Bezalel Smotrich: ‘Insane’ that divorced fathers shouldn’t have anything to eat
‘Discrimination against divorced fathers one of the worst crimes today in Israel, percentage of suicides is disproportionate,’ Smotrich says.
MK Bezalel Smotrich, who heads the Knesset’s Religious Zionism party, has called on Welfare Minister Meir Cohen (Yesh Atid) to eliminate the discrimination against divorced fathers.
“One of the worst crimes happening today in the State of Israel is the discrimination against divorced fathers,” Smotrich said. “It’s a complex and complicated issue. It has a lot of facets and small letters.”
Smotrich recalled his pre-election promise to change how the issue is managed, prevent parental alienation, and prevent abuse of false allegations as a way of managing divorce.
“Attorneys make money off of giving the couple bad advice, telling them to submit false claims against each other and pass the buck to the children,” he emphasized.
Turning to Cohen, Smotrich said, “These are negative trends. Instead of us knowing how to isolate, and then dealing very seriously with true complaints, today we are encouraging false allegations as part of divorce disagreements.”
“The results are horrendous. The percentage of suicides among divorced fathers is disproportionate to every other part of the population in the State of Israel. The fact is that today there is no decent living stipend, no minimum that you leave the father before you start taking child support at astronomic levels. There’s no standard.
“I have no argument against this, that when both partners can allow themselves they should provide their children with everything they need with grace and abundance. But when Dad does not have anything to live off of, and he goes to live with his parents or on the floor in some storage room, and he doesn’t have anything to eat, and when he takes his children to his home he has no way of buying them food and he goes to collect donations to cover it – that’s something that’s completely insane.”
“We need balance. We’re not against women, and we’re not against men. Divorce is an awful thing, and we need to strengthen the institution of the nuclear family. Preventive treatment is always better. The divorce rates in the West are awful and horrific. It’s awful for society, for parents, and for children,” he concluded.
From Arutz Sheva, here.