Muslim Man Masquerading as Jewish Outed Weeks After Wedding
by CrownHeights.info
The Jewish world is in an uproar over a horrific story involving a Muslim man masquerading as Jewish, and even getting married to a Jewish woman.
The news broke Sunday that a woman named Sally had gotten married to a man who called himself Eliyah Haliwa in a Jewish wedding in Lakewood, NJ.
Allegedly, the man portrayed himself as a Lebanese Sephardi Jew, who had become connected to Chabad in Texas during his years as a university student.
According to the Yeshiva World News, The man had allegedly produced a “family tree” and claimed he worked for NSA, showing Sally a “letter” from his co-workers at NSA congratulating them on their wedding.
Officiated by Rabbi Ezra Zafrani, a respected Syrian rabbi in Lakewood, N.J., a Chabad Shliach from Texas walked the groom down the aisle, as his family was not there for the wedding.
Weeks later, the newlywed wife began suspecting something was amiss, and discovered papers showing that her husband was in fact not Jewish at all. According to her suspicions, Eliyah may even have been a Palestinian Arab who had previously lived in Beiruit.
Understanding the implications of the finding, she left the home and notified the authorities, who brought the FBI in to investigate the situation.
As the story circulating involved the Chabad Shliach – Rabbi Yossi Lazaroff – released a statement regarding the incident, clarifying the details and his involvement in the affair.
The Rohr Chabad Jewish Student Center at Texas A&M is open to all Jewish faculty and students to explore Judaism.
In 2018 a student presenting himself as Eliyah Haliwa began visiting Chabad along with other local campus Jewish institutions (including serving as president at one of them). He would occasionally attend Shabbat meals at Chabad, and infrequently attended the services or Torah classes.
Last year he met a woman from N.Y. on a Jewish dating website.
He falsely presented himself to her as observant. When asked by the woman and her family, I informed them that his conduct did not reflect that of a fully observant Jew.
The fundamental responsibility of the officiating rabbi at a wedding, the mesader kiddushin, is to determine the Jewish status [birur hayahadut] of the couple and ensure that they are both Jewish, single, and allowed to marry each other in accordance with Jewish law.
Accordingly, when Rabbi Ezra Zafrani, a respected Syrian rabbi in Lakewood, N.J., asked me if Eliyah was Jewish, I explicitly informed him that I did not know and that whoever was officiating would need to do a proper birur and would need to independently confirm his Jewish status.
The wedding itself was officiated by Rabbi Zafrani’s son, Rabbi David Zafrani. As my wife and I were in New York for other reasons, Rabbi David Zafrani, who was officiating in place of his father, and his wife, asked us to join the wedding. As the groom had no family attending, at the request of the couple and the Zafranis, we walked him down the aisle and I signed the ketubah, which had been drafted by Rabbi Ezra Zafrani. We were not officiating and our involvement was predicated on the understanding that, as supervising rabbis, Ezra and David Zafrani had done their due diligence to confirm the groom’s Jewish status.
In the ensuing weeks, it has come to light that the bride was aware that Eliyah was using a false name, information he concealed from others, when she learned of his Muslim name. We were clearly misled about his identity. Our hearts go out to this woman, her family and everyone else deceived by this individual here in Texas and in New York and New Jersey.
At present, the circumstances of the incident are not clear, including whether the intentions of the Muslim man were to cause harm.
