The Billion Shekel Theft
And other aveiros committed by "the Torah Community"
“Resha’im!” “Oppressors of Jews!” “Antisemites!” “They’ve declared war!” Such is the rhetoric being sounded today by the charedi rabbinic and political leadership against the High Court.
The background to these accusations is as follows. The High Court froze a government transfer of 1.09 billion NIS (that’s over 300 million dollars) to charedi school networks. The government had decided to do this transfer in order to compensate charedim over the financial consequences of the mass draft evasion.
The reason for the freeze is very straightforward. The transfer would contravene a law, which was legislated by representatives of the voting public. The law is that schools which don’t teach any core studies of math etc. (and thus raise people to drain the economy rather than strengthen it) are not entitled to public funds.
The funding under discussion was for charedi schools which agree to teach most of the core curriculum (just as yeshivish schools in the US do). However, investigations into over 100 such schools showed that they were not actually teaching this curriculum! Hence, they were not entitled to these public funds, and the court ruled that the transfer must be frozen pending further investigation.
But it subsequently transpired that all but 90 million NIS - over 1 billion shekels - had already been transferred!
In case it’s not clear: This is theft. Taking public money for institutions that were ruled by publicly-elected legislators as not being entitled to that money is theft. Over a billion shekels were stolen from the public by charedi institutions.
And when people try to stop it, this is what the charedi political leaders declare to be “war” and “oppression” committed by “resha’im”! (Incidentally, the Supreme Court judge who issued the ruling is religious, and is the first cousin of R. Osher Arieli of the Mir Yeshiva!)
Apparently the charedi community’s leadership believes that the Torah prohibitions against slander do not apply to them. But then, if they don’t even care about stealing hundreds of millions of dollars from the general public, it’s hardly surprising that they don’t care about other Torah prohibitions.
And all this theft of vast public funds, which could have gone to so many infinitely more worthy causes, is enabled by the Likud and the other parties of the government coalition. I hope that their voters will hold them accountable.
Note: I plan to visit South Florida next month (Miami, Hollywood and Boca Raton). If you live there and you’re interested in arranging or attending presentations, please be in touch.
The Billion Shekel Lie
"the court ruled that the transfer must be frozen pending further investigation.
But it subsequently transpired that all but 90 million NIS - over 1 billion shekels - had already been transferred!
In case it’s not clear: This is theft. Taking public money for institutions that were ruled by publicly-elected legislators as not being entitled to that money is theft. Over a billion shekels were stolen from the public by charedi institutions."
I am a lawyer and will respond as a judge considering this accusation of theft against the charedi defendants.
From this quote, it is completely obvious that there was no theft at all. The prosecution claims that "Taking public money for institutions that were ruled by publicly-elected legislators as not being entitled to that money is theft." However, this fails for two reasons: First, the government agency that distributed the funds, who was responsible to determine compliance, either found that the institutions met the requirements (perhaps wrongfully overlooking the subjects not taught and perhaps culpable for this themselves) and voluntarily distributed these funds to these institutions. The institutions did nothing but passively receive them from an authorized government agency. There is no obligation on the institution to review the agency's decision and decline the distribution.
Second, the court's ruling FOLLOWED the institutions taking these funds. At the time of the taking, there was no ruling that the institutions were not entitled to them. The original knesset decision requiring compliance with teaching certain subjects was a legislative act and not a ruling about anything specific. The legislation bound the government in it's obligations to dispense the funds and was not directed at any potential recipients of these funds, and thus, such recipients can clearly not be found to have violated it. Furthermore, the only order by the court was further investigation - not that the institutions must return the funds. There was not even a final determination that they were not entitled.
It is therefore clear that no theft has taken place and the accusation is without merit. This post is dismissed.