Schlesinger Twins: Another Chabad rabbi supports Beth

Lubavitcher refuses to divorce his wife saying the Rebbe is alive and "paskened"

Psak Din

הבעל, שמאמין כי הרבי חי, התעמר באשתו ובילדיו במשך שנים. בית הדין הרבני שחרר את האישה וקבע: "יחיה הוא בחייו כרצונו אך יעזוב את אשתו לנפשה."

גבר ואישה נישאו ב-1991. לשניהם היו אלה נישואין שניים: האישה הייתה אלמנה עם שני ילדים, ואילו הבעל גרוש עם שני ילדים. לבני הזוג נולדו ארבעה ילדים משותפים, שלושה מהם בגירים ואחת קטינה. הם נישאו בישראל ולאחר מכן עברו לדרום אפריקה. ב-2009 עזבה האישה את הבית ואת דרום אפריקה, ועברה לגור בניו יורק ליד הוריה. מאז ועד היום הבעל ממשיך לגור בדרום אפריקה והאישה בניו יורק.

לשאלות בענייני משפחה:

תחילה פתחה האישה בהליכים נגד הבעל בבית הדין ביוהנסבורג בדרום אפריקה. הבעל סירב לשתף כל פעולה עם בית הדין בדרום אפריקה, שבתגובה הוציא נגדו "כתב סירוב וחרם חמור".

לרגל חתונת בנם המשותף שמתגורר בישראל, הגיעו השניים לארץ. האישה ניצלה את ההזדמנות ופתחה תיק בבית הדין הרבני האזורי בתל-אביב, בו תבעה מבעלה לתת לה גט.

האישה טענה כי לאורך השנים שררה בבית אווירה קבועה של פחד וטרור. לטענתה, הבעל נהג בהתפרצויות זעם, צעקות וכינויי גנאי משפילים, גם כלפי הילדים, שאותם אף נהג להכות. לפני שש שנים עברה לניו יורק כי הרגישה שהיא פשוט לא יכולה יותר להמשיך כך.

לדבריה, הבעל מעולם לא עבד ולא פרנס, ואף לא נתן לה לצאת לעבודה, ובמשך כל השנים המשפחה התקיימה מתרומות שאביה אסף עבורם. אם לא די בזה, המשיכה, הבעל בהתנהגותו הביא לכך שהיא הייתה חייבת לשלוח שניים מילדיהם ללמוד בארה"ב בגלל הסכנה הרוחשת בבית.

הבעל – חסיד חב"ד שחי באמונה כי הרבי מלובביץ עדיין חי – טען כי קיבל מהרבי "איגרת" ובה ההוראה לא להתגרש, וזהו זה. הוא הכחיש את האלימות הפיזית והמילולית, הן כלפי האישה והן כלפי הילדים, וטען כי הילדים נשלחו לארה"ב כדי לקבל חינוך טוב יותר. 

Uziel Frankel - Rivky Stein's mentor - use of beis din to obtain house

I received the following document from Yoel Weiss regarding Uziel Frankel - Rivky Stein's mentor - problematic use of a beis din to obtain a house.

This allegations was referred to in the recent Weiss document to dismiss Rivky's charges.

http://daattorah.blogspot.co.il/2015/02/weiss-files-motion-to-dismiss-rivkys.html

"Mr. Frankel is very familiar with filing frivolous RICO complaints. He has done it unsuccessfully before in previous attempts to intimidate, threaten and harass innocent people. He even stole an innocent person's home and he was convicted when he was sued for that in State RICO complaint. (See Exhibit 4 attached.)"

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   Uziel Frankel - Petition to Confirm Arbitration Award 3-31-04-1 

Beaten wife receives Get by hiring false witnesses to tell the truth.Is this Get valid?

Rav Yizchok Zilberstein (Aleinu L'Shabeach Vayikra page 317) describes a strange case. A woman is being beaten by her husband. She goes and complains to beis din. They simply tell the husband to behave himself - but the beatings go on. There were no witnesses for her claims - which is common in such cases. Her brothers, seeing nothing was being done - hired two people to be false witnesses on her behalf and to testify that they saw the husband beating her. The beis din carefully examined the false witnesses and decided that they are telling the truth. Based on this testimony the beis din orders the husband to give his wife a divorce - which is the law in Shulchan Aruch.

After she received the Get she went to Rav Silberstein to ask whether she can remarry with a Get given because of false witnesses - who were telling the truth about her beating. She said, "It is clear that what the witnesses said was true that the husband beat me. But on the other hand they lied when they said that they witnessed it. Is the Get posul?"

Rav Silberstein felt that the Get was valid because we accept the principle that every Jew wants to do what is right in the eyes of G-d. The reason why we sometimes force the husband to give a Get is because his yetzer harah sometimes prevents him from doing the right thing. In this case the husband is well aware of the truth that he was beating his wife. In his heart he knows that he has an obligation to divorce his wife. Therefore we can consider that he gave the Get willingly - even though he was forced to give it.

However Rav Eliashiv did not agree with this reasoning and stated that it is prohibited to remarry with a  Get obtained through false witnesses. However in this case since the woman already has the Get there is no reason to tell the husband that Rav Eliashiv said the Get is not valid....It is possible to say to him that since the Get already is in the hands of his wife perhaps he will now write a get of his own free will...

Survivor tells Pope Francis to hand priests over to police as new Vatican child abuse commission starts work

Telegraph

Pope Francis should immediately hand over to the police all the Vatican documents on Catholic priests accused of sexually abusing children and “cast out the vipers” who are still being protected by the Church, a British survivor of clerical abuse said.

The Catholic Church needs to end decades of obfuscation and cover-ups by fully cooperating with civil authorities around the world instead of protecting abusive priests, moving them from parish to parish or subjecting them only to canon law, said Peter Saunders.

Peter Saunders, who was sexually abused as a child in London by two Catholic priests and the headmaster of his Catholic primary school, was appointed by the Pope to a new Vatican commission on child protection, which will hold its first full meeting on Friday in Rome.

“The Pope should release all the documents the Vatican has on abusive priests,” he said in an interview shortly after arriving in Rome for the meeting of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors.[...]

New York Times' "The Orthodox Sex Guru" - furthered an inaccurate stereotype that Orthodox Jews are clueless about reality

Times of Israel     Last week, the paper of record contained a 3,000 word profile piece on Bat Sheva Marcus “Orthodox Sex Guru” who feeds into the hands of the New York Times by furthering the ignorant stereotype of unworldly Orthodox Jews clueless in the bedroom.
See original post

You don’t have to be a guru to recognize that rather than remaining in the dark ages as Marcus describes, in the last few years, Orthodoxy has been advancing in healthy sexual awareness, building on our rich treasure trove of holy traditions surrounding the spousal relationship. 

The Orthodox community in Israel is paving the way for healthy discourse and learning surrounding intimacy and sexuality. Where Dr. Marcus finds it challenging to gather a crowd for sexuality training course, we are seeing the opposite here in Israel.

In my work as an educator and therapist, I have found that the words ‘Orthodoxy’ and ‘Sex’ are not incongruous, but describe a fast growing and important area. There are a number of burgeoning organizations that offer training in the topic of intimacy to a variety of medical professionals, as well as kallah and chatan teachers.

In addition to numerous private practitioners, organizations like the Eden Center, Merkaz Yahel, the Puah Institute, and Nishmat’s Yoatzot Halacha Program, to name a few, are all doing pioneering work in expanding the healthy discussion surrounding intimacy and sexuality within the religious community in Israel.

In America steps are definitely being taken in this direction with pioneers taking the field in the form of religious and community leaders, among them; Drs. Scott and Rivky Chudnoff as well as Chani and Shmuel Maybruch. [...]

Royal Commission: Rabbi Gutnick shakes as he tells of phone call that he thought was a prank, a decision he ‘profoundly regrets’

The Guardian

Rabbi Moshe Gutnick, a senior judge of the Sydney Beth Din rabbinical court, now worked with victims of child sexual abuse and encouraged them to go to police without fear, he told the royal commission into institutional responses into child sex abuse on Wednesday.

Gutnick said he received the phone call in 1987, when he was a teacher at the orthodox Yeshivah Centre Bondi, and it was the first time he had heard of sexual abuse there.[...]

“I then subsequently forgot about the phone call because I thought it was nothing more than children playing a prank,” he told the commission.

Gutnick became emotional as he described how in 2011 a man asked to meet him. 

“This proved to be a life-changing experience,” Gutnick said before commissioner Justice Jennifer Coate.

“At my house the man asked me if I remembered receiving a phone call from a young boy in the 1980s, during which the young boy reported Gug for child sexual abuse. He told me that it was him, and that Gug had sexually abused him.

“I was shocked. It was the first time I had come face-to-face with a victim.”

Gutnick began to shake as he told the commission at Melbourne’s county court that after speaking to the victim he resolved to do everything in his power to make sure the voices of sex abuse victims were heard. [...]

Manny and Zephaniah Waks tell royal commission about sex abuse ordeal at Yeshivah Centre

abc

The only survivor of abuse within Melbourne's Jewish community to speak publicly, he has become a name synonymous with the fight against sexual abuse in the Jewish community worldwide.

However it has come with a cost.

Mr Waks has felt so ostracised by the ultra-orthodox Chabad Jewish community that he moved his family to France to start a new life.

Only days ago he returned to Australia to give evidence at the royal commission, as it hears for the first time allegations of abuse in Jewish institutions.

"You know on the plane ride on the way here I had to pinch myself to say, 'Wow, I'm actually coming to Australia because the royal commission is happening'," he said.

"I've literally been working towards this goal, even subconsciously, for decades."

Mr Waks, 39, was sexually abused by security guard David Cyprus at the Yeshivah Centre in Melbourne in the 1990s.

He reported the abuse to senior staff at the centre but he says nothing was done.

It was only years later, when he disclosed the abuse to his father Zephaniah, that they went to police.

"There is still a significant group of rabbis, mainly within the ultra-orthodox community, within the Yeshivah Chabad community, who would not support victims to go to the police," Mr Waks said.

"It causes untold damage.

"The reality is we don't even know how much damage it does because we don't know how many victims are out there thinking, 'I'd better not go because it causes all sorts of things'." [...]

In national abuse probe, leading Australian rabbi decries Orthodox community’s ‘cover-up culture’

JPOST

A senior Australian rabbi told a government commission of inquiry on Wednesday that the Jewish-Australian Orthodox community was guilty of covering up sex crimes against its members, going so far as to use intimidation to prevent people from coming forward.

In testimony before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, Rabbi Moshe Gutnick, a senior Chabad leader in Sydney and the head of the Organization of Rabbis of Australasia, said that “a culture of cover-up, often couched in religious terms, pervaded our thinking and our actions.”

Gutnick asserted that those who reported abuse were labeled mosers (“informers”), and subjected to social ostracism, according to The Guardian.

Such actions are a “gross misuse of rabbinic power,” he said, adding that those who push for victims to go to their rabbis rather than the authorities are trying to “hush it up, to cover it up, to prevent the victim from finding redress. There is no doubt at all: Mesira [‘informing’] has no application whatsoever to instances of child sexual abuse. To use mesira in this way is an abomination.”[...]

Victim’s rights advocate Manny Waks, who was himself sexually abused as a student in a Chabad school, took to Facebook to praise Gutnick for his statement, which included an admission that he had been informed about allegations of abuse 20 years ago and had not followed up properly. [...]

Martin Wolmark's Plea Agreement in the Wolmark-Epstein Get torture case

 Wolmark Plea Details 
 

Mitochondrial Disease: Britain allows repairing embryo with DNA from 3rd party

BBC

MPs have voted in favour of the creation of babies with DNA from two women and one man, in a historic move.

The UK is now set to become the first country to introduce laws to allow the creation of babies from three people. 

In a free vote in the Commons, 382 MPs were in favour and 128 against the technique that stops genetic diseases being passed from mother to child. 

During the debate, ministers said the technique was "light at the end of a dark tunnel" for families.

A further vote is required in the House of Lords. It everything goes ahead then the first such baby could be born next year. 

Proponents said the backing was "good news for progressive medicine" but critics say they will continue to fight against the technique that they say raises too many ethical and safety concerns.

Estimates suggest 150 three-person babies could be born each year. 

Prime Minister David Cameron said: "We're not playing god here, we're just making sure that two parents who want a healthy baby can have one."

Life-saving The method, which was developed in Newcastle, should help women like Sharon Bernardi, from Sunderland, who lost all seven of her children to mitochondrial disease.