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A year since leader’s death, ultra-Orthodox ‘cult’ hibernates in Central America


It’s been almost a year since Shlomo Helbrans drowned in Mexico, leaving Lev Tahor, the controversial religious sect he founded in Israel in the 1980s, without its charismatic leader.


The flock, which followed Helbrans from Jerusalem’s Beit Yisrael neighborhood to Brooklyn to the snowy suburbs of Montreal before settling in tropical Guatemala, now faces an uncertain future.


Driven by Helbrans’s anti-Zionist beliefs and known for its extreme customs — women and girls are covered head-to-toe by full-length black garments, marriages are arranged and separation by gender is strictly enforced — Lev Tahor has been dogged by legal troubles everywhere it’s gone.



Photo by Yaakov Naumi / Flash 90

Daughter Of Shlomo Helbrans Dies After Suffering Allergic Reaction; Buried In Guatemala


Just two weeks after Lev Tahor cult-leader Shlomo Helbrans died after drowning while “Toiveling” for Shabbos in a river in Mexico, the Helbrans family once again was struck with tragedy.


Sources confirm to YWN that Miriam Gittel Brocha, the 24-year-old daughter of Shlomo Helbrans suffered an allergic reaction and was Niftar on Sunday. She leaves behind a husband and 4 young children.


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