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Artscroll Editors Abruptly Resign in Wake of “Get” Controversy

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In the wake of heightened controversy and a boycott over their alleged involvement in a Orthodox Jewish divorce related blackmail case, two prominent editors at the Artscroll publishing house tendered their temporary resignations last week.

The Orthodox Jewish world was shaken to the core when it was revealed that the editors: Yosef Asher Weiss and Yisroel Weiss had extended their support to the former’s son, Avraham Meir Weiss, who has allegedly refused to grant a “Get” (Orthodox Jewish bill of divorce to his wife) for several years, leaving her as a “chained woman” who is unable to remarry and build her life according to Talmudic law.

The resignation letter was written last Thursday and appeared on the Artscroll blog. Rabbis Yosef Asher and Yisroel Weiss wrote that they did not wish to “distract ArtScroll-Mesorah from its holy work” and that they were leaving the company “until this situation is resolved.”

In August of 2012, Avraham Meir Weiss and his 25-year old wife, Gital Dodelson obtained a civil divorce, but according to published reports Weiss has remained recalcitrant in his staunch opposition to releasing his wife from the marital contract. The couple has one child.

Weiss’ family lineage is replete with an impressive rabbinic legacy, as his great-grandfather was Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, ZT’L; internationally renowned as one of the greatest Halachic authorities and Torah scholars of the 20th century. He was an outspoken supporter of “Agunot” (women who are trapped in marriages due to the non-issuance of a “get.”

In an article that appeared in the November 4th issue of The New York Post, Ms. Dodelson had claimed that Weiss had attempted extortion; demanding $350,000 as a requisite for him granting her a get. Asserting that Weiss is conducting a power play, Dodelson said that, “On my last mission to ask for a get, a month ago, Avrohom said, ‘I can’t give you a get – how else would I control you?’ I think that’s the key to it all. He insists the marriage isn’t over until he says it’s over,”

She added that, “One good thing is that I have gathered a lot of support from people in the community who are horrified by the whole issue of the agunot [women whose husbands won’t grant gets]. They staged two rallies outside Avrohom’s home in Staten Island, with about 200 supporters each, in June 2012 and June 2013. We asked people to make it as non-confrontational as possible and keep it respectful. He never even came out of his house. Even though withholding a get is defined by Jewish law as a form of domestic abuse, Avrohom refuses to give an inch.”

As such, many people rallied around Dodelson in the days after the Post article was published and called for a boycott of ArtScroll “until get abuser Avrohom Meir Weiss grants his wife an UNCONDITIONAL get.”

In their letter to Artscroll, the father and uncle of Avraham Meir Weiss leveled their own accusations against the Dodelson family, stating that they had engaged in a “slander campaign” against their respective families and thus created a “heinous desecration of G-d’s name.. based on untruths and lies.”

The Rabbis Weiss had further charged that it was “The Dodelson’s, not we, who are preventing the get from being given.”They asserted that they had accepted an arbitration agreement last May.

Speaking to The Staten Island Advance, Rabbi Yosef Asher Weiss said of the New York Post article: “Our family is horrified by the vitriol, lies and hate that permeate Gital’s article. It is full of misinformation and outright fabrications, as well as untruths…This is a very, very heart wrenching and ongoing dispute. We’ve been trying desperately to resolve this for a long time. This has destroyed my family health wise and destroyed my family financially,” he continued,, adding that his greatest concern is how the dispute could eventually impact his grandson. Weiss insisted that no attempt has been made by his son to get sole custody.

“We have a grandchild here,” Rabbi Yosaif Asher Weiss said, “the sweetest child you will ever meet, who doesn’t understand any of this, who one day is going to grow up and have to read this. We don’t want him to think that we could ever say anything bad against his mother, no matter what she did.”

Meanwhile, the Artscroll boycott organizers were appalled at the letter penned by the Weiss’, calling it “horrible” and castigated Rabbi Meir Zlotowitz, the publishing house’s founder, for a “mutually acceptable outcome.”

In late October, Rabbi Mendel Epstein of Brooklyn, New York and Rabbi Martin Wolmark of Suffern, New York along with seven other defendants, were arrested and accused of accepting tens of thousands of dollars to orchestrate kidnappings of Jewish husbands to persuade them to grant divorces to their wives, according to the criminal complaint.

Condemning the use of strong arm tactics in cases such as this was The Organization for the Resolution of Agunot, a New York based advocacy group, stating that it did serve to highlight the desperation of agunot.

“The refusal to issue a get, as a pattern of controlling behavior, is a form of domestic abuse,” the organization stated.

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