Israeli Polygamist Cult Leader Convicted of Raping His Wives
Goel Ratzon in 2010. Image by Getty Images
An Israeli polygamist and cult leader was convicted of several sexual offenses including raping his wives.
Goel Ratzon was convicted Monday in Tel Aviv District Court in charges including rape, sodomy, indecent assault, and sexual abuse within the family. He was cleared on one charge of sexually enslaving one of the women the he called his wife.
Ratzon was arrested and indicted four and a half years ago, after a complaint filed by one of his of 21 ‘wives,’ with whom he fathered 38 children.
Ratzon made the women believe he was the savior of the world and that he had supernatural abilities. He also alienated the women from their families and only allowed them to speak in public areas of their home.
Ratzon, 64, never officially married any of the women that he called his wives.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
