Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Guatemalan authorities take 160 minors from extremist Lev Tahor sect after abuse allegations

The law enforcement raid on Friday is the latest legal action against the group, which is often described as a cult

(JTA) — Authorities in Guatemala raided the compound of Lev Tahor, an extremist Jewish sect, and removed 160 children and teenagers after allegations of abuse and human trafficking.

The law enforcement raid on Friday is the latest legal action against the group, which is often described as a cult. In 2022, two leaders of the sect were given 12 years in prison on charges of kidnapping children and exploiting them for sexual purposes. Earlier this year, three members of Lev Tahor were sentenced to more than 10 years in prison for child exploitation and kidnapping after abducting a pair of siblings ages 12 and 14.

Friday’s operation involved almost 480 Guatemalan government personnel, who entered the compound after several minors escaped and got in contact with authorities. The raid followed multiple unsuccessful attempts to enter the compound, and also included the arrest of a police official believed to be collaborating with Lev Tahor.

“Based on the statements of the complainants, the evidence obtained, and the medical examinations, it was possible to establish that there are forms of human trafficking against these minors, such as forced marriage, abuse, and related crimes,” Guatemalan prosecutor Nancy Paiz said, according to Reuters.

Lev Tahor is a secretive group with an estimated membership in the hundreds who observe an extremist interpretation of Jewish law. The group places tight restrictions on its members that largely separate them from the outside world. Lev Tahor was formerly based in Israel and Canada, and its members have lived in places including the Balkans and Mexico, where police raided their compound in 2022, arresting dozens of members and taking women and children to a shelter.

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

2X match on all Passover gifts!

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:

  • Credit the Forward
  • Retain our pixel
  • Preserve our canonical link in Google search
  • Add a noindex tag in Google search

See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at editorial@forward.com, subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.