Sunday, July 24, 2011

Briskman case: Reasons to refuse to give Get



Yisrael Briskman’s wife in Israel wanted a divorce, and a rabbinical court decided she should be granted one. But Briskman refused and fled to the United States, where the FBI says an Orthodox Jewish rabbi and his wife lured him to their New Jersey home, kidnapped him and said they’d bury him alive in the Pocono Mountains if he didn’t relent.

Briskman said he was kicked repeatedly in the ribs at the home in Lakewood, robbed and shown the dark body bag he’d soon inhabit if he didn’t free his wife from their marital bonds.
“For you to get used to the size,” Rabbi David Wax is quoted as saying in the criminal complaint leading to his surrender to the FBI this month.

If this Sopranos-style plot is true — which the Waxes deny — it is an anomaly. But it’s not uncommon for religious communities to use coercive tactics to pressure recalcitrant husbands into granting their wives a “get,” or religious divorce. Tactics run the gamut from denying social and religious privileges to using financial and legal leverage. [...]



9 comments :

  1. That thug and his wife should get a good few decades in the slammer upon conviction for kidnapping and assault. The Feds are prosecuting them since it was an interstate crime.

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  2. The Beis Din supports Briskman since his wife has refused to allow his kids to see their father since she left him.

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  3. Kudos for the Waxmans for trying to help her get a get.
    I am surprised that this guy wasn't put in cherem from the Beis din and that no one anywhere should have anything to do with him. We have to many agunas nowadays .
    There is almost no reason to hold back a get unless you are a rasha. I know of to many cases like these and the rabbonim have to push much harder in any and all means to free these women or men.

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  4. If you have to threaten or even beat someone up in order to get a get, this means that something is wrong with the system!

    i.e. they should construct an alternative route where the husband's agreement is not indispensable.

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  5. Hopefully Rabbi Eidensohn will allow this post, which (so far) has been censored by the leftist /pro-Obama / feminist mouthpiece VosIzNeias :

    1. There's no evidence that the woman was an agunah under non-feminist normative Jewish law. Apparently the Orthodox rabbis (as opposed to the RA-banut) ruled that the husband was not required to divorce his wife. See the letters from Gadolim on the ymbriskman dot com site and mamzeralert dot blogspot dot com.

    2. What this vicious thug David Wax allegedly did (kidnapping a Jew) is clearly a CAPITAL OFFENSE under Jewish law which can never be justified - see Shemos 20:13, Devarim 24:7, etc. According to the ymbriskman web site, Briskman was beaten for hours AFTER the Get was given!

    3. The victim's wife has now been m'agen (chained) herself. The "Get" that the victim's wife received is a worthless coerced Get according to all Orthodox rabbis.

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  6. So it's "damned if you do, damned if you don't?" When "religious communities" do not use coercive tactics to force a divorce documents, then we hear all the crying and moaning about the "aguna crisis" and how the cheuvinist rabbis do nothing to help the poor chained women. (Of course nothing is ever done to help chained men, but they are ignored).

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  7. around 32 yrs ago a similar story was played out in the chasidic community in williamsburg,a low life piece of human garbage refused to give a get his wife,a couple of guys got a hold of him,they beat him to a pulp,handcuffed him and took him to the cemetery in new square,they dug a grave and threw him in,and started shovelling the dirt on top of him,when the dirth reached his nostrils,the dirtback started screaming,YES YES i'll give the GET,and right then and there they took him to the BEIS DIN,and the gET was given.
    the only mistake this Lakewood couple commited,was not finishing the job.
    chaim.s

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  8. Hurray to the WAX family and any others who use tactics and threats for men to release their wives from agunahood. He would easily have gone the 100 Rabbi signature way.

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  9. Too bad the Waxes are going to be doing very serious time behind bars once the Feds are through with them.

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