Nicole Meyer allegedly endured years of sexual abuse at the hands of her former school principal, and she has had to watch as her alleged abuser fled Australia for Israel, evaded justice for years and undergoes a protracted extradition process that critics have deemed a farce.
The lengthy, Kafkaesque legal saga over the sex-crime suspect’s fate has not only agonized Meyer, but is testing the relationship between Israel and one of its closest allies, Australia.
Malka Leifer’s case is still far from resolved and even Australia’s pro-Israel Jewish community is losing patience.
“When time and time and time again the process is just not moving forward, it’s increasingly more difficult,” said Meyer, 34, who lives in Melbourne. “Israel has an obligation to do the right thing.”
Meyer and two of her sisters have said that Leifer abused them while they were students at an ultra-Orthodox Jewish school in Melbourne — and there are said to be other victims.
In 2008, as the allegations surfaced, the Israeli-born Leifer, a trusted teacher and school principal in an insular religious community, suddenly left her position at the school and returned to Israel, where she has lived ever since.
Meyer has granted permission to be identified.
In Australia, Leifer faces 74 charges of sexual assault related to accusations brought forward by the three sisters.
A judge in a civil suit against Leifer, 53, and the Adass Israel School, where she taught, awarded Meyer’s sister more than US$700,000 in damages. Meyer and another sister settled out of court.
However, in Israel, justice has been slow.
Critics have said that the legal proceedings have been marred by needless delays and laughable hiccups, and have even roped in a government minister in what has embarrassed the country in front of its stalwart ally.
The legal quagmire has driven a wedge between Israel and Australia, a country that the Jewish state relies on for diplomatic support against what it views as anti-Israel sentiment in international organizations.
The Leifer case repeatedly comes up in discussions between the countries’ leaders, as well as in debates in the Australian Parliament, with its twists and turns having exasperated some lawmakers.
“I do not doubt the independence and the integrity of the Israeli legal system, nor do I doubt the commitment of the Israeli Ministry of Justice to pursuing this case, but enough is enough. This case has gone on for far too long,” Australian Member of Parliament Dave Sharma, a former ambassador to Israel, told the parliament in October.
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