Israel News Agency, Israel
06-09-06
Israel Attorneys Push Children of Divorce, Custody Into Psychology Crisis
By Herb Brandon
Israel News Agency
Jerusalem-----June 9.......Nothing is more sacred to us all than our families. That
natural team for which we are born into which is supposed to provide warmth,
stability and love.
Even the CIA, Mossad, MI-5 and the former KGB had rules of engagement which
directly stated: "You can hurt the agent, but never touch their families."
But for some Israel attorneys, such as Yossi Cohen of Netanya, greed and
money takes precedence over the welfare of children who are suffering from the
trauma of divorce, parental alienation and a lack of equal access by their parents.
"Cohen represented my ex-wife in a contempt of court charge against me," said a
divorced dad in the Israel city of Haifa. "The charge was nothing more and
nothing less than harassment based on false, Disneyworld allegations. Yossi
Cohen, whose only motives were his personal wealth, cared not for my 5-yearold son who is deeply suffering from emotional and mental problems. Problems
created by conflict and a lack of healthy communication for which his mother is
responsible for," he said.
"In fact, I had ordered my attorney to speak with my ex's attorney, Yossi Cohen,
to come to any kind of agreement whereby we would come to court as a caring
team for my son, rather than as adversaries pouring more fuel on a fire which
can only continue to harm my child. Both Cohen and my ex-wife refused any
rational, healthy and cooperative approach for my suffering son. As long as this
case stays in court, and not with mediators and social workers, Yossi Cohen and
other attorneys make a substantial financial profit."
Cohen, who was contacted by the INA, did not return our telephone calls.
As for the contempt of court charge, it was based upon the fathers' returning the
child to the mother 15-30 minutes late. The father stated that the child, which
only sees his father twice a week for a few hours, did not want to go back to the
mother.
"My child is dumped into kindergarten 6 days a week for excessive hours. The
mother operates her own business and is too busy for the child. After she picks
up our son, she calls baby-sitters to take over." The divorced dad continues: "On
some Friday mornings because his (our son) mother is neglectful of his dress
and physical condition, I find my son sick with fever and I would take him to a
doctor. I have my child's medical visits to the doctor as evidence as to his
whereabouts. All the same Yossi Cohen tried to punish me through the court
system for being a loving, caring and responsible father."
The charge of "contempt of court" was frozen by the Israel judge, while the entire
case was sent to Child Welfare for review. Many good judges rarely make
decisions based upon solely on evidence or lack of evidence submitted to them,
but rather they rely on outside, professional counsel and reports.
This father never wanted a divorce. He foresaw many of the problems that
divorce would create for his son and suggested marriage counseling. His wife
refused. After the divorce, to lessen the crippling conflict which placed his child
into psychological regression, again the father suggested a mediator and
parental counseling to the mother. Again she refused, stating that there was
nothing wrong with the child or herself.
Does divorce lead to less conflict? One reason that very few people know the
answer is that the assumption that divorce ends marital conflict is built into the
very language of social science. "Marital conflict" is a label that implies its own
solution: to put an end to marital conflict, you only have to put an end to the
marriage. But of course what really bothers the children is not that two spouses
are fighting, but that their parents are fighting.
Yet divorce advocates frequently compare angry marriages to low-conflict
divorces on the magical assumption that a piece of paper called a divorce will put
an end to parental fighting. In other words, they compare an exaggerated vision
of bad marriage with the phantom virtues of the ideal divorce," states Maggie
Gallagher who wrote: The Abolition of Marriage.
"Divorce often causes a bitter dispute between the parents, even worse than
before the divorce was decided upon. Two-thirds of angry divorces remain that
way after 5 years of being separated, and one-quarter to one-third of those
divorces that were initially in good spirits had degenerated to open conflicts,"
states Wallerstein and Blakeslee in Second Chances.
"A third of friendly divorces turn into bitter disputes, often sparked by the
remarriage of one or both of the ex-partners," states Constance Ahrons in The
Good Divorce: Keeping Your Family Together When Your Marriage Comes Apart
(Harper Collins Publications, 1994).
A study conducted at the University of Washington divided 117 households into
three categories: "martially distressed", "martially supported", and "divorced
mothers," and found that children of the families that had marital distress had
significantly higher disciplinary problems than children from families that reported
a happy marriage, but those children of divorced mothers had a considerably
higher amount of disciplinary problems that those who were from the other two
categories."
A recent Time Magazine article asked “Does Divorce Hurt Kids?” and presented
the conclusions from the one of the longest term studies of children of divorce. A
25-year longitudinal research study conducted on about 60 children in Marin
County, California, begun in the early 1970s by Judith Wallerstein and Joan Kelly
(Wallerstein continued the research over the years and recently, in 2000,
published the long-term findings in her book, The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce;
A 25 Year Landmark Study .)
Wallerstein’s research concluded that a significant amount of children has
permanent scars that linger through adolescence and well into adulthood. Such
scars are seen as depression, delinquency, poor grades, fear of failure, fear of
commitment, and fear of following their parents’ path. These young adults recall
their parents’ divorce as a major trauma in their lives, from which they feel
gypped out of a healthy childhood and destined to repeat the pattern, should they
marry and have children.
We know that children of divorced parents have more emotional and behavioral
problems and do less well in school than children who live with both their
biological parents. One prevalent element is that one of the parents who has
psychological problems and are unable to resolve conflict in a marriage, are
more likely to divorce. Parental conflict causes many children to act up and do
less well at school. Last, divorce itself may cause kids problems. The income and
parental time available to them drops, they see more conflict, the separation
scares or angers them, and so on.
A research team consisting of Andrew Cherlin and his colleagues studied
random samples of over 11,000 children in Great Britain and over 2,200 children
in the U.S., using information gathered on parents' and teachers' reports of
behavioral problems and the children's reading and math scores (Cherlin, et al.,
Science, 1991, June 7, 252 (5011), pp.1386-89). They statistically controlled for
the children's social class, race, the children's early behavioral and t est scores,
and factors such as physical, mental, and emotional handicaps as assessed by
physicians. After controlling for those factors, boys of divorced parents scored as
high as boys from intact couples on the behavioral and academic tests. For girls ,
there was a small residual effect, apparently caused by the divorce itself, on their
parents' and teachers' ratings of their behavioral problems. This work implies that
most of the problems we see in children of divorced parents are due to longstanding psychological problems of one of the parents, the stresses of poverty
and racism, disabilities the children themselves suffer, and so on. Their pain is
real and must be handled compassionately.
Divorce is a distressing experience, both for the couple in conflict and the
children caught in the middle. But comprehensive, new research from Iowa
State University presents strong evidence that parents, even those no longer
living in the home, have a great deal of control over children's adjustment to the
break-up of the family. The research, reported in the November edition of the
Journal of Marriage and the Family, is the first to examine all the major factors
commonly associated with divorce and child development problem. While the
findings provide encouraging information, they also reveal some critical gender
differences in the ways divorce and parental reaction can affect adolescents.
Divorced parents can substantially reduce the probability that their children will
experience developmental difficulty by continuing effective parenting and
avoiding hostile exchanges.
Findings largely support the argument that family structure influence child
development through its impact on family processes. In other words, children of
divorce are at risk for adjustment problems because their parents are less likely
to engage in competent, consistent parenting and are more likely to engage in
conflict exchanges than parents who are married to each other. Divorce, with its
emotional turmoil, time demands and often financial stress increases the
custodial mother's own chances of becoming depressed, which in turn tends to
disrupt the quality of her parenting, Simons explains. This, in turn, increases the
child's risk for adjustment problems.
Compared to fathers in intact families, the divorced, non-residential dads were
less likely to help their children solve problems, discuss standards of conduct or
enforce discipline, increasing the probability that boys would display conduct
problems. "It is essential, especially for sons, that fathers continue to function as
a parent," Simons emphasizes. "Simply showing the kids a good time and being
a pal doesn't make any difference in terms of developmental outcomes for kids."
But the worst problem that many divorced dads face is being separated from
their children and being termed "visitors" by a narcissistic mother who uses an
archaic gender biased Israel law from 1962, which states that the child
automatically goes to the mother with full custody till the age of six. Many times
child welfare wants to assist the father but must wait for the Israel court to have
child welfare request more or equal time with the father.
Most attorneys in Israel will argue for the "child best interest" but many attorneys
such as Yossi Cohen who is a father himself and serves proudly in the Israel
Defense Forces, will bury any notion of what is best for the child as long as he is
compensated for it.
"When couples start talking divorce - they need mediators, not attorneys," says
Drora Burnstein, a child psychologist in Tel Aviv. "The attorneys live off of their
conflict. The first measure they suggest is to stop all communication, as they
believe that communication can be used against the other party in a legal case.
These attorneys create what is known as the 'deathblow' for the child to have any
sense of present or future family stability."
"Studies show that children whose whose divorcing parents have resolved their
disagreements through amicable mediation will have a faster and healthier
recovery from the trauma of divorce," Sara Silber, a child psychologist from
Ra'anana, Israel told the INA. "I have worked with children of divorce whose
parents are fighting each other in court, one can see the suffering and the pain
on their faces. It makes me feel very sad, it's heartbreaking, frustrating when I
can't reach parent who is resisting lowering the conflict."
Naftali Shilo, an attorney who has practiced family law in Israel for over 15 years,
told the INA: "The parents should never use the child in their war against each
other. The child, an innocent victim, should be left out of any and all conflict.
Instead of running to the family court and filing various harassing legal motions, I
suggest that the disputing couple first go to a social worker, child psychologist or
divorce mediator. To stop wasting time and money, parents need to resolve all
issues outside of court."
Shilo adds: "Even if you do not tell the children what is going on they will still
know what's happening, they will still suffer from the conflict. Use attorneys to
create agreements on shared parenting not to increase tensions which only hurt
the child in the present and scars for them life."