The Jerusalem Post's Matthew Wagner has a new report on the Rabbi Avrohom Mondrowitz case. This is the story's first major coverage in Israel.
Mondrowitz allegedly abused (anally raped, I'm told) children in Boro Park during the late 1970s and early 1980s. He was indicted by a Brooklyn grand jury but fled to Israel in 1987 before trial. Israel refused to extradite him to due a technicality in the extradition treaty between the US and Israel. What technicality? The treaty did not specifically mention man on boy rape as a crime.
Shocked? Don't be. Israel protected Mondrowitz. It's a fact. Why? The key quote from the JPost piece tells the story:
… However, a prominent member of the Ger [hasidic] community in Jerusalem defended Mondrowitz.
"There are people who are trying to disparage Mondrowitz's name," said the source.
"Mondrowitz is a very intelligent, talented man and so are all of his children. His father is highly respected in the community. I can't believe these stories are true.…
Ger is the largest hasidic group in Israel and the most influential politically, controlling today half of the United Torah Judaism political party. Then it controlled its own party, Agudat Israel, which later combined with the Lithuanian haredi party Degel HaTorah to form the block now known as UTJ. Chabad was usually in the Agudat Israel camp, as were most but not all other hasidic groups, excluding primarily the virulently anti-Zionist groups like Satmar, and Belz, which was an early pioneer, so to speak, in selling its votes to the highest bidder. Shas was formed about this time. Before that, its Sefardic haredi voters were usually steered into the Degel HaTorah camp by Sefardic haredi leaders or to other less successful parties that no longer exist.
The word for many years on the Mondrowitz case is that the various leaders of Ger did not want him extradited. This is so even though the Edah Haredit beit din in Mea Shearim issued a ruling in 1988 against Mondrowitz noting that he had committed "insidious acts" and warning him to stay away from children.
At the time Mondrowitz worked for various schools in Israel, including the Jerusalem College of Technology and the Jerusalem College of Engineering.
The ruling from Edah Haredit did not change this.
Mondrowitz was aided by the fact that at first his accusers were all Italian-American children. There were many Jewish victims. Some of them and their parents even spoke with police. But all Jewish victims and their families refused to testify citing everything from laws against speaking lashon hara and laws against mesira (informing), to fears that siblings would not get shidduchim, that they and their families would be harassed and ostracized by their haredi communities, etc.
Haredi rabbis – who are loathe to accept the testimony of children anyway and who disparage non-haredi court proceedings – were reluctant to act based on testimony that was not only from minors and given in a non-Jewish setting, but was from non-Jews rather than from Jews. Even though some recognized that Mondrowitz was guilty, they would not act against him for these reasons and because they did not want to bring shame down on the haredi community. Others also feared having Mondrowitz go to prison in the US, where it is difficult to keep a haredi standard of kosher and religious observance and where child molesters are treated badly by other inmates.
By the time Jewish victims came forward, Mondrowitz was safe in the protective arms of Ger in Israel.
And so the case sat for 20 years. Sure, the law changed, first in 1988 to recognize man on boy rape and then in January of this year, finally making the 1988 change retroactive to the signature of the original treaty.
Then, a combination of pressure brought against the Brooklyn DA by bloggers (UOJ first among them) and their readers and some back door work by other advocates forced the Brooklyn DA to ask for Mondrowitz's extradition.
(The JPost says Hynes asked for extradition in January, but seems to be basing this on information given by the Brooklyn DA's spokesman. I am not sure this information is accurate. UPDATE: The Jewish Week reports the extradition request was made in February. Why this may be significant will have to wait for another post.)
What will come from this?
Time will tell. Mondrowitz will certainly fight extradition and the JPost reports Israel has its own open investigation against Mondrowitz. I suspect that Israel will charge him for lesser crimes than child rape and will, after a long legal process, convict and jail him, housing him in a yeshiva-prison, refusing to release him for extradition until his sentence in Israel is fully served. He will have weekend furloughs and conjugal visits and time off for family celebrations and lifecycle events. He will learn Torah most of the day and eat glatt kosher mehadrin food.
Mondrowitz is now 60 years old. By the time the legal wrangling is finished and his Israeli "jail time" served, he will be nearing 70. By then, the Brooklyn DA will have forgotten about Avrohom Mondrowitz, who will anyway then be an old man.
You get the picture.
The Mondrowitz case is proof that you can rape children as long as you belong to a well-connected (and in this case wealthy) haredi family. The law may one day find you – but that will only be after years of work by victims and their advocates.
The case also illustrates the misuse of halakha by haredi rabbis out to protect their own. It shows a level of disregard for crimes committed against non-Jews.
But most of all it illustrates the destructiveness of silence. Haredi victims and their families remained silent, preferring to rely on the courage of the non-Jewish victims while they themselves hid in the shadows while their neighbors whispered about the "Hot Yudis" and "Avremels" in their midst but refused to stand up and do anything.
If you want to protect children, end the silence.
Your voices are the only weapons you have.
Please click to enlarge.
JEM, a division of Chabad, so to speak, today released a video that contains a picture of the Sorbonne registration document of Menachem Mendel Schneerson. They're dated November 30, 1937. There are no records of any tests taken and passed or of degrees granted. It seems the Rebbe registered, perhaps to avoid deportation to Russia, perhaps to audit classes, perhaps for both reasons.
In summary, the Rebbe took classes for fewer than 1.5 semesters at the University of Berlin even though he lived in Berlin for about seven years. He was not granted any degree.
He studied, and did poorly in both grades and attendance, at a technical college in Paris. He eventually graduated with a degree in Electrical Engineering. This college is not part of the Sorbonne.
He then registered as a student at the Sorbonne. There is no record of any tests taken and passed or of degrees granted. All there is is the initial registration document.
A friend of Barry Gourary told me today that Barry told him years ago that his uncle (the Rebbe) was a perpetual student hanging out at these universities, never in any degree-granting program. He audited a few classes and hung out the rest of the time – that would be years of simply hanging out.
Chabad's "discovery" of the Rebbe's registration document seems to confirm this.
Why would the Rebbe make himself seven years older than he actually was? My guess is to avoid a possible draft into the French or, if deported, Russian army. In 1937 the Rebbe was actually 35 years old. By 1940 Britain had extended its conscription age to 40 because of a shortage of soldiers. Making himself seven years older – 42 – made it far less likely that he would be conscripted.For details on the Rebbe's time in Berlin and Paris, including the discovery of his technical college degree, read this:
Download Golan-Habad_eng.pdf
UPDATE #1, 10-9-07 5:00 PM CDT – I spoke with a consular official at a French consulate in the US. I asked about the French draft during 1935 to 1940. She spoke with a French military officer who told her that all had to register at 18, most were called up by 19. The maximum age for induction into a combat unit was 40. There was no maximum age for serving in non-frontline units.
I've also been told the Rebbe used 1895 as his birth year in French documents dating to at least as far back as 1935. In other words, he claimed to be 40 years old when he was in fact seven years younger, and did so at a time when a war with Germany was very likely.
I firmly believe he did this because it made him too old to serve in a combat unit and, until he graduated as an electrical engineer in 1937, age was his only possible exemption from frontline service. (The French system regularly exempted doctors and other community servants and it used others, like engineers, in non-frontline capacities.)So the date listed on the Sorbonne documents may not have been used for any other reason except that it matched the Rebbe's passport information.
That the Rebbe avoided the Soviet Draft in the late 1920s is not surprising. Many Jews, especially religious Jews, did this and did so for very good reasons.
There is more to this story than I can print here at this time. The Rebbe had a complicated relationship with France. Look for more information to surface on that complex relationship during 2008.