Face-Off   

Dr. Moshe Glick never dreamed that saving a fellow Jew from an Islamic assault in front of a New Jersey shul would land  him on the defendant’s bench, especially when there was explicit video footage that the purported victim was clearly the attacker. In a case plagued with legal miscues, buried evidence and coaching of alleged witnesses, there was a clear agenda: Someone was determined to get that indictment

DR. Moshe Glick and his wife Renee were in the lobby of the Inbal Hotel in Jerusalem, having traveled from their home in West Orange, New Jersey, to participate in a chizuk mission to Israel, when the phone call came. It was Moshe’s lawyer on the line, and he had bad news.

“They’re going to press charges… you could be looking at five to ten years in prison.”

When you’re a law-abiding, upstanding citizen and a family man; a dentist who’s never threatened anyone with anything other than the occasional root canal for not flossing; a maggid shiur and pillar of chesed and community work, those are not the words you think you’ll ever hear.

Dr. Glick’s story, in which he protected a fellow Jew being assaulted during an unauthorized pro-Hamas demonstration outside a New Jersey shul, is just one act in an unfortunate script playing out in many Jewish communities around the world since October 7, as pro-Palestinian protestors have not only been threatening, but physically terrorizing Jewish communal institutions and individuals. Buoyed by the hand of Hashgachah and the groundswell of support they’ve been receiving, the Glicks are determined to see the story through to a happy end. And in the process, they’ve learned about a powerful yet much underused legal tool called the FACE (Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances) Act — a federal law that makes it a crime to physically obstruct anyone trying to access health services or their place of worship — that can be used to protect Jewish communities in the United States.