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Tuesday, October 25, 2022

Satmar Fraud and the Daf Ha'Yoimie

 




Part of Satmar ideology is to scream "Hisgarois Be'umois" (antagonizing the gentiles) against the Secular Zionist Government. They claim that the very existence of the State of Israel is a "Chillul Hashem" because the State of Israel as an entity "antagonizes the gentile nations." 

This preposterous argument manifests itself in their unmitigated hate against a country that houses the majority of the Jewish people, and a country that distributes more money to Moisdois Ha'torah in one year ($250 million) then Satmar distributed in its entire history. 

The mystery of how the Satmar Rebbe (R' Zalman Leib) was able to put together five million dollars to distribute to Moisdois in Israel, that "don't take funds from the Zionist government" has finally been solved. 
He just stole "lunch money" from the the hungry mouths of New York children and brought it to Israel.So he basically took money from his "medina" to distribute to the other "medina". 
This is a massive Chillul Hashem and is the quintessential "Hisgarois Be'umois" and the reason this is so grave, is because Chareidim claim that their way is the authentic Jewish tradition. 
This story is not about a regular private guy who happens to be a Satmar Chusid that committed fraud, this is Satmar hierarchy perpetrating a thought-out fraud, systematically. 

The whole "Satmar Fraud" story coming out today is ironic, because today the frum world following the Daf Yoimi , were learning R' Yoel Teitelbaum's favorite daf in the entire shas. Kesubois 111, where the gemarrah discusses the "Shalosh Shevuois" the three oaths! 
Satmar, of course, wouldn't know that because they as a "shitah" don't learn the daf-yoimie because it was inaugurated at the Knessia Gedoileh by Agudah! That Knessia became quite famous because the Chafetz Chayim attended it. 

At any rate stealing millions of dollars' worth of meals is not part of the "Shalosh Shevuois!" 

Incidentally, Satmar Shita'h states that the prohibition of "Shalosh Shevuois!" is "Yeherag Ve'al Ya'avoir" which means that one must give up his life before he would violate these oaths. 
Now every child of 5 knows what the three cardinal sins of "Yeherag Ve'al Ya'avoir" are (Murder, Adultery, Idolatry) but Satmar added a fourth one,"Shalosh Shevuois," Know that the "prohibition' of 
"Shalosh Shevuois," is not mentioned in the entire Shulchan Aruch not by the mechaber or any of the "nosei keilim." The Rambam who mentions every single Torah violation in his Mishna Torah says nada about the "Shalosh Shevuois!"
Satmar makes up their own Torah when it suits them. 
Read and weep!

 A major Jewish day school in New York City on Monday admitted in US federal court it had defrauded the government of millions of dollars, including by misappropriating funds designated to feed needy children.

The Central United Talmudical Academy in Brooklyn agreed to pay $5 million in penalties, in addition to over $3 million in restitution it has paid already.

The resolution will allow the school to avoid criminal charges and close a federal investigation that began in 2018.

The announcement came as New York’s yeshiva system has come increasingly under scrutiny for its lack of secular education and receipt of public funding. The criticism and efforts to better enforce state education guidelines have sparked fierce backlash in the Haredi community.

CUTA is New York’s largest Hasidic yeshiva and is located in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, the home base of the Satmar movement. The not-for-profit school serves over 5,000 students, from preschool to high school, out of three buildings. The boys’ school serves around 2,500 students, court documents said.

The school came to an agreement with prosecutors over charges of conspiring to commit wire fraud in New York’s federal Eastern District court. It will be allowed to continue operations after the resolution, the Justice Department said.

Elozer Porges, the school’s former director, and his assistant, Joel Lowy, pleaded guilty to fraud in 2018. Porges was sentenced to two years in prison, and Lowy got probation, community service and $98,000 in restitution penalties.

US Attorney Breon Peace on Monday called the school’s misconduct “systemic and wide ranging, including stealing over $3 million allocated for schoolchildren in need of meals.”

The school also engaged in tax and benefit fraud by employees, a city investigator said.

The FBI said the school had carried out “multiple systems of fraud in order to cheat the government.”

The Justice Department said the school had received over $3.2 million in funding for federal meal reimbursement programs to feed students in 2014 and 2015. The program was almost all fabricated, however, and the school diverted the funding for other uses, including to hold parties for adults. The school fabricated records and lied to government agencies as part of the scam.

While looking into the meal plan, investigators found evidence of other fraud at the school, including manipulating its payroll to commit benefit and tax fraud. The school employs 700 to 800 teachers and dozens of other staff.

For example, the school hid employee income by paying workers in cash and providing them with coupons. The employees would use the coupons at local stores, which would then redeem the coupons with the school to receive payment, creating an underground economy hidden from the government. The school also provided off-the-books payments to employees in undisclosed investment accounts.

The employees were then able to claim benefits and welfare, especially child care vouchers, that would not have been available to them at their actual income level.

The school provided letters to government agencies stating the employees’ underrepresented income so the workers could receive benefits, and the employees would then cash in some of the benefits with the school itself. Some of these scams had started by at least 2010 and went on until around 2016.

Other schemes by the school included contriving tax exemptions; setting up fake no-show jobs for spouses, relatives of friends of employees; receiving technology funding for purposes unrelated to education; and providing child care without licenses.

In addition to the financial penalties, the school has put in place a zero tolerance policy for fraud; replaced its management; set up new financial and procedural controls; and created an oversight committee, among other steps. Some of the measures have been in place for several years, which the Justice Department credited with helping reach a resolution in the case. An independent monitor will assess compliance for three years.

The Justice Department announced the Monday resolution in Yiddish. The Eastern District Court regularly publishes material in languages besides English if a case concerns a community that uses another language.

New York’s massive yeshiva system has repeatedly come under fire in recent weeks, mostly over secular education requirements, setting off backlash from its supporters.

State authorities have sought a balance between religious beliefs and values and secular education requirements in non-public schools. New York yeshivas have long been required to provide secular education that is “substantially equivalent” to lessons at nearby public schools, but the law has not been effectively enforced.

Critics of yeshiva education say many of the schools fail to provide adequate instruction in secular subjects, including English and math, leaving graduates unprepared to enter the workforce or mainstream society.

Proponents of the system argue that government meddling is an infringement on religious protections. They say the schools are the foundations of successful communities, and that students are well educated, pointing to the fact that students are in class longer than their public school peers each day.

The debate has mostly focused on ultra-Orthodox yeshivas, not on Modern Orthodox schools, which provide more secular education.

The Haredi community has fiercely resisted interference in the schools’ curriculum and critics have said public officials were reluctant to wade into the issue due to the potential political blowback.

Earlier this month, New York State officials for the first time ruled that a yeshiva, also in Williamsburg, was violating the law by not providing sufficient secular education.

Last month, The New York Times published an investigation in both English and Yiddish detailing dismal secular education in many yeshivas, which have legally received hundreds of millions of dollars in public funding in recent years. The funding for yeshivas is minor compared to sums allotted to public schools, and the yeshivas’ shortcomings in secular studies have been debated for years.

Last month, state education officials finalized rules that will boost oversight at yeshivas and other non-public schools and require them to provide a minimum level of secular education in four core areas.

A group of yeshivas and supporting organizations have filed a lawsuit against the state seeking to overturn the new rules.

As of 2020, there were around 160,000 students studying at about 450 yeshivas in New York State. Yaffed, an organization pushing for reforms in the system, has projected that by 2030, 30 percent of Brooklyn schoolchildren will be ultra-Orthodox, nearly all of whom study in yeshivas or related religious schools.


9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Both Rav Menachem Kasher, zt"l, and Rav Aviner, y"l, wrote seforim that demolish the VaYoel Moshe. The Satmer was used to pontificating whatever he wanted and if you tried to object, he'd scream at you.
This is the bottom line with the NYT story. Yes, it was a hit job on the yeshivos but boy, did the yeshivos give them material to work with.

Sabra65 said...

Come on, Satmar does not STEAL money from the government. They're shitta is that its a mitzva to take from the government. Besides, they are allowed to do whatever they want because they do bikur cholim. That's the excuse any satmar chosid will give you. Very commendable but it doesn't make theft right.

Asiatisher Marmorosher Ferd said...

The infamous Margo, who was born in Satmar in der alta Heim, took USDA-donated raisins paid for by taxpayers for the nutrition of the bucherim, adulterated the peklach, and tried SELLING them for $$ profit in the Torah Temimah cafeteria!

Chicago said...

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/americas-most-dangerous-law-illinois-candidate-warns-anarchy-criminal-justice-overhaul

Orland Park Mayor Keith Pekau railed against the SAFE-T Act to Fox News Tuesday. The controversial measure downgrades some crimes, eliminates cash bail, and treats violent suspects under house arrest with more leniency.

“When I said that this is the most dangerous law I’ve ever seen, I believe that,” said Pekau, who is running for a seat in the House.

The 764-page law was passed in Springfield in the predawn hours earlier this winter with no debate or formal hearings, former justice officials wrote in the Chicago Tribune.

Pekau told the outlet that trespassing would be dropped from a Class A misdemeanor to Class B under the measure, meaning officers in his village would no longer be able to remove a suspect from a victim’s property.

“Well, now they can’t arrest, they can only write a ticket,” he said. “So, they get to stay in that business, on your property, at your house, etc.”

“We create potential anarchy because law enforcement can’t do their job and then people feel that they have to do that job,” he said. “People aren’t trained in the use of force. They’re not trained to de-escalate situations.”

“Lots of bad things can happen out of this, and it could potentially spiral out of control relatively quickly.”

Anonymous said...

Wrong Satmar! CUTA is Aron not the Zalis

Anonymous said...

Sorry your mixing up the two satmar’s

Satmar 102 said...

9:36 & 4:47
You guys are focusing on the trees and overlooking the huge forest, the message is the same.

Moishe Gabbai Friedman said...

Zalmi's been having diarrhea ever since this story broke, worried sick that once DOJ goes digging ver veisst what else they might uncover. It would be a real beesha vucherpa if lemushul Weberman was getting a government grant to pay for his perverted sex tchotchkes!

https://www.petcarerx.com/article/is-it-safe-to-use-pepto-bismol-for-dogs/1512

Der Eybishter zolt helfen!

Dusiznies said...

Readers
People have pointed out that the fraud perpetrated by Satmar was from the Aronie faction and not the Zalonie faction.
I never wrote that the Zalonis perpetrated this particular fraud, I wrote that R'Zalman took from his "medina' and gave it to the Zionist "medina"
I stand by that comment!
Where did he get the $5 million from? Read the article carefully and you will see how both Satmar Brothers get their funding, though it was the Aronim that got caught.

The story still stands on its own as the R' Aron Teitelbaum also came with millions to Israel to distribute.
These are people who scream that one shouldn't take money from the "medina" while they line their silk pockets with money from the USA "medina"
In fact the "Bnei Yoel" protest R' Aron all the time because of his Shit'ah of taking money from the "Medina"