If Rabbi Gafni is legally charged (indicted), I hope that the United States will extradite him back to Israel to stand trial. After all, years ago, Israel extradicted Meyer Lansky back to the United States, and I believe that there was another case in the State of Maryland of an American who was accused of murder, and subsequently fled to Israel. The United States should not become a homeland for sexual predators (if that is what they are.)

goes beyond that to tell someone immediately. The first person who stands up protects the rest. A pedophile stands almost no chance of being reformed, they need to be placed as far away as practical from children and known to the community so that all can observe. They have to live somewhere, but they don't have to be in a community without people supervising them on a very frequent basis.

I am appalled that his collegues think that the problem is that he preyed on women in his own community, which implies that preying on women outside his community would be quite acceptable. Did complaints only come from religious women? Didn't they investigate at all? Clergy as sexual predators is not just a problem of the Catholic church.

There was an error in the statement made in this article: "Two American women later came fourth claiming they too had been abused by Gafni, who now stands accused of rape and sexual misconduct, when they were still minors." There were three women who came forward back in 2004 who shared their experiences of being sexually violated by Mordechai Winiarz (AKA: Marc Gafni). Articles were written in various papers at the time. Their goal was to prevent any more women from becoming Gafni's next victim. When Marc Gafni was 19 he assaulted a 13-year-old girl. He was quoted in the New York Jewish Week as saying "she was 14 going on 35," "it was a loving relationship." The girl described the his actions as rape." When Gafni was 24 he attempted to assault a 19-year-old woman. Shortly after the attempted assault, he raped a 15-year-old teenager who was living in his home. The Awareness Center, Inc. has been attempting to warn communities of Gafni's past sex offenses, yet the attempts fell upon deaf ears. One of the biggest problems we all face is that our rabbis (orthodox, conservative, reform, reconstructionist, renewal, etc.) believe that they can conduct forensic investigations. The problem is that they don't have the education, training or experience to do the necessary detective work, nor do they have the training to conduct victim sensitive interviews. We all need to demand that when our rabbis, educational institutions, and community leaders "SUSPECT" abuse or neglect, they immediately contact law enforcement and also hired agencies that have the education and experience needed to do things correctly.

I am reporting this,although I have tought a lot before deciding to do so,because I guess it is important facing the truth. Want I want to say is that Rabbis are human beings with all defects all human beings have(sometimes worst!).Nobody should get deluded thinking differently about them,nor themselves about themselves. It doesn't take off the respect we have to have for the majority of them,but truth have to be faced. When I was 17 years old,my parents took me to a Rabbi ,to help them to resolv an issue they had with me ,which they were not getting to resolv satisfatorily by themselves. After the conversation was over and we were living the rabbi and family's house,my father and mother left first ,on a small corridor,then I and ,at the end, the Rabbi, when...guess what he did?Just put his hand in my rear! For many years I did not spoke about that with nobody and even had the suficient condition to analize that behavior as a fault of him;how could a rabbi??? Well,I consider that not very traumatic to me,but it shows the HUGE disrespect this man had to me and to my parents(that never new about that),who believed him as an espiritual and right men to help them in a troubled moment in our lives. Hipocresy must be unveiled!

I thought that Gafni's ideas as expressed in his columns were interesting and worth consideration even if I did not agree with many of his conclusions. I'm very sorry that he used his charisma to gain an advantage and I hope that the Bayit Chadash community finds a way to recover from this. No community is immune from sexual predators and therefore Gafni's behavior can not be used to argue against the ideals of Bayit Chadash.

I,m amazed anyway

The following is an edited down version of Luke Ford's profile on Rabbi Mordechai Gafni. http://www.theawarenesscenter.org/gafni_mordechai.html Rabbi Marc Gafni (AKA: Mordchai Winiarz) has gone through countless reinvention's (not to mention name changes, marriages and relationships). Various individuals who have known Mordechai Gafni during his teen years through early twenties have stated that Gafni saw himself as the next rabbi Shlomo Riskin. People used to joke that he was cloning Riskin, and often delivered word-for-word presentations that were previously presented by Rabbi Riskin. During the day that Gafni was going by the name of Mordechai Winiarz, he wore a white shirt and black suit. His hair was cut short. He looked like what was expected of a "respectable" Orthodox rabbi. After mastering Rabbi Shlomo Riskin, Gafni moved on to mimic Rav Yosef Soloveitchik, claiming to be the Rav's disciple. Those who know Mordechai Gafni stated that around 1980 wanted to become the next Shlomo Carlebach. Recreating himself once again. In the New York Jewish Week article, Rabbi Gafni admitted to sexually assaulting the first known survivor. The girl was thirteen, yet in the article Gafni stated, "She was 14 going on 35, and I never forced her." Marc Gafni has been married and divorced three times. He has also been engaged to numerous women he never married. Back in the 1980's Winiarz ran an organization called JPSY (Jewish Public School Youth). It was funded by such major Jewish philanthropists as Michael Steinhardt and Mark Belzberg (who seemed impressed by Winiarz). JPSY was founded by a woman named Ellen Liberman. Prior to a maternity leave she hired Gafni as a temp. When Liberman returned she learned that Gafni taken the organization away from her, after seducing the board of directors with his charm. Rabbi Gafni is insatiable for power and his predatory sexuality is just a part of his power thing. Some of his supporters, such as Mark Belzberg (from the wealthy Canadian family) have said, "Yeah, Mordecai has a yetzer hora."

Marc was married to his second wife at the time he took control JPSY. This is when he attempted to sexually assault a 19-year old JPSY advisor and assaulted the 15-year old who was living in his home. There have been rumors that a similar situation broke up his first marriage. When Mordecai was in high school, he was accused of various crimes and misdemeanors and illicit use of credit cards. It appears that many individuals who went to high school with Gafni and have known him the longest have been the most afraid of the damage he could do. Many of these individuals are high profile Orthodox educators. Over the years these "educators" have done what they could to protect Orthodox communities from any further harm. Many believe this is why he drifted out of Orthodoxy and into both the Reform and Jewish Renewal movements. After Gafni sexually assaulted the fifteen-year-old teenager, he stalked her for about a year. He attempted to destroy her life. Like many other sex offenders he did what he could to discredit her, by spread rumors that she was crazy. Back in the 1980's the fifteen-year-old told her story to rabbi Shlomo Riskin. At the time he chose to believe rabbi Gafni. Rabbi Riskin told her to stop harassing "the good rabbi Gafni." The fifteen-year-old also told one of the JPSY advisors. A short time prior to the teen-agers assault the nineteen-year-old advisor has been accused by Gafni. She immediately believe the fifteen-year-old. A Beit Din was convened in New York. (1985). Winiarz was basically chased out of town and moved from New York to some unsuspecting community. Marc Gafni moved to Boca Raton around 1985, he worked as a charismatic Kiruv worker (Jewish outreach worker). He built up the community (Boca Raton synagogue) that rabbi Kenneth Brander once ran, prior to his move to Yeshiva University. Rabbi Brander inherited the community from Mordecai in 1987. According to Luke Ford, Rabbi Gafni left the Boca Raton community suddenly. There were rumors that he'd had an affair with a married woman. There were a string of sexual allegations against him. He had to pick up in the middle of the night and move to Israel (and then took on the name Mordecai Gafni). Prior to the scandal broke out in Boco, Marc Gafni was considering moving back to New York to run for Congress going into politics. Gafni also wanted to become a television anchor man. He knew he spoke well and he was just looking for ways to put his face before a lot of people. It was widely known that he kept a scrapbook with clippings from every article he was in. There was a wealthy Jew in Boca Raton, the late Jerry Hahn, a big Aish Ha Torah donor who loved Winiarz. Gafni took the three day Aish Ha Torah Discovery seminar around 1987. He then went into the office and took all the original Discovery files. A week later, Rabbi Gafni started teaching the Discovery seminar in Israel. Rabbi Gafni was confronted on this. He responded to the rabbis at Aish "you guys don't own this. It's Torah. Anybody can teach it." Rabbi Gafni went around and taught the Discovery seminar for a year month or two. He was a great teacher. He started parroting the teachings of Aish Ha Torah founder Rabbi Noach Weinberg. Rabbi Weinberg, when he found out, was amused. Rabbi Gafni decided to follow Rabbi Riskin's blueprint of becoming chief rabbi of his own town. Rabbi Riskin became chief rabbi of Efrat by creating his own town with his own community.

In Israel, to become a rabbi of a city, it takes a lot of political savvy and support. If you wanted to become the rabbi of Jerusalem, you'd have to hire a PR firm and spend hundreds of thousands of dollars and have major support in political places. Major Torah scholarship won't be enough to make it happen. Rabbi Gafni cut a deal with the contractor so he could become the rabbi of Beit Tzufim. He got a job in the Israeli city of Kfar Saba. Every fourth Shabbatot, he was the guest rabbi. People loved him. He was charismatic. He made friends.

One man approached him for help with his 22 year-old daughter. She needed counseling. She was dating a guy the father considered inappropriate. Mordecai agreed to counsel her. He shaved off his beard. He got up in front of the synagogue and said he had found the woman of his dreams. He was leaving the rabbinate. He was leaving his wife. He was going to spend the rest of his life with this 22-year-old. His second marriage came to an end. The father of the 22-year-old went berserk. He contacted the Chief Rabbi's office and filed a complaint. Rabbi Gafni had one or two flings with his Isralight students. Rabbi David Aaron won't speak about it. Rabbi Gafni got fired from Isralight. He got a job with a group called Milah (Jerusalem Institute for Education). He became high profile in Jerusalem around 1998. He got fired because of money and power issues. (A source writes: "Milah was an adult education ulpan for Americans and ethiopians who finished the regular ulpan and were still not comfortable in Hebrew. Gafni used this role as head of the organization, not to teach Hebrew, but to teach his theories of pagan Judaism and a parashat hashavua class.") A rabbinical student at Hebrew University around this time had a moral dilemma. He worked for a famous rabbi as a research assistant. "I listen to tapes of other well-known rabbis. I write them up for him. Then he gives over their classes." Mordy walked into this guy's office and said he wanted to be president. The guy said Mordy would have to buy him out (Mordy doesn't have any money). The guy went away on a business trip for three weeks. He finds out that Mordecai Gafni had told everybody that he was president. So Belzberg's partner fired him on the spot. Mordy's relationship with the 22-year-old broke up quickly. Mordy left the rabbinate for about a year. Rabbi Shlomo Riskin was still in Mordy's corner. At this point, around 1992, no American or Israeli institution would take Rabbi Gafni. So Mordecai Gafni left for Australia. Rabbi Riskin had funding there. Rabbi Riskin wanted to spread his empire to Australia. Rabbi Gafni was caught in some obvious lies and his credibility down under was shot. Rabbi Gafni has no contact with his child from his first marriage. He has three kids from his second marriage. He's now married for five years in his third marriage and I don't think he has any kids this time around. Mark Belzberg hired Mordy (they'd known each other from high school, Mark was a surrogate older brother for Mordecai) as a software salesman. Mark had a business partner, a wealthy lawyer baal teshuva who moved to Israel. He's reported that Mordecai used the company credit card for all kinds of immoral things on business trips (that he was made to pay back out of his own pocket). Mordecai couldn't stay away from teaching Torah. He couldn't stay away from the limelight. Rabbi Riskin helped Mordecai get a job around 1996 with Rabbi David Aaron from Israel (Isralight).

Rabbi Aaron's web site uses a promo from that litigious, and in my opinion, nogoodnik Deepak Chopra (who successfully sued the Weekly Standard and the New York Post for saying he patronized hookers): "Inspirational, wise, warm and witty... David Aaron gives us a down to earth understanding of the Kabbalah, revealing the secrets to living a soulful, happy, and more meaningful life." It was obvious the student worked for Rabbi Mordecai Gafni. So whose tapes was he stealing these days? Rabbi Noach Weinberg among others. Rabbi Gafni would often give over the teachings of other rabbis word-for-word, without attribution. There was an eccentric, a Yaakov Fogelman, a Harvard-educated lawyer, who ran around the old city of Jerusalem. He swore by Mordecai. He publicized whenever Mordecai would speak. He thought Mordecai was a genius. 'He's the most brilliant educator of the past 500 years. I heard Soleveitchik. I heard this rabbi and that.' So what genius things did Mordecai say? Yaakov would quote something that Mordy had stolen from some other rabbi. Mordecai has great taste. He knows how to steal things from great people. Another man had a moral dilemma. His wife had moved to Israel two months before him. He suspected that she had had an affair with a rabbi. Guess who he suspected of cuckolding him? A lot of high profile Orthodox rabbis (until this Gary Rosenblatt article) did not know that Marc Winiarz was Mordecai Gafni. His name change worked. He succeeded in reinventing himself. In the past four years, Rabbi Gafni had developed an effective new strategy of admitting he did some bad things when he was a kid. Confession gains credibility. "I've done teshuva. I have a good marriage. There are people who are stalking me." He turns the accusations around. A healthy baal teshuva is one who can forgive himself for his sins. In this sense, Marc is very healthy. A part of me admires him for everything he's been able to get away with, like the Tom Hanks crook in Catch Me If You Can. Rabbi Gafni is great at identifying people with big money. And what they believe, he will believe and preach. He's a purported TV star in Israel. It's paid television. He's paying (or his backers are paying, such Shari Arison, then the richest resident of Israel) for him to be on TV. It's like 6 a.m. for three minutes. For a while, Rabbi Gafni defined himself as post-denominational. Let others fight these petty fights between Reform and Orthodox. Rabbi Gafni is beyond such things. According to the recent Haaretz profile, it sounds like Rabbi Gafni's latest theology comes straight from the Da Vinci Code -- the best-selling novel that claimed that ancient Christianity believed in two divinities, Jesus and Mary. In Rabbi Gafni's enlightened theology, he claims the Jews have gotten rid of the erotic and chased away the female deity. He makes his brachot using the name of the shekhina to re-unite the male and female sides of God.

My sources tell me that the Master of the Universe mightily appreciates Rabbi Gafni's good works in this respect, and the Holy One, Blessed Be He and She, feels much more united and whole since Rabbi Gafni adjusted his brachot. And what's a few molestations by Gafni compared to the Almighty's wholeness? Shall we talk of the things of girls or of the things of G-d? Rabbi Gafni is mighty different in private than in public. In public, he's full of love and cheer and performance. In private, he curses and talks like a slob. Rabbi Gafni is a terrific actor, and for that, I salute him. I am, however, skeptical of his claims of credentials. I believe that one of Gafni's biggest financial supporters is Israeli Jacob Davidson, whose wife (active in the protest group Women at the Wall) tried to get acceptance to Yeshiva University to become a rabbi. In November, 2004, rabbi Gafni spoke in a tent in the Modern Orthodox German colony in Jerusalem. Gafni was surrounded by girls as he spoke about erotic Judaism. A source says that Gafni looks like a cult leader. He now wears long hair. He looks like a hippie.

I am getting a bit sick of this so-called "Awareness Center." Let's be clear: this "center" has about 1/10 the credibility of NOW, which itself has little credibility. As far as I can tell, it consists of a bunch of damaged lesbians. Chana Stein, you are a vicious creature.

There are organizations that are raising funds to assist survivors of Rabbi Mordechai Gafni. Please consult with an attorney prior to accepting any funds. DO NOT sign any agreements without your attorney reviewing the documents! By accepting funds you may become ineligible to file a civil suit against the organizations that attempted to cover up Gafni's past history. This organizations should be held accountable. Please be aware that the newest round of assaults could have been prevented.

Sorry, one is a "survivor" if one has been in a concentration camp but not been killed. One is not a survivor if one has been raped, one is a rape victim. One's own personal trajedy doth not a Holocaust make. And Vicki Polin, from what I have heard about her, is a typical manhating nutcase.

I tried to post Chana's # 11 post a while back and Ynet refused to post it. They should have broken this scandal rather than reported it.

Mordechai Gafni's sexually predatory behavior was so well-known by so many people for so long; his megalomania and instability are so obvious to any thinking adult who meets with him, I just don't understand how well-meaning people like Ner-David were so willfully blind to him for so long. Yes, he's bright, with a couple of interesting ideas, but how that obscured all else about him for so long is just beyond me.

Gafni's idiocy (if not his sexual predator characteristics) was obvious to me the first (and only) time I saw him speak in Jerusalem in 1997. Yaakov Ner David is a highly successful businessman. How could he be so naive about Gafni?