A serious fire broke out at a girls’ seminary in Yerushalayim on Monday. Dozens of girls were injured, and several neighbors suffered wounds as they bravely sawed the locks open and worked to save the trapped students. Miraculously, no lives were lost. But the terrifying reality behind the incident should shake us to our core.
The girls were literally trapped inside the building. Not by accident, not by oversight, but by design. The dormitory had been padlocked shut to ensure that the girls could not sneak out at night and wander the streets. When the fire erupted, those locks could have been a death sentence. This was not just a fire—it was a preventable tragedy in the making, eerily reminiscent of the infamous Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of 1911, when Jewish girls lost their lives because they were locked inside their workplace.
Even more startling is the revelation that this is not an isolated incident. After speaking with others, it appears that locking seminary girls inside their dormitories at night is not uncommon. This practice is beyond reckless. It’s a grotesque distortion of the notion of safety, replacing one potential danger with a far graver one.
Some may argue that these measures are necessary to protect the girls from the risks that lurk outside. The streets of Yerushalayim, they say, can be dangerous at night, and strict precautions are needed. I understand this concern. But in locking the doors, the seminaries are gambling with the girls’ lives. Monday’s fire is proof that the risks inside can be just as deadly as those outside.
And then comes the larger question: Why are we still sending our daughters to these seminaries at all? Parents are paying exorbitant amounts—tens of thousands of dollars—to place their daughters in substandard living conditions, often with cramped rooms, poor facilities, and inadequate safety measures. For what? The lessons and values taught in these seminaries can be conveyed just as effectively in the United States, at a fraction of the cost and without the life-threatening risks.
Some will say that the experience of living in Eretz Yisroel is invaluable. Fine. Let the seminaries organize month-long trips to Israel instead of year-long programs that put girls in harm’s way. A short visit can provide the inspiration and connection to Eretz Yisroel without requiring parents to send their daughters halfway across the world, unsupervised and vulnerable.
The seminary system has become a juggernaut of expectation in our community, a rite of passage for many girls. But at what cost? Monday’s fire should be a wake-up call. This system needs to be re-evaluated from the ground up. Our daughters’ safety must take precedence over outdated expectations and financial burdens.
We have reached the end of the line with post-high school seminaries in Israel. It’s time to rethink what we are asking of our girls and their families. If nothing else, the today’s near-tragedy make one thing clear: when it comes to seminaries, enough is enough.
Sincerely,
A Suddenly Terrified Mother
The views expressed in this letter are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of YWN. Have an opinion you would like to share? Send it to us for review.
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31 Responses
Mamish sickening, criminal behavior. Shame on the administrators of these schools. With the amount of money they charge there’s no reason they can’t have guards for the night hours.
This has to be the most incoherent rambling post I’ve seen to date. Conflating two entirely different issues: fire safety and seminary in general. I think a letter connecting Alaskan ice melt , the demise of the Japanese water beetle, and the price of yaapchik at satmar grocery would’ve been more enlightening…..
It wasn’t an American seminary.
It was an israeli girls High School.
In the American Seminaries, the doors aren’t padlocked. They are locked, and there is (usually) someone on staff like a dorm counselor or Aim Bayit who has the ability to open the doors.
To make the leap from a locked door to shutting down all seminaries is beyond logic.
Take a chill
How did the fire start and spread?
The experience of living in Eretz Yisroel is invaluable for seminary girls.
The streets of Jerusalem are a danger to the girls at night, either spiritually or physically or both, so they need to be locked in their dormitories.
Those two sentences can’t both be true.
Either we think the spirituality of Yerushalayim will uplift our girls so we spend a fortune and let them spend a year there, or the streets of Yerushalayim are a dangerous place for our kids to be.
We need to think about this and decide which is correct.
According to one article I saw it was an American chabad seminary.
And yes, unfortunately many seminaries do lock the girls and with no way out.
Why can’t the girls listen to the endless shiurim available on TorahAnytime and delete seminary ??? There is so much amazing Hashkafa for free !!
How about Seminar Yerushalyim?
(The place that was recently blackmailed into taking a girl for free or if not they will be trashed on a big WhatsApp group.)
Does that place get locked down?
I went to visit my daughter last year and yes — she was locked in a CAGE. They ARE locked down at night.
My daughter was locked in a gate. Not in the building. So technically they might be safe from fire. But not from anything else. They have no way of getting out in an emergency.
Go to Shmuel Hanavi and Bar Ilan and check out the seminary. (Id rather not name them)
I’m so triggered.
If I remember correctly, doors that lock people inside and make it impossible for them to leave the building without the key to the lock, are ILLEGAL in New York City.
@ Sara K – My daughter was in one of those seminaries. It’s true. The gate is locked in.
is engla serious?
From the eyewitness descriptions, there were no fire alarms sounding. The heroic Arab went through the corridor that was on fire, opening doors and shouting to the girls to get out.
As to security, note that this construction worker was able to enter from the upper floors where he was working.
Danger issues aside, who are you helping by locking teenage girls in a cage? What’s the long-term benefit?
You can earlier connect the locked doors to fire system, that they unlock when there is a fire C”V.
And the second part about seminary has
Nothing to do with the first part.
It doesn’t sound like the letter writer or any of the opinionated commentators here actually know anything about the school in question, let alone why the girls were unable to get out. Information in articles aren’t always reliable.
And Square Root doesn’t seem to even be clear on what country the school is in.
Bottom line – if the dangers outside the seminary are that great the doors need to be locked and/or padlocked, WHY OH WHY do we need to be sending our daughters to EY for the “seminary experience” at a HUGE cost and stress on the poor parents?! Enough already. It’s time our Gedolim put an end to this craziness. And, no, I don’t think anyone else can stop it. Parents cannot individually face the pressure and tell THEIR daughter you will be the only one (or one of a very select few) that won’t go to EY. It must come from the Gedolim and/or high school principals.
I pray this is a lesson well learned, no more locking girls inside, get a guard at the entrance and make sure there are fire alarms. HOW DID THE FIRE START? Was it terrorism?
Let me embellish on golfers comment in simple (childish) language.
ALL you parents who (admittedly) send their daughters to seminary in EY with the understanding that they need to (at least according to the seminary you chose) be locked in at night are SIMPLY RETARTED.
Why in the world are you sending them WITH YOUR OWN HANDS into such a dangerous situation???
First – this was a Chareidi girls’ high school (called a “Seminar” in Hebrew), not a post-high school “Seminary” for American girls.
As to the point of the locked doors – this is a long-standing issue with Chareidi dorm schools in Israel, which often tend to view legal safety requirements as not being “real” and applying to them, since it’s not Mefurash in the Shulchan Aruch. It’s a serious problem that, everyone in a while, results in a greater or lesser tragedy – think of Meron, where building codes and crowd size rules were ignored. B”H nothing like that happened here – but the attitude leads to numerous ticking time bombs.
an Israeli Yid
@sharonpr The schlemiel spills the soup. The schlimazel’s clothes go soup spilled on them. The nudnik asks what kind of soup it was.
So we, who are living in Israel should send our daughters to the USA?
My daughters sem locked the doors
But at least they had the brains to put a key in a glass box next to the door that you can break in case of emergency
This was an ISRAELI HIGH SCHOOL, not an American seminary.
American seminaries always have a madricha or the like with a key who is responsible to open the door. Girls aren’t usually so much locked in, as locked out. In other words, it’s a way to enforce curfew and ensure that the madricha knows when girls break it.
> which often tend to view legal safety requirements as not being “real” and applying to them, since it’s not Mefurash in the Shulchan Aruch.
I am not sure what is the benefit of sending your children to LEARN in a place that violates major halochos of safety and following civil law. You, the parents, are responsible for both safety situation and bizayon of Torah.
levi > So we, who are living in Israel should send our daughters to the USA?
No, you should teach your kids, both sons and daughters. It says so in the Torah.
Kind of crazy ranting. Not sure what your talking about just asked my wife quickly and she said there was always at least 2 staff members sleeping in every single night with a key. So your making quiet the cholent here. Mixing an Israeli seminary with a American one, when american ones deff have staff every night and then mixing in that we shouldnt send to seminary at all cuz of a Israeli Seminary fire?? Man you must make great actual cholent!
I wonder if the boys are locked up at night in their yeshivos? I most certainly think not.