Six months after he was attacked in the Of Oz food production plant in the Negev town of Segev Shalom, mashgiach Eliraz Barvai was attacked once again by the same man. This time, he was choked and hit with a metal rod.
The original attack took place during operation Guardian of The Walls when Eliraz arrived at work as the mashgiach in the Shechita house. “Until that day when I told the worker that he was doing something incorrectly, everything was going fine. That’s my job as the mashgiach to point out when someone is doing something wrong. The worker’s manager punished him and sent him home early,” Eliraz recounted.
Eliraz said that after the man received his punishment, he attacked Eliraz. “After he was told to go home, he grabbed a metal rod and hit me in the back and hand.” Eliraz received medical treatment and filed a complaint with the police. Last week, a letter of indictment was filed against the attacker, and Eliraz was informed that the man no longer works at the shechita plant.
Eliraz said that since the day the letter of indictment was filed, the worker kept showing up at the plant and looking for Eliraz. “I understood that he was arriving at the plant and looking for me. Today, he found me. He asked me that I remove my complaint and I told him that I was unwilling to do so.”
The man then proceeded to bite Eliraz on the neck and began fighting with him. Eliraz managed to pry the man off of himself and ran. “He ran after me with a large metal pole and hit me with it. I ran into a room and closed the door. Other workers came to protect me there until the police were able to arrive,” Eliraz recounted.
Eliraz was treated for his injuries at the hospital and released with contusions on his back and hand.
In response to the attack, the other mashgichim at the plant halted the work at the plant for two hours in protest over the incident, and intend to do so again tomorrow.
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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2 Responses
Oy vey! Terrible! There must be increased oversight for these things! The mashgiach should have a refuah sheleimah!!
I can assure everyone that this is NOT an isolated case. And while certainly not every angry or simply independent-thinking worker (restaurant chef, kitchen help, owner, or household help) gets violent and causes bodily harm, many mashgichim are afraid of the staff for whom they are hired to supervise. When it comes to restaurants and caterers, where the facts are the mashgichim – even those of large national and otherwise very reliable hechsheirim – are paid by the food service and not by the hashgachah, they report turning a blind eye, or keeping their mouths closed for fear of losing their jobs! As far as domestic help is concerned; remember they believe they are responsible for the house and for the most part it is true, after all they are so often left to do the shopping, the carpooling, to wait at the bus stops, etc.
We all see the degree of lawlessness in the streets today. Law enforcement is being stripped of their authority and large groups of people ignore them completely. Are we to still say, under these dire circumstances, that the concept of “mirsus” exists? Rav Yisroel Salnter said the amud ha’yirah has faltered even more than the amud ha’chachmah. We see how true that is. Who has fear of malchus? But we continue to rely on nichnas vi’yotzei and on ein ha’uman mareh es umnaso.