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The quest to replace Park East Synagogue’s 92-year-old rabbi is not going smoothly
(New York Jewish Week) — More than a year after it attracted attention for the abrupt termination of its popular assistant rabbi, Manhattan’s Park East Synagogue was again the scene of a heated squabble on Sunday.
And like last time, the spat centered on who will succeed the Orthodox congregation’s 92-year-old spiritual leader, Rabbi Arthur Schneier.
In the time since the former assistant rabbi, Benjamin Goldschmidt, was ousted, no one has been appointed to take Schneier’s place after his tenure ends. The synagogue announced a search for a “worthy successor” to Schneier 11 months ago, and a public event on Sunday night was supposed to herald the next stage in that process. A candidate for the position, Rabbi Yitzchok Schochet, delivered an hour-long lecture to a crowd of 100 people, including members of the search committee.
But following the talk, the event held in the synagogue’s Charles Brooks Ballroom devolved into a verbal sparring match between Schochet, the rabbi of London’s Mill Hill Synagogue, and Kalman Sporn, a political consultant who describes himself as a “human rights activist.” Sporn questioned Schochet’s past outspoken opposition to same-sex relationships. Schochet claimed that Sporn was engaging in “cancel culture.”
“Park East’s bimah is New York’s hallowed ground for human dignity,” Sporn told the New York Jewish Week. “It must not become a pulpit for prejudice.”
Michael Scharf, who serves on the rabbinic search committee, told the Jewish Week in an emailed statement that Sporn’s comments were “disrespectful” to Schochet.
“Rabbi Schochet is a most distinguished Rabbi with a demonstrable record of great accomplishment, an incredible speaker, a true man of faith, and certainly not one who should be the subject of a smear and libelous campaign emanating from a group of nasty malcontents who obviously did not listen to Rabbi Schochet’s eloquent rejoinders to their issues,” Scharf wrote.
Rabbi Yitzchak Schochet spoke at Park East Synagogue on Sunday about the pursuit of happiness, when some synagogue members began to question him about his record on LGBTQ and Palestinian issues. (Zoom Screenshot)
The incident has prompted congregants to consider whether Schochet has the right temperament to lead a congregation that has hosted a succession of dignitaries, including Pope Benedict XVI. Critics say Schochet’s history of controversy, in addition to his response to being criticized on Sunday, do not accord with the synagogue’s self-image as a distinguished public forum.
And the drama Sunday night has raised the same question that has nagged at the synagogue for more than a year: Who is a fitting replacement for Schneier, a longtime religious freedom activist and former U.S. alternate representative at the United Nations?
Goldschmidt, who was popular among young congregants and was once seen by some as Schneier’s heir apparent, was fired in October 2021. He was subsequently derided by Schneier’s allies as lacking the education and gravitas needed to lead the synagogue. That dispute ended with Goldschmidt founding a breakaway congregation, the Altneu, which also meets on the Upper East Side and has attracted a growing membership.
“Park East has a problem where they really haven’t had a rabbi for many years,” said one member who, like several who discussed the synagogue’s internal debates, wished to remain anonymous. “We’re down on people coming on Saturday. The schools are a problem. Covid hurt us. [Rabbi Schnier] is 92, so on a day-to-day basis, he hasn’t really been involved.”
Schochet, 58, is a Chabad-affiliated rabbi who has held a number of prominent positions in British Jewish communal organizations. For three decades, he has been the rabbi of London’s Mill Hill United Synagogue, an 1,800-member Orthodox congregation in northwest London. According to a biography on the synagogue website, he has also served as the chairman of the Rabbinical Council of the United Kingdom’s United Synagogue, and as a member of the British Chief Rabbi’s cabinet.
But Schochet has also faced backlash for his comments about Palestinians and their supporters. In 2018, the British Holocaust Memorial Day Trust condemned Schochet for referring to Jews who said Kaddish for Palestinians as “kapos,” or Jews who served in positions of authority in Nazi concentration camps.
In 2015, Middle East Monitor, a pro-Palestinian media outlet, criticized Schochet for two tweets he had written four years earlier in response to a user called “Jew4Palestine.” In one, he wrote, “I have a spare Israeli flag if you want to hang yourself on it.” In the second, commenting on unemployment statistics in Gaza, he wrote, “Then again if you include terrorism as work, it’s 100% employed.” Soon afterward, Schochet was removed as a patron of a charity called Faith Matters.
At the meeting on Sunday, however, much of the criticism of Schochet revolved around his past public opposition to same-sex marriage. Jewish law has traditionally prohibited same-sex relationships, and refusing to conduct same-sex weddings remains normative practice among nearly all Orthodox rabbis.
In 2011, Schochet said that “the time-hallowed sacredness of marriage should always be preserved.” In 2012, the rabbi called gay marriage “an assault on religious values.” That same year, he penned an essay for PinkNews, an LGBTQ-focused publication, called “Homosexuality is prohibited in Orthodox Judaism but so is eating bacon, everyone is welcome.”
In 2014, England, Scotland and Wales legalized same-sex marriage. The following year, Schochet wrote that the Torah prohibits homosexual acts, but does not condemn a person for having homosexual feelings.
Schochet did not respond to a New York Jewish Week request for comment.
Sporn has posted tweets criticizing Schochet’s positions, and at the meeting on Sunday, brought up Schochet’s record of controversial statements during the question-and-answer portion of the event.
“I personally have been troubled by some of the positions you have taken in the past,” Sporn said. “You have openly fought efforts for marriage equality, while you want gay people to in your words feel reassured that they are always welcome into synagogues.”
Sporn was eventually cut off from using the microphone. Schochet responded, saying he had seen Sporn’s tweets. He said he had been invited to write an essay for PinkNews in 2012 “precisely because I was deemed as being the more moderate amongst all the Orthodox rabbis on gay issues.”
He added that the previous year, in a segment that aired on the BBC, he defended a gay couple who were denied access to a hotel room by a Christian owner. Schochet also said that a high-ranking member at his synagogue was gay.
“To everyone’s surprise, other than my own and those who know me to be a liberal conservative, I argued that everyone has a right to uphold their religious convictions without compromise,” Schochet wrote in a blog post about the BBC broadcast. “However, what you cannot do is look to impose those on others. That’s religious fundamentalism.”
In that same blog post, Schochet doubled down on his opposition to gay marriage. “If you choose to reject religion and lead a gay lifestyle, or conduct extra marital affairs, then frankly that is your business,” Schochet said. “That I choose to frown upon what you do because my G-d says it is wrong is very much my entitlement.”
Schochet then began to criticize Sporn, mentioning Sporn’s involvement in a scheme to apportion Catholic papal knighthoods for cash.
“You and I can go on canceling each other all night long,” Schochet said. “Cancel culture, which is the scourge and the malaise of our 21st century is, in the words of Barack Obama, scorched earth, partisan politics, where people we disagree with are maligned.”
(In 2019, regarding condemnations of people on social media, Obama said, “That’s not activism. That’s not bringing about change, if all you’re doing is casting stones, you’re probably not going to get that far. That’s easy to do.” A column on the Jewish website Aish.com about Obama’s comments does criticize “this scorched-earth partisan politics – where people with whom we disagree are denied a fair hearing and a voice in public life.”)
Schochet continued, “it divides families, it divides society, it tears apart relationships, it polarizes and pits people against one another. We may always be two Jews as indeed we are with three opinions, but we should always maintain one heart. I invite you to join me in that mission statement.”
When he finished, the crowd erupted into applause. The room became calm, until later, another member of the congregation, who did not use a microphone, stood up and confronted the rabbi about his exchange between him and Sporn — leading Schochet to apologize to Sporn.
“If I did embarrass you, I do genuinely apologize to you profusely and I hope you forgive me, and I mean that sincerely,” he said.
Addressing the crowd following the incident, Schneier — who has led Park East for more than 60 years — said, “When it comes to the selection of a rabbi, it is entirely up to the membership.”
“The purpose of Rabbi Schochet coming here with us, some of you did not have a chance to to hear him, to meet with him, and now I hope you get to know him a bit better,” Schneier said. “All kinds of rumors, forget about them.”
Schochet’s reaction to Sporn was “a personal attack,” the member who wished to remain anonymous said. He added that Schochet’s conduct did not reflect the decorum the synagogue strives to maintain.
“He ganged [the crowd] up in a mob mentality where they cheered for him,” the member told the Jewish Week. “Instead of answering the question, he attacked him. [Schochet] had such a great opportunity to be diplomatic. This guy is not diplomatic on an interview. Could you imagine if he had a contract? This is almost beyond belief.”
This member also said that Schochet is the only rabbi who has been brought to the synagogue by the search committee.
Another synagogue member told the Jewish Week that Sporn’s tweets attacking Schochet provided critical context for their exchange.
“It did not come across to me as embarrassing to Kalman,” the member said. “It came across to me as Rabbi Schochet saying that what you’re doing is being unfair.”
He added that what is getting lost amidst the squabble is that Park East “is looking for a rabbi.”
“Every member should have the opportunity to come and ask questions,” the member said. “The sense I had from people is that they got a really good understanding of where Rabbi Schochet stands on the issues. Yes, Kalman brought up an issue, and Rabbi Schochet apologized.”
That member said no decisions have been made thus far as to who will be hired.
Meanwhile, Avital Chizhik-Goldschmidt, the wife of Benjamin Goldschmidt, told the New York Jewish Week that the new synagogue they started is “only growing” and that she hasn’t followed developments at her husband’s old congregation.
“I really don’t have anything to do with that place,” Goldschmidt said of Park East Synagogue. “We have moved on.”
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The post The quest to replace Park East Synagogue’s 92-year-old rabbi is not going smoothly appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Does Israel Hater Hasan Piker Have More Chutzpah Than American Jews?
Hasan Piker. Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Any article about Hasan Piker should start by explaining that he said “America deserved 9/11,” according to Congressman Ritchie Torres (D-NY). It should then say that Piker referred to Ultra-Orthodox Jews as “inbred.”
Piker is one of the most popular streamers on Twitch and just did a major interview with a Jewish outlet, speaking with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency’s Andrew Lapin.
Lapin’s article left it up to the reader to keep score, as good articles do. It’s worth a read.
Hasan Piker is a major force in pushing Democrats to turn against Israel. He is calculating. He knows that people care about status and charisma. They care about looking smart, not actually being intelligent.
Piker is physically attractive, and has been the subject of glowing articles in outlets like People and The New York Times.
So why did Piker pick this time to give an interview to a Jewish media outlet? Because he sees he has the backing of influential people to downplay his evil. He knows that politics is about power, and he has more chutzpah than many American Jews do — he’ll go to a Jewish outlet, and claim to support Jews.
He can go to Yale and other colleges like he is someone to be admired and get applause. According to Congressman Torres, in addition to supporting terrorist groups like Hezbollah and championing “resistance” against Israel, “Piker has even gone as far as to incite violence, telling his followers to ‘kill’ and ‘murder’ people ‘in the streets’ and ‘let the streets soak in their red-capitalist blood.’”
In an Opinion article for The Forward, Emily Tamkin writes: “If pushing back against antisemitism is the top priority for our community, I suspect that writing Piker off as an antisemite with whom engagement simply can’t be countenanced will do more harm than good.”
She says that his statements and attitudes are different than Nick Fuentes, and that “this distinction matters. Fuentes’ antisemitism is so extreme and all-encompassing that his fans and followers will never be allies to American Jews. There is little evidence to believe the same is true for Piker. To successfully fight antisemitism, American Jews need a broad base of allies. In that context, Piker’s audience — including nearly 3 million followers on the streaming platform Twitch — is one that it would be a mistake for us to wholly write off.”
While I don’t know if it’s a good use of time to worry if Fuentes or Piker is worse, it is important to note that Fuentes will not be joining any major candidates on the political stage, while Piker will. I also would not be surprised if Piker eventually decides to run for office himself.
Many Democrats like Torres and Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) realize how dangerous and extreme Piker is. But many more Democrats are ready to embrace him.
Piker is anti-American — and also obviously hates Israel.
A failure to protest the normalization of Piker into mainstream politics signifies that Jews are not only okay with being America’s punching bag, but we prefer the bully sit next to us at the table, so we can tell ourselves we are cool. Ezra Klein is a disgrace to try to give Piker a positive profile — as are many other progressives of all stripes (Jewish and non-Jewish alike). We are way past mental gymnastics. We are at the point where fools have broken the balance beam.
Piker has calculated that many Jews are stupid, afraid, or don’t have the chutzpah to protest him, because so many are like Thomas Friedman and will do anything to stay relevant. The sad thing is that Piker may be right.
The author is a writer based in New York.
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What Has the War Against Iran Revealed About the Status of Countries Around the World?
United Kingdom’s Ambassador to the United Nations Barbara Woodward, accompanied by other E3 members German Ambassador Ricklef Beutin and Deputy French Ambassador Jay Dharmadhikari, speaks to members of the press about Iran and nuclear weapons outside the UN Security Council chamber at UN Headquarters in New York City, US, Aug. 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Angelina Katsanis
The Epic Fury/Roaring Lion War cast a spotlight on the power index of many countries and the global and regional balance of power. For the purposes of this paper, a country’s power is defined as its security and economic posture. A country may have additional supporting strengths (once called “soft”), such as diplomacy, influence, and internal resilience. For the weaker player, such strengths provide power, but their effectiveness is limited. Ultimately, they are embodied in two main ones: strategic-security posture and economic dominance.
There is a gap between a country’s self-perception and its actual power, as Russia learned after its decision to invade Ukraine. This paper assesses “objective” power rather than a country’s self-perception.
One country in the world today is considerably more powerful than all others: the United States. There are weak countries in the world. In fact, out of about 200 countries, a significant portion of them are either weak or have small yet sufficient power relative to their surroundings. A new member of the latter club is Spain, which was once a global empire but which is now weak in terms of both security and economy.
The other countries rest on a continuum. They can be divided into two types: those that strive for power and those that flee from weakness. The Epic Fury War held up a mirror to the global and regional arena, allowing for a recalibration of the position of various countries on the continuum.
There are several reasons why Epic Fury is a better indicator of countries’ strength than the war in Ukraine or the situation in the China Sea:
- It is the first global war crisis during the presidency of Donald Trump, who has placed the issue of power at the center of his strategy;
- it transformed from a regional crisis into a global one due to the energy issue and the supply chain challenges, which have intensified in recent years, especially since the Covid-19 pandemic; and
- it puts key geostrategic arenas to the test, such as Russia-Europe, India-Pakistan, and, in the Pacific, from China to Australia.
Estimating change in the power index of key countries
The description below is intended to provide initial directions for the professional and academic discourse on the issue.
Iran: The Islamic Republic has returned to fleeing from weakness. In the first two decades of its existence, the regime fled from weakness, with the trauma of the Iran-Iraq War playing a central role. However, in the last two decades, it changed course and moved toward striving for power. The Iranians decided that security power was more important than economic, and were willing to pay the painful price of sanctions in exchange for it. The main milestones of this shift seem to have been the regime’s success in suppressing the “Green Movement” protest in 2009; the absence of restrictions on its behavior in the missile field and in the regional arena in the JCPOA in 2015; its ability to supply advanced missile capabilities to proxies; and the victories of its axis in aiding the Assad regime in Syria and in the Houthis’ fight against the Saudis and the UAE. Unlike Qassem Soleimani, who strove for regional power in a calculated manner while managing risk, his successors were less rigorous, as evidenced by their inability to control Hamas on October 7. The current war, even if the Islamic regime does not yet fully understand it as such, is a severe blow to its striving after power. During the process of internalizing the results of the war, the regime will likely grasp that it has to return to the approach of fleeing from weakness.
United States: The US has strengthened its pursuit of power. Epic Fury was a purposeful display of the Americans’ absolute military superiority, especially as it was supported by an ally who is a “running horse,” not a “lazy donkey.” It experienced a slight backlash in the area of economic power, because it is still internally sensitive to energy price fluctuations, but this negative is insignificant relative to its achievements.
China and the Pacific: The Chinese have come out ahead in their pursuit of power. On the one hand, an ostensible ally of Beijing has been severely damaged and isolated. But on the economic level, through the strength it has built in recent years in the field of supply chains, China has demonstrated clear superiority over its Japanese, South Korean and Australian neighbors. On the military side, what happened in the Persian Gulf hardly whet the world’s appetite for further conflict in the China Sea, which strengthens China’s bargaining power.
Russia and Europe: The Russian balance sheet for the pursuit of power, especially vis-à-vis Europe, is positive. In economic terms, the war boosted its ability to profit from energy sales and balance the economic difficulties resulting from the long war and sanctions. In the security sphere, Europe’s weakness strengthens Russian power. Like Russia, Ukraine – a country that is by definition fleeing from weakness, especially in the current war – also managed to strengthen its position in the form of security and economic gains. On the other hand, Europe, fleeing from weakness, suffered another blow to its security power: the practical disintegration of the NATO alliance and the distancing from Europe of the United States, NATO’s critical component.
India and Pakistan: India’s quest for power has been negatively affected. Pakistan succeeded – in a process that has been going on for more than a year – in positioning itself as an asset to the United States, but was exposed for its weakness as a military partner of Saudi Arabia. However, this development should be analyzed more in the context of India, since the rapprochement between the United States and Pakistan is an American challenge to the independent strategy that India is pursuing, among other areas, in the Russian context. In addition, the war revealed weaknesses in the Indian supply chain. These developments reflect the fact that India still faces significant challenges in its quest for global power.
Germany, Great Britain and France: Here we see a reversal of roles. Germany is the one striving after power, while Britain and France, which, in recent decades, have exercised security power in various arenas, have been revealed as unable to exert power, mainly for internal reasons. They are now deep along the continuum among those fleeing from weakness, while Germany appears to have passed through another stage in its complex return to being a security power.
Saudi Arabia and the Gulf: Epic Fury posed a challenge to the Saudi approach of striving for power and fleeing from the weakness of the other Gulf countries. For decades, Saudi Arabia positioned itself as the key regional player striving for power through its enormous economic capabilities. The current de facto ruler, Muhammad bin Salman, attempted to regulate this effort through Vision 2030. In this pursuit, Saudi Arabia prioritized economic power over security power, and this resulted in painful military losses to the Houthis over the past decade. The Iranian decision to militarily attack the Gulf states and oil exports as a central strategic approach (albeit with no choice) represented a security challenge to the Gulf states’ economic power. Saudi Arabia will now have to reexamine whether it can continue to strive for power or must shift to the more realistic approach of fleeing from weakness.
In the other Gulf states, the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, and Kuwait, the situation is even clearer. Their basic strategy is to flee from weakness. The war proved to them that they need to improve their capabilities, mainly in the security field and in alternatives to oil and gas flows.
Turkey‘s approach also retreated somewhat as a result of the war. It has shifted from a country that strives more and more after power to one that flees from weakness.
Israel: Epic Fury/Roaring Lion constituted a significant achievement in Israel’s pursuit of power – with an asterisk.
David Ben-Gurion’s national security strategy was designed as a flight from inherent weakness. It created a durable force with five components: a qualitative conventional military advantage, an image of nuclear deterrence, special relations with a superpower, economic and technological superiority, and national resilience.
Over a long process, Israel’s approach transformed from a flight from weakness to the pursuit of power. A number of key events can be highlighted: the Six-Day War, which confirmed Israel’s military power in the region and ultimately led to the peace agreement with Egypt; the leap to a hi-tech, free-market economy that manifested from 1992; and the process, resulting from the shock of the October 7, 2023 attack, of releasing itself from the constraints it had placed upon itself on its use of military force. That unshackling manifested in the operation in Khan Yunis in early 2024, the beeper operation and elimination of Nasrallah at the end of that year, and Operation Rising Lion in 2025. The State of Israel today is, as a result of the current war, a country with military and economic power much greater than its objective geo-political posture. However, when we look forward, we see that its position is unbalanced. Israel must re-strengthen the other elements of its power (see Perspective Paper No. 2347, June 3, 2025): an advanced, resilient society and economy, with improved long-term positioning of its relations with the United States and other powers.
Col. (res.) Shay Shabtai is a senior researcher at the BESA Center and an expert in national security, strategic planning, and strategic communication. He is a cyber security strategist and a consultant to leading companies in Israel. A version of this article was originally published by The BESA Center.
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Shocking: How Palestinian Propaganda Mirrors Language Directly From the Nazis
The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, meets with Adolf Hitler in 1941. Photo: German Federal Archives via Wikimedia Commons.
How similar are narratives presented in Palestinian society, and the words spewed by the Nazis? Read for yourself below and decide:
Hitler:
“The Jews are the eternal archenemy of the human race. They manipulate, corrupt, and destroy societies.”[Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chap. 11]
Palestinian Writers’ Union General Secretariat member Talal Abu Afifa:
“The Jews, wherever they settle, they try to take control of the country’s economy and wealth… They did this not just in Britain, but in most of the European states…”
Official PA TV host: “Indeed, wherever they arrived, destruction followed.”
[Official PA TV, In Memory, Nov. 2, 2024]
Hitler:
“The Jews … are a race of parasites… systematically undermining the fabric of societies”[Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chap. 10]
PA TV religious lesson:
Palestinian researcher Muhammad Al-Yahya: “Jews are by nature arrogant, do not accept the other… Their [Jewish] thinking is based on racism that caused them to be hated everywhere. The Zionist thinking is based on them being ‘God’s chosen people.’ [as written] In the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.”[Official PA TV, Returning, Jan. 17, 2023 and Feb. 27, 2023, May 14, 2023]
Hitler:
“If the Jew, with the help of his Marxist creed, is victorious over the peoples of this world, then his crown will be the funeral wreath of humanity”[Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chap.11]
Abbas’ advisor, Mahmoud Al-Habbash:
“The occupation (i.e., Israel) is the cause of all evils… of all crises and disasters that everyone … even possibly the whole world, experiences.”[PA leader Mahmoud Abbas’ Advisor on Religious Affairs and Islamic Relations Mahmoud Al-Habbash, YouTube channel, Jan. 19, 2025]
Hitler:
“The Jewish people, by virtue of their innate characteristics, were driven to world domination.”[Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chap. 11]
PA Daily:
“They [Jews] want to subjugate the entire world”[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Dec. 15, 2024]
Hitler:
“The danger represented by the Jews today finds expression in the undeniable dislike of them felt by a large section of our people.”[Letter from Hitler to Adolf Gimlich, 1919]
Fatah leader Tayseer Nasrallah:
“What happened in the Netherlands [attack on Jewish sports fans] is the best proof that the world is sick of the Jews.”TV host: “Right.”
[Official PA TV, Nov. 10, 2024]
Hitler:
“The personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Jew.”[Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chap. 11]
Mahmoud Abbas’ Advisor Mahmoud Al-Habbash:
“Satan does not have to be in the form of a demon, hidden, he can also be in your form, but he is Satan. In the form of man, but he is Satan. And they (i.e., Satan-Jews) are still fighting us until they turn us back from our religion.”
[Official PA TV, July 7, 2023]
Hitler:
“The Jew’s existence is a crime against humanity, and the only solution is his removal from our midst.”[Mein Kampf, Vol. 2, Chap. 13]
PA Ministry of Religious Affairs:
“The Hour [of Resurrection] will not come until the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, and the rock or a tree will say: ‘Muslim, O servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him’”
[PA Ministry of Religious Affairs, Facebook page, Oct. 18, 2023]
Facebook page of the PA Ministry of Religious Affairs, Oct. 18, 2023
Hitler:
“The result will not be the … victory of Jewry but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe.”[Hitler to Reichstag, January 30, 1939]
PA Shari’ah Judge Abdallah Harb: “Allah, strike the aggressive Jews, count them and kill them one by one, and do not leave even one.”
[Official PA TV Live, July 5, 2024]
Hitler:
“I defend myself against the Jew.”[Mein Kampf, 1,2]
PA leader Mahmoud Abbas:
“They said that Hitler killed the Jews because they were Jews, and Europe hates the Jews because they are Jews. No!… They fought [the Jews] because of their social role…“Hitler … fought the Jews because they worked based on usury and money. In other words, they caused ruin in his opinion, and therefore he hated them”
[Official PA TV, August 24, 2023]
The author is the Founder and Director of Palestinian Media Watch, where a version of this article first appeared.