Q&A: Racial Separation in Immanuel
Racial Separation in Immanuel
Question
About 15 years ago there was an affair in which Ashkenazi and Sephardi girls were separated in a Haredi school in Immanuel. The High Court of Justice ruled that this was illegal and sent the administrators to jail. On the one hand, separation on a racial background sounds pretty bad (it brings to mind things from South Africa). On the other hand, anyone familiar with Haredi society knows that there is a clear separation between Ashkenazim and Sephardim—in customs, rabbis, style of learning, etc. So the question is whether, because this is part of Haredi tradition and has a certain logic to it, it should be respected. Or should the state really intervene and say that there are things that are a red line.
Answer
I think that as long as the school is privately funded and not supported by public money, they have the right to conduct themselves as they see fit. When public money is involved, there is room for imposed standards.
As a rule, claims like these need to be examined carefully. It is very easy to hide racism or discrimination underneath them. But sometimes it is a genuine and straightforward claim.
Beyond that, sometimes the public or the institution, out of inertia, is convinced that it is right, while in truth it is not right and this is just mental rigidity. In such a situation there is definitely room to shake them up.
Beyond that, if the distinction is based on ethnic origin, that is problematic. If the distinction is based on relevant criteria, and the result ends up being correlated with origin, that can be okay. The practical difference is that there are people from the supposedly problematic background who are nevertheless admitted because they meet the relevant criteria.
In the past I wrote about this case, and there I discussed the various arguments. See columns 445 and 233.
Discussion on Answer
Are you trying to prove from this that there was racism there? It's a very common claim, and the confidence reflected in merely quoting the story shows that readers are supposed to see it as an obvious joke. But when you think about it again, you see that this is no proof of racism at all:
1. It is definitely possible, and even likely, that he was right. Mizrahim would pass fewer high-level Torah exams. That does not necessarily assume some built-in stupidity in the Mizrahi ethnic group, but rather different education, a different atmosphere at home, and a different mode of learning.
2. It may be that he did not mean a high level in the intellectual sense, but rather a high Torah level according to the standard Haredi norm (television, secular society, language, and the like). And here too the facts are probably statistically correct. See my columns on racism and the Immanuel affair.
That doesn't mean there isn't racism. There definitely is. It only means that these are not proofs of it.
Eli—I studied in that yeshiva many years ago. In my class, 30 percent were Sephardim. At the end of the day, the yeshiva is very Ashkenazi in its character (learning, prayers, etc.), so it makes sense that they would accept fewer Sephardim in order to preserve that character. Indeed, among the yeshiva elite (the students), there was noticeable condescension and contempt toward Mizrahim, and that's a shame!
It reminds me…
Many decades ago, a reporter from a Tel Aviv local paper came to the principal (not the rosh yeshiva) of HaYishuv HeHadash Yeshiva (which is located in Tel Aviv) and asked him: Why is there racism in your institution?
The principal answered: There is no racism here at all.
The reporter asked: I'm comparing the students' names in your school to the names in the other high schools in Tel Aviv, and you barely have any Sephardim.
The principal answered in these exact words: There is no racism at all; it's just that our entrance exams are at a high level, so the Sephardim don't manage to get in…