Jewish child whose Jewish mother wishes to raise him."
The original agreement between the mother and the foster family stipulated that the child would be raised as a Jew, but in fact he was placed in a Christian Anglican nursery. The welfare authorities long took the side of the foster family, but recently changed their mind and agreed that the mother was capable of raising both her children. Her attorney Moshe Osditcher praised the Court for ruling both that the ethnicity of a child is of critical importance in cases of this nature, and that a child should be removed from his natural home only for as short a period as possible.
The same Judge Moshe Drori is also involved in another case of current interest. In August 2002, he allowed the release from prison of a teenager who wore a shirt with the words, "No Arabs - No Terrorism." Drori ruled, "It is doubtful whether it is against the law" to wear such a shirt. This coming March, this issue will again come to the fore when David Ha'Ivri of Tapuach will stand trial for circulating such T-shirts. Atty. David Heimowitz, representing Ha'Ivri, plans to accuse the State of political motives in prosecuting him, and will maintain that the slogan in question is not a racist statement, but rather a factual one.
The original agreement between the mother and the foster family stipulated that the child would be raised as a Jew, but in fact he was placed in a Christian Anglican nursery. The welfare authorities long took the side of the foster family, but recently changed their mind and agreed that the mother was capable of raising both her children. Her attorney Moshe Osditcher praised the Court for ruling both that the ethnicity of a child is of critical importance in cases of this nature, and that a child should be removed from his natural home only for as short a period as possible.
The same Judge Moshe Drori is also involved in another case of current interest. In August 2002, he allowed the release from prison of a teenager who wore a shirt with the words, "No Arabs - No Terrorism." Drori ruled, "It is doubtful whether it is against the law" to wear such a shirt. This coming March, this issue will again come to the fore when David Ha'Ivri of Tapuach will stand trial for circulating such T-shirts. Atty. David Heimowitz, representing Ha'Ivri, plans to accuse the State of political motives in prosecuting him, and will maintain that the slogan in question is not a racist statement, but rather a factual one.