Shalom Eichler finally arrested in Jerusalem

Chaim Levin the victim

by 

Chaim Levin

Sholom Eichler the "molester"

Sholom Eichler was arrested on March 21st near Kfar Chabad for sexually abusing me as a child. I had already filed a civil lawsuit against him in New York and he ignored the lawsuit and fled to Israel with his family. The result of that lawsuit is still pending, I was awarded a default judgment against him and will hopefully know the amount of that judgment by this coming Monday, March 25th.

As I’ve written previously on my Facebook page and have told many people as well, the last place that Sholom Eichler molested me was when our families were visiting Israel together on a family trip while we were staying at the [then Hilton] David Citadel hotel. The details of that incident, along with many of the other incidents remain clear as day in my mind; I even remember the room number that he abused me in while we were in Jerusalem.

After ignoring the civil lawsuit against him in New York Sholom Eichler and his family fled to Israel because of the default judgment that I was granted against him. Unfortunately for Eichler, the criminal statute of limitations are much broader and severe in Israel, and so I spent the past few months researching my options before deciding to press criminal charges against him. It pains me greatly to know that there are so many sex offenders out there whose victims have the ability to bring them to justice but are too afraid to do so because of community or family pressure, or because they don’t feel strong enough. For 7 seven years I was frightened by the prospect of forcing Sholom Eichler into a courtroom or even confronting him, and it is thanks to the support of many great survivors, advocates, friends and family who showed me that it’s possible to pursue justice despite the staggering intimidation that many victims face once reporting their crime and/or going public especially when coming from more religious communities.

The Israeli justice system operates quite differently than what I was familiar with in regards to how sexual abuse cases are handled in the US. After I received confirmation on Thursday morning that Eichler was arrested, the police requested that I be on “standby” for when they would call me. I thought they would ask me to ID Eichler or something, but what came next was very unexpected. I was brought into a fairly small room with three police interrogators, one of them a translator, and was directed to sit in a seat right across from Sholom Eichler where he was sitting with shackles on his feet.

The main interrogator read Eichler his right to remain silent and warned him that anything he said would be used against him. I was still absorbing the fact that I was sitting right in front of the monster who took so much away from me, the monster that caused so much damage that no amount of therapy will ever undo, but within two minutes I was able to gain my bearings. According to legal experts in Israel, this process is called “eimut” (confrontation) and is used by interrogators to observe the body language between the victim and the accused. I was instructed to look at Eichler and tell him what he did to me, they were adamant that I describe every incident in detail and not hold back on anything. It was at that moment that I looked at the monster in the eyes and told him exactly what he did to me, where he did it and the painful and sensitive details of the times he abused me.

This “confrontation” was sort of like a court proceeding, after I gave my opening statement Eichler was given a chance to respond to what I said, and without an ounce of shame or remorse he attempted to deny everything that I claimed he had done to me. With every word he spoke, with every lie he told I felt my blood boiling to the point where I thought I was going to explode, but although he was lying, his body language was telling a very different story. He was completely unhinged and was shaking non stop, he sounded like he was on the brink of tears and his attempts to discredit what I was saying were clearly not working. One of the things I confronted him about was about a meeting that he and I had five years ago before he got married in which he apologized to me for what he had done to me. I looked at him and said “how dare you sit right in front of me and call me a liar? How do you live with yourself knowing what you did despite the fact that not only did you apologize to me but also admitted your crimes against me to my older brother and my mother as well?”. Eichler admitted to meeting me five years ago, (something he denied until now) and said “I didn’t apologize for what I did to you, I apologized for how you were feeling”.

I pressed further and recounted in vivid detail how Eichler used to wait on his parents’ porch that was just across the street of my school for when I would be walking home from school so that he can lure me inside to commit those unspeakable acts. I also recounted the times that he abused me in the synagogue that our families attended, in my parents’ house, upstate at the bungalow colony that our families both attended during the summer, and of course, one of the most brutal incidents, the last time, in that hotel in Jerusalem on the fifth floor. Eichler had the audacity to attempt and accuse my older brothers of actually abusing me; and when asked by the interrogators why I would make such claims against him he said that he was the “perfect target”. I responded to that by saying that if i was looking for a “perfect target” I would have gone after one of his older brothers which would have ensured that one of them would be sitting in American prison today because they would’ve been well within the criminal statute of limitations within the American justice system.

Those twenty minutes felt like hours and most of the exact details are quite blurred in my head at this point, but luckily it was all on the record and will surely be used to prove his guilt in criminal court. What I remember was the feeling of empowerment I felt when I looked at this evil excuse for a man in the eye and told him exactly what he had done to me and the look on his face, the expression of guilt and shame, feelings that I felt for far too long because of what he had done to me; the tables had finally turned and for the first time in thirteen years Sholom Eichler finally had to answer for his heinous crimes. After leaving that room, I felt nothing but strength and a certain of closure. As painful and emotional as that confrontation was for me, it reminded me that pursuing justice is one of the most important things that a person could do in his or her life.

Eichler was released on bail the next day, the exact amount is still unknown to me but I hope to find out soon, and it is my sincere hope that he will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. I hope that others will learn by example that while at certain points the prospect of facing their abuser might seem impossible but the truth is that with the right amount of support, therapy, and healing facing one’s abuser IS possible and the power that abusers enjoy over their victims (the way Eichler had power over me) diminish over time.

Aside from knowing that it was my obligation to make sure that Eichler answer for his crimes and that I exercise every single legal option that was available to me in order to do so, I hope that by pressing criminal and civil charges against my abuser a better precedent will be set in the future for those struggling with the decision of if and how they should take action against those who stole part of their innocence, part of their soul. I know that by being so public about my past and about what was done to me is giving a voice to so many who feel like theirs was taken from them, something I once felt all the time. I’ve been publicly shamed on more than one occasion; anonymous emails and tweets from people who don’t even have the courage to use their real names remind me the importance of this journey and only empower me even more to pursue justice. Those voices of hate and negativity fade and the voices of my family, friends and every single person who supported me and encouraged me echo loudly for me and for the world to hear, to you all, I am thankful, I wouldn’t be here without you.

A Victim of the "Breslover Tzaddik" tells her story

The Tzaddik Harav Elizer Berland

It took A. some time to realize she had been sexually harassed by Rabbi Eliezer Berland - a holy and righteous man in her eyes - and for her to file a police complaint. She is 18, married, her pretty face wrapped tightly in a black kerchief in the so-called Jerusalem fashion. She is going through a crisis, not only as a woman who was sexually harassed, but also as someone who was raised with a unique system of beliefs, at the center of which is the rabbi, the righteous foundation of the world.

Since A. became disillusioned, her world has collapsed. She stopped working, and her life now revolves around both the court case and the rift in her community, which has shunned her since she submitted her complaint to the police.

"I am the daughter of a veteran disciple of the rabbi," she says. "My father still believes in him. I think that if he were to cease believing, he would die from it. Today, now that I am outside, I understand that Shuvu Banim is a false Hasidic sect that is only after money. Everything the rabbi would do was very peculiar, not ordinary. He would yell, would travel around at night to tikkunim [sessions of 'spiritual repair'], and we'd follow after him.

"My husband is a righteous one. Our vart [a Yiddish term for an occasion that proceeds a betrothal] was at the rabbi's. We waited there all night. My husband cried to the guards to let us in to see the rabbi, and only at 5 A.M. did we break a plate. I was pleased. It was a matter of pride between me and my girlfriends that I had a groom who would chase after the rabbi. After the sheva berakhot [the week of nightly meals and blessings after a wedding], my husband continued his pursuit of the rabbi. He would go to Hebron, Amuka [in the Galilee] - wherever the rabbi was, my husband would chase after him. Later I joined in too.

"We thought we were demonstrating our devotion. For a year after our marriage, I did not have a single evening with my husband, because I was busy, in pursuit: We were the rabbi's minions. There was a group of women who pursued the rabbi. The rabbi would excite us, suddenly emerge from the car, do tikkun, and then get in and drive off. I worked from noon until 4 P.M., so that I would have time to sleep in a little in the morning, but many times I would telephone and say that I wasn't feeling well. So I also wasn't receiving a proper salary.

"My father instilled in us at that the rabbi is the essence of spirituality at home. I began going to the rabbi too, because we'd heard you could get a blessing. Once we used to see him from afar, but now we realized that you could get in to see him without paying millions of shekels. We got excited, we started going to him at night.

"The first time I went in to the rabbi, it was with another woman: He gave us a kiss on the forehead. Something gentle, a kiss from the righteous one. At the time I didn't think it was unusual, but from a kiss it developed into holding you, touching, licking. A lot of women don't believe the rabbi touched and kissed [others], because he didn't touch them. These are older Ashkenazi women.

"If he had touched them, they would have done him in. So he did it to us, the innocent disciples. Like that, so we wouldn't feel it, his hands were constantly fluttering about. He would come close and do it quickly without your realizing, with three or four women in the room - caress this one, embrace that one. One day he told my husband, 'Your wife will have the privilege of being in the world of nobility' [a higher realm the soul belongs to, according to kabbala]. It was only afterward that we understood he was preparing him.

"That time I had come with my husband to the rabbi as usual, and he said, 'You stay here and you come with me.' He locked me in his room and went out. When he entered he pointed to the bed. I don't remember what he said to me. He kissed me and stuck his tongue in my mouth. He held me real tight, my whole body, close to his, and he became dreadfully excited and panted. He told me, 'Now you are in the world of nobility,' and licked my face until it was really sticky. I was fighting with myself not to do anything. To this day I am traumatized by it.

"After that he put his hands under my blouse and felt me up brusquely. And then he opened the door and I ran to my husband and told him excitedly that the rabbi said I was in the world of nobility. We began to fight, because my husband understood."

'I miss kissing you'

A. says Berland frequently preached sexual abstinence. "For nine months he told me and my husband not to touch. From the time we married, we were prushim [abstaining from sexual relations]. It killed us. Sometimes we would touch and then we'd say, 'The rabbi will be mad at us.' My husband and I would go in and I would ask the rabbi, 'When will we be blessed with children?' He would say, 'You are not touching each other? You will be visited.' We were naive. I thought I would have children just because the rabbi promised me we would be visited. But he kept on saying, 'Now go immerse yourself' [in a ritual bath], as though he was ensuring that I would be pure for him. In front of other people he would ask: 'When did you go to immerse yourself?' I whispered in his ear, and he would say in front of the others that I had gone. I would feel embarrassed. The rabbi would call all the time: I love you, miss you, miss kissing you. But he would mix this sort of talk with holy talk. And then all of a sudden he stopped calling me."

A. came to her senses with the help of a veteran disciple of the Bratslav Hasidic sect. "The Hasid's daughter was a friend of mine," she explains. "She would go in to the rabbi every night, like me. After the incident occurred [the sexual harassment], her father told her he a secret scroll, which told of 18 women who were each tied to the righteous one [the rabbi] on a different side of the body and how each has a part in redemption. We came to her father and began talking to him about it. Suddenly he said, 'Enough, there is no secret scroll. The rabbi is despicable.' We were shocked. He called our husbands and told them. Only then did we understand what had happened, and everything blew up."

The public suspicions regarding sexual harassment by Berland arose during the course of an a police investigation into a dispute and shooting within the Hasidic sect. The investigation concluded that the dispute broke out following an attempt to silence Itai Nachman Shalom, a disciple of Berland who witnessed him having sex with a woman from the community, and refused to keep quiet about it. Since the scandal's eruption a few months ago, the Shuvu Banim sect has been split between the rabbi's supporters and detractors.

Berland, who is apparently in the United States now, knows he is under investigation for sexual harassment, and is represented by the Tel Aviv attorney Jacob Weinroth.

Women from the community are now offering support to the ones who say they were harassed and are encouraging them to seek help. The women wish to remain anonymous because they fear the wrath of thugs within the sect. They explain that Berland took advantage of weak women by force of his charisma. They say both he and his disciples explained to the women that by means of their submission, they were "helping" the rabbi to battle the Iranian threat facing Israel, and to prevent a holocaust from being visited on its people. A lot of women were hurt but are for now keeping mum, they say.

A Facebook page for victims of the rabbi's alleged abuse from the Hasidic sect, which was launched by a Haredi woman outside it, has seen a steadily growing number of subscribers. According to the woman who manages the page, several women have been in touch with her privately, and told her that they too had been sexually harassed. The descriptions are similar: "They came into the room to receive a blessing from the rabbi and it ended in lickings, roaming hands and statements such as, 'I am taking all offenses from you.'" She adds that several of the women say they subsequently received money from Berland, sums of $500-1,000, but are afraid to complain and are not willing to speak with the authorities about this.

Miss Israel a black girl meets President Obama, Video

Rabbi Lau's powerful words to President Obama, Video

Monsey Boy serving in the IDF comes home for Pesach and surprises his mother in Amazing Savings, Video

Surprising his mother in Amazing Savings

A mother is left stunned as her soldier son walked into a store she was shopping at.

The man from Monsey, New York, who served in the Israeli army surprised his mother when he came home without notifying her.

The Orthodox Jewish soldier, who spent time serving in the Israeli army, decided to come home and spend the upcoming holiday of Passover with his family.

He did not let his mother know of his plans, instead he arranged for someone to record the sweet reunion between himself and his mother, which took place at the Amazing Savings store in Monsey, New York, where his mother was shopping at the time.

Chaim Halpern the accused rapist will be giving a shiur on "Ze'roah & Beizim"

Young frum teenager commits suicide in Tallis and Tefillin

הלב כואב וממאן להאמין, לראות דבר כזה, בחור צעיר שנשבר משאיר מכתב מסביר מדוע הוא עושה מה שעשה, וזרק את עצמו כשהוא מעוטר בטלית ותפילין

אני לא כותב שם וגם לא מביא את התמונה המקורית של הבחור, מפני שמדובר בענין אישי בלבד ולא ציבורי. אבל אני מביא את הדיווח מפני שזה מחייב לשים עין על בחורים שבורים, לעיתים עם מילה טובה או עידוד הכי קטן מצילים נפשות

Loosely translated:
It is with an aching heart and hard to believe, to see something like that, a young man broken in spirit and leaving a suicide letter explaining why he  did this , that he had to to throw himself off the banister dressed in  tallit and tefillin

I did show the original picture of the guy, because it is a personal matter and not a public matter . But I am showing this,  because we all should  keep an eye on the boys who are broken in spirit , and perhaps we can give them a kind word or encouragement, it  can save lives.
read Beoilumim shel chareidim

Rehearsal at Ben Gurion Airport for Obama , Video

Turner the admitted sex abuser walks

Moshe Turner, der kranker zucher

A 59-year-old Monsey man was sentenced Tuesday to 10 years probation for sexually abusing a 14-year-old boy, though the judge said the man hedged on taking full responsibility.Moishe Turner told Rockland probation officials that the boy backed his buttocks into him, causing them to have sexual contact, state Supreme Court Justice William Kelly said reading from a pre-sentencing report.Kelly said the comments raised doubts about Turner’s sincerity and he seemed to blame the boy for the sexual acts . The judge noted the probation officer recommended six months in jail for Turner for that reason.Turner seems to have “characterized the victim, a 14-year-old, as sexually aggressive, a wild child,” Kelly said, adding Turner was 

“qualifying” and “hedging” on his January plea.

Turner pleaded guilty to second-degree criminal sex act on Jan. 18, a charge that could have brought seven years in prison. He admitted having anal and oral sex with the boy on seven occasions during July 2011.District Attorney Thomas Zugibe and prosecutor Jennifer Parietti offered the plea agreement sparing Turner from serving jail time when the family didn’t want the boy testifying in open court, though the youngster offered specific details of sexual abuse before the grand jury that indicted Turner on seven counts of criminal sex act and endangering the welfare of a child.Turner also denied he rented a car for the boy, who was stopped by police for driving without a license. The report stated Turner, a married father of five children, is unemployed, has no prior criminal history and receives food stamps and Section 8 assistance toward his rent at 8 Dana Road, Kelly said.Turner’s lawyer, Kenneth Gribetz, insisted to Kelly that the Monsey man accepted responsibility. Gribetz told the judge that Turner has come to the realization that he was wrong and there’s no rationalization for his actions .“I’m sorry for the whole problem,” Turner told Kelly. “I will never do that in my life.”

Satmar girl sings "Kah Ribon Ulam" with Chassidishe accent, Video

In a revealing top, a former Satmar girl shows off her singing skills.

A source close to the woman, revealed her identity as Breindy Rosenberg.

Rosenberg does not look or dress as a typical Satmar girl, but when she sings her accent definitely gives away her background.

Rosenberg grew up in the Satmar community of Kiryas Joel in Monroe, New York.

Rosenberg is seen dressed in a sleeveless and v-neck top as she sings a Jewish song, which Orthodox Jewish men sing at the Shabbat table every Friday night.

According to people who know Rosenberg, she has left Kiryas Joel and she now resides in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

In the video below, Rosenberg is heard singing a Jewish song. She is struggling to carry the tune and she stumbles over many Hebrew words.

A man is heard in the background helping her with the song. At the end of the song she laughed at herself and she wished everyone a Good Shabbos. We can only hope that the video was not recorded on Shabbat.
Video was removed, will try to get it back soon