Religionאליעזר ברלנד

Eliezer Berland

Eliezer Berland is an Israeli Orthodox rabbi of the Breslov Hasidic movement who heads the Shuvu Bonim yeshiva and was convicted of sexual offenses and fraud.

born 1937Heading the Shuvu Bonim yeshivaBreslov Hasidic leadershipSex offense and fraud convictions

Born: 26 December 1937, Haifa
Occupation: rabbi, rosh yeshiva
Education: yeshiva, Yavne Religious High School

Eliezer Berland was born in 1937 in Haifa

Berland was born in Haifa on December 26, 1937, to Chaim and Atia Berland. His mother grew up in Eastern Europe and his father came from Galicia. Sources differ on whether he grew up in a religious home.

He studied at the Knesses Chizkiyahu yeshiva in Kfar Hasidim. He married Tehila Shaki, daughter of later Knesset member Avraham Shalom Shaki, and studied at the Ponevezh and Volozhin kollels in Bnei Brak. Later he joined the Breslov movement.

In 1978 Rabbi Shimon Teichner founded the Shuvu Bonim yeshiva in Bnei Brak and named Berland its head. The yeshiva moved to the Old City of Jerusalem and settled there in 1982. In 1998 he and his students were barred from the main Breslov synagogue in Mea Shearim.

After sexual misconduct claims surfaced in 2012, he left Israel and lived in Morocco, Zimbabwe and South Africa. He was arrested in the Netherlands in 2014 and returned to Israel. In 2016 he was convicted under a plea deal and sentenced to 18 months, and in 2021 he received another 18-month sentence for fraud.