ISRAEL
Jerusalem Post
Former cabinet minister Michael Melchior attacked former MK Haim Druckman on Tuesday for defending Rabbi Mordechai Elon, a recently convicted sex offender, and inviting him to his yeshiva.
Writing on his Facebook page, Melchior, like Druckman a rabbi, recalled that he refused to join a long list of prominent people who congratulated Druckman when he won the Israel Prize. Melchior said that when he was told he was the only one who had refused, he responded that he could not back anyone who covered for or protected someone who harmed youth.
“I was not at all surprised to read that Rabbi Druckman continues to invite Rabbi Elon to teach young men in his yeshiva in Or Etzion, even after his conviction in court,” Melchior wrote in both English and Hebrew.
Melchior praised the Takana Forum of prominent religious Zionist figures, which fights sexual abuse in the National Religious sector, for the way it handled the allegations against Elon. He said he wished the ruling of the forum and the court was respected by Druckman and others who continue to back Elon.
“I wonder, what more needs to happen before Religious Zionism, Bnei Akiva yeshivas and yeshivot hesder will no longer consider this person [Druckman] suitable to lead them,” Melchior wrote. “Is it possible to enter the month of mercy and forgiveness, and the Days of Awe and claim to The Almighty that we have done all that we must do in order to set an example for, and to protect our children? Is it not said that in a place where God’s name is being desecrated, we do not give respect to Rabbis? In this instance, when a Rabbi is an icon, I ask what could be a bigger desecration of God’s name than to pay tribute to a man that has turned a blind-eye to harm done to innocent children?” Elon was convicted on two counts of indecent assault by force against a minor by the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court two weeks ago. He could serve up to seven years in prison.
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