The M'sira Machine
By Menachem Ben David
M'sira, the handing over of a Jew or
his property to the non-Jews or non-Jewish authorities, where the Jew is not
endangering anyone's lives, is one of the most heinous crimes in the Torah. As
expressed by our sages Shulchan Aruch, Choshen Mishpat, Chapter 388:
It is strictly forbidden to moser either a Jewish person or his property. One
who mosers a Jewish person or his property has no share in the world to come.
Certain elements of the Orthodox Jewish community seem to be ignoring the Torah
prohibitions on m'sira. The writer of this article personally observed
the following events. In a large Orthodox and Yeshivish type community in the
New York area, a Jewish woman filed a false domestic violence charge against her
husband. The husband was served a domestic violence restraining order by the
local police and was forced to vacate his home immediately. He was granted about
15 minutes to remove his possessions from his home. For months he was forced to
sleep in the basements of various friends, while stripped of his possessions,
unable to see his children, and terrified of being caught near his home by the
police.
The writer of this article also observed the woman bragging about how she was
able to remove her husband from her home. During the whole incident there was
not the slightest outcry or public censure of the woman from the local Orthodox
rabbis, or the community. As in ancient Sodom, instead of punishing the
criminal, the victim was punished instead. A major Jewish "agunah" organization,
LBYI, apparently broadcast a series of e-mail messages claiming that the man's
wife was an agunah, and asking the community to support her. None of the
rabbis I consulted with considered the woman to be an agunah in any way,
shape, or form, despite the fact she had not yet received her ghet. There
was no evidence the woman had ever gone to Beis Din.
Last May this writer was informed of a case of m'sira far more heinous
than the one previously described. The 05/23/2002 Internet edition of the NJ
Star Ledger published an article about the plight of Mr. Gerald Weiss, Hashem
Yatsilo. Mr. Weiss, from Short Hills, NJ, is an Orthodox Jew whose wife
allegedly sued him for divorce after he contracted a rare and fatal form of
cancer. A family court judge allegedly ordered him to pay $12000 per month in
child support and he was unable to do so. Mr. Weiss has been jailed in Essex
County, NJ at least 2 years. He is apparently dying of cancer in jail and is
only expected to live a few more years. The judge refuses to release him and he
is not allowed visits from his children. The constitutional prohibition of
debtor's prison and rights to due process seem to be non-existent where divorced
fathers are concerned. I have independently verified these facts with Mr. Weiss'
rabbi.
Upon making some inquiries and doing some research, I learned this was not an
isolated incident. The ruthless, anti-male tactics and ideologies of the
non-Jewish feminist world are penetrating into our Orthodox communities. A whole
network of women's organizations, some of them secular, and some even calling
themselves "modern Orthodox", have become experts at exploiting the anti-male,
police-state apparatus of the family court systems. These organizations will
eagerly assist corrupt and wicked women to quickly remove their husbands from
their houses and confiscate their children and assets. For details on abuses in
the civil court system, see:
http://www.massoutrage.com/rodirtytricks.htm
Various Jewish women's organizations in New York receive continuous prominent
and favorable coverage in the Jewish Press and other major Jewish publications.
Some of these organizations claim to be assisting women to deal with spousal
abuse by providing low-cost legal represenation in both Family Court and Beis
Din. A number of these prominently featured Jewish feminist organizations seem
to be continually spreading hysterical propaganda about an alleged widespread
problem of abusive relationships in the Orthodox community, the only solution
being of course domestic violence protection orders.
Domestic violence laws are being promoted by women's groups under the pretense
that they are needed to protect "battered women". Lawyers, toens, and father's
rights groups have informed me that the the vast majority of these protection
orders are obtained under false allegations and that the woman shows no sign of
physical abuse. Doctors, accountants, computer programmers, and other
professionals with no criminal record are being routinely served these
protection orders. These protection orders are in fact a trump card which
enables divorcing women to obtain primary custody of the children, obtain
possession of the marital home, and to evict their husband in one quick court
hearing. The hearing is ex parte, ie the husband is not present, and no physical
evidence of harm done to the woman is necessary.
Various Jewish feminist organizations are attempting to foist this scam on a
somewhat naive and gullible Orthodox Jewish community. This writer was able to
obtain a large packet of materials provided to participants at a recent
"Domestic Violence Conference" (DVC) in NY City. The conference materials listed
a variety of Jewish and political organizations as sponsors of the conference,
including the District Attorney of Queens County, the Queens Jewish Community
Council, various local politicans, a variety of feminist activists, and several
modern Orthodox rabbis. The participants were provided detailed materials on how
to prosecute their husbands for alleged domestic violence crimes. Some of the
actions which are implied to be "domestic violence" in the information packet
include: "withholding information, withholding access to family finances,
controlling where she goes, making gestures, making all the big decisions,
acting like the master of the castle, being the one to define men's and women's
roles, playing mind games, giving her an allowance". For these "violations" and
others, the woman were urged to go to court, get an order of protection, and to
think seriously about leaving the household with the children and moving into a
temporary shelter.
Many of the definitions of domestic violence in the DVC information packet
appear to be starkly at odds with Jewish law and tradition. According to
halacha (Jewish law), only a woman whose life is truly in danger may be
allowed to report her husband to the authorities, if there is no other way she
can save herself. A Kol Koreh (Jewish Law Announcement)
Kol Koreh I
obtained from leading rabbis in NY explains how m'sira is certainly one
of the most heinous crimes in Judaism, the penalty for which one loses their
share in the world to come.A moser may be chayav misah even
b'zman hazeh. At a minimum we are obligated to publicize the names of the
mosrim and their supporters.
The DVC material seems to casually equate a law suit in family court with a law
suit in Beis Din. An unlearned person reading the DVC material might
easily conclude that a Jewish woman is allowed to sue her husband in family
court, and then come to Beis Din only to obtain the ghet.
Apparently never explained in any of the material in the DVC packet are the
halachic facts that false domestic violence charges against another Jew
constitutes m'sira, or that halacha forbids suing another Jew in
civil court. The fact that so-called "Orthodox" rabbis could participate in and
encourage such a conference speaks volumes about the moral decay and inhumanity
of these "rabbis" towards their Jewish brethren who are victims of m'sira.
Certain modern Orthodox clergyman and much of the Jewish media continually raise
hysterical cries about the so-called "agunah problem". Yet our Jewish brothers
are being dragged from their homes, robbed of their children and possessions in
court, and thrown into jail if they refuse to concede their G-d given halachic
rights. The silence of the Orthodox Jewish community is deafening, when one
considers that m'sira is one of the most heinous violations of the Torah.
Importation into the Orthodox community of the feminist practices of informing
on innocent men to the authorities is an unspeakable, heinous crime. The
activities of certain Jewish feminist organizations may be resulting in the
wholesale m'sira of Jewish men. It is time that the decent G-d fearing
rabbis investigated and condemned the activities of such organizations. The
names of individuals and organizations which commit m'sira must be
publicized to the Jewish community.
I ask the Orthodox community: Because the family court systems, bureaucracies,
and feminist groups are waging war against fathers, will we now emulate their
example in the Orthodox Jewish community? Are there any rabbis left who will
publicly denounce and oppose feminist m'sira? How long can we continue to
live in a country and culture which makes war upon families and fathers?
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