Published: 12 April 2018
Last updated: 4 March 2024
But she found the hospitals large, impersonal, and not encouraging of her plans to try for a vaginal birth after a prior Caesarean section.
Then, later, scrolling through a popular Facebook group for new mothers in the Jerusalem area, she saw a number of posts about fellow Jewish women having good birth experiences at the small St Joseph Hospital in East Jerusalem’s heavily Palestinian Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood.
So, at 35 weeks pregnant, she decided to take a tour. All her uncertainties faded into the background as she took the tour. The staff was welcoming, listened to BenEzra’s wishes for her upcoming birth, and a doctor even gave her a check-up. And no-one said anything when she told them she was from Efrat.
BenEzra is among a growing number of Jewish Israeli women who are choosing to give birth at St Joseph, saying it is worth going out of their cultural comfort zones.
FULL STORY Coexistence in the maternity ward (Tablet)
Photo: St Joseph Hospital (Facebook)
