Jeff Seidel, the find-you-at-the-Western-Wall-invite-you-for-Shabbat-get-you-into-haredi-BT-yeshiva-forever kiruv guy, who also runs missionary outposts he calls student centers at large Israeli universities, has always used non-Orthodox famous people as lures, and has almost always done so without their permission. But his new Passover ad might have reached a new, deceptive, low.
Jeff Seidel
Jeff Seidel, the find-you-at-the-Western-Wall-invite-you-for-Shabbat-get-you-into-haredi-BT-yeshiva-forever haredi kiruv (missionary outreach) guy, who also runs missionary outposts he calls student centers at large Israeli universities, has always used non-Orthodox famous people as lures, and has almost always done so without their permission. But his new Passover ad might have reached a new, deceptive, low.
Bar Refaeli is not Orthodox or a supporter of Jeff Seidel. Seidel is shamelessly playing off the controversy over Israel's Foreign Ministry using Refaeli as a spokesperson for Israel when she, a) evaded the military draft and, b) rather famously dated/cohabited with Leonardo DiCaprio, who isn't Jewish.
Seidel – who vehemently opposes intermarriage and inter-dating, is shamelessly using Refaeli picture to make it appear, a) as if she supports his work – which she does not – and, b) as if he does not disapprove of inter-dating – which is a blatant lie.
Seidel knows many of the kids he's trying to lure have dated non-Jews or are still dating non-Jews, and the Refaeli ad is meant to lure them in.
I've known Jeff for 26 yeears and his wife, who is from Minnesota, for a considerably longer time. Her brothers were friends of mines and was her late father.
I even freelanced for Jeff at one time, ghostwriting a few Jewish Press columns for him. I even rode with him to Tel Aviv University once when there were threats against him for luring overseas students into "cults" – haredi yeshivas.
I always opposed deception in kiruv even then, and I always made that clear. It's one of the reasons I never pursued other opportunities with his organization.
But Bar Refaeli?
Jeff, you should be ashamed.
[Hat Tip: Jewish Outreach.]