Fathers: Israel Becomes Haven For Government Child Abuse

"Sometimes I wonder what I risked my life for. I went to fight for freedom and security but what freedom
and what do rights mean anything if a man doesn't have the right to be a father to his own child?"

Seeking a family / divorce attorney in Israel?

By WENDY McELROY
Fox News / Israel News Agency

Tel Aviv----March 27, 2005.... While he was deployed in Afghanistan, a U.S. Navy Seal wrote a lullaby for his son Sean, whom he calls SS. The song opens: Rock a bye SS ROCK Rock a Bye you sang to me each eve And you gave me rolling rock a byes of dreams I've yet to dream. Each night I'd pray that when I'd awake You'd have safely ROCK'd me home to the greatest gift, the Lord hath given me; my little son named Sean.

Sean may never hear that lullaby again, not because his father Gary died, but because Sean's mother relocated him to Israel.

She visited family in Israel during one of Gary's re-deployments and simply stayed, seeking a divorce from abroad. Israel is notorious for it's archaic system of implementing and enforcing gender bias discrimination through an outdated law from 1962 which "presumes" that the mother will look after the child until the age of six unless the court is convinced she is incapable of doing so. This 43 year-old law, passed by Israel's Parliament is enforced today by the Israel family court system and local child welfare departments. Gender bias discrimination has been outlawed in many Western countries and replaced with best interest of the child or shared parenting.

According to the American Psychological Association, joint custody and shared parenting has been found to reduce conflict between separated and divorced parents.

Gary has unsuccessfully battled the family court system in California, which has jurisdiction over the divorce, for almost two years in order to gain some access to SS. After all, that same court demands he pay hefty child support. Gary comments "I am paying $2,100 a month not to see my son." This is the new face of father's rights, a face men's rights activists are determined you will see in coming months: the military man who is "processed" by the family courts during his tour of duty or upon his return. A father who returns 'home' to children he cannot see and, often, to support payments he cannot make. As Gary http://www.glennsacks.com/the_betrayal_of.htm states, "Sometimes I wonder what I risked my life for [in Afghanistan]. I went to fight for freedom but what freedom and what rights mean anything if a man doesn't have the right to be a father to his own child?"

On March 13th, the men's rights syndicated radio show His Side featured Gary in a program entitled "Two Years into Iraq War, Little Has Been Done to Protect the Rights of Military Fathers." Gary is not alone.
The grassroots organization American Coalition of Fathers and Children (ACFC) has just launched a vigorous ad campaign to educate the public on how anti-father bias in the courts is destroying the family. An ad currently being prepared by the ACFC highlights the dilemma of military dads who are victimized by zero-tolerance and unreasonable legislation that was passed to deal with "deadbeats." Activists are pushing the image of the military father who is victimized by family courts not merely because it is true but primarily because it is effective. That image breaks through the pervasive cultural stereotype that fathers who lose custody or become "deadbeats" are uncaring, unfit, wife beating, child-abusing losers who deserve what they get.

Do uncaring and unfit fathers exist? Absolutely. But others fathers resemble Gary — a Navy veteran with a perfect military and civilian record. It is his image that father's rights activists wish you to see. Why? Because to a large extent, it is the stereotype of the loser or abusive dad that permits family courts, government agencies and the general public to turn a deaf ear to the three main complaints of father's rights activists.

These complaints are responsible fathers are commonly denied custody or access to their children, often through the mother's relocation; paternity fraud goes unpunished or even rewarded by judges who assess child support nevertheless; and, child support standards are unreasonable. By contrast, the family court system cannot ignore the complaints of alienated military fathers with the same impunity. For one thing, public opinion will not permit them to do so.

An indication of how strong the public backlash might be came in the early '90s with the http://www.ancpr.org/bradleywtarticle.htm Bobby Sherrill case. Sherrill wasn't a member of the military proper; he was a Lockheed employee and divorced father working in Kuwait when Iraq invaded. Sherrill was held captive by the Iraqis for five months. Upon his return to North Carolina, he was arrested for non-payment of $1,425 in child support that accrued while he was a hostage. The public backlash passed, partly because people assumed Sherrill was an aberration, a bizarre exception under an otherwise 'good' law. But Sherrill was imprisoned because of the same unreasonable legislation that returning military fathers and every other alienated dad in America must face.

Phyllis Schlafly, who publicly endorses the ACFC ad spotlighting military fathers, blasts one particular piece of legislation in her February 18th column at TownHall, entitled "Reservists deserve protection from family-court mischief." She writes, "The Bradley Amendment takes us back to the cruel days of debtors' prisons. It requires that a child-support debt cannot be retroactively reduced or forgiven, and states enforce this law no matter what the change in a father's income, no matter if he is sent to war.and no matter if he is ever allowed to see his children."

"It is child abuse on a national level not to allow a child to see his father for no rational reason other than gender bias" - Gary Pickholz, Israel Fathers Children Rights Advocacy Council

Consider one example of how the Bradley Amendment impacts military fathers. Reservists typically assume a sizeable pay cut when they transfer into military life. But child support is based on their civilian salaries and the Bradley Amendment effectively blocks readjustment of that debt. Thousands of miles away and out of communication, such fathers are vulnerable to defaults that can lead to financial ruin, as well as the forfeiture of passports, driver's and professional licenses. In some states, a default of over $5,000 is a felony that includes imprisonment.

Advocates of the Bradley Amendment maintain that taking a rock-hard line is necessary to ensure that deadbeat dads do not use loopholes to avoid their obligations. But these advocates now argue against a different image of divorced fatherhood. The military dad. He voices a message on behalf of every alienated father. Repeal the zero tolerance laws that have removed compassion and circumstance from family law. Repeal the Bradley Amendment; remove the bureaucracy that automatically separates father and child.

In Israel, serving your country in uniform also means little when one returns from Jenin, Rahmallah or Gaza to visit your children.

George, a recently divorced father who serves as a reserve officer in the Israel Defense Forces, joined the Israel Fathers Family Rights Advocacy Council after bitterly reaching the conclusion that the legal, law enforcement and the social welfare systems in Israel were all against him for no other reason than the fact that he was a man.

"There is gender bias in Israel," he told The Jerusalem Post in an interview held outside a family court in central Israel, where he was fighting for joint custody of his four-year-old child.

George, who like most people, is not overly familiar with the law, was shocked by the power that the state had over him when it came to intimate family affairs. When he concluded that "regular" lawyers did not understand his pain and his sense of ill-treatment, he sought help from the council, headed by Gary Pickholz, and the Israel Fathers Family Rights Party, headed by Ya'acov Schlosser.

George recounted a horrendous story of how he was allegedly treated by his wife during the marriage breakup and subsequent divorce. But outwardly, he was most angry at the Israel system which, he believes, has conspired to prevent him from seeing enough of his son or, more precisely, from giving him rights equal to those of his ex-wife. Some of George's complaints are based on misperceptions stemming from his unfamiliarity with the law and his deep sense that the establishment has treated him unfairly. But it appears that on the question of custody, he was put on the defensive from the start.

One day, after his marriage was already in serious trouble, George was summoned to the local police department and told his wife had lodged a complaint of violent behavior against him. The police told him that from that moment, he could not return home for a week, not even to pick up clothes or money. "I was kicked out of my house without due process," said George. The police, seeing that George was in shock and emotionally abused by his wife, attempted to calm him telling George that this was classic opening procedure used by many unscrupulous divorce attorneys in having the father's children taken away from him. Police eventually dismissed all charges.

To add to the bitterness between the couple, his wife eventually threw him out for good. It turned out that she owned the house and obtained an eviction order from the court. Several days later, George said he went to the kindergarten to see his son because he was worried about the child's emotional state as a result of the separation. He saw that he was highly distraught and took him out of the kindergarten for a few hours to cheer him up. The following day, his wife went to the Israel court and obtained an order in the presence of one side, restricting the hours he could spend with his son to three hours, twice a week. Once again, George felt the court had punished him without giving him a chance to defend himself.

Soon afterwards, however, another meeting was held in the presence of both parents. As is standard procedure in such cases, the Israel judge appointed a young social worker to examine the situation. Based on her findings, the court decided to let George see his son twice a week, including one overnight, and every alternative weekend. George was not satisfied with this outcome. He felt the Israeli court had been biased in favor of his wife. After that hearing, in the hopes of reducing the conflict with his wife and persuading her to give him more hours, he decided to accept her demand for a divorce. However, they failed to reach a custody agreement and decided to fight it out in an Israel court.

In the interim, George said, he tried to avoid a custody trial by appealing to a committee including two municipal social workers and an Israel Health Ministry official. It was "like talking to stone walls," he said. "They told me I should be happy to be seeing my child more than six hours a week. 'Why should I be happy?' I replied. 'I used to put him to sleep with bedtime stories every night and see him every morning. Why does the mother by default get custody of the child?" Nothing came of the meeting and George and his ex-wife met in Israel court earlier this week to start their custody fight.

Naomi Leitner, a veteran family lawyer, agreed that there is a widely accepted "Tender Age Doctrine" in Israel which asserts that in most cases, young children should remain in the custody of the mother. This begins with the 1962 Custodianship Law which "presumes" that the mother will look after the child until the age of six unless the court is convinced she is incapable of doing so. The law is based on a concept of the modern Israeli family which, from her 20 years of experience in Israel, still holds true today, she said. The father works fulltime and is the primary breadwinner. The mother moves in and out of the employment market and devotes a significant amount of her time to raising the children. This doctrine is also accepted by the courts and the social welfare system in Israel, according to Leitner.

Leitner has said that based on her experience, even during the hours when the child is in the custody of the father, it is usually a woman, the grandmother or a girlfriend, who looks after the child. But many male activists in Israel say the hardship faced by the father is much greater.

According to Pickholtz, even though the law in Israel states that the mother should generally have the child until the age of six, the courts apply the Tender Age Doctrine, rather than the "Best Interests of the Child" and "Shared Parenting" concept, to the age of 12. Until then, he said, they virtually never award custody of the child to the father. By then, it is too late, he continued. The child has been alienated from his father by the mother who is suffering from Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) and will no longer consider the possibility of going to live with him even when he can. Pickholtz said that during his own divorce in California, the judge described the system in Israel as antiquated. "Israel is only 50 years old but California has already been ahead of it for 100 years," he quoted the judge as saying. In California, divorces automatically entail joint custody unless one side is shown to be unfit. The same holds true for most states in the US. The Tender Age Doctrine in England has also been changed, he said.

"In order to minimize the conflict and suffering of divorce and separation it is highly recommended that children spend an equal amount of time with their fathers," said Sheila Tinman, a licensed child psychologist who practices in Ra'anana, Israel with over 20 years of clinical experience in both Israel and Brazil. "Children need both role models - that of the father and the mother to achieve a healthy and balanced emotional and psychological base for their development."

Divorced and separated fathers are no longer remaining silent. Global father's rights protests and demonstrations for equal access to their children are now taking place from London, Toronto and New York to Rome, Tel Aviv and Tokyo.

Over the weekend, two men dressed in monk's robes climbed to the roof of England St Paul's Cathedral in a protest about the rights of divorced and separated fathers. The two men stood next to a large sign that read "In the Name of the Father." Fathers 4 Justice, the group organizing the protest, is campaigning for greater rights of access to children by divorced fathers.

"The church isn't doing enough to change the laws," said Darryl Westell, 23, of Fathers 4 Justice, who was on the ground. The protesters had food and water and planned to stay on the roof until Easter Sunday, he said. Other recent demonstrations by the group included throwing bags of purple flour at Prime Minister Tony Blair in the House of Commons, sending a man in a Batman suit up the front of Buckingham Palace, and handcuffing a government minister.

The global demonstrations have resulted in an abundance of public awareness pressing governmental officials from England to Israel to seek modern, healthier and more practical civil rights reforms in basic family law.

In the States, many divorced dads are now taking issue with the state's laws and court system, claiming that they are biased toward mothers in custody disputes. The fathers back a bill before the General Assembly that promotes shared parenting, which encourages judges to have children of broken families split roughly equal time with both parents, unless one parent is deemed to be unfit.

"The court situation really is modeled on criminal situations where there's a right and a wrong, and a winner and a loser. And I think that's the exact wrong way to handle it," said John M. Clapp, chairman of the Shared Parenting Council of Connecticut. Under current state law, joint legal custody is awarded only if parents agree. And much of the time, parents who are divorcing, do not agree on anything so the mother gains the child by default or maintaining an atmosphere of conflict.

But arrangements for children spending time with both parents can vary greatly depending on family circumstances. Backers of the bill say the system doesn't encourage co-parenting because children often live with one parent and visit the other. But as lawmakers begin to assess the state's custody laws, they enter rough terrain. What works for one family will not necessarily work for another, making it difficult to impose unilateral change.

Rep. Michael Lawlor, D-East Haven, who chairs the Judiciary Committee, said a group of lawmakers will study the issue more carefully. "The vast majority of the time, one of the two parents is going to get physical custody. The vast majority of the time it is going to be the parent that stays in the family home. The vast majority of the time that is going to be the mother," Lawlor said. "How you change that, what law you can do to change that, I'm not exactly sure."

Divorce lawyers and the state's Judicial Department say there are some practical problems with defining shared parenting as state law. Does time when a child is in school or sleeping count? What happens if a parent can't get transportation, or child care, or works hours that conflict with another parent? Is shuttling back and forth between two homes in a child's best interest? Under the current system, there is flexibility to look at individual family circumstances, experts say. "One size does not fit all when it comes to children," said Shirley Pripstein, a divorce attorney who serves on the family law section for the Connecticut Bar Association. "Shared custody does not always work. Sometimes the parents cannot continue to live in the same town. It's very hard to work a shared parenting plan when the parents live an hour apart. And the children often don't like it."

Determining if gender bias actually exists in the system also is difficult. The state's Judicial Department does not track how frequently children are given to mothers and fathers in divorce cases. Though complaints can be filed against judges, lawmakers say they are often filed by people who are just dissatisfied with the outcome of their cases.

Proponents of shared parenting look to Oregon's law as a model, which encourages parents to get out of the courtroom and into mediation to develop a parenting plan. Massachusetts, New Hampshire and New Jersey have also begun discussing how to better encourage involvement from both parents following a divorce. The issue has been studied in Connecticut before. In 2002, the Governor's Commission on Divorce, Custody and Children found that the divorce and custody process takes too long, is too expensive, and is stressful on parents and children. One of the commission's key recommendations was to change state statutes to emphasize the role of both parents in a child's life and get parents to file parenting plans with the court. The plans would detail schedules and how the parents planned to make decisions about medical matters and school, and remedies if a parent didn't adhere to the plan.

"When children have responsible and actively involved parents they do better during and after divorce," the report said. A bill before the Legislature would also put that recommendation and others from the commission into law. Clapp, the leader of the state's shared parenting group, said he's also supportive of that bill. "What could be more in the best interests of the child than active involvement by both parents?" he said. "What is better than that? Is there anything you can think of? It's just common sense."

Wendy McElroy is a columnist for Fox News.
With the INA, AP and the Jerusalem Post.