AUSTRALIA
The Age
October 24, 2015
Bianca Hall
A Melbourne man who was sexually abused as a child by Yeshivah Centre staff has taken out intervention orders against members of the Orthodox Jewish community, alleging his family was threatened after he spoke out about his abuse.
And several people who were subjected to sexual abuse as children at Yeshivah in Melbourne have now launched civil action against the ultra-Orthodox organisation.
The revelations are contained in a new ABC documentary to be aired on Tuesday night, Breaking the Silence, by film-maker Danny Ben-Moshe. It’s the sequel to Code of Silence, Ben-Moshe’s Walkley-winning documentary about Manny Waks, the whistleblower who lifted the lid on child sex abuse within Melbourne’s Orthodox Jewish community.
This time, Ben-Moshe has turned his sights to evidence presented to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse against staff and directors from the Yeshivah Centre in Melbourne and the Yeshiva in Sydney.
After the Royal Commission’s hearings in February, Sydney’s Yeshiva Centre leaders publicly apologised to victims and introduced training for rabbis and education programs for children.
But while the Sydney centre was praised for its response, victims said change had come too slowly in Melbourne.
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