May 6, 2009 | 1:52 pm

Sexual abuse plagues Brooklyn’s Orthodox Jewish community

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

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In February, I mentioned a report from NPR about sexual abuse in Brooklyn’s hasidic community. Yesterday ABC News followed up on the story about what Joel Engelman and Tamir Weissberg said happened to them as young Orthodox Jews.

The parallel themes between abuse in the Orthodox world and that which plagued Catholic communities are striking, particularly the code of silence brought on by either shame, fear of the abuser or a misplaced fear of God.

From ABC News:

The Brooklyn district attorney’s office, which last month announced a hotline for alleged Orthodox sex abuse victims, says it has 19 active cases of alleged sex abuse in the borough’s Orthodox Jewish community. And advocates say the problem extends beyond Brooklyn.

“If you’re a pedophile, just go to one of the orthodox communities. You’re probably safest there,” said New York State Assemblyman Dov Hikind, himself an Orthodox Jew. “It’s sad for me to say that, but it’s true.”

When Hikind broached the subject of sexual abuse on his weekly radio show last year, he said he was “inundated” with calls from alleged victims from the United States, Israel and parts of Europe.

ABC News has spoken to Orthodox Jews who claim they were victims of abusers in New York, Baltimore and Illinois, who shared stories of alleged molestation followed by what they described as hostility from community leaders when they sought help.

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“They are willing to protect the community at the expense of the children,” said a woman who claims she was abused by her father, a rabbi, and who asked to be identified only by her first name, Nanette. The woman’s father did not return repeated messages seeking comment.

She said that when she began discussing the accusations against her father, her rabbi said if she continued to speak about it publicly, no other Orthodox Jews would be willing to marry any of her siblings. She says her family refused to speak with her.

“My sister told me until I stop the slander, she can’t be my sister,” she said.

“One of the things they say is when people speak out like this it causes desecration of God’s name,” she said. “But the real desecration to God is that they are willing to protect the community at the expense of the children.”

For more on this two-year-old Jewish Journal cover story (pictured) about abuse in shuls across the country.

May 5, 2009 | 12:59 pm

Naked nonsense: More on the Miss California mess

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Miss California Carrie Prejean remains in the cultural crossfires because she honestly answered a loaded question from Perez Hilton about whether she thought gays should marry. (Prejean doesn’t, which has led to a lot of Hollywood gossipmongering and appearances on the talk show and church circuit.) Today TheDirty.com, of Matt Leinart fame, posted a photo of Prejean doing her best Victoria’s Secret pose and got characteristically preachy:

Exclusive: Self-proclaimed bible thumper Miss California, Carrie Prejean, should start pointing the finger at herself for her own indiscretions. TheDirty.com has received exclusive images of the homophobic debutante that would clearly strip her of her Miss California crown. So much for being a good role model for the state of California Carrie. Looks like your Dirty photo shoot makes you a sinner too. I decided.

The celebrity gossip site then invites you to “Click On Image To Enlarge On This Sinner.”

Talk about judgmental. Prejean responded with this statement:

“I am a Christian, and I am a model. Models pose for pictures, including lingerie and swimwear photos. Recently, photos taken of me as a teenager have been released surreptitiously to a tabloid Web site that openly mocks me for my Christian faith. I am not perfect, and I will never claim to be.”

I’ve got to say I agree with Miss California on this one again. Many Christians would.

I don’t know pageant rules and, frankly, I couldn’t care less. This post is not about whether Prejean should lose her Miss California crown. This is about the public stoning she’s received during the past two weeks, which I’ll agree she has only inflamed with TV and speaking appearances.

Prejean isn’t Ashley Harkleroad posing for Playboy and showing off more than just her Jesus fish tattoo. This a lingerie pic. Nothing is revealed, though not a lot is left to the imagination. What matters here, I think, is context.

Furthermore, it’s ludicrous to call Prejean a “Bible thumper.” Better would be to call her a “Bible believer,” who has a socially and biblically conservative perspective on sexuality. Agree with it, disagree with it—but don’t write her off as some nut.

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May 4, 2009 | 9:00 pm

Mayor Villaraigosa talks about L.A. and Israel at AIPAC

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Mr. Katz

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa spoke at the AIPAC policy conference today. (Watch his 12-minute speech here or read some highlights here.)

As the mayor often does when speaking to Jewish crowds, which he does regularly, Villaraigosa connected his life story to the Israel’s story and mentioned his favorite Jewish high school teacher.

“Israel’s story is part of who I am as an Angeleno,” Villaraigosa said. “The history of struggle, the fighting for freedoms, an exodus from the bondage of discrimination, those echo my own community’s struggle for civil rights. And on a more personal level when it comes to Israel, my roots run deep. They go back to my mother, who believed in the power of diversity and the value of every human being; to my childhood in East L.A., Jewish neighbors welcomed me into their homes and never turned a cold eye of bigotry toward my family; to Herman Katz, the Jewish teacher who saw potential in a high school dropout and sent me on a course to college, a strong education and a chance at success; and to the leaders in the Jewish and Israeli communities in L.A. who understand the dreams of peace and freedom, justice and democracy, extend from the shores of the Pacific to the beaches of Tel Aviv.”

Much has been made, or more accurately was made, of Katz’s influence on the delinquent young Tony Villar. It’s never been clear how much of the story is reality and how much is fable. Katz appeared in Villaraigosa’s 2005 campaign commercials and on stage at his inauguration. But this is politics, and, in case you hadn’t noticed, Los Angeles has a big Jewish community. And Villaraigosa knows this. So a bit of skepticism is understandable.

The Jewish Journal provided a bit of insight when the paper profiled Villaraigosa’s favorite MOT in 2006. Here’s what his former teacher had to say:

“I saw that he was a bright kid, and from what he had told me, he really didn’t know what he was going to do,” Katz said. “It was just a matter of encouraging him.”

“It wasn’t a ‘this-kid-could-be-mayor-one-day’ type of thing. But it just so happened that this was at a time when he needed somebody who showed a little interest, who would give him the encouragement, and that’s what it really was,” Katz said.

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May 4, 2009 | 8:53 pm

Israel and its ‘alleged nuclear weapon’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

This response isn’t exactly refusing to confirm or deny, but I guess when your past prime minister let slip what everyone already knew—that Israel is a nuclear power—there isn’t much need for smoke and mirrors. From the JPost:

Western policies based on pressuring Iran to give up its nuclear program will fail because they disregard Israeli nuclear capabilities, which is “the first and greatest threat to security in the region,” an Egyptian Foreign Ministry spokesman said on Monday.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor categorically rejected that classification.

“If he can quote at least one occasion in which Israel has threatened any of its neighbors with the alleged nuclear weapon, then his statements would gain him credibility,” Palmor said. “Unless he produces evidence to support his claims, these kinds of remarks are completely out of line.”

Read the rest here.

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May 4, 2009 | 7:28 pm

Rep. Harman vows to clear her name at AIPAC policy conference

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

The AIPAC policy conference seems like an odd place for a politician accused of doing inappropriate favors for the pro-Israel organization to be campaigning for exoneration. But there Rep. Jane Harman was yesterday, vowing to clear her name after an NSA wiretap captured her promising to intervene at the Justice Department on behalf of two former AIPAC staffers accused of obtaining and disclosing state secrets. (That case was dropped by prosecutors last week, but not because of Harman).

From The Washington Post:

The California Democrat noted that she had called on the Justice Department to release all the information it had about secretly monitored conversations that involved her.

“I want it all out there. I want it in public. I want everyone to understand, including me, what has happened,” Harman said before a packed auditorium at the opening of the annual policy convention of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, the powerful pro-Israel lobby group.

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Harman has described the wiretap as an abuse of government power. But sources have told The Washington Post that she was not being surveilled; the tapped phone belonged to the suspected Israeli agent, who happened to talk to her.

“I will not quit on this until I am absolutely sure this can never happen to anyone else,” Harman told the AIPAC audience, which warmly applauded her. She said the incident was having “a chilling effect” on members of Congress who “care intensely about the U.S.-Israeli security relationship . . . and have every right to talk to advocacy groups.”

Or how about this extra nugget that MSNBC picked up on:

She described herself as “not a victim,” but rather “a warrior on behalf of our Constitution and against abuse of power.” And she promised that she will “not quit on this, until I am absolutely sure that this never can happen to anyone else.”

At several points, the audience broke into applause. During one of those instances, Harman cautioned, “It ain’t over yet. Clap next year.”

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May 4, 2009 | 5:52 pm

Democrats, less educated more likely to blame Jews for financial crisis

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Shortly after The Christian Science Monitor published my op-ed about anti-Semitism and the financial crisis, I received an e-mail from Neil Malhotra, a professor at Stanford School of Business. Malhotra said that he and a colleague had just done a study on American sentiments surrounding the financial crisis, and that they found that 24.6 percent blamed the Jews a moderate amount or more for the financial crisis.

I mentioned these findings in my cover story last month, “Why Blame the Jews?” This month, Malhotra and Yotam Margalit of Columbia University published their findings and a bit of analysis in the Boston Review. Among the findings, Democrats were almost twice as likely to blame Jews for the financial crisis. College graduates were two-thirds as likely as those lacking a four-year degree.

Malhotra and Margalit explain their methodology and what their findings mean:

Survey results

To assess more deeply whether the tendency among a subset of Americans to blame the Jews is meaningful, we conducted a controlled experiment. The question of interest is whether anti-Semitic sentiments affect people’s thinking about the preferred response to the economic crisis. For example if people associate corruption on Wall Street with Jewish financiers such as Madoff, what is the impact on their views about bailing out big business?

To address this question, we carried out a simple but powerful experiment. Participants in a national survey were randomly assigned to one of three groups. All three groups were prompted with a one-paragraph news report that briefly described the Madoff scandal. The text was the same for all three groups, except for two small differences: the first group was told that Bernard Madoff is an “American investor” who contributed to “educational charities,” the second group was told that Madoff is a “Jewish-American investor” who contributed to “educational charities,” and the third group was told that Madoff is an “American investor” who contributed to “Jewish educational charities.” In other words, group one did not receive any information about Madoff’s Jewish ties; group two was told explicitly that Madoff is Jewish; and group three received implicit information about Madoff’s religious affiliation. In a follow-up question, participants were asked for their views about providing government tax breaks to big business in order to spur job creation.

The responses of the members of the three groups are revealing and disturbing: individuals explicitly told that Madoff is a Jewish-American were almost twice as likely to oppose the tax cuts to big business. Opposition to tax cuts for big business jumped from 10 percent among members of group one to over 17 percent among the members of group two, who were explicitly told about Madoff’s Jewish background. This difference is highly significant in statistical terms. The implicit information contained in Madoff’s charitable history also produced an aversion to big business, but to a lesser degree, with opposition to corporate tax breaks in this case increasing to 14 percent.

This result is most likely not a coincidence. First, when we examine the results of the experiment on Jewish voters, we find that respondents had the exact same policy preferences in all three groups. In other words, the information about Madoff being Jewish only had an effect among non-Jews.

You can read the rest here.

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May 4, 2009 | 4:57 pm

Democrats for Israel at AIPAC

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Last January, I watched Larry Greenfield, then head of the California chapter of the Republican Jewish Coalition, and Andrew Lachman, president of L.A.-based Democrats for Israel, spar over the presidential candidates in townhall forums. Now Greenfield, who has left the RJC, is blogging for The Journal from the AIPAC policy conference and Lachman is getting interviewed by the JTA news crew.

You can watch Lachman in the above video. Here’s a snippet of what Greenfield had to say:

Obama is at best neutral between our democratic ally Israel and her Arab enemies.

He is inexperienced and “off the charts” radical in his approach to the true nature of freedom’s enemies.

Barack Obama is the anti-Ronald Reagan.  Mr. Obama is unrealistic about a dangerous world, and without deep convictions and principles to guide him.

So, here I am again, helping to leverage a successful pro-Israel community to help the United States remain strong as well. One cannot be pro-Israel without coming to understand that America needs to be strong and successful.  Obama has us going in exactly the wrong direction on national security issues.

We overcame Jimmy Carter.  We shall overcome Barack Obama as well.  We had better, because the missile threats are a unique marrying together of terror states and proxy stateless terror groups with modern technology.

It’s amazing how differently Lachman and Greenfield see the same situation.

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May 4, 2009 | 1:39 pm

Michael Oren: Bibi’s surprise pick for U.S. ambassador

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Over at Bloggish, Rob Eshman has a good post about Bibi Netanyahu’s surprise pick for Israeli ambassador to the United States. Israel’s most important diplomatic post will be filled not by a politician but author Michael Oren.

Rob writes:

Why did Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu select Michael Oren as Israel’s next Ambassador to the United States?

That’s a question many among Israel’s political and religious right are asking in the wake of the Princeton-educated historian’s appointment to the country’s most important and high-profile diplomatic post. “He supported the withdrawal from Gaza,“ one leading activist told me. “I think it’s dreadful.“

Oren indeed supported Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza, and in a speech last month argued that Israel do the same from the West Bank.

“The only alternative for Israel to save itself as a Jewish state is by unilaterally withdrawing from the West Bank and evacuating most of the settlements.“ he told an audience at Georgetown University in March, when he was a visiting professor there.

As Haaretz reported:

Oren said he supported the disengagement from the Gaza Strip. After they started firing Qassam rockets from Gaza, he said Natan Sharansky asked him if the disengagement wasn’t a mistake.

Oren said he replied that it had not been. The mistake was Israel’s failure to react to the Qassam fire, which sent a message of weakness to the entire Middle East.

But while the appointment’s critic blast Netanyahu for the choice, they may also come to realize that he can be just what Israel needs about now: an articulate, appealing and highly intelligent public spokesman for the cause, as the country attempts to marshal American and international support to confront the existential threat that is Iran.

It was this subject that Oren focused on in his speech yesterday at the Aipac convention in Washington: ““Israel will not remain passive while a government that’s sworn to wipe it off the map acquires the means for doing that,“ said Oren of the notion of a nuclear-armed Iran.

You can read the rest here. On a related note, a new ADL poll found that 66 percent of Israelis would support a military attack on Iran if diplomacy fails.

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May 4, 2009 | 4:31 am

Stanley Chais sued by Madoff court-appointed trustee

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Stanley Chais, the Beverly Hills money manager accused of being a Madoff fund feeder, was already the focus of a $250-million class action lawsuit. Friday, Chais was sued by the court-appointed trustee overseeing the liquition of Bernard L. Madoff investment Securities.

Chais is accused of, among other indiscretions, receiving such “implausibly high” returns that he did know, or should have known, he was involved in a massive Ponzi scheme.

From the NYT DealBook blog:

The complaint asserted that Mr. Chais was a primary beneficiary of the Ponzi scheme for at least 30 years, reaping annual returns on his family accounts that averaged 40 percent and were sometimes as high as 300 percent, The New York Times’ Diana B. Henriques reports.

The various funds he ran for clients — who ranged from family friends to Hollywood aristocrats like Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Trachtenberg — produced annual returns of 20 to 24 percent, the complaint said.

That was still about twice what most Madoff investors expected.

The trustee, Irving H. Picard, was appointed at the request of federal regulators to recover money on behalf of those who invested with Mr. Madoff.

The suit marks the first time Mr. Picard has accused a supposed victim of the Madoff fraud of receiving special treatment, although he has sued other institutional investors under provisions of the federal bankruptcy code that allow him to challenge payments Mr. Madoff made in the final 90 days of his long-running fraud.

Reached later by an NYT reporter, Chais’ attorney said “it is important to understand that Mr. Chais and his family have suffered astounding and ruinous losses from the Madoff scheme.”

He added that Mr. Chais was “saddened by the trustee’s suit and outraged by the very public way in which the trustee has proceeded,” specifically by including Mr. Chais’s children and their spouses as defendants and referring to Mr. Chais’s grandchildren, “none of whom had any decision-making involvement in the investments,” he said.

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May 1, 2009 | 8:19 pm

Wolverine with Jew claws

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

I’ve often thought about being Wolverine for Halloween. My mutton chops often match. But thank God I don’t have a receding hairline. I would look just like this guy, who was so excited to see “X-Men Origins: Wolverine,” he decided to join the team:

“What if I went as Wolverine?”

“Okay, Jewish Wolverine,” I said, liking it. “Jew-verine.” Loving it.

No mention at I Heart Jews of Jewverine’s deadliest weapon: Menorah-shaped Jew claws:

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May 1, 2009 | 4:01 pm

More on football to frum: When Alan met Shlomo

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Sorry Ben, but I have to admit I missed your link to the Chabad story about Alan Veingrad the first time around. Thanks for reposting it in the comments for yesterday’s “Retired footballer goes frum” post.

I love stories on Jewish athletes—the Jewish Jesse Owens, Jordan Farmar, etc.—and this deeper profile of Veingrad is a good one.

Here is an excerpt:

Meet Alan Veingrad. Offensive lineman. Green Bay Packer. Dallas Cowboy.

Champion.

Alan, winner of Super Bowl XXVII as a member of the 1992 Dallas Cowboys, had a great life. “A life that anybody would have wanted,” as he put it. He was a gifted athlete with a wonderful personal life. He had grown from a normal kid living in South Florida into one of the most successful athletes in the world.

And yet there always seemed to be someone else beside him. Someone walking with him on his journey from Florida to college in Texas to the Pros. It watched him as he grew up, practiced with him as he groomed himself into a master lineman, it even sat with him as he went fishing. Who was this? Who was watching him, who was practicing with him, who went fishing with him?

Meet Shlomo Veingrad.

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May 1, 2009 | 3:18 pm

StandWithUs gets signatures for UCSB prof investigation

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Within five minutes of publishing the previous post about the UC Santa Barbara professor under fire for his strong criticism of Israel, I received this e-mail from the pro-Israel campus organization StandWithUs:

The StandWithUs petition supporting the University of California- Santa Barbara (UCSB) investigation of a professor’s possible violations of faculty conduct codes has been overwhelmed with endorsers. Released on April 30 at 5:00 PST, the petition had over 1,500 signatures by 10:00 AM May 1.  StandWithUs expects thousands more signatures from around the world and will deliver t he petition to UCSB administration in May.

StandWithUs is an international Israel education organization.  The petitions, sample letters to UCSB administration and background information can be found at:  http://standwithus.com/rup/ucsb.asp?tab=5

“People are genuinely concerned because crucial principles are at stake. This case is a litmus test of whether professors can exploit their positions of authority to impose their political prejudices on students or whether the university truly will remain a place where all points of view can be comfortably and responsibly discussed.  That is the reason we support the administration and wrote this petition,” stressed Esther Renzer, international president of StandWithUs.

On January 19, Professor William I. Robinson used one of his class e-mail lists to send inflammatory comments, an article, and lurid photos that equated Israel and Nazi Germany. He admitted they were unrelated to the course. Two students dropped the class and filed grievances against Robinson for violating the Faculty Code of Conduct by intruding material unrelated to the course, exploiting his position of authority to foist one extreme point of view, and using a university class e-mail list for political purposes.

When UCSB administrators decided to formally investigate the violations, Robinson’s supporters launched a campaign to oppose it. They claim they are defending academic freedom, but they are undermining it, according to StandWithUs. The Faculty Code guidelines that Robinson may have violated are designed to uphold academic freedom.

Robinson’s supporters also claim that he is being accused of anti-Semitism merely because he criticized Israeli policies. “This is disingenuous,” stated Roberta P. Seid, PhD, StandWithUs education/research director. “Robinson’s e-mail demonized I srael, its founding, and its history. The university should be concerned about the degradation of academic standards when professors present such polemics as reasonable analyses. But that is not the case against him.  The case is that he inappropriately used university resources to impose and promote his personal political prejudices, stifling students’ ability to critically examine controversial issues.  I’m sure he would be glad that the Code of Conduct safeguards are in place if a homophobic or racist professor took the liberties he took to influence students.”

StandWithUs launched the petition also to protect the right of students to register grievances against faculty without fear of hostile faculty reactions. “Robinson’s supporters’ assault on the students’ complaints could disempower other students with grievances and intimidate them into silence,” said Roz Rothstein, StandWithUs international director.

“The politicization of academia is a serious problem today. We applaud the UCSB administration for trying to uphold standards of academic freedom and responsibility. They are under a lot of pressure, and our petition lets them know that tens of thousand of people support them and their commitment to ensure that the university remains what it should be—a place for the critical examination of ideas, facts, and values,” said Rothstein.

For more, check out the profile of StandWithUs that I wrote last year.

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