A Chabad-affiliated rabbi criticized a rival group for its public disapproval of a circumcision-related ritual currently under investigation in Germany.
Some Jewish leaders “decided to align themselves with those who are working against Jewish interests,” Rabbi Menachem Margolin, director of the Rabbinical Centre of Europe, wrote in an editorial Thursday in the Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper.
The editorial by Margolin, who is personally affiliated with the Chabad movement, followed a statement by the Conference of European Rabbis that said the practice of metzizah b’peh – oral suction of blood from the circumcision wound – carried risk of disease.
The statement was made in connection with complaints filed by an anti-circumcision activist against Yehudah Teichtal, the Chabad rabbi in Berlin, for allegedly allowing metzizah b’peh at the brit milah of his son last month.
Margolin wrote that Jews critical of metzizah b’peh may have been acting out of hope “to restore peace to the Jewish community. This is a miscalculation to the extreme,” he said, adding: “It won’t be long at all before governments will once again accuse Europe’s Jews of inhumane and uncultured practices.”
Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt, the Moscow-based president of the Conference of European Rabbis, told JTA he had wanted to be “supportive of [Teichtal] without endangering the whole issue of brit milah,” and to make clear that “Orthodoxy is on the side of medicine in this issue.”
Teichtal said his son’s brit met the highest medical standards. Germany’s circumcision law, passed in December, requires that medical standards be upheld.
The head of the Central Council of Jews In Germany, Dieter Graumann, issued a statement supporting the Conference of European Rabbis’ criticism of metzizah b’peh.
This publication should be kept out of COL
Started to read article…saw the newspaper name…remembered that one of their reporters Nathaneil Popper, help to cause Agriprocessors ruination with many lies.
Sorry, will not read any articles from this evil publication.
Hershal Shachter misquoted his daughter and exaggerated what she said.
Hashem will reward Rabbi Teichtel for upholding minhagei yisroel against people who fight against the holiness of our way of life. See the Rebbe’s sichos in Likutei Sichos Gimel (or maybe Alef) on why we ask on matbilin first on Pesach – because minhagei yisroel are the most important to keeping Judaism alive and flourishing. And mitzitza bpeh is more than a minhag and removes danger from the baby! (According to Rashi, who’s more of an authority than Goldschmidt/Schechter). Kol HaKavod Rabbi Teichtel. We are praying for you and wish you as fellow Chasidei HaRebbe. – Someone who you taught… Read more »
Here’s more of what Hershel Schachter says.
http://forward.com/articles/173452/yeshiva-rabbi-hershel-schachter-stirs-hornets-nest/?p=all
The Torah was just fine before Hershel Schachter, Goldschmidt and all these people with new ideas came along. That they now speak out in the fight against minhagei yisroel is just a shame.
to Rabbi Teichtel for upholding minhogei Yisroel despite the tzoros from these people.
So is Hershel Shachter from YU against it.
http://forward.com/articles/174081/are-new-york-hospitals-hiding-herpes-from-metzitza/