Investigation • modesty board threatened: remove the figureheads from the window

Preserve the neighborhood. Brooklyn. Photo: LipaStauber not only in Israel: main prosecutor's office in Brooklyn last week claims is investigating this past week whereby the members of the 'modesty board' in the ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods acted against the law. Among other things, the office has received complaints from shops threatened - by the activists, who broke into the homes of innocent people to their homes who have advanced technology equipment, and citizens of the community received threats claiming that they deviated from the rules of modesty.

Among the cases checked: claims of a Brooklyn store owner who said he got a call from an unknown person, who ordered him to remove the figureheads placed in the window facing the street. "Do me a favor, we are trying to keep the character of our neighborhood," he said.

The New York Times reported this week extensively on the phenomenon. According to the article, after two days of pressure, the shop owner gave in and took down the figureheads, lest the man behind the call, who apparently belongs to the modesty board, will boycott his shop and his livelihood will suffer.

Another case came to the office of the Attorney General happened recently when a masked man entered the home of a resident and took away computer equipment and advanced technology equipment, alleging that these devices are not compatible with the ultra-Orthodox education.

Another witness said an Orthodox man received threats that they will publish stories about him in public, after the members of the committee demanded that he pay money for "treatment" that they will give him, because they discovered that he went beyond the scope of his marriage.

"They act like a bakery," said Rabbi Alan Nadler, director of the Judaic Studies at New Jersey. "They go to a store and send you a threat that if you don’t meet their terms, they'll break your window, or you lose your customers." Rabbi Nadler added: "They can come to a shop owner whose daughter wears a too short skirt for their taste and tell him if you do not want to lose your customers then talk to your daughter."

Assemblyman of New York, DovHikind said that these people do not represent an official body or act on their rabbi's behalf or their backing. "They are working on their own and think that with their activities they are defending G-d," he said.

'בחדרי' גם ברשתות החברתיות - הצטרפו!