היימישע איזרעלי פרוי אנגעקלאגט און אביוס

זאיס שוין די צווייטע מאל און ארץ ישראל וואס זאיס געשעהן אזא מעשה

A 54-year-old mother of 12 is under arrest for allegedly severely abusing her children, police said Tuesday
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The woman who allegedly abused her children arrives in court on Tuesday.
Photo: Channel 2

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The Beit Shemesh resident is also suspected of failing to report multiple cases of incest among her children. She was remanded for six days by the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court on Tuesday.

It is the latest in a spate of cases of alleged child abuse in Israel, and comes less than two weeks after a haredi US immigrant couple living in Jerusalem were arrested for seriously abusing their two small children, aged three and four. One of them remains hospitalized in critical condition.

The suspect, who cannot be named by order of the court, was arrested last month after neighbors heard a child crying for help and objects being broken in the home, a police investigator told a Jerusalem court at a remand hearing on Tuesday.

It took police two hours to gain entry to the home, with the intervention of local rabbis. Officers and social workers soon uncovered brutal physical abuse of several of the children, including whippings with both belts and electric cables, according to a police officer's court testimony.

The mother is also suspected of breaking one daughter's nose with a rolling pin, leaving her children to sleep outside in a locked shed when they came home late, and preventing them from receiving medical treatment for their injuries. The mother said it was all part of their "education," according to court documents.

The father of the family was abroad at the time of the arrest, seeking charity donations, and had not returned for the court hearing on Tuesday.

When the abuse was discovered last month, only two of the couple's 12 children, who range in age from eight to 33, lived at home.

The two clearly abused children, including a disabled teenager, have since been removed from the home by social workers, the police investigator told the court.

When the children of the family were treated by social workers, it emerged that the teenagers had committed incest with each other, over a long period of time, the police officer said.

The teenage boy who was removed from the house told social workers that he had had sexual relations with his 18-year-old sister, and that he had told his parents and his rabbis, and that the latter told him not to tell anybody else.

The defendant, who was covered in several layers of clothing, did not speak in court.

Her attorney, who obtained a court order barring publication of his client's name, over the opposition of police, said the woman "did not speak with men," according to a court protocol of the proceedings.

The judge rejected the attorney request to place her under house arrest instead of keeping her in police detention, citing investigative material that presented "a very difficult web of physical violence and even abuse."