• Published 00:00 02.04.07
  • Latest update 00:00 02.04.07

Abandoned woman fights for daughters' right to stay in Israel

The mother, a non-Jew, is in Israel illegally. She knows that if she leaves she will not be able to return. But she wants her daughters to grow up here, so about 18 months ago she began the process of obtaining passports for the girls.

By Ruth Sinai

Z.S. hasn't seen her daughters for two and a half years. She's afraid they're hungry and not going to school, though one is nine and the other seven. Their father is an Israeli citizen whom Z.S. met a decade ago when she was 20 and he came for a visit to Azerbaijan.

She came to Israel at his invitation, and the couple had the girls. The father later abandoned Z.S. and the girls, left them with his family, and went to Azerbaijan. Eighteen months ago he returned with a wife and new baby, and demanded Z.S. leave his mother's flat, hitting her repeatedly.

In June 2004, the father told her he was taking the girls to Azerbaijan for a vacation. He demanded $400 for plane tickets and $600 for a weekend with them before the flight. This is what Z.S. told the Council for the Welfare of the Child, and testified to the attorney aiding her via the Justice Ministry.

"They said they are hungry all the time and their grandmother [whom the father sent with them to Azerbaijan] says they are hungry," says Z.S., who sent them money.

The mother, a non-Jew, is in Israel illegally. She knows that if she leaves she will not be able to return. But she wants her daughters to grow up here, so about 18 months ago she began the process of obtaining passports for the girls.

However, the central district prosecutor, representing the Interior Ministry, told the Ramat Gan Family Court that the mother was "improperly using the daughters" to obtain citizenship. In his ruling two weeks ago, Judge Gershon German said "the parents of the minor children are in Israel and it is inconceivable that they would not be able to return to their parents or custody not be finalized because it might further the illegal stay of the mother in Israel."

German ordered that the passports be issued, but as of yesterday the Israeli Embassy in Baku has not done so. The Interior Ministry said in response that the relevant instructions had been issued.

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  • 4. 0 0
    If the father is an Israeli, so doesn´t this factor
    • Alicia
    • 03.04.07
    • 22:36

    give the girls a legal right to apply for the Israeli citizenship? Has the father recognized his fatherhood? It is easily checked with DNA-tests. If the girls have a right to the Israeli citizenship, then the mother is entitled to residency and to stay with her daughters. It is regrettable that the mother chose the illegal way to reside in Israel, else she could have become an Israeli national by now. That she broke against the Israeli law, she definately needs to be punished, maybe through some civil-service a certain period of time?

  • 3. 0 0
    Frank
    • Yoav Ben Zakai
    • 03.04.07
    • 18:22

    Shame on you Frank!! This woman's rights as a human being and as a mother have been violated by a cruel man who happened to be Israeli, impregnated her and then abandoned her. Is this how we treat the stranger among us? This woman and her daughters are not a drain on our society. The drain is our incompetent leadership and government, the crime rampant in our society, the corruption, forgetting the poor and the needy, the orphans and the vulnerable, the drain is forgetting what this country was all about Chag Pesach Sameach and let us not forget that we too were strangers in Egypt

  • 2. 0 0
    Evil
    • Ethan
    • 02.04.07
    • 11:59

    There seems to be no end to the evil and stupidity that haunt our country.

  • 1. 0 0
    Illegal
    • Frank
    • 02.04.07
    • 10:00

    The mother is an illegal. She should be immediatly deported and if she wishes to fight the process she can certainly do it from abroad. Illegals must be deported. They are a drain on our already stretched resources and should be accored no rights and only the considerations normally granted to people. This does not included living illegally here.