"Life and Death:" NY Rosh Yeshiva Attacks Scooters, Electric Bikes

Rabbi Yaakov Bender, rosh yeshiva of Darchei Torah in New York, issued a sharp warning to parents over the growing use of electric scooters and e-bikes by yeshiva students, saying the trend has become a direct danger to children’s lives.

“I am at a loss,” Rabbi Bender wrote at the opening of an unusually forceful letter, in which he described his frustration over parents who continue allowing children to ride electric vehicles despite repeated accidents and warnings.

Rabbi Bender said he had personally confiscated dozens of electric scooters and bikes that students brought to the yeshiva and hid in nearby yards in an effort to avoid the school’s ban. The vehicles are now being held in his office under lock and key.

“This is pure negligence,” he wrote, stressing that giving a child an electric scooter or bike is not a harmless convenience or a way to satisfy social pressure.

According to Rabbi Bender, the issue is not whether a child feels left out or whether other families allow it. The question, he said, is whether parents are willing to expose their children to a real risk of serious injury or death.

The rosh yeshiva compared giving such a vehicle to a child to placing a dangerous weapon in his hands, saying parents must understand that they are responsible for their children’s safety.

“There is no room here for compromise or understanding,” he wrote. “Parents need to realize that they are responsible for their children’s lives. This is not a matter of comfort or of ‘everyone does it.’”

Rabbi Bender’s warning comes after a series of serious accidents involving electric scooters and bikes, including recent reports of two young riders who were badly injured after crashing into a concrete barrier. One of them lost consciousness and was taken to the hospital in serious condition.

The problem is not limited to the Haredi community. Traffic authorities in Israel and the United States have warned of a rise in accidents involving electric vehicles, especially among inexperienced teenagers. In Israel’s Yarkon area alone, police issued 95 tickets to riders of electric bikes and scooters over the past week and confiscated 49 vehicles.

Darchei Torah, led by Rabbi Bender, is one of the leading yeshivas in the United States, with thousands of graduates. His public stand is expected to carry weight across Haredi communities in New York and beyond.

Rabbi Bender ended his letter with a direct appeal to parents.

“Wake up,” he wrote. “Do not wait for a tragedy. Remove these electric vehicles from your home and explain to your children that this is a matter of pikuach nefesh. Nothing is worth this risk.”