UNITED STATES
Forward
Sam Kestenbaum
January 5, 2016
Marc Gafni, a once-promising Jewish leader dogged by allegations of sexual improprieties stretching back years, has returned to the public eye as a leader of a California think tank.
But his stunning re-emergence, trumpeted in a recent New York Times article, has elicited a new wave of condemnations from Jewish leaders.
Rabbi David Ingber, an influential Renewal rabbi in New York who once studied with Gafni but has long since severed ties, says anyone who knows Gafni has a responsibility to warn others about him.
“We are calling for other organizations to pull their support for him,” said Ingber. “We did not do enough before to warn people about this person. I feel responsible. I am implicated.”
Ingber organized a petition of denouncement, which carries the names of around 100 other Jewish leaders, including rabbis Donniel Hartman, Avi Weiss, Sharon Kleinbaum, Ebn Leader and Joseph Telushkin. The petition specifically names Whole Foods, whose co-founder and CEO, John Mackey, is on the board of Gafni’s think tank. Posted on December 30, it now has more than 2,500 signatories.
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