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(RNS) — Agudath Israel of America, a lobbying group on behalf of Haredi Jewish synagogues and colleges, has mounted an aggressive media and billboard marketing campaign answering a New York Occasions investigation into New York state’s non-public yeshiva colleges.
The marketing campaign, with a brand new web site and at the least three billboards in Manhattan, accuses the newspaper’s investigation of threatening Haredi Jews’ security and lifestyle at a time when antisemitism in opposition to Jews is rising.
One distinguished poster juxtaposes two panels. “2x New York Metropolis Antisemitic Assaults Doubled,” reads one. The opposite reads: “12 New York Occasions Articles Towards Orthodox Jews in 3 Months.”
“We imagine their reporting is unfair and in lots of instances biased,” mentioned Rabbi Yitz Frank, Ohio director of Agudath Israel. “It creates a unfavorable tone about our neighborhood among the many public. That’s what we’re nervous about.”
A billboard created by Agudath Israel of America close to the Lincoln Tunnel in Manhattan. Picture by Naftoli Goldgrab, courtesy of Agudath Israel
The brand new web site, known as KnowUs.org, factors to the rising incidence of violence in opposition to Orthodox Jews in New York enclaves, concluding: “A serious newspaper launching a marketing campaign in opposition to a minority group is at all times flawed. On this local weather, it’s deeply regarding.”
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The New York Occasions investigation into the colleges, which started with a front-page story in September, discovered that New York space yeshivas deprive college students of secular training, a lot in order that at one faculty, all 1,000 college students failed the standardized checks in studying and math.
The tales reported that some college students have been subjected to bodily abuse from poorly paid, unqualified lecturers. Meantime, the paper reported, these yeshivas have taken in additional than $1 billion in federal, state and native taxes over the previous 4 years alone.
Members of the ultra-Orthodox and Hasidic Jewish communities maintain a protest earlier than a board of regents assembly to vote on new necessities that personal colleges educate English, math, science and historical past to highschool college students, Sept. 12, 2022, exterior the New York state Schooling Division constructing in Albany, New York. (Will Waldron/The Albany Occasions Union through AP)
Shortly after the primary story was printed, the paper reported that the most important such yeshiva in New York state, the Central United Talmudical Academy in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, agreed to pay fines and restitution totaling greater than $8 million for paying lecturers off the books and requesting reimbursements for meals for college kids that it by no means truly supplied.
A spokesman for the Occasions mentioned the paper was assured within the accuracy of its reporting.
“Our reporters have spent months in search of to assist readers perceive what is going on inside a few of New York’s lowest-performing colleges, chatting with lots of of oldsters, college students, and educators to elucidate the inside workings of Hasidic Jewish non secular colleges, which obtain substantial quantities of public cash,” the spokesman mentioned in an e-mail.
Rabbi David Zwiebel, government vp at Agudath Israel, wouldn’t disclose how a lot cash it was spending on the marketing campaign.
Agudath Israel is New York state’s third largest instructional lobbyist (behind New York State Affiliation of Unbiased Colleges and the New York State Catholic Convention).
Beatrice Weber. Picture by Randi Childs Pictures
A nonprofit group set as much as problem the yeshivas to enhance secular training mentioned the marketing campaign was misguided.
“They’re a multimillion-dollar lobbying agency that invests closely in getting funding for these colleges,” mentioned Beatrice Weber, government director of Younger Advocates for Honest Schooling, or Yaffed. “They really feel extremely threatened by these points.”
Weber, whose group is cited on the Know Us web site as a supply of the Occasions’ criticism of Haredi colleges, mentioned it was harmful for Agudath Israel to conflate rising antisemitism with the New York Occasions’ investigation.
“There’s actual antisemitic issues occurring but it surely’s not investigative reporting from The New York Occasions,” Weber mentioned. “That’s not the place antisemitism is going on.”
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