More Fake Stories from Yeshiva World News (YWN)

Three days ago, Rabbi Zalman Grossman, a well-known and highly-respected figure in the religious Jewish world, was making one of his regular visits to the Tomb of Shimon HaTzaddik, on the outskirts of the Old City of Jerusalem. Rabbi Zalman often spends many long hours at the tomb, praying for the welfare of his fellow Jews. But on that day, one of the other visitors to Shimon HaTzaddik – a clearly-disturbed Jew with side-curls - decided to launch an unprovoked violent attack on Rabbi Grossman that was captured by CCTV. The attack was so violent, that Rabbi Grossman was taken to hospital to be checked out.

Some young men from Shuvu Banim were also in the Tomb at the time, and one of them in particular pulled the man off Rabbi Grossman, and tried to prevent him from throwing a shtender at him.

Here’s how many of the ‘haredi’ news sites, including the infamous Yeshiva World News, decided to report that incident:

“HORRIFIC: Berland Cult Member Savagely Beats Famous Mispallel At Kever Shimon Hatzadik.”

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The following day, Rabbi Zalman Grossman himself released a video, where he is sitting with the three young man from Shuvu Banim who helped to try to defend him from his attacker the previous day.

In that video, Rabbi Zalman said: "The main thing is to renew oneself and start over again, it doesn't matter if a person got beaten. He needs to go on and start again as if he was born again today. Don't think about what happened. "All the disgrace that I went through should be for the success of Rav Eliezer ben Etya and for the yeshua (salvation) of Am Yisrael. And everyone should find their shidduch especially our friend sitting here who saved me. He grabbed the shtender and saved me, and we should merit the geula shleima soon in our days amen". The following day, a man suspected of being the attacker was arrested and appeared in court – and he had no connection to Rabbi Berland, and does not study in the Shuvu Banim Yeshiva whatsoever. See the video for yourself. The first part is the brutal beating (user discretion advised) and the second part is R Zalman Grossman thanking the Shuvu Banim boys who protected him:

Did the ‘haredi’ news sites issue an apology, or even just a public correction? Did Yeshiva World News even run the true story with the video of Rav Zalman himself?

No, they didn’t. The fake news article on Yeshiva World News is still up, its slanderous headline is still in place, the totally inaccurate story is still on the site. It’s bad enough – way, way bad enough – that so called haredi sites are regularly breaking every rule in the book of lashon hara (evil speech, even when something is true) and motzi shem ra (spreading slanderous falsehoods) on a daily basis. See this article we just ran a week ago about this subject. What’s worse is the way they are pulling so many of their readers into believing their lies, and then engaging in a terrible outpouring of sinat chinam in the comments section, on social media, and elsewhere online, in full view of the non-Jewish world. This is a terrible chillul Hashem, on so many levels! Rebbe Nachman of Breslov told us clearly, that he can judge even the worst sinners in the world favorably and they can do teshuva – except for those he called baalei machloket. Baalei machloket are those people who enjoy setting Jews at each other throats, who enjoy baselessly sullying other Jews’ reputations in public, and who enjoy having a forum for taking their lashon hara, insults and lies to new heights. We end with a plea that every Jew who values their soul, and who values their world to come, should stay far away from these baalei machloket ­– and the fake news sites that are giving them a platform, even in the haredi world, and even such sites with the word "Yeshiva" in their name.