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Prominent German rabbi resigns from leadership roles as report confirms allegations against him
BERLIN (JTA) – In a landmark step, investigators commissioned by Germany’s main Jewish organization have concluded that abuse of power and sexual harassment did occur at Germany’s liberal rabbinical seminary — and some of it, they say, may have crossed the line into illegality.
The 44-page “executive summary” of an investigation initiated by the Central Council of Jews in Germany is the latest and most damning report about the leadership of Rabbi Walter Homolka since accusations against him broke into public view last May.
Issued Wednesday after tense public conflict between the council and Homolka’s attorneys, the report concludes that structural changes are required to set Germany’s liberal rabbinical seminary, known as Abraham Geiger College, and other related Jewish institutions on the correct footing.
“A significant cause for the emergence of the problems identified by the investigators at the institutions under investigation is the personal misconduct of Rabbi Prof. Dr. Homolka in his function as a leader or person with great influence, which the investigators are convinced of,” the investigators wrote in their report.
Homolka announced Monday that he would withdraw from all functions in the seminary that he and a German-born American rabbi named Walter Jacob, founded in 1999. He also dropped out of the running on Tuesday for another term as chair of the Union of Progressive Jews in Germany.
A more comprehensive report including details about incidents in which investigators concluded that Homolka and his husband engaged in misconduct is due out in January, according to the Cologne-based law firm Gercke Wollschläger.
The preliminary report was welcomed in a joint statement by the Central Council, the German Interior Ministry and the Brandenburg State Ministry of Science, Research and Culture, which said they would “continue to fund the Abraham Geiger College to the same extent as before until the structural new beginning has been completed.”
It was also greeted with relief by the rabbinical student whose complaints kicked off the scandal.
“I think the report and the subsequent documents are a blessed development,” Itamar Cohen told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “It seems to confirm many suspicions which I and others share. It does affirm that I did the right thing and [this] could be the beginning of a new chapter of liberal Judaism in Germany.”
The scandal that erupted publicly in May began after Cohen sought help from Jonathan Schorsch, a professor at the School of Jewish Theology, in dealing with unsolicited pornographic material allegedly received from Homolka’s husband, who was also an employee at the seminary. (Abraham Geiger College is part of the School of Jewish Theology, which itself is under the auspices of the University of Potsdam.)
A German newspaper’s report about the allegations and an apparent effort to obscure them opened the floodgates for criticism of Homolka from past and current students, employees and colleagues. Homolka took a leave of absence from the numerous leadership roles he held with liberal Jewish religious and educational institutions that he had helped found since the late 1990s.
The scandal has shaken the foundations of modern liberal Judaism in Germany, and the new report suggests that those foundations were weak because they rested largely on one individual.
Josef Schuster, the president of the Central Council of German Jews, said the report made it clear that Homolka could not continue in his previous roles.
Homolka has rejected the allegations against him throughout, and his attorneys told German news media Wednesday that they believed the entire investigation was politically motivated. They accused Schuster of wanting to see Homolka exit Germany’s liberal Jewish leadership and said the Central Council had failed to consider fully the statement Homolka had given to investigators.
Rabbi Walter Homolka. at left, with other leaders of Germany Jewry including Josef Schuster, president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, at far right, at an event in October 2019. (Wolfgang Kumm/picture alliance via Getty Images)
The report is the first to emerge from a third-party investigation into the allegations against Homolka. A separate investigation by the University of Potsdam, released in late October, found that some of the accusations regarding abuse of power to be justified, but did not find any criminally actionable behavior and thus confirmed Homolka’s ongoing employment there as professor. It did not investigate the sexual harassment accusations, as Homolka’s husband had left his job by then.
The new report did scrutinize those allegations. The investigators said they found 13 specific incidents involving allegations against Homolka’s husband. German libel law bars the publication of his name. Using what they called a “traffic light system,” the investigators classified nine of these incidents as “red” cases, in which 25 instances of misconduct could be identified. Two of these cases involved the “initial suspicion of a criminal offense,” they added.
Regarding allegations of abuse of power against Homolka himself, they found — after interviewing 73 individuals — a total of 45 concrete incidents, 14 of which they classified as “red,” involving a total of 23 instances of misconduct. A detailed account of those cases, including responses that Homolka delivered earlier this week, will be included in the final report in January, they said.
More broadly, they said, their interviews had illuminated a culture of misconduct in which unchecked, unlawful or arbitrary decisions could be made largely because of a consolidation of power under Homolka. He presided over an institution ruled by a “culture of fear,” the investigators found, leaving employees and students alike less likely to express criticism or concerns because of the possibility of reprisals.
The investigators said structural changes were needed if there was any hope of shifting the culture. “As long as institutions are in private hands or even in the hands of an individual, or at any rate within the essential sphere of influence of the person who, in the opinion of the investigators, practices and exemplifies misconduct himself, it is hardly conceivable that the causes of the deficits identified can be remedied,” their report says.
Cohen told JTA he wants to see “real change in the leadership” of all liberal Jewish institutions in Germany, and “an external compliance system set up.”
He said, “I hope to see the institutions Homolka founded take a life of their own, no strings attached.”
Anticipating the report, the Abraham Geiger College had announced its own restructuring plans on Monday, a day after ordaining four new rabbis and two cantors at a ceremony in Berlin.
In a statement, interim director Gabriele Thöne said a new foundation would become the provider of rabbinical training in Potsdam.
Gabriella Thoene, interim director of Abraham Geiger College, in Berlin’s Rykestrasse Synagogue on the occasion of an ordination ceremony, Dec. 1, 2022. (Toby Axelrod)
Further, Thöne said the “door is open to Zacharias Frankel College” — the Conservative movement seminary also under the umbrella of the School of Jewish Theology at the University of Potsdam — “to join the new foundation on an equal basis while at the same time maintaining its independence.”
But in a scathing response issued Wednesday, the Conservative seminary said the Geiger College interim administration had not consulted them about the restructuring.
“A partnership between equal parties requires joint preparation, mutual trust, transparency and consensus. All this has been lacking so far, and continues to be lacking,” the statement said.
Signed by Rabbi Bradley Artson, dean of Zacharias Frankel College and the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies, the Conservative seminary in Los Angeles among others, the statement also said the preliminary report released Wednesday “confirmed the asymmetrical constellations of power in the two Potsdam rabbinical training colleges.”
Zacharias Frankel College “was in a state of dependency on the will of one person from the time it was founded in 2013. Our institution was deliberately pushed into invisibility and excluded from communication with funders in Germany,” the statement read in part.
“From the outset, the project of a Masorti rabbinical training in Potsdam was merely a makeshift means of being able to found the School of Jewish Theology [also in 2013] and give it the appearance of representing several denominations, and thus of being pluralistically positioned. Instead, however, the accumulation of power led to a monopolization of non-Orthodox Judaism in one person” – namely, Homolka.
For their part, the government and Jewish funding organizations said in their statement Wednesday that they were “committed to ensuring that there will continue to be both liberal and conservative rabbinical training in Potsdam in the future,” but that the proposals developed so far at the Abraham Geiger College do not meet the requirement of being “a clear cut from the previous structure and a comprehensive new beginning.”
The release of the Central Council-commissioned report was preceded by a volley of statements by lawyers for both parties.
On Monday, the council’s attorneys announced that their preliminary report would come out in two days. On Tuesday, Homolka’s attorneys issued a statement criticizing the impending “sudden” release of the report’s summary, suggesting it reeked of “prejudgment.”
The law firm representing Homolka — Behm Becker Geßner — noted that its client had received “a list of questions with serious accusations” from the council’s attorneys, and that he had responded in writing last Sunday. “Should the result not take into account the meaningful statement of our client, there would be a massive violation of personality rights,” warned the lawyers, who have successfully battled some critical press coverage of Homolka.
The Central Council criticized what it called Homolka’s delay tactics, saying its attorneys had asked Homolka in early September if he would respond to questions but had not gotten any response to questions sent Oct. 19 until late Sunday night, well after multiple previous deadlines. Still, the council confirmed, its investigators would take Homolka’s responses into account.
“This tactic is the main reason why the law firm will not be able to complete the final and detailed report of the investigation by the end of the year,” the Central Council said. “The courage of the numerous victims must not be sacrificed to Homolka’s delay tactics.”
Meanwhile, the Union of Progressive Jews in Germany is to meet next week in Berlin, after a three-month postponement. Board elections will be held for the position of chair, previously held by Homolka.
On Nov. 26, that group published a report from an investigation that it had commissioned, which concluded that there was no proof of abuse of power at Abraham Geiger College.
German rabbis who are part of the General Rabbinical Conference, Germany’s liberal rabbinical association, file into Berlin’s Rykestrasse Synagogue for an ordination ceremony, Dec. 1, 2022. (Toby Axelrod)
On Wednesday, a critic within the body, the State Association of Jewish Communities of Lower Saxony, said the Central Council’s commissioned report “supports us in our demand for the resignation of Walter Homolka from all his offices within the Jewish community, which we already made in May.”
And there is dissent within the General Rabbinical Conference, Germany’s liberal rabbinical association, as well. About a dozen members issued a statement in November, breaking from the official, cautious tone, saying that “the abuse of power proven against Rabbi Prof. Dr. Homolka [in the university’s report of Oct. 26] is not compatible with the values of Jewish and general ethics.”
The association, known as ARK, issued a statement at the end of November stating that, despite differences of opinion in their ranks, they join the call for a structural and personal new beginning, as “a chance for the next phase of rabbinical training in Germany.”
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Itamar Ben-Gvir draws criticism from Netanyahu for video taunting detained flotilla activists
(JTA) — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has joined a chorus of Israelis and Jews denouncing his national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, for posting a video that showed Ben-Gvir taunting detained activists from a Gaza-bound aid flotilla that had been intercepted by the Israeli navy.
“Welcome to Israel, we are the masters,” Ben-Gvir said in the video as he waved a large Israeli flag above the detained activists, who could be seen blindfolded and kneeling on the ground with their hands behind their backs.
Roughly 430 activists that took part in the Global Sumud Flotilla, which set sail from Turkey last Thursday, were brought to the city of Ashdod aboard Israeli naval ships on Wednesday, marking the latest in a long-running series of confrontations between Israel and activists seeking to break its naval blockade of Gaza.
In a second video posted on social media, Ben-Gvir said that the activists “came here all full of pride like big heroes. Look at them now,” appealing to Netanyahu to grant him permission to imprison them.
ככה אנחנו מקבלים את תומכי הטרור
Welcome to Israel 🇮🇱 pic.twitter.com/7Hf8cAg7fC
— איתמר בן גביר (@itamarbengvir) May 20, 2026
Netanyahu said in a statement that he had instructed authorities to deport the activists “as soon as possible.” But he also offered a public rebuke of Ben-Gvir.
“Israel has every right to prevent provocative flotillas of Hamas terrorist supporters from entering our territorial waters and reaching Gaza,” Netanyahu said. “However, the way that Minister Ben Gvir dealt with the flotilla activists is not in line with Israel’s values and norms.”
The foreign ministers of several countries, including Canada, Spain, France, the Netherlands and Italy, also condemned the videos and summoned their Israeli diplomats to answer for the display.
But some of the sharpest criticism came from within Israel, where Ben-Gvir plays a crucial role in maintaining the governing coalition while also engaging in antics that threaten to flare tensions and undercut the country’s claims that it behaves in accordance with international law.
Ben-Gvir is “not the face of Israel,” tweeted Foreign Minister Gideon Saar in English.
“You knowingly caused harm to our State in this disgraceful display — and not for the first time,” Saar wrote. “You have undone tremendous, professional, and successful efforts made by so many people — from IDF soldiers to Foreign Ministry staff and many others.”
Ben-Gvir’s videos come as his antics and rhetoric have drawn new scrutiny in recent days. Last week, he departed from longstanding norms and waved an Israeli flag on the Temple Mount, a Muslim holy site, in a show of Jewish supremacy. His oversight of Israeli prisons, where he has said he wants to see prisoners given only the minimum of food and comfort as required by law, also drew attention because of a New York Times column alleging sexual abuse of Palestinian prisoners.
Progressive groups heavily criticized Ben-Gvir’s video, saying that it was inappropriate for him to be part of the Israeli government.
“The disgusting images of Israel’s National Security Minister abusing detainees from the Gaza flotilla are not just bad optics,” tweeted Mickey Gitzin, the acting CEO of the New Israel Fund. “A government that gives a Kahanist this kind of power has already abandoned any notion of decency. These grotesque images are the real face of current Israeli policy.”
Ben-Gvir’s videos showing the treatment of participants in the latest flotilla offered a contrast to other recent interceptions in which Israel has released footage appearing to show activists being treated without force. When past arrestees from flotillas have alleged abusive treatment, Israel has denied it.
The organizers of the Global Sumud Flotilla said all of its boats had been intercepted by Israel by Tuesday evening, accusing Israel of employing “illegal, high-seas aggression.” The Israeli Foreign Ministry said no live munition was used during the operation, which it said was necessary because it will “not permit any breach of the lawful naval blockade on Gaza.”
Among the activists aboard the more than 50 boats in the flotilla was the sister of Irish President Catherine Connolly. On Tuesday, Connolly, who was elected in October and has a record of anti-Israel rhetoric, called the detention of Irish activists aboard the flotilla “unacceptable.”
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What Tuesday’s primaries tell us about Democrats, Republicans and the Israel issue
(JTA) — Reading the polls and listening to conservative podcasts, you would understandably think that Republicans are souring on Israel and poised to start voting like Democrats on the issue. At least a little. But the congressional primary results Tuesday in Philadelphia and northern Kentucky tell a more nuanced story (at least for now).
Chris Rabb’s win in the Democratic primary for a congressional seat representing sections of Philadelphia reinforced the view that staunch anti-Israelism is arguably the most potent force in Democratic politics today. The Pennsylvania state representative executed the progressive playbook perfected by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, showing how tough talk on Israel and AIPAC can galvanize the party’s left-wing base.
In Mamdani’s case, however, he was running against several candidates with strong pro-Israel records and deep pro-Israel support – for a position that has long served as a key public cheerleader for Israel in the United States. Rabb, on the other hand, proved that the strategy can be the winning ticket in a race ostensibly having nothing to do with Israel or AIPAC.
Unlike the New York mayor’s race, Tuesday’s primary in Philadelphia consisted of candidates with similar views on affordability issues, while Rabb’s opponents weren’t exactly waiving the pro-Israel flag or raking in major pro-Israel dollars. But, to borrow from 1964 GOP presidential candidate Barry Goldwater, for an increasing swath of Democratic voters (and D.C. lawmakers), when it comes to standing up for the Palestinians and rejecting U.S. support for Israel, extremism is no vice and moderation is no virtue.
On the Republican side, U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie’s flameout in the GOP race for Kentucky’s 4th District suggests that while there may be a gathering storm of discontent over Israel, the main force that matters when it comes to the ballot box remains Donald J. Trump.
Massie tried his best to make his race a referendum on Israel and the influence of pro-Israel money, rather than Trump’s decision to go all in for challenger Ed Gallrein. It didn’t work.
“I’m walking to an airplane to rejoin the most expensive congressional race in U.S. history. It’s turned into a referendum on whether Israel gets to buy seats in Congress,” Massie said a few days before an election that saw record spending by groups both supportive and critical of the Jewish state. After Massie’s defeat, he quipped: “I would have come out sooner but I had to call my opponent to concede and it took a while to find Ed Gallrein in Tel Aviv.”
Despite such rhetoric, the biggest reason Massie will be leaving Congress in January is that Trump wanted him gone – in part over his criticism of the Iran war, but more generally over a range of issues that the Kentucky lawmaker has broken with Trump on. A string of other Republican primary results suggest that the first rule of GOP politics is: If Trump wants you out, you’re cooked – even without a dollar of pro-Israel money going to your opponent.
In his concession speech, Massie lamented that most GOP voters seem to want somebody who will “go along to get along.” But, he added, one group – young voters – stayed with him.
Unfortunately for Massie, the GOP for the time being belongs to Trump and his loyal followers, not the growing number of young conservatives who want an end to U.S. support for Israel. On the bright side for Massie and his fans, they already hold the power in at least one key area. As one popular pro-Trump conservative social media poster put it: “Don’t think of it as losing a Congressman. Think of it as gaining a podcaster.”
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of JTA or its parent company, 70 Faces Media.
The post What Tuesday’s primaries tell us about Democrats, Republicans and the Israel issue appeared first on The Forward.
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AOC and other leading Democrats condemn Texas congressional candidate Maureen Galindo over antisemitic rhetoric
(JTA) — Rabbi Mara Nathan says watching an antisemitic conspiracy theorist emerge as a serious contender for a U.S. House seat in her Texas district has been “very disorienting.”
Nathan lives and works in San Antonio, where Maureen Galindo, a local activist who has vowed to turn a local immigrant detention center “into a prison for American Zionists,” was the top vote-getter in a Democratic primary in March and now faces a runoff on Tuesday.
“It seems shocking that someone who is so virulently antisemitic and anti-Zionist has not only been given a voice, but is even now in this primary runoff,” Nathan, the senior rabbi of Temple Beth El, a 150-year-old Reform congregation, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Galindo’s extreme rhetoric has drawn national attention as the runoff in Texas’ 35th Congressional District nears — and increasingly has also drawn condemnation from other Democrats, including some who are themselves critical of Israel and its supporters in the United States.
Last week, the Texas Senate candidate James Talarico revealed to JTA that he would not back or campaign with Galindo if she wins the runoff against sheriff’s deputy Johnny Garcia.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the progressive leader who has been strongly critical of Israel, threw her support behind Garcia in a post on X Tuesday, calling Galindo’s rhetoric “absolutely disgusting.”
“This bigoted garbage and antisemitism should be nowhere near our politics. If you’re in TX-35, vote for @johnnygarciatx,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote.
Also on Tuesday, Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Washington Democratic Rep. Suzan DelBene issued a joint statement condemning Galindo’s rhetoric, writing that the “vile language by her is disqualifying and has no place in American politics, and certainly not in the Democratic Party.”
The two Democratic leaders also accused Republican leadership of propping up Galindo in the race through the newly launched Lead Left PAC, which has spent nearly $600,000 on ads and mailers bashing Garcia and boosting Galindo.
While the PAC has not had to disclose its donors, the metadata on its website previously linked it to WinRed, a Republican donation platform, according to a Punchbowl News report. Ocasio-Cortez made the connection in her statement, saying, “The donors behind the Republican super PAC funding her should be exposed.”
Jeffries and DelBene called on Republican leadership to “immediately cease propping up this antisemitic candidacy, pull spending in the race and forcefully condemn these comments,” adding that “MAGA extremists should be ashamed of themselves.”
In a statement to The New York Times regarding funding for a mailer supporting her candidacy, Galindo suggested that the funds had come from “a billionaire zionist who made the pac to sabotage candidates.”
“Dems and Republicans uniting against me in the same week with the same message is evidence that theyre working together for the zionist billionaires that control our government and tax money,” Galindo told The Times.
Galindo, WinRed and the National Republican Congressional Committee did not immediately respond to JTA requests for comment, and attempts to reach Lead Left PAC and the Republican National Committee were not successful.
The head of Democratic Majority For Israel, Brian Romick, whose organization has launched a new six-figure ad campaign backing Garcia, also took aim at Lead Left PAC’s spending on Galindo in a statement, calling on Republicans to “explain why they’re paying to keep her viable.”
“Republicans aren’t doing this by accident,” Romick said. “They are deliberately elevating one of the most grotesque antisemites in American politics this cycle because they think it helps them win.”
Several Jewish Democrats, including Sen. Jacky Rosen of Nevada and Reps. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey and Jared Moskowitz of Florida, also decried Galindo’s rhetoric. In a joint statement Wednesday, Gottheimer and Moskowitz said that, if Galindo wins the election, they would force votes to expel her from Congress “every single day we are here.”
The Jewish Federation of San Antonio did not immediately respond to a request for comment from JTA. But the federation appeared to weigh in on Galindo’s remarks in a post on Facebook last week, calling on “candidates and elected officials” to “refrain from bigoted and offensive attacks.”
The widespread condemnation has reassured Nathan that opposition to Galindo’s rhetoric extends across the Democratic party.
“It is heartening that those folks who are clearly no fan of Israel understand that you can be critical of a government without saying you’re going to put Jewish people in internment camps,” Nathan said.
Nathan said she hoped the growing attention surrounding the race would help Texans “wake up and step up for a more sane perspective in how one is going to lead our community.”
“On both sides of the aisle, what we need is for both our elected officials and people who are running to speak out against that kind of antisemitic rhetoric,” Nathan said. “Beyond the political position, the idea that you want to attack any faith or any religion, any race is really abhorrent and goes against American values and certainly Texan values.”
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