What will it take for Orthodox Judaism to hold sexual abusers accountable?

I’m a survivor of abuse in the Haredi community and the director of a survivor advocacy organization. Seeing the results of investigations taking place in various religious denominations feels a lot like being an “older single” at a wedding. You sit there wondering if it will ever happen for you while well-meaning friends and relatives assure you that it will, with pitying looks in their eyes.

Adult Survivors Act appears poised to pass through Assembly

ALBANY— As the Adult Survivors Act appears poised to pass through the Assembly before the end of the state legislative session, activists continue to debate whether the legislation is the best way to address the needs of people who suffered sexual abuse.

The bill, designed after the Child Victims Act, would allocate a one-year lookback window for survivors to file civil claims against their abusers or the institutions that safeguard them. It has already passed in the state Senate unanimously twice.

Office Jokes or Sexual Harassment? [Covering the JOFA Scandal] with Asher Lovy (podcast)

This may be an unusual episode because we go into lots of details of an ongoing story with JOFA. [Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance]

You will learn about all kinds of workplace behavior, why sexual harassment is considered different and how it is so hard to detect when it's woman to woman.

You will also hear about the incredible work that Asher Lovy does with Za'akah for victims and survivors of sexual abuse.

Lawsuit: Camp Ramah showed ‘deliberate indifference’ to camper’s sexual assault

A Conservative Jewish summer camp in upstate New York mishandled a 2018 incident of sexual assault between two campers, according to a lawsuit filed in federal court last week. The lawsuit claims that Camp Ramah in the Berkshires and Rabbi Ethan Linden, the director, “acted with deliberate indifference” and failed to report the assault to police, inform the victim’s family or remove the alleged perpetrator from the camp.

The complaint describes an incident in which the plaintiff — who the lawsuit identifies only as a female minor — awoke to find a male teenaged camper with his hands on and inside her genitals.

Za'akah: Hear Our Cry with Asher Lovy (podcast)

Asher Lovy is an abuse survivor and Director of ZA'AKAH, which raises awareness about child sexual abuse in the Orthodox Jewish community, advocates for legislative reforms, and operates a Shabbat and Yom Tov mental health peer-support hotline.

Jewish feminist group in turmoil after Orthodox sex guru Bat Sheva Marcus, a founder, is accused of harassment

(JTA) — For years, two former executive directors of a pioneering group for Orthodox Jewish feminists believed that they had been retaliated against for raising concerns about the behavior of the group’s board chair, a prominent sex therapist who had been the subject of a glowing profile in the New York Times.

They had chronicled alleged bullying, demeaning comments about their appearance, inappropriate sex talk and, for one of them, the uncomfortable experience of being given a vibrator unsolicited by one’s boss.

Some survivors of child sex abuse shut out of legal process

ALBANY— After years of advocacy and support from lawmakers, the Child Victims Act was passed in Feb. 2019.

Touted as a momentous piece of legislation that granted what turned into a two-year window for survivors of child sex abuse to file time-barred civil claims, it also increased the statute of limitations for the crime.

Overseeing Generations of Growth: Rabbi Yosef Blau’s Historic Career at YU

YU has stood at the heart of American Orthodoxy for over a century. What started as a small yeshiva has grown into a renowned institution with numerous undergraduate and graduate programs and thousands of students. While many educators have come and gone throughout YU’s years, Rabbi Yosef Blau has been, and continues to be, a beloved member of YU for over 70 years. Not only has Rabbi Blau witnessed YU’s development in the last decades, he has also actively and generously nourished its growth.

Bergen Rabbinical Council Will Cut Contracts With Accused Chef

TEANECK, NJ —The Rabbinical Council of Bergen County will no longer supervise the kashrut (Jewish food laws) at restaurants owned by a chef accused of sexual assault and child endangering.

Shalom Yehudiel was arrested last week on charges he sexually assaulted a child younger than 16 multiple times in Teaneck.

Yehudiel owns The Humble Toast, a Jewish deli, and La Cucina Di Nava, an Italian restaurant, in Teaneck. He appeared on the Food Network show "Chopped" in 2020, the first contestant to fully commit to kosher cooking.

Teaneck restaurants will lose kosher certification after chef's sex assault charges

The Rabbinical Council of Bergen County said Thursday that it would end its kosher certification for two Teaneck restaurants, after their celebrated Orthodox Jewish owner was charged last week with sexually abusing a minor.

In a statement to the community, the council said it would end its association with chef Shalom Yehudiel, who gained fame in 2020 on the Food Network's "Chopped" for proudly bringing kosher cuisine to the cooking contest.

The Yeshiva University Rape Scandal (podcast)

On August 25th, 2021 the student newspaper at Yeshiva University, The Commentator, published an anonymous opinion piece entitled, "I Thought Rape Culture Didn’t Exist at YU — Until I Was Raped." Its allegations were deeply troubling, and charged that the university was extremely negligent in its handling of the serious charge that a Yeshiva College student on the basketball team had raped a student from Stern College. In this episode, Scott interviews Shifra Lindenberg and Asher Lovy about the very controversial Non Disclosure Agreement, the failures of the Title IX office, where Yeshiva University went wrong , and what changes need to occur to prevent administrative negligence and failure in the future.

CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE: SUPPORT THE VICTIM, NOT THE PERPETRATOR with Asher Lovy (POdcast)

There are trending topics and then there are topics that must be spoken about at all times. Child sexual abuse is one of them.

Meet Asher Lovy from Za’akah. Since 2012, Za’akah has been at the forefront of the fight against child sexual abuse in the Orthodox Jewish Community, EDUCATING people about child sexual abuse, securing JUSTICE for survivors, and working to prevent child sexual abuse in our communities.

Kosher no more

The Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office has arrested a high-profile kosher chef and restaurateur and charged him with raping a minor he employed at one his restaurants.

Shalom Yehudiel was arrested and sent to the Bergen County Jail in Hackensack last Wednesday. He faces counts of first-degree sexual assault, second-degree sexual assault, and third-degree endangering the welfare of a child.

How a Grassroots Movement Exposed an Abusive Children’s Author

About a year and a half ago, I moved across the country to escape my Hasidic community.

After years as an activist and abuse advocate, I was exhausted and defeated. I had finally admitted to myself that the Haredi (or “ultra-Orthodox”) Jewish community was by definition extreme and impossible to truly reform without changing the very core of its beliefs and societal structure.

TABC principal steps down after sexual assault allegations - report

Rabbi Shlomo Adelman, the principal of the Torah Academy of Bergen County (TABC) in Teaneck, New Jersey has officially stepped down following sexual assault accusations against him, ZA'AKAH, an organization fighting child sexual abuse in Orthodox communities alleged on Wednesday.

New Jersey yeshiva principal resigns abruptly amid allegations of past sexual abuse

(JTA) — Rabbi Shlomo Adelman returned to his position leading a Modern Orthodox yeshiva in New Jersey in October, just weeks being placed on leave following an allegation that he had molested a camper decades earlier.

So it came as a surprise on Wednesday morning when parents at Torah Academy of Bergen County woke up to an email announcing Adelman’s resignation as head of school, effective immediately.

She defended disgraced author Chaim Walder. Now a revered rebbetzin is facing a backlash of her own.

The recent revelation of acclaimed children’s author Chaim Walder’s decades of sexual abuse has prompted a reckoning in the Orthodox community, or at least calls for one.

It also prompted a prominent Haredi rebbetzin and scholar, Tziporah Heller, to write an impassioned Facebook post decrying those who shamed Walder and vilifying the reporter who first wrote about the women who have accused him of molestation and rape. Heller described the Haaretz journalist as a “supercilious” and dishonest lapsed Orthodox Jew — and appeared to blame him for Walder’s Dec. 27 death by suicide.

After Chaim Walder's death, Jewish orgs. offer support for abuse victims

Several major Jewish organizations have come out in support of victims of sexual abuse within the Orthodox community following the death of haredi author, therapist and accused rapist Chaim Walder.

The Rabbinic Council of America (RCA), a leading North American Orthodox rabbinical organization, issued a statement over social media expressing concern and support for the victims of Walder's abuse.

Chaim Walder dead in suspected suicide following rape allegations

Haredi author and educator Chaim Walder was found dead in a cemetery near his son’s grave on Monday in what is suspected to have been a suicide. Walder was facing multiple allegations of rape and sexual assault of minors since a Haaretz expose last month.

Walder was a well-known author of children’s and young adults’ books in the haredi (ultra-Orthodox) world. His series Kids Speak (in Hebrew, Yeladim Mesaprim al Atzmam) has sold more than two million copies in communities across Israel and the Diaspora. The first book in the series became one of the top five best-selling books in Israel of all time.

Teaneck Chef Comes Under Fire For Sexual Assault Allegations

TEANECK, NJ — Teaneck's Shalom Yehudiel gained recognition in 2020 when he appeared as a contestant on Food Network's competition show "Chopped." He was the first chef to observe kosher dietary laws and cook purely kosher cuisine on the show.

But now he is gaining recognition for some serious allegations that have been made against him in the past few years. Two women have accused Yehudiel of sexual assault and harrasment while they were allegedly underage.

Teaneck chef fights abuse lawsuits as #MeToo movement roils Orthodox Judaism

Not long ago, Shalom Yehudiel was something of a hero in North Jersey's Jewish community.

The accomplished chef appeared on the Food Network series "Chopped" in 2020 as the first contestant to proudly observe kosher dietary laws and cook kosher cuisine. Though he ultimately didn't win, many Jewish fans deemed his appearance a historic achievement.

‘I felt I had to do something’

On Sunday, a crowd of 30 people gathered to protest in front of the Humble Toast, a kosher restaurant in Teaneck’s Queen Anne Road business district.

The protest came in response to two civil suits alleging that the restaurant’s owner and chef, Shalom Yehudiel, had allegedly sexually assaulted and harassed two underage girls; one of them was an employee of the Humble Toast, and the other alleged that the assault happened at the synagogue where she and her family go.

The Orthodox community rose up against accused abuser Chaim Walder. That needs to become the norm.

(JTA) — Allegations of child sexual abuse against Chaim Walder, the author of children’s books beloved in the haredi Orthodox market, and the uncharacteristically swift and harsh community response, have left many wondering if this case could mark the turning point in how the community addresses sexual abuse.

As Reform Jews investigate themselves, a reckoning over sexual abuse grows

Multiple investigations, which will look at both historic and more recent instances of sex abuse, signal a desire for a new level of ethical accountability on sexual misconduct and gender discrimination.

(RNS) — After a prominent Manhattan synagogue made public the results of an investigation into the “sexually predatory” behavior of one of its former rabbis last spring, the Reform movement took the unprecedented step of hiring expert law firms to investigate three of its main institutions.

For Orthodox Jews and Israelis, WhatsApp outage highlighted basic community infrastructure — and its vulnerability

Asher Lovy was expecting a flood of notifications on Monday morning when he posted information about a sexual abuse case to several WhatsApp chat groups devoted to tracking the work of his organization, which provides support to survivors of sexual abuse within the Orthodox community.

Instead, he heard nothing. WhatsApp, the Facebook-owned messaging app he uses, was down, along with Facebook and Instagram, three of the most widely used social platforms in the world.

A man sues a rabbi for sexual abuse — and explains why others won’t do the same

The first time Joel Engelman sued the rabbi he accused of abusing him was in 2008. He did so, despite having missed the deadline for such lawsuits, in order to name the man — Abraham Reichman — and hopefully protect other children from him.

Now he’s suing again, but his reasons are slightly different: That deadline has been extended, through the Child Victims Act, and he wants to set an example for other child victims of sexual abuse, especially in the Orthodox community.

This time around, SAR is much quicker to act

News that the FBI accused a now former associate principal at Salanter Akiba Riverdale Academy with production of child pornography among other charges comes on the heels of new developments in an old case of alleged abuse at the school.

Jonathan Skolnick, an educator responsible for Judaic studies in SAR’s middle school, was arrested Sept. 14 on charges he solicited sexually explicit images from boys by posing online as teenaged girls. Investigators believe Skolnick may have communicated with as many as 25 boys, although authorities say the final number could be much higher.

The Ultra-Orthodox Community's Sex Abuse Crisis Has Finally Reached a Tipping Point

Thanks to a new law, one of the most secretive and isolated subcultures in the United States is facing possible exposure.

Fourteen years ago, an anonymous blogger calling himself Un-Orthodox Jew (UOJ) lit a fuse in the ultra-Orthodox Jewish world when he began posting sexual abuse allegations concerning a Brooklyn yeshiva teacher named Yehuda Kolko. As the blog's hit counter climbed into the hundreds of thousands and the comments piled up, it became clear to anyone reading that Kolko's alleged behavior spanned several decades and was not exactly a secret in his community.

‘We feel like we failed’: How one Jewish school is processing the arrest of a teacher who preyed on children

NEW YORK (JTA) — Sitting at the front of a large room lined floor to ceiling with Jewish holy books, Rabbi Joseph Beyda’s voice broke as he processed, seemingly in real time, the idea that a trusted teacher had preyed on his students.

“I think the overarching feeling of the administrators and the faculty and the board of the school is, we know you trust us, we take that trust very deeply, we dedicate our lives to it, we failed on this,” said Beyda, the principal of the Yeshivah of Flatbush’s Joel Braverman High School. “You could say it’s not our fault, but we feel like we failed.”

Finding Justice for Sex Abuse Survivors (video)

Brian Toale and Asher Lovy have a few things in common: they were both molested as children by people they should have been able to trust, they both suffered alone and in silence for years, and they both survived and turned that pain into advocacy for the countless other victims of child sexual abuse. Brian was abused by a lay instructor at his prestigious Catholic High School, Chaminade. He’ll talk about, not just the experience, but the manipulation, the grooming and the threats that kept him silent then, and the fear that made him maintain that silence for more than 40 years.

The Child Victims Act Is About To Shake The Orthodox Jewish Establishment

It used to be that the hardest part of my job was talking to survivors — as director of community organizing for ZA’AKAH, an organization dedicated to advocating for survivors of child sexual abuse in the Orthodox Jewish community.

For Abuse Survivors, A New Shot At Justice

Mordechai Twersky, one of the plaintiffs in a 2013 lawsuit against Yeshiva University accusing administrators and teachers of a decades-long cover-up of physical and sexual abuse at its affiliated high school, said the flagship Modern Orthodox institution “left us for dead” after a U.S. District Court judge dismissed the suit.

Citing federal and state statutes of limitations, which had expired, the judge wrote in a decision handed down on Jan. 30, 2014, “No exceptions apply.”

As of last week, that is no longer the case.

Supporters celebrate Erin’s Law

ALBANY, N.Y. (NEWS10) – A bill requiring education in schools aimed to prevent child sexual abuse and exploitation passed both chambers in New York State this session. Now, “Erin’s Law” is on its way to Governor Andrew Cuomo’s desk.

It’s a bill that was first introduced in the New York State legislature in 2012.

Supporters say it will give children the instruction they need on what to do if something isn’t right.

Assembly committee heads Erin's Law for first time in 8 years

ALBANY, N.Y. (WRGB) - “Hopefully we can get this passed because it's been too long.”

New Yorkers in support of Erin's Law stood together outraged on Wednesday that the bill is held up in the NYS Assembly Education Committee.

Advocates who rallied at the New York State Capitol want New York to become the 37th state to pass Erin's Law.

“It makes sense to everyone who hears it, except for apparently the Assembly Education Committee,” said advocate Asher Lovy.

Abuse survivors bombarded with attorney ads

ALBANY — When the Democrats retook the state Senate in November, effectively ensuring passage of the Child Victims Act (CVA), new ads for attorneys offices began appearing on airwaves, in newspapers, and on social media.

They targeted child sex abuse survivors who had been denied the opportunity to sue their alleged perpetrators or file criminal charges because of the state's narrow statute of limitations.

Legislation Could Expand Child Abuse Reporting to Include Clergy

Months after expanding the definition of mandatory reporters of sexual abuse to include private schools, state lawmakers are looking to go further.

Bills introduced in the Senate and Assembly go beyond educational institutions to include most people working with children. Assemblywoman Sandra Galef introduced legislation after she says two Boy Scouts told her their scout leader sexually abused them.