Seven NY Orthodox arrested in $14 million scam to steal school money

The sign at the entrance to the Kiryas Joel community, prior to its becoming the independent town of Palm Tree, warns visitors not to offend the sensibilities of the residents by exposing bare arms and legs.

By Carolyn Yeager

REMEMBER KIRYAS JOEL? I WROTE about it last November. It has the distinction of being the first Jewish town in the United States. This Hasidic community of over 20,000 Yiddish speakers had been a thorn in the side of the city of Monroe, NY – so much so that the voters in Monroe finally approved a measure to allow the Satmar sect to secede and become the state's first new town in 35 years. The town of Palm Tree (English translation of Teitelbaum, the surname of the rabbi who first settled in the area with a few Jews in the mid-1970's ) will come into official existence in 2020 with 214 acres of Monroe land and its own school system.

One of the issues of tension between the citizens of Monroe and the large, growing Orthodox community had been their abuse of the school system, by electing themselves to the school board even though no orthodox or haredi children attend the public schools.

Orthodox sisters wait for school bus in Kiryas Joel. Gender separation requires not only separate schools but separate busses. Male and female are not intended to ever really get to know each other.

Now, seven people, including a rabbi, from Kiryas Joel and Monsey, NY were arrested in connection with an alleged $14 million scam to steal funds earmarked for Orthodox schools in Rockland County, New York. Unfortunately, names have not been reported. [According to the NYTimes, in the 1950's Monsey was a one stoplight town with a single yeshiva. By 1997, Monsey had 112 synagogues and 45 yeshivas. The 2000 census shows 41.48% of residents speak Yiddish at home, 6.88% Hebrew.]

The suspects, who were arrested on Wednesday, August 29, had requested funding for Hasidic Orthodox schools through the E-Rate program, a federal school technology funding program for underprivileged students, funded by the Federal Communications Commission. They posed as consultants and vendors to obtain the funds, but never provided the funded services. The scam took place from 2010 to 2016.

The internet is banned in the insular private schools run by the Orthodox for which the funds were requested.

NBC reported that, in one case, over $500,000 in video conferencing equipment was ordered for a daycare center serving 2- to 4-year olds. According to the FBI, the equipment would “serve no real purpose for the student population.”

“The suspects in this investigation allegedly used funding from a program designed to give underprivileged schools internet access to pad their own bank accounts,” NBC quoted William Sweeney, FBI assistant director in charge, as saying. “To add insult to injury, school officials, who see the day-to-day struggle to even find money for pencils and paper, were allegedly involved in the scheme.”

 One thing is clear in all this: There is too much money floating around looking for a place to land, and the term “underprivileged” is too loosely defined. The post WWII welfare state has become a tool of the multicultural agenda. Those who serve and advance this agenda are complicit in allowing abuses like this to go on.

When it comes to observant Jews, they are encouraged to be criminals by their religion. That's why they will never stop and never reform. They see the Gentile world as fair game for their schemes. When will this be more widely realized for just what it is? Only then can it be stopped. In the meantime, because of their large-family policy (enabled by welfare and politicians who want their votes), the number of observant Jews in the US just keeps expanding.