One emerged as an especially crucial source: Leonard “Lenny” Pozner, a Jewish-American father whose son Noah Pozner was the youngest Sandy Hook shooting victim. Noah had celebrated his sixth birthday less than a month before his death.

 

Six year old Noah Pozner A"H

“People used the tenets and practices of his faith to question everything, from the nature of Noah’s funeral to his burial, to sort of question whether he was dead or not.

Sandy Hook ‘hoax’ trial shows how false narratives are fed and spread, warns author

 

In her new book, ‘Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth,’ NYT journalist Elizabeth Williamson sounds the alarm on more pernicious conspiracy theories

In early August, a Texas jury ordered extremist talk show host Alex Jones to pay nearly $50 million in total damages to the parents of a first-grader killed during the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. Conspiracy theorist Jones had falsely called the mass shooting a “hoax” coordinated by the United States government to spur a tightening of US gun laws.

While 26 people, most of them children, were killed in the 2012 mass shooting, the conspiracy theories of Infowars host Jones and others took root among some Americans. Believers in such disinformation harassed Sandy Hook family members, smearing them as liars and even issuing death threats against them.

In her new book, “Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth,” New York Times journalist Elizabeth Williamson sounds the alarm over the spread of this and similar disinformation campaigns and conspiracy theories.

The August 5 judgment against Jones in a defamation case brought by Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, parents of a 6-year-old killed in the attack, marks a high point in the Sandy Hook survivors’ legal battle against opportunists who profit off conspiracy theories. But the fact that the false claims were taken so seriously by so many is extremely troubling to Williamson.

“It’s really a foundational story about how false narratives and misinformation have grown,” Williamson told The Times of Israel in a phone interview. The journalist has been chronicling the Sandy Hook legal battle and conspiracy theories since 2018.

“I trace it in our society and our culture, going from Sandy Hook to the spread of conspiracy theories and misinformation, especially aided by social media. It has brought a lot of worry to us over the last decade,” said Williamson.

The book follows the flow of disinformation from Sandy Hook to Pizzagate, QAnon, COVID-19 and the January 6, 2021, riot at the US Capitol. Since the book’s publication in March, conspiracy theories echoing those about Sandy Hook continued to materialize — including after the May 21 school shooting in Uvalde, Texas.

 

Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones attempts to answer questions about his emails asked by Mark Bankston, lawyer for Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, during trial at the Travis County Courthouse in Austin, Texas, August 3, 2022.

“An increasing number of individuals, for reasons of ideology — or in Alex Jones’s case, for profit — are willing to deny established truth and accepted science more frequently,” Williamson said. “January 6 really showed us that people are more often willing to cross from the virtual to the real world and defend these false beliefs with confrontation and with violence.”

For the book, she sifted through around 10,000 pages of court documents and interviewed over 400 people. One emerged as an especially crucial source: Leonard “Lenny” Pozner, a Jewish-American father whose son Noah Pozner was the youngest Sandy Hook shooting victim. Noah had celebrated his sixth birthday less than a month before his death.

Noah Pozner, 6, was among the 20 child victims of the Dec. 14, 2012 shooting massacre at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., that also claimed six adults. (Courtesy Pozner family, via Forward)

“This book would not exist without Lenny Pozner, and without his willingness and generosity in sharing his story,” Williamson said.

On December 14, 2012, Pozner and his then-wife Veronique had their three children — Sophia and twins Arielle and Noah — at Sandy Hook Elementary. When Veronique rushed to the scene after receiving an alert, she saw that Sophia and Arielle were with Lenny in the school parking lot. But inside one classroom, a police officer found the wrenching sight of 14 slain children — including Noah, who was wearing his Batman hoodie.

Readers have told Williamson that it’s a difficult book about a dark subject, with some unsure about even picking it up.

Veronique Pozner reacts with grief after learning that a gunman killed her son Noah at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, December 14, 2012. (AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey)

“If people are unwilling to engage with the book because of the horror of that day, I completely understand the human reaction,” she said. “But I would really encourage people to try to [read] it anyway… In the end, it’s really a story of Lenny and all the families who confronted this phenomenon of misinformation.”

Born in Latvia, Pozner left the Soviet Union with his parents, living in Israel and Italy before finally settling in the US. With a background in the tech industry, Pozner once believed in a few conspiracy theories himself — including about the moon landing.

“He was the person that helped me understand, early on, just what a significant threat the Sandy Hook conspiracy theories were, how they were this watershed in how information and disinformation travel,” Williamson said, adding that this included “how social media algorithms feed false information to people” and how social media helps isolated conspiracy theorists “find each other and gather online.”

Lenny Pozner with his son Noah.

Williamson credits Swiss-born Veronique — who, like Pozner, is also an immigrant to the US — for insights stemming from her career as a health care worker, including with regard to COVID-19 misinformation.

Williamson also interviewed Sandy Hook parents Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, whose son Jesse died in the shooting and who filed one of three separate lawsuits against Jones.

In covering many legal battles over the years, it was through one in particular — a family court hearing after Jones’s divorce from his ex-wife, Kelly — that Williamson introduced herself to Jones and got an interview with him. They met at his office in Austin, Texas, a location that he keeps private. The interview lasted for three hours. In the book, she recalls him sweating despite freezing indoor temperatures, pacing around the office and comparing himself to a leader of the Texans at the Alamo.

Following the publication of the interview in 2018, multiple Big Tech companies from Apple to Twitter booted Jones and Infowars off their platforms.

“Although he likes to say he was only spreading the theories of others, or he was just reporting what was already out there, in actuality I found he was one of the first people to embrace and concoct a false theory around the Sandy Hook shootings,” Williamson said. “Hours after the shooting, he began spreading it. He did it for years.”

Tens of millions tuned in to hear Jones’s show online or through hundreds of radio stations nationwide. When he wasn’t pitching conspiracy theories, he was hawking merchandise to address such fears as the end of days, civil war or a government takeover. Such merchandise brought $50 million in revenue each year, according to the author.

“Once he hit on a theme that seemed to resonate with his listeners, he did not let go,” Williamson said. “Sandy Hook was one of them. What he did in the aftermath of Sandy Hook was despicable even for him. He named specific victims, thereby exposing them to very personalized abuse, including Lenny Pozner.”

The harassment Pozner faced included antisemitism.

“I would say Lenny was one of the chief recipients of this,” Williamson said. “People used the tenets and practices of his faith to question everything, from the nature of Noah’s funeral to his burial, to sort of question whether he was dead or not.

‘Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth,’ by Elizabeth Williamson.

“Part of it was the sort of conspiratorial bigotry — the idea that he and Veronique… did this for profit, somehow pushed by the government to fake their own child’s death. That is truly despicable. Some of the individuals who spread these false theories targeting Lenny and Veronique in particular were rank antisemites and Holocaust deniers.”

Lenny found ways to push back. He won a defamation case against James Fetzer, the co-author of a book titled “Nobody Died at Sandy Hook,” whom Williamson characterized as an antisemite. And he engaged in an effort to speak truth to conspiracists by participating in a group chat with the members of a Facebook group called “Sandy Hook Hoax.” Lenny aimed to transparently answer questions while providing documentary evidence — Noah’s birth certificate, school resources and, tragically, postmortem report. Initial sympathy turned to vitriol, with Lenny eventually getting kicked out of the group.

“I trace in the book how [the group] turned from expressing condolences and identifying themselves, asking great questions, to attacking him. He was such a threat to the group by being there and trying to confront them with the truth,” Williamson said.

Infowars host and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones rallies pro-Trump supporters, November 5, 2020, in Phoenix, Arizona

 

Yet Pozner was also fielding respectful questions from other members of the group – mainly young mothers whose children were around the age of the Sandy Hook victims. These women could not accept that children had perished in the mass shooting and turned to conspiracy theories for an explanation. Pozner established a separate Facebook group where they could speak with him. These women became Pozner’s first volunteers for a nonprofit he founded called the HONR Network that fights online hate and harassment, from conspiracy theories to revenge porn.

“He’s made it his life’s work to push back against this kind of material, to support and defend vulnerable people who are targeted by it,” Williamson said.

In speaking with Sandy Hook families overall, she said, “I was incredibly privileged to hear their stories. I am incredibly grateful they trusted me with their stories. They did it because they want to help all of us. They’ve seen and experienced firsthand the human impact of the disinformation proliferating in our society. They want to issue a warning to all of us.”

https://www.timesofisrael.com/sandy-hook-hoax-trial-shows-how-false-narratives-are-fed-and-spread-warns-author/?utm_source=The+Daily+Edition&utm_campaign=daily-edition-2022-08-23&utm_medium=email

"Do you not know that a false pretender to prophecy is liable to capital punishment, for having arrogated to himself unwarranted distinction, just as the person who prophesies in the name of idols is put to death, as we read in Scripture "But the prophet that shall speak a word presumptuously in My name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die." (Deuteronomy 18:20). What better evidence is there of his mendacity, than his very pretensions to be the Messiah."

 

"You mention that a certain man in one of the cities of Yemen pretends that he is the Messiah.¹⁷ As I live, I am not surprised at him or at his followers, for I have no doubt that he is mad and a sick person should not be rebuked or reproved for an illness brought on by no fault of his own. Neither am I surprised at his votaries, for they were persuaded by him because of their sorry plight, their ignorance of the importance and high rank of the Messiah, and their mistaken comparison of the Messiah with the son of the Mahdi [the belief in] whose rise they are witnessing. But I am astonished that you, a scholar who has studied carefully the doctrines of the rabbis, are inclined to repose faith in him. Do you not know, my brother, that the Messiah is a very eminent prophet, more illustrious than all the prophets after Moses? Do you not know that a false pretender to prophecy is liable to capital punishment, for having arrogated to himself unwarranted distinction, just as the person who prophesies in the name of idols is put to death, as we read in Scripture "But the prophet that shall speak a word presumptuously in My name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die." (Deuteronomy 18:20). What better evidence is there of his mendacity, than his very pretensions to be the Messiah.

 Do these characteristics make him a Messiah? You were beguiled by him because you have not considered the pre-eminence of the Messiah, the manner and place of his appearance, and the marks whereby he is to be identified. The Messiah, indeed, ranks after Moses in eminence and distinction, and God has bestowed some gifts upon him which he did not bestow upon Moses, as may be gathered from the following verses: "His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord." (Isaiah 11:3). "The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him." (11:2). "And Righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins." (11:5). Six appellations were divinely conferred upon him as the following passage indicates: "For a child is born unto us, and a son is given unto us, and the government is upon his shoulder, and he is called Pele, Yoetz, el, Gibbor, Abiad, Sar-Shalom." (Isaiah 9:5). And another verse alluding to theMessiah culminates in the following manner "Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee." (Psalms 2:7). All these statements demonstrate the pre-eminence of the Messiah." 

 As to the place where the Messiah will make his first appearance, Scripture intimates that he will first present himself only in the Land of Israel, as we read, "He will suddenly appear in His Temple" (Malachi 3:1). As for the advent of the Messiah, nothing at all will be known about it before it occurs. The Messiah is not a person concerning whom it may be predicted that he will be the son of so and so, or of the family of so and so. On the contrary he will be unknown before his coming, but he will prove by means of miracles and wonders that he is the true Messiah. Scripture in allusion to his mysterious lineage says, "His name is the Shoot, and he will shoot up out of his place" (Zechariah 6:12). Similarly, Isaiah referring to the arrival of the Messiah implies that neither his father nor mother, nor his kith nor kin will be known, "For he will shoot up right forth as a sapling, and as a root out of the dry ground." (53:2). After his manifestation in Palestine, Israel will be gathered in Jerusalem and the other cities of Palestine. Then will the tidings spread to the East and the West until it will reach you in Yemen and those beyond you in India as we learn from Isaiah.

I beg you to send a copy of this missive to every community in the cities and hamlets, in order to strengthen the people in their faith and to put them on their feet. Read it at public gatherings and in private, and you will thus become a public benefactor. Take adequate precautions lest its contents be divulged to the Gentiles by an evil person and mishap overtake us (God spare us therefrom).²² When I began writing this letter I had some misgivings about it, but they were overruled by my conviction that the public welfare takes precedence over one's personal safety. Moreover, I am sending it to a personage such as you, "and the secret of the Lord may be entrusted to those who fear Him." Our sages, the successors of the prophets, assured us that persons engaged in a religious mission will meet with no disaster (Pesahim 8b). What more important religious mission is there than this. Peace be unto all Israel. Amen. 

*

THE EPISTLE TO YEMEN, probably a compilation of several shorter responsa, was written by Maimonides about 1172 in reply to an inquiry (or inquiries) by Jacob ben Netan'el al-Fayyūmi, the then head of the Jewish community in Yemen. The exchange of letters was occasioned by a crisis through which the Jews of that country were passing. A forced conversion to Islam, inaugurated about 1165 by 'Abd-al-Nabī ibn Mahdi, who had gained control over most of Yemen, threw the Jews into panic. The campaign conducted by a recent convert to win them to his new faith, coupled with a Messianic movement started by a native of the country who claimed he was the Messiah, increased the confusion within the Jewish community. Rabbi Jacob evidently sought guidance and encouragement, and Maimonides attempted to supply both.

In the course of his reply Maimonides deals at length with several subjects which were live issues in his time. In the Hebrew introduction these topics are analyzed in detail. Here only a brief summary will be presented.

 

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Epistle_to_Yemen/Complete

The Bomb of a Grandson!

 

Haredi Student Arrested for Operating Bomb Lab in Dorm Room

Photo Credit: Screenshot from Kan 11 News tweet.

The Haredi bomb maker.

 

On July 25, Kikar Hashabbat reported that large Shin Bet and Israel Police forces raided a dormitory room in a sleepaway Haredi Yeshiva in Israel, and discovered an explosives lab and explosive devices (השב”כ והמשטרה עצרו תלמיד ישיבה; החשד: מעבדת נפץ). The Haredi yeshiva boy suspected of running the lab was immediately arrested and taken for questioning, while his room and the lab were scrubbed. A severe gag order was imposed on the investigation and the existence of the gag order and the suspect’s detention was extended several times, as investigators tried to figure out the purpose of the operation. The gag had been lifted on July 24, and Kikar Hashabbat reported that the detainee is the grandson of one of Israel’s biggest Lithuanian rabbis.

On Sunday, night, Kan 11 News revealed (הנין של גדולי הרבנים שנעצר על ידי השב”כ מתוודה מול המצלמה) that the student was the great-grandson of two great Lithuanian leaders: the late Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky (who passed away last March), and Rabbi Aharon Yehuda Leib Shteinman (who passed away in December 2017). Their scion is likely going to be charged with conspiring to commit a nationalistic crime, creating illegal weapons, trading illegal weapons, possessing illegal weapons, and manufacturing homemade explosives.

---

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His goal was to “arm the hills with explosives” to carry out price tag operations against PA Arabs. Kan 11 will broadcast an exclusive report Monday night, during the evening news, with the young man’s confession in front of the cameras, detailing his preparation of the charges and the ideology behind the endeavor.

Despite the public channel’s attempt to present this as a “Haredi underground,” the story so far shows it was a one-man underground, albeit with grandiose aspirations to expand the franchise. The suspect, A., told the reporters: “The plan was to establish a Haredi underground. Not to puncture another tire in Sheikh Jarrah (a.k.a. Shimon HaTzadik, a majority-Arab neighborhood in eastern Jerusalem – DI). This is a systematic plan at the level of an underground.”

A. went on to say that “each load was made of gunpowder, a gas bottle, and an empty can of Pringles. Each load costs about NIS 40 ($13). The first charge I made exploded in my hands when I threw it out of the room.”

“The plan was to arm the hills, to put in each area some kind of weapon that would be easy to release if they wanted it. That’s why I didn’t involve any of the Hill Youths, they were all Haredim, because I knew that the Shin Bet had the least foothold in the Haredi yeshivas.”

Two things: 1. Turns out the Shin Bet has a foothold in the Haredi yeshivas, and, 2. It remains to be seen how many of A’s recruits were real or imagined.

Last Friday, according to Kan 11, A. was arrested once again on the suspicion that he had threatened a special police force investigator and threatened to install explosive charges inside his yeshiva building.

While we don’t yet know his motivations, it’s plausible to assume it is in response to the Bnei Brak and El Ad terror attacks as well the many ongoing assaults against Charieidim by Arabs, which are often made into viral TikTok videos.

 

https://www.jewishpress.com/news/israel/religious-secular-in-israel-israel/haredi-student-arrested-for-operating-bomb-lab-in-dorm-room/2022/08/22/

Nisht Gut Far Der Yidden....נישט גוט פאר די יידן

 Goldiner, Dave (August 24, 2018). "Who Is Allen Weisselberg, The Third Key Jewish Associate To Flip On Trump". Jewish Daily Forward.

Allen Howard Weisselberg (born August 15, 1947) is an American businessman who was the chief financial officer (CFO) of the Trump Organization. Weisselberg served as a co-trustee of a trust set up in 2017 by Donald Trump before Trump's inauguration as president of the United States.

Weisselberg was born in Brooklyn, New York, and grew up in the borough's Brownsville neighborhood.^[1] He is of Jewish descent.^[2] He graduated from Thomas Jefferson High School in nearby East New York, before receiving a Bachelor of Science in accounting from Pace University in 1970.^[3][4]

Trump CFO’s plea deal could make him a prosecution witness

1 of 2

FILE - Allen Weisselberg, right, stands behind then President-elect Donald Trump during a news conference in the lobby of Trump Tower in New York, Jan. 11, 2017. Weisselberg, Trump's chief financial officer, is expected to plead guilty on Thursday, Aug. 18, 2022 to tax violations in a deal that would require him to testify about business practices at the former president's company. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)

 

NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump’s chief financial officer is expected to plead guilty to tax violations Thursday in a deal that would require him to testify about illicit business practices at the former president’s company, two people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press.

Allen Weisselberg is charged with taking more than $1.7 million in off-the-books compensation from the Trump Organization over several years, including untaxed perks like rent, car payments and school tuition.

The plea deal would require Weisselberg to speak in court Thursday about the company’s role in the alleged compensation arrangement and possibly serve as a witness when the Trump Organization goes on trial in October on related charges, the people said.

The two people were not authorized to speak publicly about the case and did so on condition of anonymity.

Weisselberg, 75, is likely to receive a sentence of five months in jail, to be served at New York City’s notorious Rikers Island complex, and he could be required to pay about $2 million in restitution, including taxes, penalties and interest, the people said. If that punishment holds, Weisselberg would be eligible for release after about 100 days.

Messages seeking comment were left with the Manhattan district attorney’s office and lawyers for Weisselberg and the Trump Organization.

Weisselberg is the only person to face criminal charges so far in the Manhattan district attorney’s long-running investigation of the company’s business practices.

Seen as one of Trump’s most loyal business associates, Weisselberg was arrested in July 2021. His lawyers have argued the Democrat-led district attorney’s office was punishing him because he wouldn’t offer information that would damage Trump.

The district attorney has also been investigating whether Trump or his company lied to banks or the government about the value of its properties to obtain loans or reduce tax bills.

Former District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr., who started the investigation, last year directed his deputies to present evidence to a grand jury and seek an indictment of Trump, according to former prosecutor Mark Pomerantz, who previously led the probe.

But after Vance left office, his successor, Alvin Bragg, allowed the grand jury to disband without charges. Both prosecutors are Democrats. Bragg has said the investigation is continuing.

The Trump Organization is not involved in Weisselberg’s expected guilty plea Thursday and is scheduled to be tried in the alleged compensation scheme in October.

Prosecutors alleged that the company gave untaxed fringe benefits to senior executives, including Weisselberg, for 15 years. Weisselberg alone was accused of defrauding the federal government, state and city out of more than $900,000 in unpaid taxes and undeserved tax refunds.

Under state law, punishment for the most serious charge against Weisselberg, grand larceny, could carry a penalty as high as 15 years in prison. But the charge carries no mandatory minimum, and most first-time offenders in tax-related cases never end up behind bars.

The tax fraud charges against the Trump Organization are punishable by a fine of double the amount of unpaid taxes, or $250,000, whichever is larger.

Trump has not been charged in the criminal probe. The Republican has decried the New York investigations as a “political witch hunt,” has said his company’s actions were standard practice in the real estate business and in no way a crime.

Last week, Trump sat for a deposition in New York Attorney General Letitia James’ parallel civil investigation into allegations Trump’s company misled lenders and tax authorities about asset values. Trump invoked his Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination more than 400 times.

___

Follow Michael Sisak on Twitter at twitter.com/mikesisak. Send confidential tips by visiting https://www.ap.org/tips/.

Officials had previously warned that the Rockland County patient was most likely the “tip of the iceberg.” The County of "Chosen" Idiots!

 

Polio May Have Been Spreading in New York Since April

 

A new study from the C.D.C. provides more details about a polio case detected in New York last month, and suggests the virus has been spreading elsewhere for a year.

 

Polio vaccines at a pop-up clinic at the Rockland County Department of Health in Pomona (Monsey N.Y.)

Polio may have been circulating widely for a year, and was present in New York’s wastewater as early as April, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

A wastewater sample collected in April in Orange County, N.Y., tested positive for the virus, pushing back the earliest known detection in the area. Officials had previously announced that the virus had been found in wastewater samples dating back to May in neighboring Rockland County.

Changes in the genome of the virus suggest that this version has been circulating, somewhere in the world, for up to a year. Genetically similar versions of the virus were detected in Israel in March and in Britain in June.

The new study provides more details from a continuing investigation into a polio case detected in New York last month, when officials announced that a young adult in Rockland County had become paralyzed from polio. It was the first report of polio in the United States since 2013.

The findings are not altogether surprising, especially given that polio, which is highly contagious, often spreads without causing serious symptoms, said Joseph Eisenberg, an infectious disease epidemiologist at the University of Michigan. “It can be circulating pretty extensively, being under the radar, before you actually start seeing paralysis cases,” he said.

Officials had previously warned that the Rockland County patient was most likely the “tip of the iceberg.”

In at least one of the county’s ZIP codes, just 37 percent of children under 24 months old have received three doses of the polio vaccine, according to the new study.

The patient, who had not been vaccinated against polio, was hospitalized in June after developing symptoms including a fever, neck stiffness and lower-limb weakness, according to the study. Poliovirus, which spreads mainly through feces, was subsequently detected in the patient’s stool.

Genomic sequencing revealed that the patient was infected with a version of the virus derived from the oral polio vaccine, which contains a weakened version of the virus. The oral vaccine has not been used in the United States since 2000. (American children are routinely immunized with an injected vaccine.)

The oral vaccine is safe and effective, but people who receive it can shed the weakened virus in their stool for weeks, potentially infecting others. In communities with many unvaccinated people, the virus can keep circulating and eventually acquire enough mutations to again become dangerous.

The discovery of the Rockland case prompted health experts to begin testing wastewater samples collected in the region, including those that had previously been collected for coronavirus surveillance.

Officials had previously announced that they had found the virus in 20 wastewater samples collected in Rockland and Orange counties and that all had been genetically linked to the patient sample.

The new study revealed that a 21st sample, collected in Orange County in April, also tested positive for the virus. However, there was not enough genomic information available to conclusively link it to the other samples.

Two hundred and sixty wastewater samples from Rockland and Orange Counties had been tested as of Aug. 10, and polio was detected in 8 percent of them, according to the new study.

“This suggests that there is a lot of community spread under the radar,” John Dennehy, a virologist and wastewater surveillance expert at Queens College, said in an email.

The virus has also been found in six wastewater samples from New York City.

The Rockland County patient was most likely exposed to polio one to three weeks before developing symptoms, the report noted. The patient did not travel abroad during this time, but did attend “a large gathering,” according to the study.

Polio was detected in wastewater in Rockland County 25 days before the patient developed symptoms, suggesting that others had been previously infected.

“The fact that we see it in the sewage 25 days before means that he’s probably not even the second case,” Dr. Eisenberg said.

People who have received three doses of the inactivated polio vaccine are well protected against the virus, but the virus poses a potential danger to unvaccinated people, including children who are too young to be vaccinated.

Nationally, polio vaccination rates are relatively high. But there are pockets of the country, including in New York, where vaccination rates are much lower, and the pandemic has set back childhood vaccination campaigns.

As of July 2020, just 67 percent of Rockland County children younger than 24 months had received three doses of the polio vaccine, a figure that fell to 60 percent by this month, according to the study.

After the Rockland County case was detected, the local Health Department began a vaccination campaign, but the number of shots given “was not sufficient to meaningfully increase” vaccination rates, the researchers reported.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/16/health/polio-new-york.html

“If you ever tell somebody, I’m going to kill myself.” - The standard line of child molesters - filthy coward!

 

Texas Man Convicted of Sex Crimes Took Deadly Drink in Court, Lawyers Say

 

Prosecutors believe that Edward Peter Leclair slipped poison into his bottled water and drank it, choosing death instead of prison time.

 

The Denton County Courts Building, where a jury found Edward Peter Leclair guilty of child sexual assault last Thursday.

Edward Peter Leclair’s hand shook as he reached for his water bottle inside a courtroom last Thursday and waited to hear whether a jury in Denton County, Texas, had found him guilty of five counts of child sexual assault.

The drink was slightly cloudy, but as the judge read aloud the guilty verdict for each count, Mr. Leclair, 57, quickly chugged it. About five minutes later, after he was taken by bailiffs to a nearby detention cell, he began throwing up. An ambulance took him to a hospital. Forty-five minutes later, he was dead.

Immediately, Mr. Leclair’s lawyer and prosecutors, who were in the courtroom and described Mr. Leclair’s actions, asked themselves: What had Mr. Leclair put in his drink?

“We’ve had incidences of people fainting. We’ve had heart attacks. We’ve even had people who fake illness,” said Jamie Beck, the first assistant attorney for the Denton County District Attorney’s office, which prosecuted the case. “But never something like this.”

The medical examiner’s office in Denton County is investigating the cause of death and whether it was related to some sort of poison. But prosecutors believe that Mr. Leclair, who was out on bond, sneaked cyanide — a deadly chemical — into the courthouse and put it in his Dasani water bottle as jurors deliberated for three and a half hours, Ms. Beck said. Surveillance footage from inside the Denton County Court building shows Mr. Leclair purchasing the water from a vending machine at about 7 a.m., she added.

Mr. Leclair’s lawyer, Mike Howard, said, “I think he made the decision to do what he did at the last moment,” when he realized that he could face up to 100 years in prison, which was a likely outcome given the seriousness of the charges and the conservative nature of the county.

“Had he waited another 30 seconds, he would have been in been sheriff’s custody and not had access to that bottled water,” Mr. Howard said. “He wouldn’t have been able to. So, you know, I think he knew.”

The trial, which lasted four days, had not been closely monitored in Denton, a suburb of Dallas. The specifics of the case were dark, Ms. Beck and Mr. Howard said: Mr. Leclair, of Frisco, had been accused of raping a girl between 13 and 17 years old five times from 2016 to 2018. The victim had testified during the trial, sharing disturbing details, Ms. Beck said.

But the case had not garnered attention until various local news organizations, including The Denton Record-Chronicle, reported on Mr. Leclair’s apparent death by suicide.

Ms. Beck said Mr. Leclair’s final action was selfish one.

“Not only did the offense traumatize the victim, and, you know, having to testify at the trial,” she said. “But then to have this happen, it’s like re-victimizing her all over again with his actions.”

Mr. Howard described Mr. Leclair as a normal client who was engaged throughout the trial, taking notes and asking questions. Mr. Leclair had worked as a corporate recruiter for years before losing his job during the pandemic, Mr. Howard said.

When he saw Mr. Leclair drink the water, Mr. Howard recalled, he thought: “Of course his mouth went dry. He just got very serious news.”

Perhaps his hand shaking, Mr. Howard thought at the time, would help show the jury that Mr. Leclair was a human being and not a “coldblooded monster.”

After Mr. Leclair threw up and emergency management services workers prepared to take him to a hospital, Mr. Howard said, he got one final look of his client, who had a “very grayish-white color” to him and looked in extremely bad shape.

Ms. Beck said that grayish color — along with his rapid death and the futile chest compressions — is why prosecutors with the district attorney’s office believe he ingested cyanide, which prevents the body’s cells from using oxygen, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

If it was cyanide, how he sneaked it in and in what form remains a mystery, Ms. Beck said. He could have placed it in a tiny pill, which would have been difficult for officers at the courthouse to detect, she added.

The 12 jurors, who were supposed to decide the length of his sentence by Friday morning, were dismissed on Thursday and not told what had occurred. The judge asked them to return to court on Friday morning. Mr. Howard and prosecutors were in the room when the news was shared with jurors.

“It was highly emotional,” Mr. Howard said.

Nearly all the jurors began to cry. Some believed that they had essentially driven a man to kill himself because of their verdict, he said.

“The judge was concerned that they would feel guilty — that they would feel guilty like this was their fault,” Mr. Howard said.

Wanting to ease the jurors’ minds, Mr. Howard said he gave them a forceful message: “You have nothing to feel bad about.”

“I said, ‘You know, the prosecution and defense see this case differently, and that’s OK,’” he recalled. “We’re adversaries, and that’s our job. But at the end of the day, your job is to come in and be fair and apply the law — and you did.”

When prosecutors told the victim what had happened, it “deeply impacted her,” Ms. Beck said.

Mr. Leclair’s manner of death also had a haunting quality for the victim, Ms. Beck said: He would often tell the girl, “If you ever tell somebody, I’m going to kill myself.”

“It’s a way to re-victimize somebody,” Ms. Beck said. “And that’s exactly what happened.”

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/15/us/texas-man-guilty-sexual-assault-poison.html

* The Tendler Syndrome * Another former member of the group, identified by the network only by the Hebrew initial Tet, has testified in court that a different member of the group, identified by the initial Aleph, was sexually abused by Laitman, who had promised her that sleeping with him would lead to spiritual enlightenment.

 

Would-be Likud Knesset member accused of helping cover up sexual abuse claims

 

Hanoch Milvitzky, who won the 26th slot on party’s electoral slate, is alleged to have convinced woman to commit perjury while serving as legal counsel of New Age religious group

 

Hanoch Milvitzky, former deputy Peta Tikvah mayor and legal counsel of the Beni Baruch group, has won the 26th slot on the Likud list for the November 1 elections.

 

A political newcomer expected to enter the next Knesset as part of opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party is suspected of convincing a sexual assault victim to commit perjury to protect the leader of a Kabbalistic group that he is a devout member of, according to an Israeli television report.

Hanoch Milvitzky, 49, managed to easily beat his competitors in Gush Dan for the 26th slot on the Likud’s list for the Knesset, basically guaranteeing his position as a member of Knesset, as polls have consistently shown the party winning over 30 seats in the November 1 elections.

Ahead of the Likud primaries last week, Milvitzky organized a conference that was attended by Likud’s top brass, including MKs Israel Katz, Yoav Gallant and Miri Regev.

The appearance of Likud bigwigs at Milvitzky’s gathering seemed to confirm him as a central figure in Israel’s largest party, a surprising development for a previously unknown attorney who until recently served as deputy mayor of Petah Tikva on behalf of the centrist Yesh Atid party.

According to Channel 12, Milvitzky’s swift rise in Likud ranks can be traced to a relatively small but active group called “Bnei Baruch – Kabbalah Laam,” a New Age religious association founded by Michael Laitman in 1991. The group has a following of approximately 50,000 in Israel and another 150,000 around the world.

The group teaches Kabbalah, a school of thought in Jewish mysticism, but seems to have political standing within the Likud party despite its denial of any political aspirations.

According to the network, some 7,000 members of the group have joined Likud calling themselves “Ihud Haam [literally translated from Hebrew as people’s union] in Likud.”

A former member of the group said it has a dark history relating to sexual abuse offenses, which the report claimed Milvitzky was directly involved in.

The individual, named in the Channel 12 report only as Bokah and described as a member of Laitman’s personal security team who was a member of Bnei Baruch for 20 years, detailed the immense power Laitman has over the group.

“You’re given a solution to any problem you may have in life – relationships, career, and so on. Anyone seeking to get married asks for his permission. The same goes for divorce. If, say, you’re sick, you’d go to him and he’d give you a bag with candy, a kind of medicine,” said Bokah.

Another former member of the group, identified by the network only by the Hebrew initial Tet, has testified in court that a different member of the group, identified by the initial Aleph, was sexually abused by Laitman, who had promised her that sleeping with him would lead to spiritual enlightenment.

According to Tet’s testimony, Aleph, originally from Russia, described Laitman as “an old man who had built a personal relationship with every woman in order to help her reach spiritual enlightenment.”

She allegedly told Tet how Laitman had led her into a small room with a bedroom and told her to get undressed. After she refused, he said, according to Tet’s testimony, “I’m your rabbi. If you love me, you’ll do it for me.”

“He controls your mind, your soul, your conscience — and you can’t refuse him. I was scared, I was scared to say no. It was rape,” Aleph said, according to Tet.

Michael Laitman, founder of the Bnei Baruch – Kaballah Laam, a New Age kabbalah association. 

 

Milvitzky got involved in the coverup attempt, according to the report, as the group allegedly managed to convince Aleph to return to Israel to reject Tet’s damning testimony in exchange for money.

“They flew her to Israel and trained her how to speak in court, how to lie and say she never slept with Laitman,” Bokah said.

Milvitzky, who serves as the legal counsel of Bnei Baruch, was brought in to brief Aleph on the false testimony she would need to give in court, according to Bokah, who said Aleph had shared her ordeal with him when it happened and has since left the group.

“[Milvitzky] led the entire thing. He briefed her on what the judge might ask and what she should say and in what way,” Bokah said. “He knew she was lying. That’s why they were paying her $20,000; first $10,000 and then another $10,000 after she appeared in court and returned to Moscow.”

Channel 12 said, moreover, that the Israel Bar Association is considering disciplinary measures against Milvitzky over claims that he had signed statements on behalf of women in the group without their knowledge.

According to a report by The Marker from earlier this month, Milvitzky was also involved in leading a defamation campaign against a woman who claimed to have been a target of sexual abuse by a member of Bnei Baruch and against another woman who said she was beaten by a member of the group.

Responding to the allegations, Milvitzky issued a statement denying wrongdoing.

“Regarding the accusations against Michael Laitman, the accusation attributed to Tet is not true as she [Tet] recanted in court. Similarly, Aleph has denied the accusations against him [Laitman] twice, six months apart. Your other claims about Milvitzky’s conduct were never brought up in court,” the statement said.

“The complaint filed against Milvitzky with the Israel Bar Association is false and we expect it will be directed to its proper place – the trashcan.”

He noted as well that he had been a member of Likud for about a decade, and had run for office in Petah Tikva under the Yesh Atid party banner on an ad hoc basis and with Likud’s authorization.

Bnei Baruch denied any political involvement and dismissed the allegations against its leader.

“The association has no political colors and does not deal in politics. Rather, it works to share the Kabbalah’s wisdom and make it accessible,” the group said.

 

https://www.timesofisrael.com/would-be-likud-knesset-member-accused-of-helping-cover-up-sexual-abuse-claims/?utm_source=The+Daily+Edition&utm_campaign=daily-edition-2022-08-14&utm_medium=email

Trump For Jail 2022! "We Don't Want To Wait"

 

I WANT MOSHIACH NOW!!!

 

A court on Friday unsealed the Justice Department’s warrant that preceded the search of former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property in Florida on Monday, revealing that the FBI is investigating him for possible violations of the Espionage Act and other laws. 

 Donald Trump's allies both on Capitol Hill and the airwaves spent the past few days clamoring for explanations after FBI agents searched the former president's home. On Friday, they got what they asked for. As it turns out, the Justice Department is conducting an investigation under the Espionage Act and other federal statutes that say highly classified government documents—especially those dealing with things like nuclear weapons—shouldn't be removed from secure locations in favor of a resort compound in Florida. The search for documents was reportedly preceded months ago by a subpoena and visits by federal agents including the head of the DOJ's counterintelligence and export control section. "I can't imagine why Trump would have this material," said Neil Eggleston, former White House counsel under President Barack Obama. "It's just hard to know why this whole battle ensued and why President Trump didn't simply return it when he was asked for it."  —David E. Rovella

 

 Nation's Top Secrets On Trump's Carpet ----- Pages from a Department of Justice court filing on Aug. 30, 2022, in response to a request from the legal team of former President Donald Trump for a special master to review the documents seized during the Aug. 8 search of Mar-a-Lago, are photographed early Wednesday, Aug. 31, 2022. Included in the filing was a FBI photo of documents that were seized during the search.

https://apnews.com/article/mar-a-lago-government-and-politics-1fef158c3a66bfc0ba6224570753ba47/gallery/954a1ccd337c4f5a8c588260e2abfefc

Read the full warrant below.

https://thehill.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/gov.uscourts.flsd_.617854.17.0_12.pdf

 

REDACTED DOJ AFFIDAVIT: AUGUST 26, 2022 - RELEASED BY FEDERAL JUDGE

https://thehill.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/gov.uscourts.flsd_.617854.102.1_2.pdf

One Picture Tells You All You Need To Know About Chabad's Outreach!

CHABAD ACTIVITIES IN BERMUDA - A mezuzah goes up on a Bermuda home

 

"When You See Corruption Being Rewarded and Honesty Becoming a Self-Sacrifice - You (May) Know That Your Society is Doomed!"

 

Rabbi David Vaknin, a leading Chabad rabbi in northern Israel, suggested that it was unlikely Klimi had carried out a sexual assault against the victim due to her age and accused the victim of having an ulterior motive.

 

‘We’re all human’: Rabbis, commanders defend officer who raped 70-year-old cleaner - Klimi Wants Moshiach Yesterday!

 

WE WANT MOSHIACH NOW!

Court records show support for officer Priel Klimi, 33, sentenced last week; rabbi casts doubt on his guilt, saying he’d managed to withstand ‘greater temptations’

Priel Klimi in military court, April 13, 2022

Senior military officers and prominent rabbis rallied in defense of an Israel Navy officer who was sentenced to seven years in prison for raping a 70-year-old cleaner at the base he was serving at, the Ynet news site reported Wednesday.

Priel Klimi, 33, a father of five who held the rank of major, was arrested in January 2020 and convicted earlier this year for raping the contract worker on four occasions. His lawyers had originally asked the court to prevent the publication of his name because he came from a “closed Haredi community” and it could have a negative impact on his family. The court denied the request.

While denying the allegations at first, Klimi later claimed that the sexual relationship with his victim was consensual after DNA samples matched the evidence on the scene.

Last week, Klimi was sentenced to seven years in prison by a military court. The prosecution had originally asked for a 10-year sentence.

Klimi was dismissed from the IDF and demoted to private.

The sentencing came following months of court hearings, during which a number of witnesses who had known Klimi were asked to testify to his character, including several leading rabbis and fellow IDF officers, according to Ynet, which revealed the testimonies from the trial.

 

WE DON'T WANT TO WAIT!

Priel Klimi arrives at military court in July 2022

Rabbi Chaim Shlomo Diskin, the chief rabbi of Kiryat Ata, told the court that he had known Klimi for a number of years, and praised the former officer during his trial and after the conviction.

“He has a heart of gold,” Diskin said. “I was always impressed by him.”

“I don’t know what happened, but I’ll say that even if he did slip, he’s still a good person,” Diskin said. “His family is miserable. He was very successful in the military and is now left without anything… We believe that every person possesses evil urges and it’s not [necessarily] a serial [offense].”

The military prosecutor challenged the rabbi, according to Ynet, noting that four separate rapes did not constitute a one-time lapse in judgment.

“You’re right,” Diskin replied. “But I believe that every person is born with urges. We’re all human… We don’t know what goes on in the soul. Things can build up. I’m not sure what happened there.”

 

Rabbi Chaim Shlomo Diskin (L) meets with Aryeh Deri during his visit in Kiryat Ata 

 

An unnamed retired lieutenant colonel who had served as Klimi’s commander for over a decade said the convicted rapist was “professional and thoughtful.”

“He stood out in a good way, which is why he was sent to the IDF officers course,” the officer said.

Asked by the prosecution what he thought about Klimi’s conviction, the officer said he was “sad to hear it,” adding that “today, as a civilian, I look at things softly. Anyone can make a mistake.”

Another former Navy officer said she had known Klimi as “a quiet person with a strong work ethic. He was always the first to arrive in the office and the last one to leave, a polite and goodhearted person.”

Rabbi David Vaknin, a leading Chabad rabbi in northern Israel, suggested that it was unlikely Klimi had carried out a sexual assault against the victim due to her age and accused the victim of having an ulterior motive.

“We’re talking about a 70-year-old woman. [Klimi] was subject to greater temptations and didn’t cave, but he caved to her?” Vaknin said. He accused the victim of “having a specific agenda or a plan that you [the judges] are unwittingly helping her achieve,” and suggested she was seeking “a fat pension.”

Tami Ulman, an attorney who represented Klimi, said during the court deliberations that her client “respects the conviction but claims he is innocent and thus does not express remorse and does not confess to the allegations.”

She accused the prosecution of “intimidating” Klimi’s commanders who came to testify in the trial.

The IDF said last week after Klimi’s sentencing that the military prosecution would study the case and consider appealing the verdict.

The military has been criticized for its handling of sexual assault allegations. In an ongoing case in military court, Lt. Col. Dan Sharoni reached a plea deal last month after being charged with 79 counts of sex crimes for filming dozens of his female subordinates while they were nude without their knowledge. The deal, which originally included him potentially retaining his military pension, set off a firestorm of controversy about the case and about how the IDF handles sex abuse.

Last week, a former IDF soldier said she was repeatedly raped and sexually abused by a Palestinian security prisoner while she served in Gilboa Prison, with the full cooperation of her commander.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/were-all-human-rabbis-commanders-defend-officer-who-raped-70-year-old-cleaner/?utm_source=The+Daily+Edition&utm_campaign=daily-edition-2022-08-04&utm_medium=email

The polio victim is reportedly living at his parents’ home with his wife. “He was released from the hospital,” one source told the New York Jewish Week on condition of anonymity. “He’s a young adult, in a wheelchair. He got married recently.” Rabbi Shmuel Kamenetsky Speaking To Himself Said The Polio Victim Is A Hoaxer!

 

NYC health officials urge vaccination in Brooklyn’s Hasidic communities following upstate polio case

New York City Health officials met with the Brooklyn Hasidic community to urge vaccinations after a Rockland County Orthodox man was diagnosed with Polio last month

(New York Jewish Week) — New York City health officials held a conference call with leaders of Brooklyn’s haredi Orthodox community after a Jewish man in Rockland County was identified as the first U.S. polio patient in 10 years.

During the call, held two weeks ago and scheduled before the man’s case was reported on July 21, officials from the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene urged the leaders to encourage members of the city’s large haredi and Hasidic communities to get the polio vaccine. 

A measles outbreak in 2019 centered in Rockland, as well as lower-than-average COVID-19 vaccination rates in heavily Jewish zip codes, have focused concern on pockets of vaccine resistance among haredi Orthodox Jews.

“The fact that there is already such a severe case [of polio] is an indication that there are likely many more undiagnosed infections,” said a press release about the meeting from the United Jewish Organization of Williamsburg, which represents the Satmar Hasidic community in Brooklyn.

The press release said participants on the call included Dr. Jane Zucker, assistant commissioner of the city’s health department; Menashe Shapiro, Mayor Eric Adams’ deputy chief of staff, and Joel Eiserdorfer, Adams’ senior advisor.

Representing the Orthodox communities was Rabbi David Niederman, executive director of the UJO, and other community leaders. 

“They wanted to alert us that come the new school year, everybody should be vaccinated,” Niederman told the New York Jewish Week. “It was very important and helpful outreach to make sure that, God forbid, we don’t have any cases over here.” 

A New York City health department spokesperson also confirmed the meeting in an email to the New York Jewish Week, saying it was “a previously scheduled meeting” that provided basic information on the importance of  vaccinating against polio. 

Local health officials, who launched a drive to increase vaccination against the potentially deadly virus, said the victim was experiencing paralysis, a hallmark of the disease, and that he had not been vaccinated against it. 

The New York State Department of Health said that Rockland County currently has a polio vaccination rate of 60.5% among 2-year-olds, compared to the statewide average of 79.1%. Multiple sources told the New York Jewish Week that the 20-year-old man diagnosed with polio is part of Rockland County’s substantial Jewish community. 

Although the UJO press release spoke of the possibility of more undiagnosed cases, Niederman asserted that “people are vaccinated here” in Williamsburg and said that the meeting was more about alerting parents before the school year starts. “The fact that there hasn’t even been one case over here shows you that people are vaccinated,” he said.  

Another individual on the call who wished to remain anonymous was worried that people were singling out the Orthodox community. “We don’t want to be out there saying this is a Jewish issue,” the source said. “You have to understand the sensitivity.”

Polio is a highly contagious disease that can cause paralysis and even death. Before an effective vaccine was developed in the early 1950s, tens of thousands of Americans were infected annually; some wound up with permanent disabilities and a handful were consigned to iron lungs, machines that would help them breathe mechanically after their own bodies were too weakened to do so on their own. A 1952 outbreak killed more than 3,000 people, mostly children. 

“Polio is something that when people hear about it, they shiver,” Niederman said. “Everybody is concerned.” 

The polio victim is reportedly living at his parents’ home with his wife. “He was released from the hospital,” one source told the New York Jewish Week on condition of anonymity. “He’s a young adult, in a wheelchair. He got married recently.”

Meanwhile, the New York State Department of Health said in a separate press release that they launched a wastewater surveillance investigation with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the region, which lead to the discovery of polio virus samples from June in Rockland County. The investigation showed that the samples are linked to other samples from Jerusalem and London.

Officials are urging anyone who is unvaccinated to get vaccinated to protect themselves. For more information on polio vaccinations, visit health.ny.gov/polio.

https://www.jta.org/2022/08/03/ny/nyc-health-officials-urge-vaccination-in-brooklyns-hasidic-communities-following-upstate-polio-case?utm_source=JTA_Maropost&utm_campaign=JTA_DB&utm_medium=email&mpweb=1161-46775-462090