Members of the Jewish Orthodox community walk through a Brooklyn neighborhood on the Yom Kippur holiday, Oct. 9, 2019. (Spencer Platt\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Groups that smear yeshivas, and suburbanites who assail observant Jews for daring to want to move into their towns, thicken an expanding cloud of hostility against Jews who wear their Jewishness openly. Denying that subtle but significant link should not be an option. <\/p>\n
Since 2012, an activist group called Young Advocates for Fair Education has accused a number of Hasidic yeshivas of neglecting secular studies and thereby handicapping their students, preventing them from becoming productive members of society. <\/p>\n
The group\u2019s founder and executive director, Naftuli Moster, would himself seem to belie his claim. He has mounted a tremendously successful, if misleading, public relations campaign against those yeshivas, and convinced a wide assortment of media to parrot and embrace his claims \u2014 an impressive accomplishment for a graduate of what he insists is a school that didn\u2019t prepare him for a career.<\/p>\n
Moster insists that his only concern in championing state control and radical overhaul of all yeshivas and private schools in New York State is to ensure that Hasidic children will be able to make decent livings. But some observers, who note that he has characterized Orthodox rules governing family purity as \u201cabsurd\u201d and \u201ccrooked,\u201d feel that Moster may be motivated by the antipathy he harbors for the community in which he was raised.<\/p>\n
He also claims that many Hasidic parents are overjoyed by his crusade but are too cowed by nefarious community leaders to register their chagrin. <\/p>\n
The truth emerged when New York State released proposed regulations calling for tight state oversight of private schools. YAFFED reportedly managed to amass 2,000 comments of support for the measure. Opponents, though \u2014 actual parents and grandparents of yeshiva students who went on record against the regulations \u2014 numbered more than 140,000. <\/p>\n
Still, the New York City Education Department investigated YAFFED\u2019s charges. It did not locate the thousands of students reputed to be barely able to sign their names in English.<\/p>\n
Of the 39 allegedly deadbeat yeshivas YAFFED had pointed to, only 28 were found to in fact be K-12 schools \u2014 the others served older students and were thus outside of the department\u2019s purview. <\/p>\n
Two of those 28 were found to be fully providing the entire spectrum (12 distinct subject areas) of mandated secular studies; 21 were close to providing them or in the process of developing equivalency of instruction. A total of five yeshivas were found to be \u201cunderdeveloped.\u201d<\/p>\n
This means 82 percent of yeshivas reported as failing were meeting or close to meeting the DOE\u2019s curriculum standards. Contrast this, if you will, with the 47 percent proficiency in English and 46 percent proficiency in math for students across New York City public schools. <\/p>\n
In the letter detailing the findings, New York City Department of Education Chancellor Richard A. Carranza noted that \u201cThe DOE recognizes and applauds the significant progress made as a result of the proactive steps many schools have taken.\u201d <\/p>\n
Carranza also pointed out that a group called Parents for Educational and Religious Liberty in Schools \u201chas developed and expanded\u2026 secular curriculum materials it has made available to yeshivas in mathematics, English Language Arts, and STEM.\u201d He added, too, that \u201csubstantially equivalent instruction does not necessarily require that a school meet each and every item in the Education Law\u201d and that \u201ca strong argument has been made that Judaic Studies can be a powerful context in which to cultivate critical thinking and textual analysis skills.\u201d<\/p>\n
Then came the inflammatory headlines from national and Jewish outlets alike, which erroneously proclaimed that only two yeshivas provide basic secular education. <\/p>\n
Pivot, now, to upstate New York and northern New Jersey, where Orthodox Jewish families from Brooklyn have been migrating since the 1970s, seeking a less urban and more affordable place to live. <\/p>\n
A number of towns have enacted zoning changes forbidding new houses of worship.
In the Orange County town of Chester, 60 miles north of New York City, housing rules were used to prevent an influx of Hasidic Jews. New York Attorney General Letitia James recently announced action to fight the rules. <\/p>\n
James has called the town\u2019s actions \u201cblatant anti-Semitism.\u201d She warns that \u201csome people find it easy to present Orthodox Jews as the source of all their problems. That\u2019s just wrong.\u201d <\/p>\n
Last year, a video produced by the Rockland County Republican Party began with dark clouds rolling in and ominous orchestral music swelling as large text flashes slowly across the screen warning that \u201ca storm is brewing\u201d and \u201cif they win, we lose.\u201d<\/p>\n
The \u201cthey,\u201d the production makes clear, are the Orthodox Jewish residents of the county\u2019s villages and towns. After an outcry, the video was removed. But its creation was telling. <\/p>\n
The previous year, Councilman Pete Bradley of Clarkstown, a Rockland County town, encouraged local residents to call or text him if they \u201csuspect that non-residents are using our Town Parks.\u201d Orthodox families from neighboring towns had apparently been bringing their children to play in Clarkstown\u2019s parks. <\/p>\n
A few months earlier, Bradley criticized New York Governor Andrew Cuomo for visiting with Hasidic Jewish community leaders, contrasting them with what he called \u201cnormal Jews.\u201d<\/p>\n
In Jackson Township, New Jersey, Councilman Robert Nixon was accused of orchestrating the creation of several ordinances aimed at curbing the activities of Orthodox Jewish residents, of spying on Jewish residents and of coordinating his efforts with \u201cJackson Strong,\u201d a group that has demonstrated deeply anti-Orthodox sentiment. After becoming the subject of two federal civil rights lawsuits, Nixon resigned. <\/p>\n
In the Ocean County town of Toms River, the town\u2019s mayor once called the growing Orthodox presence \u201can invasion,\u201d and residents posted unfriendly comments online, including one referring to the Orthodox Jews as \u201cstinkin cockroaches.\u201d<\/p>\n
There is no direct line from seeking to undermine yeshivas and seeing Hasidic Jews as targets for physical violence. Stupid thugs don\u2019t know a yeshiva from a yurt. <\/p>\n
And there is no direct line, either, between those who don\u2019t want Jews moving into their towns and jerks who take pleasure in knocking off Jews\u2019 hats or punching them.
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/01-24-20-brooklyn-orthodox-jews.jpg\")