A celebrity rabbi who served as Michael Jackson’s spiritual advisor, counts himself a friend and “trusted ally” of RFK Jr., and lauded Donald Trump as “the greatest friend of Israel to ever occupy the Oval office,” is battling the condo board of his New York City apartment building over an amenity fee he allegedly sees as akin to Nazi genocide.
Last May, “America’s Rabbi” Jacob “Shmuley” Boteach used a common room on the 18th floor of the Riverside Boulevard tower on Manhattan’s Upper West Side to hold a small memorial service for Shani Louk, a 30-year-old German-Israeli tattoo artist who was kidnapped and beheaded in the October 7, 2023, Hamas massacre, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday by the board and obtained by The Independent.
After the building billed Boteach, 58, its standard rental fee of $500, along with the customary $210 for cleaning, the board’s complaint contends the Kosher Sex author and father of nine “concluded that the Board’s charging him $710 is equivalent to the Holocaust.”
“In lieu of simply paying the $710 fee for the use of a common room in a Condominium he paid over $4 million to live in, Botach has undertaken a campaign to defame, threaten, insult and coerce the Board and its agents, alleging that the $710 fee is proof of antisemitism, and that its imposition desecrates the memory not only of the victims of October 7 but of all other tragedies throughout Jewish history and is a thread of the same fabric of history that produced the Holocaust – all this for $710, what would be to a man who can buy a $4 million condominium, essentially pocket change,” the complaint states, using the original spelling of Boteach’s last name throughout.
The board says in its complaint that the $710 fee is “uniformly charged to everyone using the common room, regardless of the type of get-together, and equally regardless of the religion or heritage of the Unit Owner.”
“Indeed, waiving the fee on the basis of religion would be a discriminatory act against those not of that religion,” the complaint states.
It claims Boteach used the room again in September, bringing the amount he owes to $1,420, which he has “vehemently, if unjustifiably refused to pay,” according to the complaint, which says the board has now added $400 in late fees to the total.
But, in an hour-long interview Thursday evening, Boteach flatly denied using the room for a second time, calling the notion of a September gathering a “complete fabrication.” He said he already pays some $3,000 a month in fees that he believes allow him access to the room without extra costs, as long as there are fewer than 10 attendees. He also insisted that others in the building use the room regularly for birthday parties and other events without paying, accused building management and the condo board of “spying” on him, said he was kept from joining the board himself, complained that his favorite concierge had been mistreated by higher-ups, and warned he is prepared to hit back with “a catastrophic, massive counterclaim that will expose all the malfeasance in this building.”
“Their hatred of Israel and of and of Jewish residents [in the building] is so great that they are prepared to spend millions of dollars to recover $710 while our elevators do not work,” Boteach told The Independent. “Just to stop a Jew from commemorating a victim of October 7.”
Boteach argued, “I’m not the kind of resident they want here,” and said Black residents are also made to feel unwelcome in the building’s shared spaces, save the children of two players for the New York Knicks. Boteach further views the filing of the lawsuit against him as a sign of things to come in “Mamdani’s New York,” calling the incoming mayor an “Islamist” and claiming he’s being targeted for “standing up for something Jewish.”
“I am not a Jewish sheep,” Boteach asserted, voice growing louder and more heated. “I am a Jewish lion… I don't fit in with my yarmulke, my beard. I'm the only Orthodox Jew in this entire building. I don't fit in. Well, tough luck. I am going nowhere… This dumb building thinks that they're going to intimidate me.”
Boteach emphasized that U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was at his memorial for Louk a year earlier – which was not held in the building – and that the controversial cabinet member “cried” during the service.
Attorney Adam Leitman Bailey, who is representing the condo board, pushed back strongly against Boteach’s claims, denying that others use the 18th-floor room for free, and saying that Boteach is “the only one who hasn’t paid.”
Leitman Bailey, who is himself Jewish, said that three of the five condo board members are Jewish. One, Shmuel Kliger, is in fact an Israeli citizen and IDF veteran. Another, Randi Wax, is deeply involved in Jewish philanthropy and has hosted multiple Oct 7 hostages and their families at a home she owns in Southern California. The third, Dan Senor, a well-known Republican political strategist, is the son of a Holocaust survivor, studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and has for years strongly advocated for Jewish causes.
Boteach is “using Judaism and antisemitism as a tool here to bully others,” Leitman Bailey told The Independent. “And none of these acts are actual antisemitism.”
In January 2022, Boteach and wife Debbie purchased a three-bed, four-bath spread on Manhattan’s Riverside Boulevard, a once-forlorn stretch by the Hudson River, for a little less than $4.5 million, the board’s complaint says.
Residents have access to a suite of private rooms for entertaining, on the 18th floor of the 38-story luxury building, the complaint continues. Condominium rules require reserving the rooms in advance, signing a rental agreement and paying set fees for their use and to have them cleaned afterward, according to the complaint.
On October 7, 2023, Palestinian militant group Hamas carried out a deadly cross-border incursion from Gaza into Israel, killing some 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages. It was the deadliest terror attack in the Jewish state’s history; retaliatory strikes by the Israeli military have since killed an estimated 67,000 Palestinians.
In May 2025, the complaint says Boteach used one of the 18th-floor event spaces to hold a memorial service for Louk. She was referred to by President-elect Trump, days before he was sworn in for his second term in the White House, as, “That beautiful girl where [Hamas] threw her in the car, pulled her by her ponytail and threw her in the car like she was a sack of potatoes.”
“I argue that she is the most desecrated woman in the history of the world,” Boteach told The Independent.
Louk’s father was at the memorial, Boteach said. Fewer than 10 people were there, he claimed.
When building management found out about Boteach’s allegedly unauthorized use of the room, the condo board added a $710 charge to his account. The complaint says the second $710 charge from September has also gone unpaid, leading to two separate late fees of $200 each.
The blowback from Boteach, who insists that fewer than ten people attended the gathering, was swift. On September 4, he sent an email to the condo board and various unit owners in the building, demanding the charges be removed, and seeking an apology from a board member who told Boteach she was“disappointed in [his] behavior as a rabbi,” the complaint says.
Otherwise, Boteach vowed to “embroil [the entire building] in… litigation which is going to [be] massive, national and ugly,” according to the email, which is reproduced in the complaint.
“I WILL NOT BE PUNISHED FOR HAVING A FEW FRIENDS OVER TO COMFORT A JEWISH FATHER WHOSE DAUGHTER WAS MURDERED BY HAMAS,” the email went on. “[The condo] will be in the national news for their attempt to squash memorials for Jews murdered by Hamas, as is happening in other places all around the country and who are being sued for it. As owners, you all deserve to know what’s about to happen.”
The missive then took building management to task as “bigots,” and threatened to subpoena and depose board members who Boteach said he viewed as “compromised.” (The board says nothing in the condominium’s rules or by-laws permits them to waive the rental fees, regardless of the intended use, according to the complaint.)
Another email Boteach sent in October also went to the condo board and select apartment owners, calling the board “corrupt and only half-elected,” and slamming the rental and cleaning fees for the 18th-floor room as “extortion” and “an antisemitic desecration of Shani Louk’s blessed memory.”
“We are up to date with all payments save for this blatantly discriminatory and illegal fee, levied specially against Jewish supporters of Israel,” the message read. “We will NEVER acquiesce to your disgusting and discriminatory treatment, even if it takes ten years in court... So, take off the disgusting, abusive antisemitic, Israel-hating bill for the one hour use of that tiny room on the 18th floor for which we already pay thousands per month. You will not shame us.”
It says Boteach also took to Facebook, where he has upwards of 900,000 followers, likening the board’s enforcement of the amenity rental agreement to “Nazis forbidding Jewish funerals,” according to the complaint.
“Jews have long been punished not only for living, but for mourning,” Boteach posted. “In medieval Europe, rulers charged Jews exorbitant fees for burials — or denied them entirely. In Nazi Germany, Jewish funerals were forbidden; bodies were dumped into pits, families denied Kaddish. Now, in Manhattan, a rabbi is threatened with dire legal consequences for hosting a tiny memorial for Shani Louk.”
At the same time, Boteach demanded a board seat after two members resigned, calling the entity “corrupt, fraudulent and antisemitic” when they denied him a position. The complaint says he has additionally harassed building staff, posting videos of it on Instagram. (Boteach denies harassing anyone, and said he is the one who has been harassed.)
“Botach’s unhinged, legally specious, unreasonable, intentional and defamatory actions were designed to harass, intimidate, disrupt and interfere with the efficient and peaceful management of the Condominium, and to deprive the Condominium Board and Unit Owners of their right to the quiet enjoyment and peaceable use of their property,” the complaint states.
The condo board is asking a judge to order Boteach to cease “any and all behaviors intended or reasonably expected to create and continue disruption” in the building, to stop “making and publishing allegations of religious animus and/or bigotry on the part of the Board of Managers and their agents and employees,” and seeks compensatory and exemplary damages to be determined in court.
For his part, Boteach says he is staying put.
“They're fixated on a rabbi who owes $710 because they don't want to be associated with Israel,” he told The Independent. “That's what this is all about, right?”
What to know about the 3 hostages whose remains are still in Gaza
Bodies of 15 Palestinians returned by Israel, health officials in Gaza say
US proposal at the UN for Gaza stabilization force faces concerns from Russia, China and Arabs
Israel says militants in Gaza have handed over to the Red Cross a body believed to be a hostage
Tucker Carlson claims FBI and DOJ are covering up Trump shooter Crooks’ motivation
Epstein’s reading list: Emails reveal pedophile’s wide-ranging Amazon picks
