In Israel, hassidic Jews associated with the Shuvu Banim yeshiva complex are protesting the arrest of their leader Eliezer Berland. Protests include picketing the police station, throwing rocks at policemen, attempting to suppress (via court order) the broadcasts about Berland's treatment of a terminally ill woman, and a coordinated assault on the house of one of the whistleblower witnesses (which led to arrest of one of the assailants). On the Shuvu Banim site, Berland is given this characteristic: "Rav Berland continues to act as the community’s powerful spiritual beacon, drawing thousands of newcomers closer to Torah and a mitzvah-observant lifestyle, while also continuing to provide guidance to thousands of Breslov chassidim both within Israel, and across the world."
This is not the first time the spiritual beacon has attracted the police's attention. In 2012, he was accused of sexual harassment and assault, fled Israel at once, switched several countries, eventually got extradited and tried and convicted in 2016. He said that he was "willing to accept any punishment in the world, including burning me and stoning me because that is Torah law", but for some reason did not insist on stoning and served the term. This time, though, it's not just him that got in trouble, but also his wife and five followers. It appears that the spiritual beacon was selling "miracle cures" to terminal cancer patients and insisting they quit regular medical treatment. Berland's "cure" included a ritual and Menthos or sugar pills; it were Berland's followers who went out hunting for marks in oncology departments of hospitals, promising cures. He claimed he took minimal payment for the rituals, but witnesses say they paid him tens of thousands sheqels for them, in some cases taking out loans to be able to pay Berland. It went on for a long while, and stayed within the "haredi" community, with attempts to get the patients back to medical treatment suppressed, until it blew up. There are at least 200 cases like that. In at least one case Berland's followers solicited more money from the family of a patient who died for "ensuring early resurrection on the Judgment Day". It also turns out that last year Berland's family already got in trouble for leeching about 50 million sheqels from the funds donated to the yeshivah, mostly spent on buying property abroad. The whole case looks so ugly that when Berland's lawyer petitioned for his release from arrest due to poor health, the judge(!) refused and told him to take a Menthos instead. The judge got reprimanded, but she only gave Berland what he gave the patients his followers preyed on.
Why am I telling you all this?
Well, because it may be very tempting to say this is abuse of privilege and these people do not represent the religion and so on. That their use of authority and appeal to deity and higher moral law to obtain money and status for themselves from people in precarious situations was an exceptional case.
But this stuff is exactly what religion *is*. Think of that.
