Registration for the Beit Yaakov school in the town of Elad near Rosh HaAyin ended two weeks ago. More than 120 families attempted to sign their daughters up for this all-girls school. Elad is an ultra-Orthodox town. Boys and girls are kept completely separate in all its education frameworks, just as they are in every other ultra-Orthodox settlement throughout the country. The girls from all 30 Ashkenazi (of Eastern European origin) families who registered their daughters for the school were accepted. In contrast, only five girls were accepted from the approximately 100 Sephardic (West Asian) families, who tried to register their daughters there. The rest of the girls hoping to attend were rejected and told that they did not meet the acceptance criteria.

The enormous commotion that ensued reached far and wide within just days. Parents whose daughters were rejected accused the school of segregation against Sephardic Jews. They submitted a petition to the Ministry of Education, demanding that the entire registration process be overturned because the rejection was tainted with discrimination. Meanwhile, the school’s administration insisted that they acted in good faith, and that it was only by coincidence that all the girls who were rejected came from Sephardic families. The town’s rabbis were asked to intervene and the incident made it all the way to the minister of education’s desk.

This was not the first time that ultra-Orthodox educational institutions have tried to keep out students of Sephardic background. Within the past few years, the Supreme Court was requested to rule about the degree to which the Ashkenazi ultra-Orthodox could use ethnic background as a gauge for acceptance in schools. In other words, the court was asked to decide whether Ashkenazi schools could reject potential students simply because they were not Ashkenazi.

Ever since the country was established, Israel has succeeded in creating mechanisms to prevent discrimination against minorities. In fact, it has built bridges on which almost all the country's citizens could walk. Jews and Arabs, religious and secular, men and women, Sephardic and Ashkenazi Jews, old-timers, new immigrants, veterans and others all benefit from a series of basic laws, understandings and social compacts that grant them all the status of citizens with equal rights. All except for one group, that is. Ashkenazi ultra-Orthodox Jews maintain their customs and traditions with blind fanaticism. There is little they will not sacrifice to perpetuate a lifestyle that draws on how they lived in Eastern Europe more than three centuries ago.