Leah Rubashkin received a standing ovation Sunday as she spoke about her husband's faith amid hurdles. COLlive was permitted to record the rare speech.

By COLlive reporter

"We are surrounded by a world that, [in] its very nature wants to deny Hashem. Bitachon is our window - not out of reality - but into reality."

This is the philosophy the helped the Rubashkin family remain strong and sane as their business and life were shattered, said Leah Rubashkin.

The wife of Sholom Mordechai Rubashkin and mother of 10 spoke Sunday to 500 women in Crown Heights about "the journey of my family."

Mr. Rubashkin had been under scrutiny for PETA's animal rights complaints, bank fraud, and immigration charges while he ran the Agriprocessors kosher meatpacking plant in Iowa.

But his wife received a standing ovation, and told COLlive she was very moved by the warm reception at the inaugural Chinese Auction of Oholei Torah's PTA.

With a cup of water handy, she read from a paper, her smile revealing her discomfort with the limelight. "They called me the guest speaker... I'm not really a speaker," she noted.

Her speech was met with enthusiastic response nevertheless, as she described how belief in the Almighty led her past the legal hurdles and personal challenges.

"Either have bitachon and be calm that Hashem is with you or alternatively be upset, nervous and worry," she said. "Hashem has his time, and when it's right, it will happen, Sholom Mordechai says."

She vividly described the May 12, 2008, Federal immigration raid on the plant founded by her father-in-law Aaron Rubashkin, and called it "a date Postville will never forget."

Mrs. Rubashkin went on to speak about the days in the courthouse in South Dakota, and the many surprising occurences and people they met.

One of those people was a local whose Jewish name was Menachem Mendel - same as the Lubavitcher Rebbe - who declared "he's innocent, innocent, innocent."

She also spoke of their appointment as the official Shluchim to Sioux Falls by Rabbi Moshe Feller, Head Shliach to the Upper Midwest.

She said witnesses for the prosecution used the term "Sholom EZ pass": "Say Sholom told you to do it and you can go."

But the real story here, she said, was the outpour of support the Jewish public has shown to her family.

"The fact that we can get support from a paper like Yated Neeman, week in week out, for months. The editor Pinchos Lipschutz went out on 'mesiras nefesh' to support a yid he never met."

Rubashkin said 1,300 letters of support were sent to judge Linda Reade and 4,000 Lubavitch students from across the U.S., Canada, England and Brazil had prayed for them.

She ended her speech reciting with the crowd the call "Ad Masai, Ad Masai, Ad Masai" for her personal redemption and the general redemption.

Watch the full speech:


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