Girl, 8, Becomes Poster Child for Anti-Haredi Backlash

By Haaretz December 26, 2011

The image of 8-year-old Na’ama Margolese — the Beit Shemesh schoolgirl so traumatized by taunting Haredim that she refused to cross the street in their direction even with the aid of her mother — has gripped the country, turning the shy daughter of North American immigrants into a poster child for the searing national debate over the exclusion of women. Margolese plight was the subject of a recent report on Israel’s Channel 2.

“I’m frightened,” cried the youngster, paralyzed by fear, as she stood on the street next to her school, refusing to budge. It was the same corner where she and her classmates have been cursed and spat at by ultra-Orthodox Jews for the past year.

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