Odeya Barkan
"I'm the rare product of almost every Jewish school system in Israel: public, public-religious and Haredi - Beit Yaakov.
At the public-religious school I was described as 'the traditional girl from Katamonim where they aren't really religious'.
At Beit Yaakov I was nicknamed the 'Sephardic Ba'alat-Tshuva 9th grader.'
At the school in Or Akiva where I taught I was considered the Moroccan who Ashkenized."
Odeya Barkan: "Integration. Yeah, right."
"New apartment, new neighborhood, new city. The move from Petah Tikva sparked hopes and expectations for a new, better future...
But the silence and disregard seemed increasingly suspicious.
The neighbor said: 'You're a nice Haredi, but that's how it always goes. First comes a nice Haredi and then come a whole lot of them and they aren't so nice. Really I have nothing against you except that you're a Haredi'."
Itschak Trachtingot: "You're a nice Haredi."
Rinat Porat: "To spare them from 'Jerusalemite heterogeneousness'". "When my children reached junior high school age I guided them towards very particular schools in Jerusalem...
I am motivated by a desire to spare them from 'Jerusalemite heterogeneousness'.
Is that racism? Is that elitism?"
Itschak Trachtingot: "You're a nice Haredi."
