AUSTRALIA
The Australian Jewish News
A WAR of words has broken out between Sydney’s top Chabad family and child-sexual-abuse victim Manny Waks. Rabbi Eli Feldman is considering his options following a public Facebook post by Waks which said “spreading hate, lies and distortions” was “unbecoming of a rabbi”.
The post, which doesn’t specifically name Feldman, has since been removed, but The AJN understands the spat erupted over differing versions of the circumstances surrounding Waks’ move to Yeshiva in Sydney as a teenager.
The post came just days after Rebbetzin Pnina Feldman, Eli Feldman’s mother, was forced to apologise after she sent Waks an email on Erev Yom Kippur, in which she said people described him as a “lowlife”.
“I haven’t met a person yet with one nice word to say about you. Most people consider you a lowlife,” Rebbetzin Feldman wrote.
She went on to tell the CEO and founder of Tzedek, an advocate for Jewish survivors of child sexual abuse, to “get over it”, adding that he needed “counselling” and that his “blame-game” was “unjust, unwarranted, undeserved and wicked”.
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