Edited by: TJVNews.com
In October of 2021, Jewish media outlets in the New York City area reported on a bizarre story of a Lebanese Muslim man who fabricated a tale that he was an observant Jew and married an unwitting Syrian Jewish girl from Brooklyn.
Sources revealed that subsequent to marrying the man, the woman became suspicious because his command of the Arabic language was too perfect. When the woman’s brothers went to his home to further investigate this matter, it was then that they discovered his Lebanese passport with the name Ali Hassan in it.
The Yeshiva World News has recently reported that Rav Avraham Reich of the Hatzalas Yisrael community in Brooklyn has now said that Haliwa is indeed Jewish.
The YWN report indicated that Rav Reich is an expert in the investigation of the yichus of Jews from the former Soviet Union. He apparently revealed on Zev Brenner’s Talkline radio program on Motzei Shabbos that he “thoroughly investigated Haliwa’s background and spoke with his mother, who admitted that she and her mother are Jewish. Rav Reich also spoke with Haliwa’s grandmother in Lebanon.”
Reasons remain murky as to why Haliwa didn’t reveal that his mother and grandmother were Jewish after the story first came to light after his wedding, according to the YWN report.
Despite his investigatory work, Rav Reich said that Haliwa still went through a strict conversion process “since there weren’t four consecutive generations in the family who were shomer Torah u’mitvos and therefore giyur l’chumra was required,” according to the YWN report.
Rav Reich did not reveal who served on the Beis Din while speaking on the Zev Brenner program, however he stated that he personally witnessed the conversion process and offered confirmation that “Haliwa is a kosher Jew l’mehadrin. The Beis Din members are reportedly some of the most prominent rabbis in the United States,” according to the YWN report.
Months ago, Haliwa appeared on Zev Brenner’s program and said that he had lied about being Jewish and that he was not he victim in this situation. He said he had a Jewish soul and expressed his strong desire to follow Torah precepts.
At this juncture, Haliwa wishes to return to his wife, however members of her Syrian Jewish community are pressuring him to give her a get (bill of divorcement). The YWN report indicated that he had refused to grant it.
Hawila had complained that he has gotten so much negative attention in Jewish media, particularly on YWN, and insisted that his only goal is to become Jewish.
“I want to be a Jew. I really want to convert. I have a Jewish soul,” he said, according to a previous YWN report.
The Jewish Voice previously reported that information had emerged in the aftermath of the ill- fated wedding that Haliwa had shown the woman he married a family tree of his antecedents, but soon thereafter it was revealed that his alleged genealogical background was replete with multiple inaccuracies. As shocking as it may sound, Eliyah also recorded on his family tree that one of his ancestors was notorious Jewish mobster, Meyer Lansky and provided names of other prominent Ashkenazic Jews. None of his findings could be verified by reliable sources.
The woman in question who has chosen to remain anonymous for obvious reasons had known that her intended was from Lebanon when they were dating but because he appeared to be a devoutly Orthodox Jew in practice, she never doubted that he was halachically Jewish. Eliyah told the woman that he was estranged from his family and the story he offered her sounded quite convincing. The fact that he spoke Hebrew fluently also helped to buttress his spurious claims.
In addition, the woman learned that Eliyah was affiliated with Chabad-Lubavitch of Texas for approximately six to seven years.
The report also indicated that Eliyah learned Hebrew and seriously engaged in Torah learning during the time he spent in Texas with Chabad. After he had mastered his Hebrew language skills and projected the image of someone who was immersed in Torah did he marry this woman.
Months ago, a senior member of the Chabad community in the US told the publication Be’Chadrei Chareidim that “Chabad did not convert this Shiite Lebanese imposter and did not perform the wedding or get involved in any way in the identity of the man.”
The member added: “This is an unfortunate case of a confused youth who struck up a virtual relationship with a member of the Syrian Jewish community who was mortified to discover after her marriage that he was not Jewish. A Chabad rabbi in Texas was asked by the officiating rabbi to walk the groom to the Chuppah since he did not have any close relatives in the US.”
If things weren’t bizarre enough, Haliwa also professed to be an employee for the National Security Agency (NSA) and displayed a supposed “letter” from his contemporaries at the NSA which stated that they congratulated him and his bride on their wedding.
When the wedding day arrived, Haliwa’s family were absent from the proceedings and he provided his bride and her family with cogent reasons as to why they chose not to attend.
