Orthodox Jewish Group Blasts NYC Universal Pre-K Program

The New York Daily News reported yesterday that the Orthodox Union has taken out ads in a number of publications criticizing New York Mayor Bill de Blasio's free universal pre-K program because its full-day schedule does not leave time for religious studies to be added after the end of school.  The OU wants the city to make more seats available in half-day pre-K programs so a religious component can be added during the other half of the day.  A spokesman for the mayor says they have worked closely with Jewish groups in implementing the program and already have thousands of half-day seats available.

Israeli Court Orders City To Remove Signs Telling Women To Dress Modestly

In Israel yesterday, the Magistrate's Court in the city of Beit Shemesh ordered the  municipality to remove signs that had been put up by haredi (ultra-Orthodox) synagogues and organizations instructing women to dress modestly in the areas of the city where the signs are posted, and not to stand outside certain synagogues. According to the Jerusalem Post, the ruling came in a lawsuit brought by four modern Orthodox women after women suffered repeated harassment and attacks by haredi youths.  Judge David Gidoni wrote:

The signs were designed to restrict women from using public spaces simply because they were women... and constitute a severe injury to the rights of women to equality and respect....  The signs create the expectation that they should be adhered and are likely to create the expectation or understanding that the area where the sign is placed belongs, in effect, to one specific population group in which its norms are applicable.

The court also awarded each plaintiff damages equivalent to $3700 (US). Responding to the court order, the city said that it had repeatedly taken down the signs, only to see them replaced, and that taking them down had led to riots.  The city added that the court did not understand the "complicated reality" of relations between different population groups in the city. [Thanks to Vos iz Neias for the lead.]

Canadian Court Rejects Claim For Damages For Breach of Ketubah

In Zalik v. Zalik, (BC Sup. Ct., Dec. 31, 2014), a British Columbia (Canada) trial court rejected a claim brought by a husband in a divorce proceeding seeking damages from his wife for her breach of their Ketubah (Jewish marriage contract).  The breach cited by the husband was a failure to maintain a lifetime marriage.  The court held that if the Ketubah contains a religious obligation to maintain a lifetime marriage, that obligation is inconsistent with the parties legal rights under Canada's Divorce Act. Metro News reports on the decision.

New Head of Reform Judaism's Religious Action Center Profiled

The Washington Post on Wednesday published a lengthy profile of Rabbi Jonah Pesner, the new head of Reform Judaism's Religious Action Center. Pesner, a Boston community activist, succeeds long-time RAC head Rabbi David Saperstein who was recently confirmed as U.S. ambassador-at-large for International Religious Freedom.  The Religious Action Center has a long history of leadership on civil rights and other liberal causes.

Synagogue Board Improperly Denied Congregational Vote On Rabbi's Retention

In Kamchi v. Weissman, (NY App., Dec. 31, 2014), a New York state appellate court interpreted the provisions of New York's Religious Corporation Law that apply to synagogues as giving wide authority to the congregational membership.  At issue was the synagogue Board of Trustee's refusal to permit a congregation-wide vote on renewal or extension of the rabbi's employment contract after the Board decided not to extend or renew it.  Members of the congregation and its ousted rabbi sued seeking a declaratory judgement that their rights had been violated and damages for tortious interference with prospective economic relations and defamation. The court held that the the congregation's authority is governed by NYRCL Sec. 200 that provides:

A corporate meeting of an incorporated church, whose trustees are elective as such, may give directions, not inconsistent with law, as to the manner in which any of the temporal affairs of the church shall be administered by the trustees thereof; and such directions shall be followed by the trustees. The trustees of an incorporated church to which this article is applicable, shall have no power to settle or remove or fix the salary of the minister....

The court held that the Board,  by refusing to allow the Congregation to act, usurped the Congregation’s authority. It also held that the trial court should not have dismissed the rabbi's defamation claim. [Thanks to Jeff Pasek for the lead.]

Orthodox Jewish Group To Lobby For More New York Day School Aid

The Forward reported this week that the Orthodox Union, the organization representing non-haredi Orthodox Jewish synagogues, is planning a multi-million dollar, multi-year advocacy campaign to try to increase governmental aid for Jewish day schools in New York.  The OU already has ten full-time staff members working on the project, and will be adding more. New York state has over 150,000 students in Jewish day schools and yeshivas. Tuition at some New York Jewish schools exceeds $30,000 per year.

Egyptian Court Bans Jewish Pilgrimage Festival To Moroccan Rabbi's Grave

In Egypt on Monday, the Administrative Court of Alexandria banned an annual Jewish religious pilgrimage that has been held since 1979 to the grave of the Moroccan rabbi Yaakov Abu Hatzira. The grave, in the Nile Delta, was declared an Egyptian cultural monument by the government in 2001. AP and World Bulletin report on the court's action not only banning the annual festival that honors Abu Hatzira's birth, but also ordering that the shrine be removed from the list of Egyptian antiquities and barring the removal of Abu Hatzira's remains to Israel as Israel had requested through UNESCO.  The annual festival which has drawn hundreds of Jews each year from Israel, Morocco and France has been controversial. The court's action came in response to a complaint filed by local residents objecting to the mingling of men and women at the festival and the consumption of alcohol. They also contended that security for the festival was disruptive to them.

Airlines Facing Religious Objections By Passengers

At least two instances have been reported in the past ten days in which U.S. airlines have had to deal with passengers who have become unruly because of religion-related objections to some aspect of the flight.  The New York Post reports on an incident last Tuesday in which American Airlines escorted a passenger off a flight he had just boarded at LaGuardia Airport.  The passenger, despite attempts to calm him, continued to shout at the flight crew objecting to the gate agent and flight attendant wishing passengers "Merry Christmas." He shouted that not everyone celebrates Christmas. Passengers applauded his ouster from the plane.

Meanwhile Failed Messiah reports on a December 20 incident at New York's JFK Airport on a Delta flight to Israel. Haredi (Jewish ultra-Orthodox) men refused to take their assigned seats that turned out to be between two women. Other passengers, many of them Israeli, refused to move. The flight finally took off 30 minutes late after an American passenger changed seats to accommodate the men.

Chabad Rabbis At George Washington University Litigate Over Contract

Thursday's Baltimore Jewish Times reports on an unusual lawsuit just concluded in D.C. Superior Court between two Chabad rabbis:

“American Friends of Lubavitch (Chabad), et al. v. Yehuda Steiner, et al.” pits Rabbi Levi Shemtov, executive vice president and director of American Friends of Lubavitch (Chabad), one of the most recognizable and politically connected Jewish leaders in the country, against [Rabbi Yehuda] Steiner and his wife, Rivky Steiner, the couple Shemtov appointed in 2008 as shluchim, or emissaries, to coordinate Chabad’s presence on George Washington University’s campus.

D.C. Superior Court Judge Neal Kravitz ruled on Monday that Rabbi Steiner, popular with students, was in breach of his contractual obligations that had previously been worked out between the two rabbis through a Jewish religious court. Kravitz enjoined Steiner from leading further Chabad activities at GWU. However, Kravitz also ruled that the non-compete provision in the Steiners' employment contract was unenforceable, leaving open the possibility that Steiner might move his outreach to D.C. students to nearby Georgetown University.

Israel's High Court Approves Rabbinical Court's Retroactive Invalidation of Conversion

On Wednesday, a 3-judge panel of Israel's High Court of Justice ruled that a rabbinical court had authority to retroactively cancel a conversion of a woman to Judaism where the woman misled the rabbinical court about her intention to lead an Orthodox Jewish life style.  Times of Israel and Jerusalem Post report that the rabbinical court acted two years after approving the conversion because convert Yonit Erez completely changed her Orthodox lifestyle shortly after her conversion. Critics of the decision say there is no basis in Jewish law, short of bribery, for reversing a conversion. Reform Rabbi Uri Regev says that false promises to maintain an Orthodox lifestyle are common among converts from the former Soviet Union in Israel.

Chabad of California Liable For $845K Damages Under False Claims Act

In United States ex. rel. Kozak v. Chabad-Lubavitch, Inc., (ED CA, Dec. 9. 2014), a California federal district court granted summary judgment in a False Claims Act  qui tam action, finding Chabad of California liable for $844,985 in treble damages and statutory penalties.  The court concluded that Chabad of California misappropriated Department of Homeland Security grant funds intended to pay for video surveillance and other security equipment for Chabad and two of its affiliated institutions. (See prior related posting.) Chabad executed documents assuring the government that it would comply with specific financial management standards in receiving advances of the grant funds to assure that the funds would be used for the purposes for which they were awarded. However Chabad had no written financial management procedures, deposited the grant funds into its general checking account and used $272,495 of the funds for non-grant purposes.

While Chabad argued that there were triable issues of fact as to whether it submitted false claims "knowingly," the court said:

The undisputed facts in this matter show that Chabad knew about the requirements attendant to NSG Program grants in general and to drawdown advance requests in particular, yet had no compunction whatsoever in failing to adhere to those requirements. Under the circumstances, it is clear to the Court that Chabad acted at minimum “knowingly” as defined by the FCA.

The court did not grant summary judgment against two Chabad affiliates that were also defendants, finding that triable issues of fact remain as to their liability.  Jewish Journal reports on the court's decision.

Lawsuits Seek To Reform Curriculum of Ultra-Orthodox Jewish Schools

The Jerusalem Post yesterday reported at length on lawsuits in New York state and Quebec, Canada to force ultra-Orthodox Jewish schools to meet government-mandated secular curriculum standards. The suit in New York was brought by Naftuli Moster, founder of YAFFED (Young Advocates For Fair Education), while the suit in Quebec was brought by Yochanan Lowen, a former member of the Satmar hassidic community. In an article last month, the New York Times reported on the issue from the perspective of Mr. Moster.  The issue has also been a heated one in Belgium where educational authorities are pressing Orthodox Jewish school on the content of their secular curriculum.

Paper Says Israel's Outgoing Government Failed To Remove Advantages to Haredi Community

As Israel moves toward new parliamentary elections in March, yesterday's Jerusalem Post carried a lengthy article detailing the modest progress, at best, made by the outgoing coalition government on the goal of ending special benefits enjoyed by the country's ultra-Orthodox Jewish population.

Georgetown Law Student Sues Rabbi Accused of Mikvah Voyeurism

As previously reported, in October Rabbi Barry Freundel, head of Washington, D.C.'s Kesher Israel synagogue, was arrested for electronic voyeurism. Freundel was charged with using hidden cameras at the synagogue's mikvah (ritual bath) so he could view women disrobing there. Freundel was also an adjunct professor at Georgetown Law School where he co-taught a seminar.  The Washington Post and The Forward report that last Tuesday a female Georgetown Law student filed a class action against Kesher Israel, the National Capital Mikvah and Georgetown Law School, alleging that:

Defendants turned a blind eye to obvious signs of Freundel’s increasingly bizarre behavior, ignoring the bright red flags that Freundel was acting inappropriately with women subjected to his authority.

The Jewish student says that she used the Mikvah twice as part of her research for a paper titled "The Mikvah: Expanding the Ritual for Jewish Women," and each time Freundel accompanied her to the changing room and then left.

UPDATE: The Forward (Dec. 24) reports that two additional suits, also seeking class action status, were filed against Kesher Israel and the Rabbinical Council of America on Dec. 2 and Dec. 18 respectively.  The suits claim that defendants should have acted sooner to remove Freundel from his positions of authority.

Israel's Cabinet Approves Proposed Basic Law Declaring Israel As A Jewish State

The Jerusalem Post reports that Israel's Cabinet today voted 15-6 to approve three proposed versions of the highly controversial "Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People." The Cabinet Ministers' discussion descended into a shouting match. The bills will be presented for a preliminary vote in the Knesset Wednesday, and then will go to committee where the versions will be combined. All of the versions protect "Hatikva" as the national anthem, protect state symbols, use of the Hebrew calendar and the Law of Return, and give freedom of access to holy places and protect them.

Monitor's Report Critical of Actions By Orthodox Jewish Majority On East Ramapo NY School Board

The New York Times reported yesterday that a state-appointed monitor has delivered a report to the New York State Board of Regents sharply critical of the East Ramapo (NY) School District board.  A majority of the East Ramapo Board's members are Orthodox Jews. In the district, Jewish yeshivas enroll around 24,000 students while the public schools enroll 9,000 students, predominately Black and Latino. Public school parents complain that the Board gives increasing financial aid to yeshivas, while cutting public school budgets. The special monitor, Hank Greenberg, essentially agreed, saying:

What I have found is that you have a board deeply influenced and informed by the community from which they’ve come — so concerned about the children of that community that it has blinded them to the needs of the entire community,

His report calls for more state funding, accompanied by a new law that would provide for a fiscal monitor with the power to overrule decisions of the school board and superintendent. East Ramapo school board president Yehuda Weismandel issued a statement (full text) responding to the monitor's report.

Israeli Rabbis Debate Jewish Prayer On Temple Mount

Today's Jerusalem Post reports on the halachic (Jewish religious law) dispute between haredi and national religious rabbis in Israel over whether it is permissible for Jews to visit the Temple Mount, now the location of Muslim holy sites.  The issue has taken on new urgency since the attempted assassination last month of Rabbi Yehudah Glick, leader of the Temple Mount Heritage Foundation that promotes the right of Jews to pray on the Mount in preparation for restoring of a third Jewish Temple there. (Background). In recent weeks there have been increased clashes between Arab demonstrators and police in Jerusalem. (Background).

7th Circuit Upholds Northwestern University's Cut-Off of Chabad House

In Lubavitch-Chabad of Illinois, Inc. v. Northwestern University, (7th Cir., Nov. 6, 2014), the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected a claim by Chabad House Rabbi Dov Hillel Klein at Northwestern University that his rights under 42 USC Sec. 1981 were violated when the University ended its affiliation with Chabad House because of underage student drinking there. Section 1981 bars racial discrimination in making or enforcing contracts. The disaffiliation resulted in non-renewal of the rabbi's contract to supervise kosher food supplied to Northwestern. The court concluded:

[T]he only discrimination ... alleged is that the university staff did not take the same measures against student organizations that it did against the Chabad house, even though, as is well known, excessive (and underage) drinking is common in such organizations, notably fraternities. But unlike Chabad houses, fraternities are not managed by adults and are components of the university rather than separate entities merely affiliated with it. And the fraternity drinking incidents to which Klein refers occurred before the current vice president of student affairs assumed office, so leniency regarding such drinking was the policy of a different decision‐maker.

White House Aide Will Be New ADL National Director

The Anti-Defamation League announced yesterday that its new National Director will be Jonathan Greenblatt who currently serves as Special Assistant to President Obama and Director of the White House Office of Social Innovation & Civic Participation. Greenblatt, the grandson of a Holocaust survivor who escaped Nazi Germany, is described as a social entrepreneur who has had a lifelong commitment to Jewish social causes.  Greenblatt will succeed long-time ADL director Abe Foxman.

Crimea Related Sanctions Lead To Issues For Russian Jews

After the United States and Western European nations imposed sanctions on Russia over of its annexation of Crimea and its support for rebels in eastern Ukraine, Russia imposed counter-sanctions barring import of European agricultural products.  To make up for the lost European produce, agricultural imports from Israel to Russia have increased dramatically.  According to yesterday's Jerusalem Post, this has created problems for religious Jews in Russia who want to comply with strict interpretations of religious law barring consumption of produce grown in Israel during the Biblical sabbatical year (which is this year). Russia's Congress of Jewish Religious Organizations met in Moscow this week to discuss the matter.