New York Supreme Court, Citing New Legislation, Rules Yeshivos Can keep their Students to be dummies ..and Cannot Be Shut Down

A New York Supreme Court granted a decisive victory today to schools that had been deemed “nonequivalent.” This development in the decade-long substantial equivalency saga — predicated on legislation advocated for by Agudath Israel and others — allows parents in these schools to exhale once more, and can have broader positive implications for yeshivas long-term.

In May 2025, all parents of six schools received a foreboding letter from New York City stating that their child’s school:

“shall no longer be deemed a school which provides compulsory education… effective June 30th, 2025, all services at the school for your child will be discontinued, including special education and related services. Given that your child will no longer be able to attend this school, a decision must be made about what school your child will attend for the 2025-2026 school year and you must notify the New York City Department of Education of where your child will be enrolled by July 1st 2025.” [emphasis added]

The letter continues by describing how parents will proceed if their child attends public school in 2025-2026.

This legislative session, new language, fundamentally redefining how nonpublic schools can satisfy “substantial equivalency,” became law.

SED had argued that all schools can opt in to the new legislation, except for schools that had already been deemed nonequivalent prior to the legislation’s enactment. The court refuted SED’s claim, calling it “arbitrary, capricious, and contrary to law.” The court further rejected SED’s argument that the schools cannot avail themselves of the new legislation because, by being non-equivalent, they are “non-schools,” and thus are ineligible to make a selection.

This case may have long-term implications if, in the future, any school is declared non-equivalent. Based on this ruling, a school can still choose to avail itself of a pathway. The “non-school” argument was soundly defeated.

The Agudah congratulated Steven Barshov, Esq., of Barshov Law PLLC, who represented the yeshivas and parents in this case.

 

Jewish Orgs Urge Shuls And Schools To Apply For Federal Security Funding – But Crazy Leftist Jews Are Boycotting The Program

 

Six of the country’s most influential Jewish organizations are urging shuls and other Jewish institutions to apply for $274 million in federal security grants. However, a growing number of progressive groups and congregations are vowing to boycott the program, citing conditions they say betray Jewish values.

The clash centers on the Nonprofit Security Grant Program (NSGP), a Department of Homeland Security initiative long championed by Jewish leaders to help houses of worship and nonprofits harden defenses against rising antisemitic violence. But new terms under the Trump administration—requiring grantees to support federal immigration enforcement and avoid diversity-related programs—have prompted liberal Jews to say they don’t want to participate in the program.

In a rare joint statement issued Tuesday, the Jewish Federations of North America, the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, the Anti-Defamation League, and three security-focused agencies—Secure Community Network, Community Security Initiative NY, and Community Security Service—urged all eligible institutions to apply.

“While we are aware that questions have arisen on the part of certain religious institutions regarding the current year’s program criteria, our organizations strongly urge all eligible institutions to apply for this critical resource,” the groups wrote. “We are in regular contact with government officials who have affirmed their continued commitment to protecting the safety of all faith-based institutions and the values they hold.”

The groups say that applying now keeps options open, noting that the conditions only take effect if funds are accepted, and that Trump administration messaging around enforcement rules has been inconsistent.

At the same time, dozens of progressive Jewish organizations—joined by pro-Palestinian advocacy groups and several synagogues—have publicly pledged to boycott the program.

“We are committed to upholding our communal values and will not comply with these repressive conditions,” reads an open letter signed by Bend the Arc: Jewish Action, IfNotNow, Jewish Voice for Peace, and others.

“Jewish safety requires inclusive democracy and inclusive democracy requires Jewish safety. We do not comply so we will not apply,” “Rabbi” Jill Maderer of Congregation Rodeph Shalom in Philadelphia posted on Facebook.

Another “rabbi,” speaking anonymously, described the grant conditions as “money being given to us on condition that we violate a specific mitzvah”—welcoming the stranger. “I don’t see how we can possibly accept that money,” he said, citing fear for refugee members of his congregation.

Trump officials have made no effort to downplay the political nature of the changes. In a statement to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, DHS declared it would “no longer fund grant projects that don’t align with President Trump’s priorities,” explicitly rejecting “DEI agendas” and “illegal aliens in our country.”

Created in 2004 and dramatically expanded after the Tree of Life massacre in 2018, the NSGP is the primary federal vehicle for shoring up the security of religious institutions at risk of extremist violence. Funds cover cameras, fencing, barriers, guards, and other protective measures.

Justice Department Exploring Gun Restrictions for Transgender People as they Shoot Up America

 

Federal officials are considering whether to restrict firearm ownership for transgender individuals, according to the AP and people familiar with internal Justice Department discussions.

The talks come in the aftermath of last month’s Minneapolis Catholic school shooting, which investigators say was carried out by a transgender suspect. While no formal proposal has been made, senior officials have been weighing whether existing federal law — which bars people deemed mentally unfit from owning guns — could be applied to individuals diagnosed with gender dysphoria.

The Justice Department said in a statement in response to questions about the firearms talks that the agency is “actively evaluating options to prevent the pattern of violence we have seen from individuals with specific mental health challenges and substance abuse disorders.” But, the department said: “No specific criminal justice proposals have been advanced at this time.”

Some conservative figures have coalesced around the idea of restricting guns for people diagnosed with gender dysphoria — the unease a person may have because their assigned gender and gender identity don’t match — through a federal law that bars people from possessing firearms if they are “adjudicated as a mental defective.”

Zera Shimshon Parshat Ki Teiz´e

 

What Chutzpah? AG Letitia James Asks Court To Reinstate President Trump’s Massive Civil Fraud Penalty While She Herself is under Criminal Investifgation

New York’s attorney general moved Thursday to have the state’s highest court reinstate President Donald Trump’s staggering civil fraud penalty, appealing a lower-court decision that slashed the potential half-billion-dollar fine to $0.

Attorney General Letitia James’ office filed a notice of appeal with the state’s Court of Appeals, seeking to reverse the mid-level Appellate Division’s ruling last month that the penalty violated the U.S. Constitution’s ban on excessive fines.

James, a Democrat, had previously said she would appeal.

Trump declared “TOTAL VICTORY” after the Appellate Division wiped away his fine, but the five-judge panel left other punishments in place and narrowly endorsed a trial court’s finding that he committed fraud by padding his wealth on financial paperwork given to banks and insurers.

Trump, a Republican, filed his own appeal last week, asking the Court of Appeals to throw out those other punishments, which include a multiyear ban on him and his two eldest sons, Eric and Donald Trump Jr., from holding corporate leadership positions in New York.

Those measures have been on hold during the appellate process and the Appellate Division judges said Trump can seek a court order to extend the pause pending further appeals.

James’ appeal is the latest twist in a lawsuit she filed against Trump in 2022, which alleged that he inflated his net worth by billions of dollars on his financial statements and habitually misled banks and others about the value of prized assets, including golf courses, hotels, Trump Tower, and his Mar-a-Lago estate.

After a trial that saw a sometimes testy Trump take the witness stand, Judge Arthur Engoron ruled last year that James had proven he engaged in a yearslong conspiracy with executives at his company to deceive banks and insurers about his wealth and assets.

Engoron ordered Trump to pay $355 million — payback of what the judge deemed “ill-gotten gains” from his puffed-up financial statements. That amount soared to more than $515 million, including interest, by the time the Appellate Division ruled.

The five-judge Appellate Division panel was sharply divided on many issues in Trump’s appeal, but a majority said the monetary penalty was “excessive.”

“While harm certainly occurred, it was not the cataclysmic harm that can justify a nearly half billion-dollar award,” two of the judges wrote.

 

Daughter of Nazi Officer Who Stole ‘Portrait of a Lady’ and Her Husband Charged With Cover-up

Patricia Kadgien, right, one of the daughters of fugitive Nazi official Friedrich Kadgien, and her husband, Juan Carlos Cortegoso, left, attend a court hearing in the case of the theft of the 18th-century Italian "Portrait of a Lady," which was taken from a Jewish collector during World War II, in Mar del Plata, Argentina, Thursday, Sept. 4, 2025.

Prosecutors in Argentina on Thursday charged the daughter of a fugitive Nazi official with trying to hide an 18th-century painting from authorities following revelations that it had been stolen from a Jewish art dealer during World War II.

The federal prosecutor in charge of the case announced the cover-up charge a day after Patricia Kadgien, one of the daughters of high-level Nazi officer Friedrich Kadgien, handed “Portrait of a Lady” by Italian artist Giuseppe Ghislandi to the Argentine judiciary eight decades after it was stolen.

The fate of the work remains unclear, pending a decision in the case. The heir of Jacques Goudstikker — the Dutch-Jewish art collector who owned the painting before Nazis confiscated his world-famous inventory — has made a legal claim to get the painting back, her lawyers have said.

Goudstikker died in a shipwreck in 1940 while fleeing the Netherlands as German troops advanced. He sold his collection, which included Rembrandts and Vermeers, under duress and far below market price. At least 1,100 stolen works from his gallery remain missing.

The Argentine court has asked that the painting be displayed at the Holocaust Museum in Buenos Aires ahead of any further transfer abroad. The museum did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Patricia Kadgien, 59, and her husband, Juan Carlos Cortegoso, 62, have been under house arrest on suspicion of concealing the painting since police raided their home on Monday for the second time in as many weeks without finding “Portrait of a Lady.”

Kadgien, with disheveled dirty-blond hair and sunglasses on her head, wore a look that mixed concern and puzzlement as she listened to Prosecutor Carlos Martínez in a jam-packed courtroom. Martínez said that Kadgien’s and her husband’s efforts to hide the painting over several days following its sudden appearance in a real estate listing amounted to obstruction of justice.

Cortegoso gazed straight ahead, his arms crossed and a stern expression on his face.

After the hearing the couple was released from house arrest but barred from traveling abroad and required to notify the court whenever they leave their registered address.

Photos of the painting hanging in Kadgien’s living room in Mar del Plata surfaced last month for the first time in eight decades in an online real estate advertisement.

Dutch journalists investigating Kadgien’s past in Argentina – where he took refuge after the collapse of the Third Reich – spotted “Portrait of a Lady” hanging above a green velvet couch in the living room during a 3D tour of the house for sale.

After recognizing it as the same portrait listed as missing in international archives of Nazi-looted art, the newspaper Algemeen Dagblad published an exposé on Aug. 25 that grabbed headlines around the world.

Alerted by international police agency Interpol, Argentine authorities raided the house and other properties belonging to Patricia Kadgien and her sister Alicia, seizing a rifle, a .32-caliber revolver and several paintings from the 19th-century that they suspect may have been similarly stolen during WWII.

But police couldn’t find “Portrait of a Lady.” They found scuff marks and a pastoral tapestry on Patricia Kadgien’s living room wall where the portrait had been photographed.

The real estate ad, first posted in February, was swiftly taken down. Prosecutors on Thursday said that security footage showed people removing the “for sale” sign from Kadgien’s front yard as media scrutiny intensified last week.

In presenting the charges, Martínez told the court that the couple was “aware that the artwork was being sought by the criminal justice system and international authorities” but nevertheless went to lengths to hide it.

“It was only after several police raids that they turned it in,” he said.

With the defendants under house arrest on Monday, their lawyer, Carlos Murias, filed a petition with a civil court in Mar del Plata asking that Kadgien be allowed to auction the painting.

The court rejected the request, arguing that it lacked jurisdiction given the painting’s provenance.

Prosecutor Martínez told reporters on Thursday that his office was informed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation that Marei von Saher, the heir to art dealer Goudstikker, lodged a legal claim to “Portrait of a Lady” at the bureau’s New York office.

The FBI declined to comment.

 

Shvigger from Hell!! Donna Adelson Guilty: Jury Convicts Matriarch in Killing of Jewish Law Professor Daniel Markel

 

The full story below the post! Watch and Weep!

 Donna Adelson, 75, the matriarch of a wealthy Miami family, was convicted Thursday of orchestrating the murder-for-hire plot that killed her former son-in-law, Florida State University law professor Daniel Markel, in 2014.

A jury found Adelson guilty of first-degree murder, conspiracy, and solicitation, closing a chapter in a case that has gripped Florida for more than a decade with its mix of bitter custody disputes, family power struggles, and violence.

Markel, a respected legal scholar and observant Jew active in Tallahassee’s Jewish community, was shot outside his home after blocking his ex-wife Wendi Adelson’s attempt to relocate their children to South Florida. Prosecutors said Donna Adelson, furious over the custody ruling, helped arrange the hit when legal avenues failed.

At trial, prosecutors described her as the calculating matriarch of an affluent family with the means and motive to eliminate the man she “hated.” Defense attorneys countered that the evidence tied other family members to the killing but fell short of linking her directly.

When the guilty verdict was read in court, Adelson burst into tears and exclaimed, “Oh!” before shaking and crying.

She becomes the fifth person convicted in the case, joining her son Charles Adelson, who is serving a life sentence, along with ex-girlfriend Katherine Magbanua, hitman Sigfredo Garcia, and getaway driver Luis Rivera.

The trial also highlighted Adelson’s Jewish identity. Her attorneys requested an expedited schedule earlier this year to avoid conflicts with Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, reflecting her observance of the High Holidays.

Beyond the courtroom, Adelson had been a prominent civic figure. In May, she testified before the Senate Aging Committee as president of the Holocaust Survivors Foundation, where she advocated for the welfare of aging survivors.

Markel’s murder sent shockwaves through Tallahassee’s legal and Jewish communities. Friends recalled him as a devoted father, scholar, and mentor. For many, Thursday’s verdict closed one painful chapter but underscored the tragedy of a family feud that spiraled into violence.

Milk shortages expected to intensify as chief rabbis veto non-Jews working in dairies over Sabbath, holidays

In a letter addressed to Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter, the chief rabbis of Israel reject a proposal to allow non-Jewish workers to operate dairies during the Jewish holidays in order to avoid an expected shortage.

“Dairies in Israel receive kosher certification from the Chief Rabbinate, and operating the plants on Shabbat could compromise the certification they are granted,” says the letter signed by Sephardi Chief Rabbi David Yosef and Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Kalman Ber.

“The Sabbath is one of the most distinctive symbols of the Israeli nation and is the sign of the covenant between the Creator and his people,” it adds. “The very fact that factories in Israel observe the sanctity of Shabbat is a statement in itself and also expresses the Jewish identity of the State of Israel.”

The High Holidays — Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur — followed immediately by Sukkot and Shemini Atzeret-Simchat Torah, starting later this month, will fall in the middle of the week, shutting milk production at dairies for a total of nine workdays. Production also ceases on Shabbat, to comply with kashrut constraints.

Yosef and Ber say that dairies in Israel already have experience with the challenge and managed to avoid shortages in the past.

“In our opinion, since we are still at a reasonable distance from the [Jewish month of] Tishrei holidays, there is sufficient time to make the necessary arrangements to ensure that no shortage will occur, God forbid,” they write in the letter.

Grocery stores in Israel have been rationing milk over the past few weeks amid production shortfalls.

 

Police Arrest an 80-Year-Old Alter-Kocker and a 60-Year-old for Jerusalem arson

The owner of the vehicle that was torched

Two suspects, aged 60 and 80, were arrested in Jerusalem on Wednesday on suspicion of setting fire to dumpsters and tires in the Rehavia and Givat Ram neighborhoods in the capital earlier in the day.

As a result of their alleged acts, a parked car belonging to an IDF reservist was severely damaged, and residents of nearby buildings were forced to evacuate. The police stressed that no one was hurt in the incidents.

Police from the Jerusalem District, together with emergency services, rushed to the scene, extinguished the blaze, and prevented additional danger to the public.

An initial investigation found that the suspects, residents of Jerusalem and central Israel, arrived at the Rehavia neighborhood and set fire to the dumpsters. As a result, the vehicle and the dumpsters were heavily damaged.

The police noted: "These are criminal and dangerous acts that can endanger lives, damage property, and disrupt the lives of the residents." They also emphasized that legal protests are permitted, but "any attempt to harm public safety will be met with strong and unrelenting enforcement."

The car that was burned was found to belong to an active reservist and his wife. The couple are parents to three children, including twin girls who were born prematurely.

All of the child safety seats were burned, along with all of the equipment stored in the vehicle. "My husband is in the reserves and was called up with an emergency reserve order, scheduled for next week," his wife shared.

"I have no idea how in another week from now, when he is in reserves, I am supposed to take my children to their preschools," she added. "Just two days ago, we put a lot of money into this car and we re-equipped it. Good luck to me getting my daughter to preschool every morning alone, with no car."

A resident of the building near the burning garbage bins told Arutz Sheva - Israel National News: “Almost the entire building caught fire, and it could have ended in a serious disaster and people dying. I call on the police to act and arrest the anarchists.”

"Settlers' Suing Leftist Reporters for Defamation and Winning!

 Senior Maariv reporter Ben Caspit was ordered by the Petah Tikva Magistrate’s Court to pay NIS 25,000 shekels in damages to right-wing activist Elisha Yered for writing libelous statements about him on social media.

The statements were published in 2022, after Otzma Yehudit MK Limor Son Har-Melech appointed Yered as her spokesperson. Caspit publicly claimed that Yered has been held in administrative detention by the Shin Bet and was unfit to serve in a public position.

Yered then filed a defamation lawsuit against Caspit through Attorney Menashe Yado of the Honenu legal aid organization.

In response to the verdict, Yered stated, “The days when leftists could conduct wild smear campaigns against the settlements are over. Whoever defames will pay. Ben Caspit tried to cast mud and lies to harm the hilltop youth, but now, thanks to him, another hill can be built in Yehudah and Shomron. I invite all the leftists who want to contribute and help settle the land to follow Caspit’s path and see what the price is for running a hostile and false campaign against the settlers of the land.”

Attorney Menashe Yado stated, “The court rejected Caspit’s claim of ‘I spoke the truth’ because he did not tell the truth and also rejected his claim of good faith because he did not correct the publications even though it became clear that they were incorrect. The practical meaning of the court’s rulings is that for Ben Caspit, defamation was more important than the truth, and that’s why he will pay.”