Ultra-Orthodox Jews Pose A ‘staggering Threat’ To Health And Safety

A CHAREDI community in London was confronted at an emergency meeting this week by government Faith Minister, Lord Stephen Greenhalgh, above, in the wake of a ‘shameful’ breach of COVID-19 regulations at a Yesodey Hatorah school wedding attended by 150 people.

Greenhalgh made clear at the meeting in Stamford Hill – attended by the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations, Charedi charity Interlink and the Jewish Leadership Council – that “shameful events could and would not continue” or there would be consequences.

Also present was the Mayor of Hackney, Philip Glanville, and the head of the police in the local area.

A senior Jewish figure who attended the meeting told Jewish News that the police warned those present that they would take a firm stand if simchas were to continue to be held and Lord Greenhalgh:

Made it very clear that the government is unhappy at reports that they’ve read.

In a letter to the Stamford Hill Jewish Community, Lord Greenhalgh stressed that the meeting’s objective was:

Simple… to ensure that there is no prospect of this sort of event happening again during the national Covid-19 emergency.

Glanville also wrote an open letter to the members of the Charedi Orthodox Jewish community in Stamford Hill. The letter, which is co-signed by the Borough Police Commander, Chief Superintendent Marcus Barnett, and Hackney’s Director of Public Health, Dr Sandra Husbands, says that:

The family who hosted this wedding have been fined £10,000, and the police are investigating the company who organised the event and those who may have assisted them.

It warns that:

The police will not hesitate to impose further such fines should similar events occur again and please do report any concerns you may have.

JN has been told that:

All of the halls (in Stamford Hill) that have been used for weddings have now definitively closed for the time being.

Meanwhile, in a blistering attack on the Charedi community lawbreakers written f0r The JC, barrister Daniel Greenberg, above, wrote:

I have seen some surprisingly intelligent commentators support the idea that the Charedi world requires special consideration in relation to compliance with Covid-19 regulations in the UK, Israel and elsewhere, because those regulations are so challenging to their core lifestyle practices.

This is ridiculous: and offensive to everybody else whose lives also revolve around meeting people in lots of different contexts and gaining social, professional, spiritual and other support from them, and who have suffered in dignified silence for the benefit of the health of the public.

There is no reason why Charedim should have more need, or be any more entitled, to gather together than any other community. The idea that their day revolves around learning and praying adds nothing: both of those activities can be carried out alone, assisted to some extent by remote communication.

What Covid-19 has actually taught us about many members of Charedi communities is something that many of us have suspected for some time: that they have no connection whatsoever with Judaism in any meaningful sense.

He then spoke of:

A staggering denial of the fundamental Jewish emphasis on health and safety.

He revealed that, in the UK, benefit fraud appears to be endemic in parts ofChareidi communities, with housing benefit in particular being manipulated through bogus shell companies and the like in order to support an otherwise unattainable lifestyle. This is incompatible with the fundamental Jewish principles of truth, yashrus (being straight) and avoiding falsehood of any kind.

Even where benefit is obtained without fraud, the Talmud emphasises the importance of people being trained to earn their own living: bringing people up to be dependent on charity is again contrary to fundamental Jewish principles.

Greenberg, who “admires many people who count themselves as Charedim” added:

[But] when the three things most publicly known about the Charedi world become benefit fraud, covering up abuse and breaking public health law, it is time for the rest of the Jewish world – including those Charedim to whom these things are abhorrent – to stand up and say clearly and loudly that any community that tolerates these three things has no connection with Jewish law or values and has become simply a self-indulgent and dangerous sect.

The biggest problem in all this is that Charedim look so very Jewish. Their obsession with the externals means that to themselves, to the outside world, and even to many other Jews, they appear to be the quintessence of Jewish life. In fact, many of them are the antithesis of fundamental Jewish principles in so many ways.

It is time for the rest of the Jewish community to disown those individuals publicly and allow them to go their own mad and dangerous way, and turn to the task of publicly representing a more balanced approach to Jewish practice as being the real continuation of the Jewish heritage in all meaningful ways.