A pattern across the decades: a Bnei Baruch timeline, 2012–2025
Where you are in the dossier: Documents and appendices Source document
The timeline lays out, year by year, what the dossier already documents. Its point is not the list but the distances: a denial under oath against an internal recording where the plan is said out loud; a blocked testimony against a lawsuit brought over telling of it; a covert investigation against a promotion to chair of the Finance Committee. The weight is heaviest where it was the police who named the link between the dates. The colour and label on each entry mark its evidence level (document, testimony, suspicion or editorial conclusion), exactly as set out on the methodology page.
The events, year by year
- 2012
December. Aharon Appelbaum sent a letter to the Ministry of Education calling "Kabbalah la-Am" a cult. That single letter set the whole later run of lawsuits in motion.
to the movement's legal machine → - 2013
The association filed its first defamation suit — against Appelbaum himself.
to the movement's legal machine → - 2014
The "K." episode: a public account of an attempted sexual assault. Milwidsky flatly denied the accusation.
to the complaints against Milwidsky → - 2015
A suit against the website "The Seventh Eye" and the journalist behind its investigations of the movement.
to the movement's legal machine → - 2016
By David Sakiyan's account, Milwidsky kept his then-wife from submitting an affidavit in which she attributed a sexual assault to Laitman.
to the silenced testimonies → - 2017
February 22. Ministers and members of Knesset came to the cult's conference in Tel Aviv - coalition and opposition alike; a sitting minister, Tzachi Hanegbi, declared himself "messenger of the messages, principles and values of Kabbalah La'Am".
to the piece on the state resource → - 2017
Army Radio (Galatz) and Kan 11 investigated a "closed cult." The suits turned on the broadcasters themselves — Army Radio and the public broadcaster Kan — and on Megiddo as well. In parallel a 3 million ₪ claim ran against the victims' assistance center, Appelbaum, and related defendants.
to the movement's legal machine → - 2018
A November claim of 600,000 ₪ against Megiddo over two tweets from October 2018 — the third case against him since 2017.
to the movement's legal machine → - 2018–19
On the suspicion under investigation, Milwidsky coached A. ahead of the hearing — to deny any tie to Laitman. In 2019 she was brought to Israel. In court she denied it.
to the Olesya / A. story → - 2019
August. The Jerusalem Magistrate's Court dismissed Bnei Baruch's roughly 415,000 ₪ suit against Didi Remez, Guy Bahar and Dalia Aloni — technical and communications figures around the Google ads linked to the assistance center and Appelbaum. The association was ordered to pay 130,000 ₪ in costs. On 30 December that same year The Seventh Eye analysed two affidavits by the association's legal adviser Hanoch Milwidsky in a different proceeding: he told the court that "Rabbi Laitman is in no way connected to politics" (the piece on the state resource).
to the movement's legal machine → - 2021
The public broadcaster pulled two Kan investigations into Bnei Baruch — under a confidential settlement.
to the movement's legal machine → - 2022
Early in the year, about six months before the primaries, Milwidsky gathered some 500 people on an internal Zoom broadcast and laid out the plan aloud: "We are talking about more than a hundred new ambassadors of ours who will enter the executive level, and some of them even the management level inside Likud" (the piece on the state resource). That same year the LAHAV 433 investigation opened. Milwidsky took his seat in the Knesset that November. News 12 published A.'s testimony.
to the investigation of the movement's counsel → - 2022
September 5. Bnei Baruch filed a 2.87 million ₪ defamation suit in Lod District Court against Benjamin "Boka" Rafaeli, Laitman's former security chief. The trigger: his News 12 interview. It did not sue A., Omri Maniv, or News 12.
to the Olesya / A. story → - 2023
March 2. The Bat Yam Magistrate's Court dismissed the suit by Milwidsky and Bnei Baruch against Megiddo. The court named it: abuse of process, forum shopping, the marks of a SLAPP.
to the movement's legal machine → - 2024
January 18. The Tel Aviv District Court rejected the appeal. The tally: four suits, roughly 2 million ₪ demanded. Megiddo paid nothing. Bnei Baruch paid him about 70,000 ₪ in costs — after more than five years of pursuit.
to the movement's legal machine → - 2024
Over the summer a LAHAV 433 delegation took A.'s testimony. The meeting was formally recorded.
to the Olesya / A. story → - 2025
July. Milwidsky was questioned under warning at LAHAV 433 — suspicion of rape, inducement to give false testimony, and indecent acts. This was the eve of his appointment as chair of the Finance Committee. According to police, the request to open the case had been sitting with the Attorney General for two full years, and the investigation ran covertly the whole time, while the man stayed a member of Knesset, and climbed. That the summons landed on that particular day because of the political calendar is what the police themselves said.
to the questioning under warning → - the takeaway
Thirteen years. The same mechanisms again and again: sue the critics. Block the testimony. Shield through politics. And one answer to every question: denial. Under oath: "Rabbi Laitman is in no way connected to politics." On the internal recording: more than a hundred "ambassadors of ours" in Likud's executive and management levels. This is not a coincidence. It is a design.
how it adds up to a pattern →