Their Journey to Slaughter

In recent years, under the policy of free trade in Israel and due to the demand for fresh meat, Israeli businesses began importing tens of thousands of live calves and sheep annually, mostly from Australia.

Transporting these animals from Australia to Israel is an extremely long and strenuous journey

It starts with several hours – sometimes days – of transportation throughout Australia in trucks taking them to the port, where the animals are loaded onto ships. After this, about three weeks of travel await them, on a rickety ship, until it anchors in Aqaba port in Jordan. Then, they are once again loaded onto trucks and transported within Jordan and into Israeli territory. The journey, literally beginning on the other side of the planet, can commence in pouring rain and end under a scorching sun – which can cause heat stroke and dehydration. After their arrival in Israel, the sheep and calves are sent either to slaughterhouses or to fattening cubicles – where they will be held captive and force fed for several months, and then loaded yet again onto trucks, this time to be transported to their deaths.

Many animals die during transportation

The death toll – which on average is 2% of the sheep – indicates the terrible suffering endured by the animals that do survive the journey. The repeated loading and unloading is accompanied by intimidation, beatings and electric shocks. Animals that stumble on the ramps risk being trampled by others. The crowdedness and humidity on the ship make breathing very difficult, and the terrible heat is deadly in its own sake. There are also many animals who simply starve to death, due to an inability to adapt to the food pellets expected to nourish them during the journey.

In just a couple of years, import has increased by several hundred percent

In 1999, 60,239 live calves were imported to Israel – 600% more than the 8,680 imported in 1997. An even greater increase can be seen in the numbers of live sheep imported to Israel: in 1998, 7,000 sheep were imported, while 89,144 were imported in 1999 – a 1,200% increase in just a year.

"Thin and covered in mucus... Insanely dehydrated"

"On August 6th we arrived at the border in Aqaba at around two or three in the afternoon. We got out of the car, and I noticed four trucks loaded with sheep on the Israeli side. When I passed the border I suddenly saw 40 or 50 trucks, all standing in some sort of open parking lot right on the border, at the Jordanian customs post. All this under a blazing sun – it's impossible to describe the heat – you can't even stand outside! You're constantly searching for somewhere shaded, to shield you from the sun; they, however, simply can't escape it. They were stuck to each other – the sheep, especially, what with all that wool... Some of them looked really terrible! Thin and covered in mucus... Insanely dehydrated."

"I asked the Jordanians why the sheep and calves were held there; why they weren't in the shade. They just told me, look, all we can say is that this shipment is supposed to enter Israel. It has nothing to do with us; there's a delay at the Israeli customs – so if you have any complaints, talk to them... And you're right, they don't have water. They don't have anything. It's very sad – that's what they told me."



"Later, when we started driving, I cried in the car. I realized I couldn't do anything; I was in the midst of a trip with lots of people and we needed to get to Petra. So I called my sister, and I told her: do something. She called Zvi Alush [journalist for popular daily newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth] and he immediately sent a photographer. Zvi really understood what I was talking about, he recognized the terrible conditions. He spoke to the woman in charge of the topic of animals in 'Yedioth", but she said that it's not an issue that would gain interest – it's just animal transport, very routine…"

"Their necks painfully strained upwards, just to get some air"

"The transport trucks have several tiers. Between the first and second tiers there's a space of maybe 20 cm through which the sheep can breathe. The sheep in the top tier have a slightly better situation: they might be unable to escape the intensely hot sun, but at least they have air to breathe. But the ones on the bottom... They're like this [strains her neck as far upwards as possible]... It's just horrendous. Their necks painfully strained upwards, just to get some air, and there's so little of it, because it's just a 20 cm gap..." "None of the trucks had awnings, only metal, and more metal... And there were holes on the floor where the sheep were held, so their legs kept falling in. In the top tier – I suppose it was made of wood – you could see their legs slipping into the floor. Maybe they were broken... What kinds of people build floors with big enough cracks to break legs? The sheep were constantly struggling to stand straight... they stood in those trucks for 12 hours, from nine am to nine pm, and waited."



"Their skin tones point to their body temperatures: they're obviously boiling. And they're all completely filthy. Wallowing in their own secretions. Some of them looked really sick. The calves – young, beautiful, amazing, no more than six months old – they just stood there, like parked cars, lacking movement, lacking expression. Even if you don't know much about animals, even before they make any sounds, their horrendous suffering is impossible to miss. And the girls who work at customs felt their pain... Everyone felt their pain. But they all just said 'well, this is how it is, nothing you can do about it...' I can't even imagine what the animals go through on the ship. I felt traumatized. Those images were stuck in my head, like a nightmare. It was the only thing I thought about for three days."

"Listen, I'm from an agricultural place, and that's just how it is when it comes to animals..."

"When I came back to the border the next day, I hoped that there wouldn't be any more animals there. But there were. And they looked even worse. And they weren't the same animals as the previous so-called shipment. So I went to the customs manager there. I told him 'I'm a civilian, an Israeli citizen, and I want to know how many hours these animals have been waiting.' and he answered: 'What's it to you?' I told him: 'listen, I think the conditions these animals are being kept in are beyond atrocious. It's unacceptable, it's completely inhumane'. 'Listen', he told me, 'I'm from a Moshav (a village), and that's just how it is when it comes to animals... that's how it is'... so I told him: 'you should be ashamed of yourselves, that you torture them this way. Is putting up some sort of awning in the area – or giving them some water to drink - completely unthinkable?'"

"They just collapse onto each other from sheer exhaustion"

Eventually I just got into the trucks and started photographing them. And I started crying again. Their eyes were completely dry... you could see how dehydrated they were. And you constantly hear these sounds – they're groaning. They were all looking at me, curious, approaching me, I longed to give them some water, to get them out of there. It was so difficult. Terrible. The only association I could make was to the trains used in the holocaust... Later, on the road, I saw the sheep tumbling in the trucks. They didn't have the energy to stand. The truck drivers all drive so fast and the animals aren't restrained, so they just collapse onto each other from sheer exhaustion. Some fall and try to get up. You can really see them rolling from
side to side, like slabs of meat, inside the trucks.

"It's all about money - nothing else"

"When I got home, I talked to Tommy Sade, a regional veterinarian in Jerusalem. He explained to me that there is always an issue of livestock "depreciation" while they're being transported between countries. There's a high level of stress, and some of the animals die, and it's a problem. He explained that what I saw was a very typical procedure. What he didn't explain was why there weren't any awnings, why they were out in the sun and not given any water. Something tells me that from the moment that these animals are sent on this journey, no one cares that they're living beings. From the moment they were paid for and sent, these animals become cuts of meat. My sister says it's all about money - nothing else."