Community members including dozens of parents and religious leaders met Monday to discuss cautionary reminders to be taken from last week’s killing of a Jewish boy in what was thought to be a safe, insular Brooklyn neighborhood.
The event, organized by a local Jewish group, also brought out law enforcement officials to advise parents how to further keep an eye on their kids after 8-year-old Leiby Kletzky was allegedly kidnapped and killed in New York on July 12.
“Time is of the essence when something like this happens,” said Teaneck Detective Eddie Lievano. “The underlying suggestion as we go through this is to call us.”
The event, at Young Israel of Teaneck, was sponsored by Chai Lifeline, a Jewish organization. Many of those who came were parents of young ones.
Rabbi Abe Friedman, a police chaplain, said that Kletzky’s murder was a life-changing event for Jewish communities because the man who’s been charged in the incident, Levi Aron, 35, of Brooklyn, is Jewish himself.
“We believe that what happened last week is our 9/11,” Friedman said. “It was a wake-up call.”
The presentation also included a California couple, Rabbi David Fox and his wife Debbie Fox. Debbie Fox touched on some of the circumstances that led to the boy’s alleged fatal encounter with Aron: Leiby had become lost in the neighborhood and accepted help from Aron in finding his way home, according to police. She urged mothers to never let their children keep secrets with strangers, and, if they become lost, to seek the help of uniformed police, or, if they are not around, other mothers with children.
“It’s our job to make sure they are protected,” Debbie Fox said.
Rabbi Philip Weinberger, co-host of the event, said there were no easy theological answers to the killing.
“A week ago, when we hears the news, any human with a heart reacted,” Weinberger said. “There’s no class of people that are so defenseless and in need of our help than our children.”
(Source: NorthJersey.com)
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14 Responses
I am not suggesting any relationship between this crime and any behavior on our part; individual or communal. I heard recently from a true talmid chachom – a gadol b’midos, a hatznaya leches, and one who is known to possess a seichal ha’yashar – that really nobody today could say this sin is what caused this onesh. What I would like to point out though is the following. Everyone is talking about how we need to be more careful and protect our defenseless, innocent children from individuals we know nothing or little about. That even members of our own community can fall victims of a da’as m’turaf and do outrageous and unforgivable things. What can we therefore say about the near total strangers in whose hands we place so many of our neshamos? Walking down the streets of Brooklyn, I hear the language they use (publicly) with or in front of our children. I see my neighbors’ children using their “nanny’s” cell phone and even receiving an affectionate good bye as they board their bus to Yeshiva to learn our holy Torah. A Rav once commented that after a Jew is niftar, we don’t permit a non-Jew to be involved with the holy body/soul. How then, he asked, do we allow them to be so involved with them when they are still alive? Dear brothers and sisters: many of the suggestions that have been made are similar to asking everyone to wear helmets so they won’t get hit by a falling meteorite. Anyone could become m’turaf. He held a job. He drove a car. He maintained an apartment. What we can do to show the Ribono she’ll Olam that the precious souls he entrusted us with are indeed special, is to do all we can to keep them holy. Don’t entrust them with those whose entire lifestyle is contrary to ours. Whose language, habits, and dress are not ours. If this was “a wake up call” as some have called it, perhaps it was to teach us to cherish our childrens’ bodies and souls. This tragedy included the destruction of both body and soul R”L more so than most. We should perhaps ask ourselves if we are treating our childrens’ bodies as if they have soul. There is kedushas ha’guf in the Jew’s body as well. It is galui v’yaduah lifnei kisei k’vodecha. Our kol basar is connected to the neshamah she’nasata bi. Both are tehorah. Both were created by Him. May HaShem have mercy on us all and bring the final ge’ulah BB”A.
Will our leaders now permit children to carry cell phones with them to school so that they can call home if they get lost or in trouble? Will our leaders all finally realize that people who endanger children need to be reported to the secular authorities and not to rabbis? Those are two concrete steps that can be taken to help prevent horrors like this in the future.
“if they become lost, to seek the help of uniformed police, or, if they are not around, other mothers with children.
Senseless panic. Why are men with children not “kosher” for seeking help? The way of the Torah is moderation. If a Haredi male sees a child fall and picks him up, will the parents accuse him of trying to molest their child? One of the greatest Kiddush Hashem is viewing a Jew help another Jew (be it child or adult) who is a complete stranger. Let’s not take away this great “Middah” by being paranoid!
“We believe that what happened last week is our 9/11,” Friedman said. “It was a wake-up call.”
Hashem is waiting for Klal yisroel to wake up & do teshuva
During the month of june 2011-over the time of 2 weeks-3 tzaddikim, from 3 different corners of the world left to the Olam Haemes (true world) & they’re names are Harav Yitzchok Dov Koppelman ZT”L from Europe, Harav Michel Yehuda Lefkowitz ZT”L from Eretz Yisroel & Harav Chaim Stein ZT”L from the U.S.A. When a tragedy like this strikes the world everyone is asking what is the message from Hashem?. The RAMCHAL in Sefer Derech Hashem quotes, when klal yisroel is in a state of Sinning R”L, suffering & pain may be imposed upon a tzaddik as an atonement for his entire generation. In doing so the Tzaddik is raised to a level of leadership in Gan eden. When THREE tzaddikim are niftar in a matter of two weeks, Hashem is already on the level of begging klal yisroel to just start Teshuva & show a sign of remorse & repentance so that it does not need to continue Chas V’shalom on to a fourth tzaddik.
These 3 Tzaddikim (above) were not enough. so this time Hashem sent a DIFFERENT KIND of tzaddik-a boy at the age of 9 R”L who has not sinned yet-to wake us all up to come to teshuva & STOP KEEP ON PUSHING IT OFF will this be enough or will it need to continue? that is up to all of us
START TESHUVA NOW BEFORE TRAGEDY STRIKES AGAIN C”V
shuali (#1) – listen to what Charliehall proposes in # 2. Sometimes we have to crawl out from under abstract hoshkofa…and just be sensible. Is that too hard to understand?
Charlie; I heard Sunday on the radio that the Shomrim say that they get ten calls a day of missing children and that the mother reported it immediately to the Shomrim but the police weren’t notified until about 2 ½ hours later. There must be a reason why people would call Shomrim immediately and not the police. Could it be that they think that the Shmorim will deal with it quicker and more effective and with more discretion? The fact that parents opt to report their missing children to the Shomrim instead of to the police flies in the face of those who say that parents should go to the police first when they suspect their children are being molested. In most cases a Rov can still be asked before going to the police; unless you don’t need a Rov and are your own Rov.
Calling it out “9-11” is a bit of overkill? We are talking about a mentally retarded meshuganah. Given that we can’t (by halacha) ignore or expel a Jew who is mentally ill and/or intellectually impaired, the issue is how to we care for such people within our community, and how to keep them out of trouble.
There is a problem with dealing with mental illness in the community. Part of the problem is that the first sign of mental illness is if someone starts acting weird, but that means “off the derech”, and “mental health professionals” consider that to be a sign of mental health. Remember that frei Jews are overrepresented among the “mental health professions” – and they see a Torah and Mitsvos lifestyle as a sign of derangement.
Teaching frum kids that frum men are to be avoided does makes sense, especially if your goal is that the kids will eventually realize the need to give up being abnormal themselves, and become good normal secular Americans. The above comments suggest the need for the frum comunity to develop its own solutions for matters, and avoid dealing with goyim.
Akuperma
Maskim, what is this 9/11 comparison? We were plenty affected by 9/11, this almost makes it sound like 9/11 didn’t affect us…
YonasonW: What is abstract about don’t leave your children with complete or almost complete strangers?
@Akuperma Why are you so quick to label the killer as a “mentally retarded meshuganeh”? He was perfectly capable of working for the past bunch of years. He got married twice to woman who didn’t think he was retarded!
Exactly. If a child is lost he should be taught to ask a father OR mother for help finding his parents.
If a guy is robbing a bank and kills someone in the process, that is one thing. But a guy who takes a child and cuts him up and puts body parts in his fridge, clearly has severe mental issues. He needs to be locked away in an asylum for the criminally insane, permanently.
Because he got married twice, doesn’t negate this fact. For whatever reason, his psychosis did not manifest itself in this horrible way until this point in his life.
Now is not the time for mussar; Now is a time for Chizzuk. I agree that we shouldn’t over react. I agree that there is no difference between a mother with children and a father with children. (Shabbos morning in BP there may be many father’s walking with children but few mothers with children)
Now is not the time for mussar? Was it an accident that happened last week, what happened to all of us last week? When something happens to someone else, we don’t give mussar, but rather chizuk. But this happened to all of us as well. The Pri Megadim states that when it come to retzichah R”L, there is no such thing as me she’ein b’yado limchos as a hetere foe not needing a kapparah. We all need to take mussar. If not now when. Look at the beginning of Shaarei Teshuvah which describes what happens when we don’t “pick up our messages.”. There are no accidents. Mikreh (happenstance/coincidence/accident) is the language of Amalek. The kol kol Yaakov has Shem Shomayim shagur b’fiv. We must realize HaShem spoke to us very harshly last week, and truth be told, really over the past several weeks. Not a time for mussar? I must disagree.