The recently released documentary One of Us tells the stories of three American Jews who left their ḥasidic communities. Although he expected the film to be an “over-the-top hatchet job,” Yitzchok Adlerstein, an Orthodox rabbi, found that it managed to shine a favorable light not only on its subjects but also on the communities they left. And, he concludes, it rightly raises some troubling questions:

The filmmakers could have gone for the jugular. They didn’t. They admit that the vast majority of the [ḥasidic] community is happy, and shares a supportive communal life that so many others don’t have. The visuals of the Ḥasidim back up that contention: lots of smiling husbands and wives. . . . Despite the searing criticism of the way those who move away from the demands of the community are treated, the film shows Ḥasidim who continue to accept the [defectors] as human beings, maintain old friendships, and offer heartfelt guidance. . . .

Watching [the film, however], was extremely painful.

First and foremost, it was painful because two out of the three Jews who are followed claim to be victims of abuse. One is a mother of seven children who was abused for years by her husband, and is now being abused by a combination of the New York legal system and the determination of [her] community not to allow children to have a relationship with a mother whose practice no longer accords with its expectations of proper religious education. The other is a young man who was abused in a summer camp. In both cases, the attitude of the community was to deny the abuse, refuse to act against it, and punish anyone who would go to the authorities for help. . . .

It was painful to watch as one of the men goes to an avuncular mentor figure in his own community to explain his decision [to defect]. The young man talks about all of his unanswered questions about God. He avers that if someone had been willing to give him answers, he would still be in the community. The mentor is left almost speechless. The best [answer] he can up with is that Ḥasidim don’t deal with whys and wherefores (he claims), but only with how to lead one’s life. He seems entirely incapable of offering even elementary explanations to common questions about Orthodox Jewish life. It was painful to watch because it is not only in [the heavily ḥasidic Brooklyn neighborhood of] Williamsburg that . . . children find their questions suppressed, or are given insufficient or silly answers: much of [the Orthodox] world refuses to take these questions seriously.

Analyzing the recent direct Iranian attack on Israel, and Israel’s security situation more generally, Michael Oren looks to the 2015 agreement to restrain Iran’s nuclear program. That, and President Biden’s efforts to resurrect the deal after Donald Trump left it, are in his view the source of the current crisis:

Of the original motivations for the deal—blocking Iran’s path to the bomb and transforming Iran into a peaceful nation—neither remained. All Biden was left with was the ability to kick the can down the road and to uphold Barack Obama’s singular foreign-policy achievement.

In order to achieve that result, the administration has repeatedly refused to punish Iran for its malign actions:

Historians will survey this inexplicable record and wonder how the United States not only allowed Iran repeatedly to assault its citizens, soldiers, and allies but consistently rewarded it for doing so. They may well conclude that in a desperate effort to avoid getting dragged into a regional Middle Eastern war, the U.S. might well have precipitated one.

While America’s friends in the Middle East, especially Israel, have every reason to feel grateful for the vital assistance they received in intercepting Iran’s missile and drone onslaught, they might also ask what the U.S. can now do differently to deter Iran from further aggression. . . . Tehran will see this weekend’s direct attack on Israel as a victory—their own—for their ability to continue threatening Israel and destabilizing the Middle East with impunity.

Israel, of course, must respond differently. Our target cannot simply be the Iranian proxies that surround our country and that have waged war on us since October 7, but, as the Saudis call it, “the head of the snake.”