The coroanvirus pandemic has forced many Israelis to spend hours at home sheltered in place with their loved ones.However, as schools closed and workers were sent on unpaid leave, stresses mounted up. Now, it seems that rather then having a baby-boom at the end of the pandemic, Israel will be having a divorce bonanza.
“Divorces always spike up after the holidays,” divorce lawyer Dan Malkieli told the Hebrew website Mako, “but the coroanvirus messed everything up.”
A resident of northern Israel recently phoned his lawyer demanding to get paperwork started for divorcing his wife after she refused to make him cholent. The woman allegedly refused because she was angry at her husband for not washing the dishes.
Another woman is divorcing her husband because she cooked for him every day only to watch him order pizza and burgers for himself and their children. She filed for divorce claiming this is an expense they cannot afford with both of them being out of work.
One woman who resides in the South filed for divorce after her husband became so alarmed from reports about the coronavirus that he began to clean the house non-stop, buying cleaning products to the tune of thousands of shekels in addition to masks and disinfection materials. The wife filed for divorce after claiming that due to this outrageous spending, "we no longer have money to buy food for the children."
Several husbands filed for divorce after their wives spent too much money, they claimed, on online shopping.One woman now facing divorce purchased a vibrator for NIS 1,000 and claims her husband is no longer interested in sex, and just constantly scans the news for updates surrounding the virus.Another woman bought clothes online, an expense her husband thinks is irresponsible as they face hardships in the virus-hit economy. A woman living in the North is also divorcing her husband after she caught him buying things online, in his case it was expensive restaurant take-out food for his mistress.A woman in central Israel found out her husband's visits to a brothel when his daily walks with the dog became much longer than usual.
"I followed him and found out he's standing in line for a brothel with other men," she said. "This is embarrassing, one of the men in line thought I worked there and offered me money for sex."
Lawyer Sharin Solan suggests that the tense living situation makes people much edgier than they usually are, and that once things return to normal, people might hit the brakes on the divorce processes.
"One man [called me and said] his wife is spending too much time walking their dog," she said. "People are just looking for a reason to fight, no matter what that reason is."