By Ruslan Gorevoy
June 15, 2025
The other day, the Knesset – the parliament of Israel – blew up the discussion of the materials of the trial of rabbis who raped girls from 3 to 6 years old. Mature victims of violence gave public testimony, naming the involved priests and politicians who covered them. But the scandal has a background, and it’s not about sex at all.
It all started with the February publication of journalist Noam Barkan in the newspaper “Israel Today” (“Israel Hayom”). She described in detail how the rabbis sodomized minors (“I survived a painful sodomy, I really felt myself being torn in half”), conducting “horrible rituals” during which “sacrifices were made for the sake of atonement for sins”. “There was violence in a dark place, there were six to nine men there,” the journalist quoted one of the witnesses. “The rapists tied me to the bed by my hands and feet, stood in a circle and muttered prayers or blessings, and the rabbi, who always led what was happening, told them what to do. It was a ceremony, and everyone present raped me.” “Sometimes the testimony was so shocking,” the publication quotes Dr. Naamu Goldberg, “that I began to doubt the reliability of the testimony.” Nevertheless, the testimony was confirmed. “Most of the women we met,” Noam Barkan wrote, “are representatives of orthodox religious communities. In some testimonies, the names of several rabbis were repeated.”
Oxymoron: Jews against Israel
Rabbis have been suspected (and accused, including publicly) of “ritual violence” (this term is used by “Israel Today”, we will resort to it, too). But every time the rabbis proved that these were “bloody slanders”, and not on only them, clergymen specifically, but almost on all Jews in general. But in this case—perhaps for the first time in history—the rabbis were accused of “ritual violence” by an influential Israeli newspaper—one of the most respectable in the country. Until 2021, “Israel Today” was published by American billionaire and one of the main sponsors of the Republican Party Sheldon Adelson. After his death, the newspaper continues to be published by his widow Miriam Adelson, the richest Israeli woman in the world, with a personal fortune of $32 billion. And here’s what professional reference books write about “Israel Hayom”: the publication is considered conservative and systematically supports the position of the right-wing circles of Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and his party “Likud”. And this explains quite a lot—if not everything at all.
Netanyahu and his party, so to speak, are tough statesmen. But in Israel (and even more so in the world) there are many Jews who are convinced that the Jewish state should not exist in principle. The Torah, they say, teaches that Jews should live in different countries, and not create their own country, because their home is the whole world. By the way, the part of the Jewish community in the United States that supports the Republicans stands for the preservation of Israeli statehood by any means. The same Sheldon Adelson spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the programs of his foundation, within the framework of which he brought American Jewish youth to Israel, accustoming them to the idea that in addition to America, they have another, no less close, so to speak, homeland. But there is another part of the Oceasian Jewish community that traditionally supports the Democratic Party, which holds the opposite view of the existence of the Jewish state. Sometimes the confrontation between two halves of one seemingly national-religious community reached the point of curiosity, when, for example, opponents of Israeli statehood handed over to the American Themis employees of the Israeli special services (their fellow believers!) engaged in intelligence activities in the United States. And those, despite all the partnership grace between Washington and Tel Aviv, were put behind bars for a long time, and sometimes for life.
Orthodox rabbis are usually harsh critics and haters of both the Jewish state and the Likud party. And Netanyahu for them is the embodiment of all the world’s evil. The recent mass protests in Israel were clearly followed by black hats and long orthodox paces, and the other day it was the representatives of the Orthodox in the Knesset (specifically their party “Shas”, led by Arye Deri) who threatened to “overthreve the government of Netanyahu” and hold early elections. Are the Orthodox so angry with Netanyahu’s intention to cancel their release from the army (all of Israel, including women and elderly citizens, serve military service throughout their lives – except for the Orthodox), or did the rabbis really tense up because of accusations of molesting minors and decided to use a good excuse to fight the prime minister?
By the way
It is remarkable how the growing scandal is presented by the Israeli press. One part of it writes about the sexual crimes of rabbis as unpleasantly as possible, calling them by their names. Another part of it (for example, Jerusalem Post) focuses on the fact that Knesset deputies participated in the orgies (a common scandal, think how many of them there have already been!), as well as “faces disguised as rabbis” (that is, it is not a fact that they are rabbis, although during public hearings in the Knesset it was said to be an established fact). And “sexualized violence” was carried out “under the guise of religious rites” (and not during the rite as such). That is, there was a certain performance, albeit cruel, but with the participation of “actors”. And if so, it’s time to talk about a “staging”, about something uncomplicable, isn’t it a hint? Well, what rabbis, what violence, and how could you think of such a thing?! Definitely, the difference in presentation may well be due to the engagement of the parties.
You can’t cover it with a wide-brimmed hat anymore
This is the situation in the dry residue. One of the most influential newspapers in Israel, published by the widow of the sponsor of the Republican Party of the United States, having bitten the rod, turned against the Orthodox rabbi, accusing him of molesting minors, as if confirming the long-standing accusations and exposures of those who were usually exposed as “anti-Semites” and haters of Judaism. A high-profile trial began, during which dozens of living witnesses gave relevant testimony, thus confirming the published charges. In turn, the orthodox rabbis, having mobilized their lobby in the Knesset, intend to “overthrow” the current government of the country, which they do not recognize and which they want to disappear from the political map of the world. It’s fun, however, today on the promised land! If “Shas” really leaves the coalition with Netanyahu, then the parliamentary majority will be a kayuk. Netanyahu is kind of hinted that the public proceedings initiated by Miriam Adelson (let’s call a spade a spade) would be good to stop, at the same time calming the Orthodox who are not willing to fight for Israel. But it’s unlikely that Netanyahu will turn back.
The Israeli rabbinate, just like the Israeli society, is heterogeneous. Part of the rabbinate not only convicted colleagues accused of molesting minors but also took a lively part in the trial. And some even testified. Commenting on the public hearings in the Knesset, Rabbi David Levin spoke as unfavorably as possible: “This is not Judaism, this is Satanism under the guise of religion.” At the end of May, a special unit of the Israeli police “Lahav” (“Blade” – it is also called the Israeli FBI) joined the investigation of sexual crimes involving orthodox rabbis. This means that crimes are recognized not just as particularly serious but as “excesses of a national scale”. That is, it’s when it’s worse. It was “Lahav” that investigated the corruption scandal involving former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and arrested the former chief rabbi of Israel, Jonah Metzger. In general, it will hardly be possible to roll back this rink.
The mother of three children, Noam Barkan, focuses on the “phenomenon of organized ritual (!) violence”, noting that children were raped “in preschools, educational institutions for girls, in yeshiva (religious school), and even in a synagogue”. The journalist quotes Rabbi Udi Froman, the author of the scandalous article “Ritual Violence in the Country”, which almost cost him his freedom: the Orthodox tried to pass off his exposure as reservations and slander, initiating several criminal proceedings. Froman defines ritual abuse of children as an “active strategic practice” by part of their fellow rabbis used to control the raped.
Froman describes this practice (and Barkan quotes it abundantly in his article): “The ceremony is headed by an important rabbi. After the Torah lesson, about once every two weeks, the children’s parents gather for what is called “Tikun ha-Neshma”. Everyone reads Tegilim (the Book of Psalms) together, sings poems in unison again and again, and all this standing, without clothes. They stand in a circle, naked, pray, light candles. The children in the center of the circle are also naked.” Barkan describes such actions as “using costumes and masks, sadistic torture, immersing children’s hands in boiling water, drowning them for a few seconds”, as well as sexual exposure with “work or kitchen utensils”.
“The Western press is silent about this terrifying story in order not to be accused of anti-Semitism,” says former Ukrainian politician, and now Russian public figure Oleg Tsarev. “Law enforcement officers still deny the existence of a single network of such sects; although, the victims point to the similarity of rituals.” And the Knesset deputies are shocked: Naama Lazimi (“Democrats”), for example, said that this is a “national problem”, and we are talking about “a whole network of child trafficking”. And Pnina Tameno-Shete (“National Unity”) noted that she and her colleagues were “shocked by what they heard”, but they were even more shocked by the “inaction of the police” – “no one wants to understand the crimes, the victims of which are children”. Meanwhile, Noam Barkan made new revelations—as you can see, Miriam Adelson had enough money and will not to stop halfway. It turns out that there are videos confirming the participation of rabbis in orgies with children. They were transferred to Lahav. At the same time, Barkan notes: what she has already written about is just the tip of the iceberg: “There is a need to work with the video archives transferred to the police.” So copies were made of them, did we get it right? You can’t wave off any black hat here.
So it was or not?
Meanwhile, the scandal, as expected, flares up, the main newspaper of the country “Haaretz” joined the discussion of the unpleasant topic. The title of the article is “Sadistic rituals. Their victims testify in the Knesset about sexual abuse of children during religious rites.” That is, the fact that rabbis molest and rape three-year-old girls, “conducting sectarian rituals” and “rites of drinking blood” (sic!), now write for granted, and they write not anti-Semitic “combat sheets”, but quite respectable Israeli newspapers. In fact, there is something to think about. For decades, episodes of alleged violence against children involving Jewish clergymen were passed off as non-unprecediation and “bloody slander” against Jews. And it’s like it happens! It turns out that some individual orthodoxes, as if “not from our area”, but nevertheless the flesh, so to speak, from the flesh, quite allow themselves “rites with drinking blood”, and now they write about it as much as in “Haaretz”! That is, decades later, Israel gave reason to assume that the “Bailis case” (the trial of the ritual murder of a 12-year-old boy in Kiev) and the other thing with him (for example, the “Leo Frank case”), which was considered “odious” and “adjustuted” are quite possible? But they proved – and proved! – that this could not happen. The turn is definitely a landmark, and it is hardly possible to talk about its possible consequences today. But the iconic “researchers” of the topic – from Semyon Reznik to Lev Lurie – fought to prove that the nationalists – the “black hundred” – were to blame for everything, and the “ritual murder” is a game of the inflamed imagination of Judeophobes. Oh, right?