RSS
Rabbinical court delays ruling on Berlin rabbi accused of sexual misconduct after he offers 11th-hour doctor’s note
BERLIN (JTA) – A Jewish religious court has convened to hear testimony against a Berlin rabbi who was fired following allegations that he preyed on young women, using religious arguments to lure them into sexual relationships.
The beit din, or religious court, of Germany’s Orthodox rabbinical association, the ORD, announced on Monday night that it had “heard several affected persons in the case of allegations of sexual assault by a rabbi.”
But the group, working together with the Chief Rabbinate of Israel and the Conference of European Rabbis, said it was not prepared to make a ruling because the rabbi had presented a letter from his doctor saying he could not testify, two hours before he was scheduled to do so. He will be given another chance, on July 13, according to the beit din’s statement.
The rabbi, Reuven Yaacobov, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency on Tuesday that his doctors have told him to rest completely for a month because of the shock he had endured. “If we don’t end the situation, then the post-traumatic situation will follow,” he recounted via WhatsApp.
The ORD would not offer more specificity about the number of women who testified. But a source outside the ORD with knowledge of the proceedings said that at least 10 women took part, locally or remotely, in the hearings held before an international panel of rabbis convened specially to deal with this case.
The hearing came one month after the Jewish Community of Berlin fired Yaacobov and locked the doors of his synagogue, the Sephardi congregation Tiferet Israel, a day after several women testified about what they described as years of sexual and psychological abuse.
The swift actions by both the Jewish Community of Berlin and Germany’s Orthodox rabbinical association stands in contrast to past responses to allegations against Yaacobov. JTA reported last month that multiple entities had received complaints about him during the 17 years that he was employed by the official Berlin Jewish community.
Yaacobov has not commented publicly on the allegations. He told JTA that he had not been told officially why he was fired. He also said he plans to contest his termination in German court and had informed the ORD he was “ready to come to a neutral Beit Din at any time and in any place as soon as my health condition improves and the labor court has met.”
Yaacobov had been a popular spiritual leader in a subset of Berlin’s large community of Russian-speaking Jews. Born in Uzbekistan and ordained by the Midrash Sepharadi Yeshiva in Jerusalem, Yaacobov, 46 and a married father of four, also studied at the Moscow Yeshiva in Russia and the Shavei Gola Yeshiva in Jerusalem before being hired by the Jewish Community of Berlin 17 years ago, according to a biography that was removed from the organization’s website last month.
Some of Yaacobov’s former congregants have joined him in a private Berlin location for services since his firing, he told JTA. Speaking Tuesday, he also questioned why Tiferet Israel, which operates inside an apartment building owned by the Jewish Community of Berlin, remained closed, with personal belongings locked inside.
“If the community has a problem with me, then they can solve the problem with me, but why does the synagogue have to be closed because of that?” he asked, noting that the Nazis had destroyed a synagogue on that same street in 1938. “Why should the worshippers pray in another synagogue?”
A spokesperson for the Jewish Community of Berlin told JTA on Tuesday that the closure of the synagogue was essential for demonstrating to women that their concerns were being taken seriously. The spokesperson, Ilan Kiesling, said additional women had come forward with allegations against Yaacobov since the closure.
“Many of Rabbi Yaacobov’s victims did not dare to report their suffering to the community board … because they thought that Rabbi Yaacobov might be able to return to his old place of work,” Kiesling said by email Tuesday. “The closing of the synagogue on Passauer Strasse also sends a clear signal that he will never serve as rabbi there again.”
The synagogue will remain closed until both civil and religious court proceedings have been completed, he said, adding, “The ban on Rabbi Yaacobov in all institutions of the Jewish Community in Berlin remains in force.”
The ultimate ruling of a rabbinical court could deepen that estrangement. A beit din can issue pronouncements that affect a person’s role in the Jewish community locally and beyond.
Elena Eyngorn, a Berlin Jew who originally brought some of Yaacobov’s alleged victims to testify to the Jewish community’s board, told JTA on Tuesday that she had arranged for a psychologist to accompany the women at the hearings by the Jewish court this week, if they so wished. The psychologist donated her time, she said.
Eyngorn, who did not attend the hearings herself, said she understood that the ORD also had permitted each woman to bring a support person.
One of the women who testified to the beit din told JTA that she had been asked to sign a statement that she was telling the truth. With her permission, she said, the religious court recorded her testimony so the three rabbinical judges could listen to it again. She estimated that she spoke with them for about 20 minutes.
“I told them at the end of the meeting that I thought it was very important to decide something about him, because we are very responsible towards the girls who are growing up in this community,” she said in a telephone interview with JTA, speaking on condition of anonymity.
—
The post Rabbinical court delays ruling on Berlin rabbi accused of sexual misconduct after he offers 11th-hour doctor’s note appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
RSS
Iran, US Task Experts to Design Framework for a Nuclear Deal, Tehran Says
Atomic symbol and USA and Iranian flags are seen in this illustration taken, September 8, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
Iran and the United States agreed on Saturday to task experts to start drawing up a framework for a potential nuclear deal, Iran’s foreign minister said, after a second round of talks following President Donald Trump’s threat of military action.
At their second indirect meeting in a week, Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi negotiated for almost four hours in Rome with Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, through an Omani official who shuttled messages between them.
Trump, who abandoned a 2015 nuclear pact between Tehran and world powers during his first term in 2018, has threatened to attack Iran unless it reaches a new deal swiftly that would prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon.
Iran, which says its nuclear program is peaceful, says it is willing to discuss limited curbs to its atomic work in return for lifting international sanctions.
Speaking on state TV after the talks, Araqchi described them as useful and conducted in a constructive atmosphere.
“We were able to make some progress on a number of principles and goals, and ultimately reached a better understanding,” he said.
“It was agreed that negotiations will continue and move into the next phase, in which expert-level meetings will begin on Wednesday in Oman. The experts will have the opportunity to start designing a framework for an agreement.”
The top negotiators would meet again in Oman next Saturday to “review the experts’ work and assess how closely it aligns with the principles of a potential agreement,” he added.
Echoing cautious comments last week from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, he added: “We cannot say for certain that we are optimistic. We are acting very cautiously. There is no reason either to be overly pessimistic.”
There was no immediate comment from the US side following the talks. Trump told reporters on Friday: “I’m for stopping Iran, very simply, from having a nuclear weapon. They can’t have a nuclear weapon. I want Iran to be great and prosperous and terrific.”
Washington’s ally Israel, which opposed the 2015 agreement with Iran that Trump abandoned in 2018, has not ruled out an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities in the coming months, according to an Israeli official and two other people familiar with the matter.
Since 2019, Iran has breached and far surpassed the 2015 deal’s limits on its uranium enrichment, producing stocks far above what the West says is necessary for a civilian energy program.
A senior Iranian official, who described Iran’s negotiating position on condition of anonymity on Friday, listed its red lines as never agreeing to dismantle its uranium enriching centrifuges, halt enrichment altogether or reduce its enriched uranium stockpile below levels agreed in the 2015 deal.
The post Iran, US Task Experts to Design Framework for a Nuclear Deal, Tehran Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Hamas Says Fate of US-Israeli Hostage Unknown After Guard Killed in Israel Strike
Varda Ben Baruch, the grandmother of Edan Alexander, 19, an Israeli army volunteer kidnapped by Hamas, attends a special Kabbalat Shabbat ceremony with families of other hostages, in Herzliya, Israel October 27, 2023 REUTERS/Kuba Stezycki
Hamas said on Saturday the fate of an Israeli dual national soldier believed to be the last US citizen held alive in Gaza was unknown, after the body of one of the guards who had been holding him was found killed by an Israeli strike.
A month after Israel abandoned the ceasefire with the resumption of intensive strikes across the breadth of Gaza, Israel was intensifying its attacks.
President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff said in March that freeing Edan Alexander, a 21-year-old New Jersey native who was serving in the Israeli army when he was captured during the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks that precipitated the war, was a “top priority.” His release was at the center of talks held between Hamas leaders and US negotiator Adam Boehler last month.
Hamas had said on Tuesday that it had lost contact with the militants holding Alexander after their location was hit in an Israeli attack. On Saturday it said the body of one of the guards had been recovered.
“The fate of the prisoner and the rest of the captors remains unknown,” said Hamas armed wing Al-Qassam Brigades’ spokesperson Abu Ubaida.
“We are trying to protect all the hostages and preserve their lives … but their lives are in danger because of the criminal bombings by the enemy’s army,” Abu Ubaida said.
The Israeli military did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.
Hamas released 38 hostages under the ceasefire that began on January 19. Fifty-nine are still believed to be held in Gaza, fewer than half of them still alive.
Israel put Gaza under a total blockade in March and restarted its assault on March 18 after talks failed to extend the ceasefire. Hamas says it will free remaining hostages only under an agreement that permanently ends the war; Israel says it will agree only to a temporary pause.
On Friday, the Israeli military said it hit about 40 targets across the enclave over the past day. The military on Saturday announced that a 35-year-old soldier had died in combat in Gaza.
NETANYAHU STATEMENT
Late on Thursday Khalil Al-Hayya, Hamas’ Gaza chief, said the movement was willing to swap all remaining 59 hostages for Palestinians jailed in Israel in return for an end to the war and reconstruction of Gaza.
He dismissed an Israeli offer, which includes a demand that Hamas lay down its arms, as imposing “impossible conditions.”
Israel has not responded formally to Al-Hayya’s comments, but ministers have said repeatedly that Hamas must be disarmed completely and can play no role in the future governance of Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled to give a statement later on Saturday.
Hamas on Saturday also released an undated and edited video of Israeli hostage Elkana Bohbot. Hamas has released several videos over the course of the war of hostages begging to be released. Israeli officials have dismissed past videos as propaganda.
After the video was released, Bohbot’s family said in a statement that they were “deeply shocked and devastated,” and expressed concern for his mental and physical condition.
“How much longer will he be expected to wait and ‘stay strong’?” the family asked, urging for all of the 59 hostages who are still held in Gaza to be brought home.
The post Hamas Says Fate of US-Israeli Hostage Unknown After Guard Killed in Israel Strike first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Oman’s Sultan to Meet Putin in Moscow After Iran-US Talks
FILE PHOTO: Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said gives a speech after being sworn in before the royal family council in Muscat, Oman January 11, 2020. Photo: REUTERS/Sultan Al Hasani/File Photo
Oman’s Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said is set to visit Moscow on Monday, days after the start of a round of Muscat-mediated nuclear talks between the US and Iran.
The sultan will hold talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, the Kremlin said.
Iran and the US started a new round of nuclear talks in Rome on Saturday to resolve their decades-long standoff over Tehran’s atomic aims, under the shadow of President Donald Trump’s threat to unleash military action if diplomacy fails.
Ahead of Saturday’s talks, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi met his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Moscow. Following the meeting, Lavrov said Russia was “ready to assist, mediate and play any role that will be beneficial to Iran and the USA.”
Moscow has played a role in Iran’s nuclear negotiations in the past as a veto-wielding U.N. Security Council member and signatory to an earlier deal that Trump abandoned during his first term in 2018.
The sultan’s meetings in Moscow visit will focus on cooperation on regional and global issues, the Omani state news agency and the Kremlin said, without providing further detail.
The two leaders are also expected to discuss trade and economic ties, the Kremlin added.
The post Oman’s Sultan to Meet Putin in Moscow After Iran-US Talks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
You must be logged in to post a comment Login