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What do people think of the ami article on lev tahor? I think it was unbelievably slanted and biased to be pro the controversial group. I find it hard to understand why ami would do this, is R’ Frankfurter naive? Trying to sell papers? The leader of this group has been accused of numerous crimes and the alleged behavior of this group is scandalous. I then looked closely to try to find the magazine’s Rabbinical advisers and am still looking. One of my relatives said they will never buy the magazine again. I am wondering if people had similar reaction.
I have known about Helbrans for years, been following the case closely and know a number of people who lived in Monsey when Helbrans lived there. I also know Canadians who know people who were attracted to him more recently. They all say that he is a VERY troubling person who does VERY troubling things. He does marry off 14 year old girls. He does attracted people who might not be emotionally balanced. The people who left have VERY negative things to say about Helbrans and his ways.
I don’t know if every claim the Fifth Estate (Canadain TV) made is true but the gist of what I have heard from people who knows his “followers” is consistent with the negative coverage.
I want to point out the early on in the Ami article they write that the only thing that Lev Tahor has been accused of is being a cult. They tuck in that comment that it is something all frum people could be accused of. Two points.
1) He has been accused of A LOT more than that.
2) If Ami does not understand why frum people in general are not a cult we have think long and hard about why we read their paper. (and BTW Ami is the one who think the “burka women” are a cult).
Ami refuted the accusations point by point. And there has been not a single actual case where it was shown that any 14 year old was married despite claims. (And the claim was that there was once one single case of someone going to some US State that allows it and got married at 15. But none of the accusers seems to know who that supposedly is. Even the welfare department found no evidence of it actually happening.) The entirety of the claims are built on a deck of cards that doesn’t hold up.
There was also a letter published in Ami signed by the Montreal Dayanim of Satmar, Skvere and another big Rov supporting the group, asking people to help them and to stop accusing them.
Ami magazine in general is very alarmist. If they could be persecuted and prosecuted because of their religion, all religious people should beware.
With that said, I think that Ami did an excellent job reporting on the one angle they were supposedly covering, the charges leveled against the group by the various government agencies. Those charges were shown to be based on very flimsy, if any, evidence and if one wishes to believe in Ami’s conclusion, it is because they are even for “Ultra Orthodox Jews” an anomaly, an easy target and the first in the process of going after all religious people.
This is a tricky issue, because it’s hard to really know what’s going on there. I tend to be very skeptical about news reports.
I do think that their overall approach is without a mesorah, but I find it hard to believe that the proper course of action is to take their children away from them.
rabbi frankfurter is a very controversial person, im sure anyone who reads his articles carefully will realize that he is trying to “stuch” someone out so here mishpacha wrote a article against lev tahor , so he wrote a article pro lev tahor.
A bit off topic but does anyone know what group uses the ka’arah on the cover of the AMI LIVING?
here mishpacha wrote a article against lev tahor , so he wrote a article pro lev tahor.
It does seem that way. However, I am told that he was disturbed by the strength of anti-Lev Tahor sentiment before the Mishpacha piece.
I know of a follower of Helbrans who did engage his 14 year old daughter to someone at Helbrans request. The daughter did not end of marrying the fellow, but that was because of extreme intervention on the part of her broader family.
Ami went from saying that Helbrans is not a cult to saying all frum people are a cult.
I personally know of people that went through this cult, and now have major issues in life (they were/are mentally stable people. One ex. a shidduch was put off last minute..).
Circumventing the law by not marring off the kids at 14-15 legally, but having a chuppah, in this day and age is child abuse.
The kids were given vitamin pills before the reporters came.
Even the pictures are posed. (Lets all line up and run to the camera… Tip: next time have the kids play with each other, if they even know how to).
I dont understand the reporter’s sentiments in regards to thinking that since it was all in the past we don’t prosecute anymore. If this group only stopped doing something while being watched, how can anyone trust them?
It is not hypercritical to claim that the kids are being taken away in part due to the fact that they are being forced away from their parents within the cult. Since the reason the cult does that (and marry them off young), is a tactic to keep the parents from running away.
Taking away the kids is the only legal option left to break apart this cult and to save the kids – yes to save them. (The are not put into foreign speaking homes, rather into chasidish homes nearby). Hopefully the parents can then leave the cult and repossess their kids.
This newspaper uses the same tactic as the cult, that this is our issue, not the cults.
The only true part is about education, but the schools are in negotiations about that.
Here we are dealing with run aways, mind control, child abuse (mostly mentally) and part of it is a lack of education.
That is not enough to write a half of a magazine equating klall yisroel to them.
The Rabbonim of Montreal did not endorse the group, they just wrote about the chumra of mesira.
There are even Rabbonim that say it is a mitzvah to maaser is this case due to the horrible things that happened to so many people that came out of the cult. (Im talking suicidal).
They have clearly written a biased article.
Either they wanted to sell some papers over Pesach, or “the writer” got influenced by the cult leader during his 3 hour meeting.
I know plenty of people that will not buy the this newspaper anymore.
Both magazines were out to sell themselves. Controversy sells.
dogo: Those allegations are false. They have not been proven because it doesn’t exist. You are parroting what you heard in the media without any evidence as there isn’t any. Not in court, not anywhere. Children belong with parents not with some other unrelated family. There is no way kidnapping these children and “assigning” them to another family will not cause far far greater damage to the children than leaving them with their own parents. Even if they have fungus on their toenails.
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