Many haredim take advantage of the room inorder to surf the net; a pastime they can’t experience at home, usuallybecause it is not permitted by rabbis.
Last Tuesday, Rachel (pseudonym), areligious student at the Bar-Ilan University who lives on campus, washit with a bout of insomnia, so she got out of bed and went to theStudent Union center where she could use the internet on thestudent-accessible computers.
She entered the big room and could not believe her eyes.Ultra-Orthodox men, whose connection with the academia was completelyhappenstance, were sitting at the computers and surfing the Web.
“I was in shock,” she recalled. “I passed them and they justcontinued surfing pornographic sites as if they were watching the news.These are not people that I know; they are too old to be students andanyone can enter the university and this center, so they simply tookadvantage of the situation,” she said.
Apparently they arrive at the universityduring the wee hours of the night, enjoying the quiet and lack ofsupervision, and use the internet at their own volition.“Everyone talks about it here,” said a yarmulke-wearingstudent. “A bunch of haredim from Bnei Brak come here, even married menwho arrive after their wives and children have gone to sleep, and usethe internet.”
A university employee confirmed the rumors. “It’s true that thishappens quite often and they tried catching these people but theyaren’t always successful,” he said. “It is difficult to control whatgoes on there and we can’t just close the computer center used by thestudents.”
It is relatively easy to enter the university late at night. AYedioth Ahronoth Ramat Gan reporter wandered into the area on Mondaynight and assessed the phenomenon, coming across a number ofultra-Orthodox men who sat and surfed freely on the library’scomputers. Some of them were indeed on porn sites.Theuniversity said in response that “in the past it was brought to theuniversity’s attention that strangers who are not students arrive oncampus, enter the Student Union offices and use the computers withoutpermission.
“In coordination with the union, we reached a decision todecrease the amount of hours the offices are open and we were indeedsuccessful in significantly reducing the phenomenon. The universityadministration is planning on assessing additional steps in completelyeliminating the entrance of strangers.”