Israel’s Health Ministry has ordered doctors to review how they prescribe a birth control drug, after accusations it was being used to control the population of Ethiopian immigrants. Suspicions that Ethiopian women had been coerced into receiving Depo-Provera arose in Israeli media a few years ago and most recently in a TV documentary linking the…
A government official has for the first time acknowledged the practice of injecting women of Ethiopian origin with the long-acting contraceptive Depo-Provera. Health Ministry Director General Prof. Ron Gamzu has instructed the four health maintenance organizations to stop the practice as a matter of course. The ministry and other state agencies had previously denied knowledge…
Israeli and Jewish aid officials are denying an Israeli TV report alleging that Ethiopian immigrant women have been coerced into taking contraceptive shots. The report, which aired Saturday night on Israeli Educational Television, charged that coercive contraception is behind a 50 percent decline in the Ethiopian birth rate in Israel over the last decade. Ethiopian…
Filmmaker Laurence Gavron is on a journey to document lost Jewish tribes in Africa. The French-born Gavron, who has made Senegal her home since 1989, says she was immediately taken by the project, which she says combines her passion for Africa with the mystery of rediscovering Judaism. The film, titled “Black Jews, Juifs noir en…
After placing 10th at the Amsterdam marathon last April and becoming the first Israeli athlete to qualify for the 2012 Olympic Games, Ethiopian-born Zohar Zemiro was succinct about how he felt: “It is the happiest moment in my life,” the distance runner told the Israeli Athletic Association, which named him its 2011 Athlete of the…
What shall be done about the large number of non-citizens that dwell in Israel? This question is no longer merely vexing, it is urgent, inflammatory, sometimes violent, often vulgar. The ger has a long and detailed history in Jewish texts and thought. Its conventional translation is “stranger,” but you don’t have to search hard to…
Ziv Koren, an award-winning Israeli photographer, is no stranger to controversy. But even he was unprepared for the flood of angry messages and comments that faced him when he checked his Facebook page a few days ago. The hubbub was prompted by a photograph he had taken in 2006 — a picture of a young…
Covering the shabby concrete storefronts in this small Israeli town are graffiti messages expressing the anger some Ethiopians feel over what they see as racism. An unemployed Ethiopian immigrant waiting at the bus terminal says he has little hope of finding a job. In a predominantly Ethiopian neighborhood named for Zionist forefather Theodor Herzl, residents…
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