Les and Rabbi Michal showed us the evidence to back up the claims – and so it was that we published Les’ blog, “THIS IS NOT THE BOARD OF OLD” - see it below in its entirety.

SHOCKING DOCUMENTS come to light in Baal Shem Tov saga! Ran our headline in February 2011 when we dug up the goods on the fact that the Shul’s neighbour Ms Christine Walters had abused her powers as a City Councillor and member of the Mayoral Committee to get City officials to act irregularly on her behalf. That was a great story and was very well read.

Also in Feb we published a list of ALL STORIES PUBLISHED to date with titles and links – which will be useful for anyone wanting to read back on this very sorry saga.

Not all of the stories were negative, one of the more light-hearted stories we ran on MyShtetl was a short little piece titled: “THE RABBI & CLR KERMIT” after a Facebook exchange between Rabbi Michal and one of the anti-Shul mob who used a Kermit the frog avatar and didn’t quite realise she was liaising with rabbi Michal. Shortly after we published that, Kermit got dropped.

As the local elections in May loomed, Jewish donors the ANC had always counted on didn’t follow the Board’s direction. In fact, many withheld contributions causing fundraising affairs to be cancelled and downgraded. Suddenly, political promises were made. MyShtetl publicised this fact but to what extent that got the cash rolling in again we never knew.

Suffice it to say that “ANC BREAKS PRE-ELECTION PROMISE” was, as had always been expected, the first headline we ran after the election.
MyShtetl supported the Shul through to its appeal to the Gauteng Provincial Townships Board which has recommended that the province grant the Shul permission to remain open. Even the City officials who attended the appeal as much as admitted that they had erred, acted irregularly and illegally.

We published an updated SUMMARY OF STORY-TO-DATE two days before the appeal hearing, which took place on 30 November.

At the appeal hearing, the Chief Rabbi spoke emotively about why THIS SHUL IS PRECIOUS TO US! If you read no other referenced background stories, read this short piece – it shows a completely different side of rabbi Goldstein to that we are used to. And it goes a long way in explaining why yesterday, at the ANC 100 celebrations, our Chief Rabbi was the only religious leader invited to join the official ANC Chaplain at the event.

By the afternoon of Wed 30 Nov we were able to publish: SHUL SAVED! and the following day the story of the HERO OF BST SHUL.

Throughout the 18-month-long saga MyShtetl managed to maintain relationships with City officials, Councillors, ratepayers groups and politicians over this matter. Yet the Board never stopped trying to supress our support for the Shul. We could never understand why? We still don’t.

But the blog by Les Harris, below, did give us and our users a respected ex-insiders’ look at the SAJBD of today.

Blog by Leslie Harris

THIS IS NOT THE BOARD OF OLD

Shabbos is wonderful. You switch off the computer, the cellphone, the radio and TV, you switch on the colindictor, and you ignore the telephone. And in between all the usual Shabbos activities - davening, learning, socialising and schloffing - you have a chance to just sit back and think.

This Shabbos I thought a lot about the whole Baal Shem Tov saga and the ugly rift that has developed in the community.

When I published my criticism of the SA Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD) last year I could never have imagined that the debate would degenerate into something so ugly and so bitter.

Criticism of the SAJBD is nothing new. For as long as I can remember people have questioned the role of the SAJBD, the composition of its regional councils, its electoral processes, and the strategies it adopts to fight anti-Semitism.

Trying to understand why this argument got so ugly I thought back about twenty years to when I worked at the SAJBD. Then, like today, the SAJBD was sensitive to criticism from the community and usually felt that the comments made against it were unjustified and unfair.

The world then was a very different place. The political climate in the country was completely different, as were the threats the community faced. It was a lot harder for the man in the street, who did not have easy access to formal media outlets, to say anything he liked to all and sundry; the Internet was not yet the ubiquitous presence in South African homes that it is today.

Perhaps the biggest difference of all, though, was the calibre of our communal leadership. Though people often criticised the SAJBD, everybody knew that the Board had the best interests of the community at heart and would do everything possible to protect it.

That the community today can even ask whether or not the SAJBD is willing to protect it, points more than anything else to the difference between the organisation's leadership then and now. In those days the members of the SAJBD were high profile individuals, many of whom were household names because of their work in the general community. The community perceived them to be people of stature.
 
Today the leaders of the SAJBD appear to be largely unknown outside their immediate fields and, rightly or wrongly, the community does not perceive them to be people of stature comparable to their predecessors. Given the events of the past few days, and Wendy Kahn's response on this site to the rabbi, one suspects that the community may well be right.

There is another crucial difference between the SAJBD then and now: how people felt after appealing to it for help. Often those who approached the SAJBD to report cases of anti-Semitism, or to seek help combatting what they thought was anti-Semitism, were disappointed that the SAJBD did not view the matter as seriously as they did.

But none of them ever felt that they had been attacked or discredited by the SAJBD, and none of them felt that they had to defend themselves against the SAJBD to restore and maintain their integrity and their credibility. Whether the SAJBD intended it or not, its public response to the crisis facing the Baal Shem Tov Shul left Rabbi Michal no option but to speak out against the Board.

By Thursday morning last week the senior leaders of the SAJBD knew exactly why Rabbi Michal felt that the Board had betrayed him. They also knew why he was convinced that he could not trust them. Then came lunchtime and the show on Chai FM, with the SAJBD giving its side of the story.

I tuned in to hear what the SAJBD's leaders had to say, and must admit to being disappointed by both the tone and the content of their message. When speaking of the rabbi and his congregation they came across as condescending and somewhat patronising. At the time I thought that their derogatory tone was unintentional. Now I'm not so sure.

Perhaps Zev Krengel was sincere when he said how much he respects Rabbi Michal. Many of those listening, however, got the impression that he meant the exact opposite of what he said. Many of those listening also got the impression that the SAJBD's only solution to the problem is to send Clr Christine Walters flowers. That, as everyone at the shul knows, is not a solution, because Walters has been consistently unreceptive to any of the shul's conciliatory approaches over the past eight years.

Having spent a lot of time over Shabbos thinking about this matter I began to understand the SAJBD's strategy. But I couldn't understand why an organisation that spends so much of its time managing how the broader community perceives us couldn't transmit its message without wounding the rabbi so deeply, and without losing the trust of so many of its constituents.

On Monday it became clear. The SAJBD had lied and acted in bad faith throughout. Most people aren't fools, and the community suspected that something wasn't quite right. Instead of treating its constituents with the respect they deserve, the SAJBD moved to consolidate its own position, once again at the expense of the rabbi and his congregation.

Let there be no doubt: Had the SAJBD acted in good faith and treated the rabbi with respect and dignity there would not be a rift in our community. But it didn't. When it was caught and finally exposed, it again failed spectacularly to put things right. Instead of an apology, it hurled unfounded allegations at the rabbi.
 
If it wants to the SAJBD can try to rectify the damage it has done. It can apologise. It can admit that it told lies to the rabbi and to the Jewish community. It can admit that it was wrong.

Will it do the honourable thing? Based on its track record in this saga so far, I wouldn't hold my breath.

Leslie Harris is a professional journalist and book editor whose MyShtetl username is LesH – which regular Shtetlers will recognise as he frequently posts comments on the website. He is friend of Baal Shem Tov Shul and has been assisting and advising Rabbi Michal. He is not a congregant of the Shul.

The real reason behind the Board’s curious (to say the least) behaviour, attitude and active lack of support towards the BST Shul remains a complete mystery to the entire SA Jewish community. Many stories have done the rounds, but they are just that – stories and not facts – and although we published upwards of forty stories on the issue, MyShtetl never once wrote any speculative content based on hearsay.

The extent to which the Board was able to take action against anyone who supported the Shul, managed to muzzle media and many religious and secular organisations and individuals – bears testimony the immense power and sway they hold over SA Jewry.

THE BOARD EVEN HAD MY SHTETL PUBLISHER ANT KATZ FIRED BY CHAI FM!

But somewhere, somehow and at some time, the SA Jewish Board of Deputies is going to have tell its constituency, SA Jewry, why they did what they did, behaved as they behaved, treated any friend of the Shul as an enemy of the Board and assaulted the characters of those who chose to act.

In the end – it was left to Rabbi Michal and his family, the Chief Rabbi, a handful of defiant (towards the Board) members of the Jewish community, a few Gentiles and MyShtetl to beat a process that was at very least irregular, and most likely illegal, targeted at Jews in Joburg.

Whether it included an anti-Semitic element or not was always a contentious issue. Clear indications and statements were put forward by some very credible people who said they had witnessed some serious anti-Semitic statements and behavior. One family even signed an affidavit stating that there had been an intentional attempt to run them over and other said they had witnessed this. Some even claim to have overheard statements regarding the fact that ‘they’ killed Muslim children. While no actual evidence of any anti-Semitism was ever presented to MyShtetl – there was a heck of a lot of smoke for there to have been NO fire. But in the media, we can only present the facts.