Lital Shemesh is a 29-year-old successful, female, Israeli
journalist who recently participated in a seminar with other young
Israelis and Arabs in hopes of igniting optimism for peace. She
returned from the seminar disappointed and disillusioned.
Lital Shemesh as Editor of Israeli's largest youth magazine
She is a rising star in the Israeli media who openly expresses
her political aspirations in the Knesset. She worked as
Editor-in-Chief for the Yedioth Youth Magazines, reported for the
Israel Broadcasting Authority and the Hot CableTV News channel,
and is CEO and Founder of a web-based girls magazine “Pinkish –
Everything that Girls Love.”
In her first video blog in English two years ago, she says, “I
really want… a peaceful quiet country to live in, and I really
want peace to come.”
"I really want peace to come" - 1:09 minute mark.
But her conclusions from the peace seminar reflect a strong trend
in Israeli society: Israelis are realizing that the negotiations
with the Arabs are destined to fail from the outset, so why waste
the time? As is apparent from the February election results,
further talks with the Arabs simply no longer interest many
people. It is an issue that has been sidelined and tabled to
“maybe the next generation.”
Her summary (below) of her experience at the peace seminar will
help readers better understand Israeli society of 2013. A must
read. Her report appeared this past Thursday (May 2, 2013) on the
Walla news site:
Peace? From the Palestinian Standpoint, There is a Past, No
Future
by Lital Shemesh
I participated in the Dialogue for Peace Project for young
Israelis and Palestinians who are politically involved in various
frameworks. The project’s objective was to identify tomorrow’s
leaders and bring them closer today, with the aim of bringing
peace at some future time.
The project involved meetings every few weeks and a concluding
seminar in Turkey.
On the third day of the seminar after we had become acquainted,
had removed barriers, and split helpings of rachat Lukum [a
halva-like almond Arab delicacy] as though there was never a
partition wall between us, we began to touch upon many subjects
which were painful for both sides. The Palestinians spoke of
roadblocks and the IDF soldiers in the territories, while the
Israeli side spoke of constant fear, murderous terrorist attacks,
and rockets from Gaza.
The Israeli side, which included representatives from right and
left, tried to understand the Palestinians’ vision of the end of
the strife– “Let’s talk business.” The Israelis delved to
understand how we can end the age-old, painful conflict. What red
lines are they willing to be flexible on? What resolution will
satisfy their aspirations? Where do they envision the future
borders of the Palestinian State which they so crave?
We were shocked to discover that not a single one of them spoke
of a Palestinian State, or to be more precise, of a two-state
solution.
They spoke of one state – their state. They spoke of ruling
Jaffa, Tel Aviv, Akko, Haifa, and the pain of the Nakba [lit. the
tragedy – the establishment of the State of Israel]. There was no
future for them. Only the past. “There is no legitimacy for Jews
to live next to us” – this was their main message. “Firs t, let
them pay for what they perpetrated.”
In the course of a dialogue which escalated to shouts, the
Palestinians asked us not to refer to suicide bombers as
“terrorists” because they don’t consider them so. “So how do you
call someone who dons a vest and blows himself up in a Tel Aviv
shopping mall with the stated purpose of killing innocent
civilians,” I asked one of the participants.
“I have a 4-year-old at home,” answered Samach from Abu Dis (near
Jerusalem). “If G-d forbid something should happen to him, I will
go and burn an entire Israeli city, if I can.” All the other
Palestinian participants nodded their heads in agreement to his
harsh words.
“Three weeks ago, we gave birth to a son,” answered Amichai, a
religious, Jewish student from Jerusalem. “If G-d forbid something
should happen to him, I would find no comfort whatsoever in deaths
of more people.”
Israelis from the full gamut of political parties participated in
the seminar: Likud, Labor, Kadima, Meretz, and Hadash (combined
Jewish/Arab socialist party). All of them reached the
understanding that the beautiful scenarios of Israeli-Palestinian
peace that they had formulated for themselves simply don’t
correspond with reality. It’s just that most Israelis don’t have
the opportunity to sit and really converse with Palestinians, to
hear what they really think.
Our feed of information comes from Abu Mazen’s declarations to
the international press, which he consistently contradicts when he
is interviewed by Al Jazeera, where he paints a completely
different picture.
I arrived at the seminar with high hopes, and I return home with
difficult feelings and despair. Something about the narrative of
the two sides is different from the core. How can we return to the
negotiating table when the Israeli side speaks of two states and
the Palestinian side speaks of liberating Palestine from the
Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea? How can peace ever take
root in a platform which grants legitimacy to terrorism?
Translated by Baruch Gordon
BS”D Sun, Apr 21, 2013
Ahharei Mot-Kedushim 5773-5953
This week we read 2 parshiot. The name of the 1st, Ahharei Mot,
translates to “After the death (of the sons of Aharon Hacohen),
the 2nd to (be) holy people. To be holy means to be separate from
the mundane, from the impure, from lusts etc. HaShem here
instructs demands of our nation to be holy people.
The Ohr HaHayim teaches us from our parshiot that the leaders of
the Israel nation must have great love of the holy land of Israel,
of the people of the Israel nation & of the holy Torah which
HaShem gave us, with full realization that the 3 are 1
inseparable. This means that the nation, the land & Torah must
be together, an absolute unity.
Therefore the members of the nation of Israel;
Should be living in the land of
Israel
Must be living the life of Torah.
Doing otherwise, e.g. choosing to live in the galut when there is
good possibility to live in the holy land of Israel, or choosing
to not live a Torah life are a Torah violation.
We saw that long before the relatively new Aliyah movements e.g.
the Bilu, Kiyahh, Aliyah Hhadasha etc which had organizations
behind them with various sorts of assistance etc, the true leaders
of our nation did indeed send some of their followers “home” to
the holy land. The Gr”a sent 200 families of his students who came
here to live in the holy city of Yerushalayim when it was half in
ruin & empty, also the Hhovavei Ssion, among others, there
were also many individuals or individual families - all were
orthodox Jews who came here to build homes to study & live
Torah & to farm when there was no organization to support
them, no Jewish Agency, no WZO, no Palmahh no IDF etc. These were
the real pioneers.
Today we have pseudo-leaders in the galut countries who seek to
separate the nation from the land. These “leaders” cause a
weakness of the Jewish community in the holy land. Were there more
Jews here than in galut, especially if they live Torah lives in
Israel there would be much less attempts by goyim to take land
from us & the Geula will come sooner. Those “leaders” who tell
their followers to stay in the galut will cause their followers to
miss the 1st stages of the Geula!
Yes you read me correctly - the Geula will be 1st here in the
holy land & ALL the people in the galut will NOT have the
slightest hint to it - ZERO! The people here will develop
spiritually beyond what was ever possible before. The spiritual
heights will change their bodies as well. Many years after the
Geula here, Galut Jews will again be able to visit. They will see
their brethren here spreading wings flying to Heaven to hear
lessons there, and then fly back to earth every day. They will be
astounded, will ask what, how, an why, you; yes & us no? The
answer they will get is brief and simple; “You chose to stay in
the galut with your material desires so you remained fully
material, we chose to live here even if there were less material
goodies rather to prefer the spiritual - so our spirituality grew
to this achievement”.
We also have pseudo-leaders in the holy land who seek by force to
separate the people of Israel from the holy Torah. The result
would be multifaceted disaster that I do not even dare to begin to
describe.
The violations that our parshiot here teach us caused the land to
vomit out the nations who were here before our coming up out of
Egypt have become more & more commonplace among our people
here.
This trend has already caused the goyim to press on us to abandon
portions of the land. These false-leader politicians would cause
the trend of those violations do become rampant.
HaShem does not want to vomit us from the land again.
But we cannot permit the evil to grow. Already we have been forced
to give land to our murderous neighbors. Already in so many of our
lands Jewish residents have felt that they cannot live here and
have fled to the galut. Will we sit quiet while the deterioration
continues?
We force HaShem to expel us again has veshalom?
Now to prevent this expulsion a well known rabbi has accepted upon
himself to be hunted & chased into exile by heinous false
accusations instead of fighting them here. This self imposed galut
hopefully will prevent loss of more land & prevent many of our
fellow residents of the land from fleeing it. Of course we hope
that soon he will be able to return home while the small cadre of
hoodlums who accuse him for their own evil purposes will be duly
punished here as well as what is waiting for them after their 120.
The hints to these problems which stand against us today were
told to us in 2 tales, Sipurei Ma’asiyoth, by Rabi
Nahman of Brelsov zassa”l.
In the story of “the King’s son & maid’s son who were
exchanged” (also called “the exchanged children”) the king’s son
after discovering that he is truly a son of royalty is guided by a
hidden sage (the man of the forest) to a kingdom known as “The
intelligent state with a stupid king” which had previously been
known as the “The stupid state with an intelligent king”. The sage
told him that there he will achieve his rightful royal status.
During the epoch of the previous king, the intelligent one, it had
peace from within & without. When that king died the new less
brilliant king took over & peace from within & without was
lost. There was a rule in that state that if a man should arrive
who had the ability to return the previous status of “The stupid
state with an intelligent king” he would become king instead of
the “stupid king”. When the “exchanged king’s son” who is the
central character of the story came there he was told by the
king’s ministers that they & the people are not really stupid,
they are in fact very intelligent but the previous king had been
so smart that they were stupid in comparison. The new young king
is the opposite. He is less intelligent than they are, so he is
considered stupid. He was unable to unravel the tests to his
intelligence left by his late father & also peace was lost.
The “exchanged” one passed all of them with flying colors becaming
the new king. He saw that several things were each out of their
proper places & that putting them in order would bring peace
good life & prosperity back.
This is the condition we have today. Our nation, which is
described in Devarim (Deut) 4:6 as “… the great nation intelligent
and brilliant which has these laws” because we have & live the
Torah laws, has been mislead by pseudo-leaders to violate those
laws. We are that “The intelligent state with a stupid king”.
To make matters worse, by our being ruled so long by “stupid
kings” we have become “dumbed down” too. We no longer have the
senses to smell out the false leaders that Rashb”i warned would be
in these latter generations. We have ignored the warning given by
Rabbi Nahman in Likutei Moharan 61:2 that there are “leaders” who
are called “rabbi” or “rebbi” who not only are unable to properly
lead their own lives, even more so they are unable to lead others.
They merely take honor & greatness to themselves to take
leadership on people. The people must be aware of this & be
careful to not ordinate them, to not give them the honor of the
title of “rabbi” or “rebbi”, careful to not permit such ones to
get leadership. He states that they are not so much as fault for
they are simply overcome by their Yeisser Hara (bad
impulse/desires). Yet it is more the fault of those who ordinate,
who honor them & permit them to take rule over the public. It
is those who give these false leaders the power to rule over the
people who will be faced with judgment for it before the heavenly
court.
People WAKE UP. Who are you permitting to lead you, or any sector
of our once lofty nation? The nation which is known in Devarim
(Deut) 4:6 as, “… the great nation intelligent and brilliant which
has these laws” is known as such when we have & live the Torah
laws & live in the holy land.
Even some goyim have attested to the connection. About 150 years
ago Dr. Allen, a well known physician & teacher of medicine in
his time, wrote in one of the text books he authored in the
section on destructive diseases such as syphilis &
tuberculosis, that “… however the Jews are free of these horrible
diseases because for centuries they have been adhering to the laws
given them at Sinai.” Now what do we have today?! So many of our
people suffer & die of horrific destructive diseases. This
terrible phenomenon is only in very recent generations, only since
the times when we started permitting false leaders to take lead of
us.
People WAKE UP. The nation of Israel the land of Israel & the
Torah of Israel are ONE! Separating them is like cutting a living
body into 3 pieces!
Will such a body live?
NO!!!!!
ALL 3 parts must be together. Only thus will it entity survive!
So I hear someone saying, “But we did survive 2 millennia in the
galut”. To this I reply “yes & no, also pay attention to how
what survived did do so”.
For many years we stayed loyal to Torah. 1st of all there was
always a central living core of Torah loyal Jews here in the Holy
Land of Israel. Until about 120 years ago there were ZERO secular
Jews in the Holy Land. This gave power by “remote control”, by
radiated influence of kedusha to those in the galut. In the galut
for most of the time there were no or almost no secular Jews.
There were almost none who left to convert to a foreign religion.
Even when faced with death, the vast majority chose death rather
than to convert out. Jews stayed loyal to Torah life. Were it not
for that obstinacy there would be no Jews today. For centuries
after the Roman conquest it was indeed extremely hard to return to
our land. Yet the nostalgia, the broken hearts longing for the
land & the rebuilding of the Jewish community as well as the
Beit Hamikdash/Holy Temple was so strong & deep that it was
considered by the soul & by HaShem as if they were indeed
here.
Suleiman Al-Kabir the Turkish emperor made it easier to some
extent. He wanted this area of his empire populated rather than an
empty ruin so he imported Jews & Muslims from across the
Ottoman Empire to the Holy Land. Many of our people gladly jumped
on the opportunity. Suleiman also aided our people to build homes,
farms schools etc. His demands were simple. “You may build farm
learn all you want & I will help you do so under the condition
that you do not try to establish a sovereignty of your own”. The
Jews who came were ALL orthodox religious Jews, they continued to
be so here. Also the orthodox groups who came later from Europe as
mentioned above. This strengthened the radiated influence for
survival of Jews in the galut. Those there their hearts &
souls continued to cry for living in the land. In those days NO
ONE - NOT any one single “gadol” said it is forbidden to go to the
land. Also through all those centuries, all those generations,
Torah life was viewed as joy, vibrant enlivening. Again Torah,
land & people were ONE!
This kept us alive, surviving, in the galut.
However, about 260 years ago along came the so-called
“enlightenment” movement, & later in Germany the “reform”
movement, with the false concepts that Jews had to become more
like the goyim in order to be loved & tolerated by them &
in order to “advance”.
The result was destructive. The Dreyfus incident was a small
example. An inkling of what happens when such a concept becomes
rife in the nation is in the realization that close before WW2
there were so many Jews who had left Judaism that there were
10,000 (yes that many) xtian priests from Jewish families! The
Nazi concept that Jews were not human was given basis in the motto
of the “enlightened” “reform Jews” “Be a Jew at home & a human
being outside”. Yes oooof! The minister of police in Stalin’s
regime was a secular Jew, so was Stalin’s right hand man! Though
the great grandson of that police minister has made Aliyah, serves
in the IDF, has done full giur & is studying in Machon Meir
yeshiva! Reminds one of the grandsons of evil Haman who converted
& studied Torah in Bnei Brak. It was a reform “rabbi” who told
President Roosevelt to ignore the pleas of European Jewry to bomb
Auschwitz, & to close the doors to emergency mass immigration
from there!
Today in USA, Canada & Europe/Russia most descendants of Jews
from a couple centuries ago do not know or do not care to know
that they are Jews. There are also many who imagine they are Jews
but in fact are not Jews by halakha because they do not have the
maternal line any more. There are many who know that they are Jews
but want nothing to do with Torah life, with missvoth etc. These
too get lost by intermarriage etc.
This is now happening right here in the Holy Land for the same
reason. Now with the new mis-government cutting off funds to
orthodox schools, cutting child stipends even more, cutting the
salaries of religious soldiers from the family stipend they used
to get, pushing to not only require mathematics etc that are
indeed needed but that orthodox schools also teach subjects that
will influence secularity; the damage to Jewish survival that we
saw & see so rife in the galut is being brought here.
The “stupid king” claims he seeks to repair the galut mentality
of the “extreme orthodox”. But he is doing it by going too far in
the opposite extreme & will only bring damage & more
fervent divisiveness. The “stupid king” seeks to purposely by
force enforce & promote violation of Shabat Kodesh &
Kashruth by the people of Israel in the land of Israel. He seeks
to promote marriage without any spot of Kedushah of holiness, no
more concept of “holy matrimony”; & seeks to promote
intermarriage. He also seeks to promote the freedom for homo’s in
the holy land, to permit & promote various other relations
forbidden by Torah.
Again we return to the fact that cutting off Torah life from our
people is like cutting off a major portion of a body. The organism
dies!
In the story of the 7 beggars found in Rabbi
Nachman`s Stories by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan, in the 2nd day of
the festive week after wedding in that story we learn of a country
which had had beautiful fragrant flowers & wonderful fruits
with good appearance fragrance & taste. Then a cruel king came
to rule over them. He was unable to do so directly so he used a
convoluted method. He placed there 3 groups of agents. These
agents influenced the residents of that country to foul language,
to mockery, to falsehood & to promiscuity & lust. This
ruined the taste of the fruit so they tasted like carrion, ruined
the fragrances to smell like carrion & caused poor vision.
Under the guidance of the “deaf beggar” they hunted down the
agents of the evil king, expelled them & the cruel king, and
then they returned to their previous good ways. Yet the fragrance
& flavors were still missing. Then they found the “gardener”
who had been keeping the central garden from which all the fruits
& flowers received their benefit. This “gardener” had somehow
been lost, & whenever he had tried to tell that he was the
“lost gardener” he would be reviled by the badly influenced
residents of that country. But now it was discovered that he was
really the good “gardener” & he was reinstated & all was
healed, good life was regained & there was great joy to all.
People WAKE UP! It is incumbent upon us all to expel the evil
king(s) & the agents who have influenced our people to mock
what is pure & good, influenced us to behave like goyim and
marry goyim - who exchanged us who are sons of The King to be like
sons of servants of maids.
It is high time we returned to be “… the great nation intelligent
and brilliant which has these laws” with a king who is worthy of
being the “intelligent king ruling over the stupid nation”. A king
whose intelligence, his brilliance is true brilliance & not
fool’s gold, the false intelligence of either extreme of
secularity or of false Torah.
The false rabbis stifled the life force, brought stagnancy &
division, & actually laid the foundation for secularity to
take hold. The secular “cruel king” is seeking to destroy all that
is pure & righteous. While we must indeed shake off the galut
styles that dried up Torah life, made it all black draped &
depressing, created divisiveness & left open a back door for
corruption; we must not permit secular corruption to take its
place. It must be realized that the secular drive is also a
product of the galut. While the depressive blackness, which is
also a relatively recent phenomenon, is stifling & has its own
damage which could eventually bring ruin, the secular
“enlightenment” is definite death. It is a sugar coated deathly
poison.
We are at war. No not the PLO, not Hamas, not Hizbullah, not the
Salafists nor Iran or Syria. We are the main enemy. We must
realize that the truth is as was stated in a “Pogo” comic strip a
few decades ago. “We have met the enemy & he is us.”
We must return to the center. We must return to real Torah, not
toira, not toiri, not xenophobic hate of individuals or groups
whose grandfathers came from different parts of the galut, or who
pray in a different nosahh. We must shake off the Hellenism that
has infected almost all of us if not all of us to some extent or
another.
This also recalls another important point, a point that Rav
Shalom Arush shlit”a mentions several times in his talks. A rav
that does everything, that is always “on call” to answer every
question immediately, that is your total connection to HaShem is
NOT doing you a favor. A real good rav must be guiding you &
making seek YOUR OWN PERSONAL connection with HaShem, so that
eventually you will not need him for this. He must at times “be
unavailable” or “wait for an answer in the meantime go talk to
HaShem & ask HIM for guidance etc”, wait for the rav for
hours, days, weeks, or even months. This forces you to seek your
contact with a HaShem.
We must reawaken to vibrant living Torah that is alive &
enlivening. To regain the ways that led our people to be able to
feel with our senses the difference between pure & spiritually
clean - & what is impure & foul. To feel the envelope of
tumah on food prepared by a non-Jew or a Jew who is a violator of
Torah; to feel the tumah on a seat that a nidah sat on. Then to be
able to clean the tumah away by pulling in sheaf from HaShem to do
it. It is doable. The ability was handed down quietly through the
generations from teacher to student. There are today a few people
who have learned & made the effort to do so. It is possible
for all of us to do so. This is just a clue as to what we can be.
We can & must return to the state where it is a joy &
vibrancy to live a Torah life. It can be done. It must be done. It
must be not only done by us who read this lesson. We must do what
we can to spread the idea, to influence others to this goal.
We must do this, & we must be living in the Holy Land of
Israel. We must reunite the 3 parts of our entity; the people of
Israel in the Holy Land of Israel with the joyful vibrant
enlivening lives of true Torat Israel - as one full unity. This
way we will get to the state of sprouting our wings to learn
HaShem’s Torah.
Yeshaya 11:9 “… the land will be filled with knowledge … water
will cover the seas”. Here as in other places water is an allegory
for Torah. The time will come when the influence of the primordial
serpent, the Samekh Mem will be defeated by the simple & pure.
The fear & terror that has controlled mankind for thousands of
years will come to an end. There are those few who have striven to
remain far from the evil, who have tried to remain simple &
pure, to be clean of the evil, to keep love & gentleness in
their hearts. There are those who were not among these but
realized the trap they were enslaved in & broke free to learn
how to be like them to join the true “freemen”. Among them are the
ones who have had to fight the evil, overtly or covertly.
The time will come yes when the evil will be conquered, the
primordial serpent put to an end. Then the waters of true Torah
shall cover the world as said in that pasuk & we will sprout
our wings to fly to learn from HaShem. To be among the winged ones
in that, hopefully near, future we must begin now to do what must
be done, to free ourselves from both extremes. We must strive for
live Torah life in HaShem’s pleasant ways together with HIS purity
in our lives.
Let’s all “earn our wings”.
Since duties events & time did not permit me to send this out
before Shabat I send it now to you my precious friends, students,
brothers & sisters with my blessings for Shavuah Tov &
Mevorakh
Rav Yaakov
BS”D Fri, Apr 12, 2013
Messorah; Vayikra 14:1-15:33
This lesson is dedicated for the memory & uplifting of the souls
of Rav Yaakov Hhai Yosef zessavek”l who passed away this afternoon,
& of Nahman Yaskil za”l a young man (21) who along with his
parents family were former residents of Betar. Nahman Yaskil died
yesterday late morning or early afternoon in his room in a yeshivah
dorm in Kfar Zeitim where he was a counselor.
Rav Yaakov Hhai Yosef zessavek”l, the eldest son of Rav Ovadia Yosef
shlit”a, was known for on top of being a top Torah scholar &
posek to be personable & bridging between Sfaradim Ashkenazim
& Hhasidim, seeking good peaceful relationships between the
various communities.
He passed away Hahasa Ein Kerem Hospital with his family & a
group of Mekubalim around him, including Rav Yaakv Ades shlit’a who
said Shema Yisrael with him at the passing.
Our parshah deals with the plague of leprosy in people &
buildings, & gonorrhea.
We have learned that Biblical leprosy was a punishment for evil
speech, slander etc. This is a sin that our generation is sorely
guilty of. I presume that everyone reading this knows how
gonorrhea is spread, & that the sin of that disease is also
widespread. Know! That in the eyes of HaShem not only the actual
act but also sinful desires in that lust, & immodest
dress-perfumery etc are just as bad & just as damaging to the
soul roots etc.
The purification of a person who contracted Biblical leprosy or
gonorrhea necessitated bringing 2 pure birds to sacrifice.
With that we turn to the passing of the 2 men for whom this lesson
is in memory of.
As I mentioned above the sins related to the diseases in our
parshah are terribly widespread these days. Were HaShem to slap
all the guilty of various phases modes etc of them how many would
be left untouched? Very few.
A quick reading of the laws of proper speech, be it speaking our
hearing, would leave us all with our heads hanging in shame.
I will recount here a relative incident which occurred in France a
number of years ago to demonstrate.
A kolleman father of several children, a Cohen, was accused of
betraying his wife with some young floozy. At 1st neither his wife
nor most people would believe it. But when the 2 accusers brought
a young woman to the Paris Beit Din who testified that he had
sinned with her & they claimed to have witness level knowledge
both the Beit Din & the wife believed them. This was done
despite the man standing on his claim that it was all a nefarious
lie. The kolleman was divorced (& being a Cohen he would never
be able to remarry his divorcee if reconciliation could have been
arranged), he was thrown out of his kollel & sent out of Paris
in great shame. For 8 full years he was pushed from town to city
to village, defiled & reviled wherever he went. Finally he
came to a small orthodox Jewish community in a small town where
the dean of the local kollel said “1st of 8 years of wandering in
shame is sufficient tikun-punishment if you indeed did as claimed.
2ndly I was not witness & was not in the Beit Din, so I cannot
be 100% sure of the validity of the accusations. Sit study &
we will see who & what you are.”
2 years later the dean offered the man his daughter in marriage.
“I have more & more difficulty believing the accusations
against you, & so I dismiss from my mind any taint of belief
in them.”
Mazal Tov, barukh HaShem the end to his galut & loneliness.
Soon after that it was heard that the 3 accusers, the 2 men &
the women, had confessed that ALL the accusations had been total
absolute lies! It was all made up! The kolleman had been falsely
accused, sentenced & shamed, his original family torn apart,
his children left fatherless & shamed for 10 years &
marked for life by a set of lies!
Why the 2 men do it? After all they too were kollelmen, in the
same kollel. They admitted that it was from jealousy! Yes
jealousy! The man was the top student in the kollel & known
for his good character traits. His wife was gorgeous, as well
known for her modesty & good character traits. Their children
were all beautiful little darlings, human angels. The 2 other men
were jealous & so sought to ruin the lives of their fellow
student & his family.
Thousands had believed their lies.
Now a similar campaign of heinous lies are leveled against Rav
Berland shlit”a by a small group of men who after making a mess of
things when they were involved in management of the his yeshiva
got tossed out. Anyone, including the police, who would be TRULY
interested in the truth would consider that Rav Berland is 76
years old, ill with diabetes & lung troubles for over 10
years, his body is wracked also from decades of many fasts &
many nights wherein he remained awake studying & praying for
Am Yisrael as well as individuals in special needs for help from
HaShem. With that it would clear that the accusations are
impossible. No way would he be capable of doing what they accuse
him of, no matter which of the various modes of accusation one
considers.
These are just 2 glaring examples of what our nation is guilty of
in speech. I am sure each of us can come up with many more
examples, of various grades. Know even “small” lashon hara is evil
& marked by HaShem.
Too is the cancer of immodesty in behavior, dress, speech,
perfumery (both men & women), & what we permit our eyes to
see. I’m talking about the orthodox communities in this as well.
Even poskim who permit women to wear wigs in public have stated
that they never agreed to & do not agree to the types that are
so common these days. They have all stated that the wigs we mostly
see are definitely forbidden & for several reasons.
Similarly perfume & makeup is permitted in the home alone so
that the woman will appear nice for her husband & not for
every male in the street. Perfumed deodorants are similar. Any
perfume that is strong enough, or formulated to keep its aroma for
24 hours as many are today, is forbidden due to it being smelled
by people out of the home as well.
For men the questions in perfume are: 1] why do you wear it? To be
smelling perfumed or because you are too lazy to wash regularly or
because you a health problem & do not take care of it? 2] The
perfume you use, does it have a feminine type odor as many do, or
is it more mundane or is it crude? Like with women there is no
need to be detectable meters away from you. If the perfume smells
feminine or crude you should not be using it.
Fashion is a disaster. Rav Nisim Peress zessavek”l used to say
that the Hebrew word for fashion, modah, was the very same letters
as the name of the angel in charge of the entrance gate to
Geheinom.
What kind of thing is this - skirts at or above the knees?!
Sweaters, trico blouses designed to emphasise the shape of a
girl’s or woman’s torso! Vest & blouse combo’s that show an
“open “V” shape in mid torso?! Blouse or sweater designs that call
attention to the area of the bust?! Black stockings with lace
style patterns (we all know what type of women wear those in other
societies!)?! These are only a few examples of what has become
common.
I really do not like to say this but it has become known that in
some orthodox communities married women go around husband swapping
(it is they the women who arrange it); also yeshiva boys &
married men going with prostitutes & plain loose women,
reading lustful websites & magazines, aside from ogling every
female on the street. It is NOT just one group. It is Litvatkers
as well as Hhasidim.
HaShem Yerahhem what this generation has come to!
Each of us has to do some soul searching, where are we guilty. At
least in some small shadow or hint of such behavior or even hidden
desire. Each of us must do what we can to try to change the tide.
Each of us MUST spend time each day or night speaking with HaShem
to plead with him to help us with repairing our individual blemish
& to help the nation that each will succeed in conquering
his/hers.
Yes there are many of our people who clean, who are wonderful
people doing good deeds etc. There is much good to be said of our
nation. Yet we must not pretend that there is nothing wrong. Doing
so would be a hidden claim that HaShem is unjust in HIS judgments,
hhas veshalom.
The funeral for Rav Yaakov Yosef zessavek”l is in progress while
am writing this. For a funeral of a death not expected by the
people, on latter afternoon of Yom Shishi the turnout of 35,000 is
large. One can be sure that had it been in the middle of the week
when people can come from overseas, from the far south & north
there would have been 4 times that number!
It is also worth noting that a Jew buried after high noon on Yom
Shishi is protected by HaShem from the Malakhei Hhabalah
(afflicting angels who beat the person with flaming iron whips in
the grave). Rav Yaakov Hhai Yosef went up pure & clean to Gan
Eden. I, & I am sure thousands of others, will miss him.
Like in the parshah 2 clean pure birds, Rav Yaakov Hhai Yosef
& Nahman Yaskil have gone as atonement for our nation. Now we
must all do t’shuvah so that they will not have gone in vain.
With that I send my blessings to all of you my precious brothers
sisters friends & students for
Shabat Shalom Umevorakh
Rav Yaakov
Obama and freedom for Jonathan Pollard
The American president and freedom for Jonathan Pollard
By ESTHER POLLARD, The Jerusalem Post
August 25, 2011
Executive clemency is not merely the president’s privilege, it's
his solemn duty; US judicial process hijacked by a political
agenda.
The extensive powers of clemency the American Constitution grants
to the president are his solemn responsibility. This executive
privilege is bestowed to enable the president to safeguard the
rights of all American citizens.
In cases where the justice system has discharged its
responsibility appropriately and the public good would be neither
benefited nor harmed by the president’s intervention, it is
entirely his prerogative whether or not to exercise executive
clemency.
But in a case like that of my husband Jonathan Pollard, where the
judicial system has been subverted to prosecute one American
citizen excessively and where all legal remedies have been
exhausted, there is a moral imperative compelling presidential
intervention.
Incredibly Obama has responded with prolonged, inscrutable
silence to a virtual deluge of appeals entreating him to exercise
executive clemency to free Jonathan.
Now completing his 26th year of a life sentence, it is manifestly
clear that the judicial process was hijacked by a political
agenda.
As JJ Goldberg revealed in a 1998 LA Jewish Journal essay, “Crime
and Punishment,” “high-ranking sources say that it was the Joint
Chiefs of Staff who urged the judge, through then-Defense
Secretary Caspar Weinberger, to ignore the plea agreement and
throw the book at Pollard.... They wanted to send a message....
Pollard is still in
jail, these sources say, not because his crime merits his lengthy
sentence it doesn’t but because too many American Jews still
haven’t gotten the message.”
Weinberger himself the man who drove Jonathan’s life sentence
admitted in a 2002 interview with journalist Edwin Black that
thePollard case had been blown out of all proportion. Asked why he
had omitted any reference to Pollard in his memoirs, Weinberger
replied that the Pollard case was “a very minor matter, but made
very
important.” Asked to elaborate, Weinberger repeated, “As I say,
the Pollard matter was comparatively minor. It was made far bigger
than its actual importance.”
Jonathan is the only person in the history of the US ever to
receive a life sentence for spying for an ally. This sentence has
always been reserved for those who spy for America’s enemies. He
received the life sentence without benefit of trial the result
of a broken plea bargain, which he honored and the US abrogated.
By sentencing Jonathan as if he were an enemy spy, the American
judicial system effected a defacto redefinition of Israel as an
enemy, not an ally.
Every attempt to seek relief from Jonathan’s life sentence has
been stymied. All legal remedies have been exhausted, without the
merits of the case ever being heard in a court of law. Even the
possibility of parole has been denied since the government placed
an insurmountable obstacle in the path of his security-cleared
attorneys, unjustly denying them access to the secret portions of
their own client’s file. Without that access, those who oppose
parole are free to fabricate reasons for keeping him in prison.
The case has been appealed all the way up to the Supreme Court,
which has refused to hear it.
Today, the only remedy that remains is executive clemency the
one area where the president’s power is absolute. Article II,
Section 2 of the Constitution states: “[The President] shall have
power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the
United States…” While the president may consult with the White
House Legal Counsel or the Pardons Attorney, he is under no
obligation to do so.
Prior to the Pollard case, no other clemency appeal in history
has provided any president with such unprecedented, transparent,
bipartisan support from senior American officials. Among those now
calling for Jonathan’s release are a former director of the CIA, a
former attorney-general and a former deputy attorney-general, a
former deputy secretary of defense, a former vice president, a
former White House legal counsel, two former secretaries of state,
and former heads of the Senate Intelligence Committee, as well as
sitting congressmen
and senators from both sides of the aisle. In the face of such an
overwhelming appeal, President Obama maintains a stony silence.
Even requests for clemency by the prime minister and president of
Israel have met with absolute silence.
Rather than embrace his responsibility for executive clemency,
the president simply remains silent while his appointees are given
free rein to make a mockery of justice by deflecting
responsibility back to the very system that failed in the first
place.
To avoid having to respond to public inquiry, they claim they
cannot comment because the issue is before the American justice
system. The system that subverted justice 26 years ago is now
being referenced as if it were about to spontaneously correct the
injustice it has perpetrated.
The numerous appeals to President Obama now pending, requesting
executive clemency for Jonathan Pollard, are my husband's last
hope of resolving a 26-year-long injustice which now threatens to
end his life in prison.
The sublimely moral task of saving Jonathan’s life, while at the
same time safeguarding the American public by correcting this
injustice, sits squarely with the president of the United States,
Mr. Barack Obama.
Executive clemency is not merely the president’s privilege. It is
his solemn duty.
A View of Current
Events in Eretz Yisroel Through the Prism of Our History
By Avrohom Birnbaum
The YomTov of Pesach is upon us. Pesach
is the YomTov of our birth as a nation and
the YomTov that perhaps more than any other
symbolizes our survival against all odds. From Mitzrayim to Greece
to Rome to Spain to Czarist Russia and, yes, to secular Zionist
Israel, there have always been designs to crush us both physically
and spiritually, but we have survived.
We have often been battered and bruised in the process, but while
all who came up against us have been relegated to the dust heap of
history, we are still here. Battered and bruised, but very much
alive.
Throughout our history, the process of golus and geulah
has constantly repeated itself, beginning with our redemption from
the crushing slave labor of Mitzrayim to Har Sinai,
where we received the Torah and dedicated ourselves to serve
Hashem. After virtually every one of the difficult, decimating
periods of exile, our nation experienced a renaissance of renewed
dedication to Torah and Yiddishkeit.
The Historical Looking Glass
It is thus vital for us to step back and view the recent events
in Eretz Yisroel through a historical prism. It is no secret that
our brethren in Eretz Yisroel are currently under siege. Our gedoleiYisroel have expressed great concern that all of the
institutions of the State of Israel are being harnessed to deal
with the most vexing issue relevant to Jewish survival: getting
the chareidim to serve in the army and severing or
drastically curbing funding to chareidi educational
institutions.
Certainly, the angst is great, as we have previously outlined in
these pages. However, it is important to understand that in the
context of history, this is really nothing new. Shlomo Hamelech
said, “Einchodoshtachashashemesh
- There is nothing new under the sun.” As we will
illustrate shortly, this process is a very predictable trajectory
in the constant process of golus and geulah
sustained by KlalYisroel since its birth as a
nation.
That is why, when I read the words of people who call themselves
chareidi - I call them “chareidi apologists” -
writing either in the print media and primarily in the online
media, and they consistently feel the need to apologize and bend
over backwards trying to explain the seemingly inexplicable
conduct of their fellow chareidim, I shake my head in
wonderment. Do they have no knowledge of history? Do they not
realize that as long as we don’t assimilate, we will always be a
persecuted minority, both among the gentiles and even among our
fellow Jews?
We are in golus to our fellow Jews as much as we are in
golus to the gentiles. Not only do they show how
shortsighted they are, but they also show how uncomfortable they
are being associated with that great vast majority of unwashed chareidi
masses who simply can’t understand the world in the
“sophisticated” way that they do.
There is Nothing New Under the Sun
In truth, however, for centuries, the “enlightened white Ashkenazim”
have been trying to force their worldview and values on their
religious brethren, with absolutely no thought and no sensitivity
to the feelings and needs of their brethren. The party line has
always been, “Trust us! We really know what is good for you. You
are too foolish and backward to have any appreciation for what we
are doing for you.”
The amazing thing about the “enlightened white Ashkenazi
elite,” whether in pre-war 19th-century and 20th-century Europe or
those in Palestine and later in the State of Israel, is that for
all their platitudes about the importance of equality, democracy,
and accepting those with “alternative” views, they have proven
themselves absolutely intolerant of anything other than their own
worldview. They have shown themselves to be racist and bigoted,
and they have ruthlessly tried to force and impose their worldview
on others in a no-holds-barred manner through virtually any means
possible. They have thus shown themselves to represent the
opposite of western and liberal values of equality and tolerance.
In fact, I think it is safe to say that history has proven the
enlightened secular white Ashkenazi elite as the most
intolerant, bigoted subgroup in Jewish society. Observing the
conduct of Yair Lapid, Naftali Bennett and others over the past
weeks has just shown that nothing has changed. “There is
nothing new under the sun.”
For the “Good” of Their Brethren: First, The Maskilim
in Europe
Let us spend the next paragraphs illustrating this point by
studying our recent history.
In the mid-1800s, with the rise of the Haskalah, a new
philosophy was put forth by the Maskilim: The reason the
gentiles hate us is because we don’t integrate. If we would just
be a little more like them, dress like them, and appreciate the
same things that they do, they would love us and Jews would no
longer be persecuted. The problem was that not all Jews subscribed
to their point of view.
What did the Maskilim do?
First they wrested control of the institutions that shape public
opinion. They opened newspapers and began to poison the minds of
the youth through the power of the pen. They established political
parties and muscled their way into becoming the “representatives”
of all Jews in the eyes of the secular government. They had no
compunctions about using the government and the courts to force
their fellow Jews to become as “enlightened” as they were. They
understood that education was the tool through which one can
transform a society, so the first order of business was closing
down the chadorim and yeshivos.
What did they do?
They instituted a law that every teacher and every melamed
had to have a teacher’s certificate attesting to this secular
knowledge. That disqualified virtually all G-d-fearing teachers
and paved the way for new “enlightened” teachers. They instituted
similar laws requiring chadorim and yeshivos
to teach secular studies. They instituted laws stating that no
person could become a rabbi without knowing the Russian language,
and then they opened their own rabbinical seminaries and made sure
that only rabbis with their “semichah” would be
officially allowed to serve as rabbis. Of course, all of these
important new laws, whereby the Maskilim used the brutal
power of the Russian Czarist government to impose their will on
the masses who were not as enlightened as they to realize how much
they were helping them, were enacted only because they cared
deeply about their fellow Jews. “For Brutus is an honorable
man…”
If this stuff sounds a bit familiar, if it sounds almost
identical to what is happening today, it is. One thing you can say
about the “enlightened white Ashkenazim” is that they
are consistent and not very innovative. It’s the same old playbook
again and again.
Then the Secular Zionists…
One more example from post-State Israel: When millions of
immigrants came to Eretz Yisroel after World War II both from Ashkenazic
and Sefardic countries, how did the institutions of the
newly founded State of Israel treat them?
The enlightened white Ashkenazim were totally
intolerant of anything for which they stood and which they held
dear. They took broken, battered Holocaust survivors and
insensitively propagandized that, in a sense, the Jews were
responsible for their own deaths and for being persecuted, because
they were foolish enough to go “like sheep to the slaughter.”
They placed these penniless refugees in kibbutzim and maabarot,
absorption tent cities where they did their best to indoctrinate
them with the new socialist secular order that the nascent state
had become. The indoctrination was forced and ruthless, because
they held complete economic control over the refugees.
Their treatment of those from Sefardic lands - Yemen,
Morocco, Iraq, Iran, Egypt and others - was even more
reprehensible. They robbed them of their heritage and were
instrumental in creating a bigoted, biased attitude toward Sefardim
that exists in every echelon of Israeli society today. They robbed
them of their heritage, thereby creating a suppressed, depressed Sefardic
underworld.
Of course, all this was done in the name of helping those
uncultured, “smelly,” Oriental Jews who were just too backward to
help themselves.
Sharing the Burden or Selling Our Souls?
The army was another vehicle of choice to shape society. Take a
teen who is 18 years old, indoctrinate him for three years, and
you have captured his soul.
That brings us to chareidim and the army. We hear all
of these platitudes about “sharing the burden” and similar
catchphrases. My question for the enlightened white Ashkenazim
is: Don’t you realize that it was you who drove the chareidim
out of the army? During those early years of the state and until
today, you insisted that they go to the army, but only on your
terms. You were never ready to accommodate their unique lifestyle
and sensitivities. You were far too intolerant to even contemplate
such a thing. If anyone drove the chareidim out of the
army and out of “sharing the burden,” as you call it, it was you,
enlightened white Ashkenazim. You dictated, “It is
either our way or no way.” Of course they opted out. No one is
obligated to sell his soul, and that was the price you demanded.
Nothing less.
Today, too, Lapid and his ilk keep on telling us that an entire
sector of society cannot opt out of serving in the army and
working. On the flip side, he and his likeminded allies make it
impossible to join - even for those not engaged in learning -
because the price of “joining” is giving up our nearest and
dearest values.
The Lapids and the Bennetts of Today Are the Same Bigots
as their Predecessors
The bitter truth is that today’s enlightened white Ashkenazim
- the Lapids and the Bennetts - are the same intolerant bigots as
their predecessors. They don’t want us to join on our terms. They
want us to join on their terms. They want us to sell our
souls, to conform to them, to assume their worldview. They are
prepared to use the power of the courts and the power of the
government to persecute us, to reduce us to poverty and to take
the bread and milk from the mouths of our children, all, of
course, for our own good, because we are too unenlightened to
realize it ourselves.
The fact, however is that enlightened white Ashkenazim
have just ensured that the “chareidi dysfunction,” as
they call it, will continue. It is no secret that in the past
decade, there has been an exponential increase of chareidm
joining the workforce. Numerous chareidi institutions of
higher learning that teach all kinds of white collar vocations
have opened and thousands have joined. All indicators pointed to
even greater increase in chareidi male participation in
the workforce in the coming years.
Why was this happening? There were economic factors, but equally
important was the fact that these colleges and vocational schools
were being opened by chareidim for chareidim,
often with the sanction and blessing of leading chareidiroshei yeshiva and rabbonim, and thus truly
catering to the sensitivities of chareidim. They were
not forces for indoctrination, but rather vehicles for chareidim
to engage in the mitzvah of sustaining the families
Hashem had blessed them with.
Again, they preach platitudes of liberalism and “live and let
live,” but in practice they have shown themselves to be the most
intolerant, racist and ruthless adversaries. No, the enlightened
white Ashkenazim have not changed much over the last
couple of hundred years.
Integration or Tolerance…At What Price?
That brings us to our dear brothers, the Religious Zionists,
Mizrachi, Mafdal or Habayit HaYehudi, as they call themselves of
late. One would think that after all of these years of
obsequiously and slavishly trying to ingratiate themselves with
the secular enlightened white Ashkenazim, they would
have realized that they will never be accepted as a member of the
elite club. They will barely be tolerated. Perhaps they’ll be used
and eventually thrown away like a dirty rag that is soiled and can
now be discarded.
Did serving in the elite combat army units for Ariel Sharon do a
whit to ensure that they weren’t driven out of Gush Katif? Even
the Arabs engender more sympathy from the enlightened white Ashkenazim
than the “settlers.”
And what price have they paid for this so-called integration into
Israeli society?
It is no secret that even the most conservative estimate is that
more than 20% of Religious Zionist youth discard religion in the
army. That is according to Rav Zalman Melamed, a prominent
Religious Zionist roshyeshiva, in an
interview with the Religious Zionist publication “B’Sheva.”
Others say that the rate of attrition is closer to 40 or 50%.
They sold their souls to the enlightened white Ashkenazim,
and what did they get in return? Tolerance, barely. It is no
secret that every effort is made by the enlightened white Ashkenazim
to ensure that kipahsrugah-clad boys do not
advance to the higher echelons of the army.
That is why the conduct of Naftali Bennett has been so troubling
and disappointing. Does Bennett not realize that as soon as Lapid
and Netanyahu have squeezed him for whatever they can get out of
him and his party, they will discard him? He is the ultimate
“Uncle Tom,” and by the time he realizes it, it will be too late.
His betrayal of the chareidim will not have gotten him
anything other than an infamous place in the annals of history
that embodies the contempt-filled words of Yeshaya Hanovi,
“Your destroyers will come from within…”
Rav Shteinman: Pure Torah Learning Persisted Then and
Will Persist Now
As for the chareidim, it seems that we are in for a
difficult time. Things will not be easy. There will be many nisyonos
and increased poverty, but we can take comfort in the fact that
“there is nothing new under the sun.” We have played this record
before. Indeed, the venerated roshyeshiva,
Rav Aharon Leib Shteinman, related that in Russia and Poland, we
were similarly persecuted and we persevered. Torah learning
performed in purity continued despite the tzaros and
that is the way it will be in Eretz Yisroel.
When thinking of the betrayal of Naftali Bennett and the
so-called Religious Zionists, the words of the Megillah
come to mind: “Revach vehatzolah - relief and deliverance -
will come from another place while you and your father’s house
will perish.”
So this year, as we sit down to the Seder and again
tell the story of our slavery and redemption from Egypt, it is
important that we realize that nothing is new. This process of golus
and geulah, of persecution and redemption, is the story
of our nation.
Nations come and go. Jewish persecutors and betrayers come and
go, while we, despite the difficulties, tenaciously hang on
without compromise. We don’t look to enlightened white Ashkenazim
to help us nor do we place any hope in betrayers.
We know that only Hashem’s promise is lasting, and when the time
comes, we will be redeemed by Hashem - “Anivelomalach - I and not an angel, Anihuveloacher - I and not an emissary!”
Chag kosher vesomei’ach.
The above article originally appeared in Yated Ne’eman USA.
By Yinon Cohen http://www.columbia.edu/ December 2012
Technical Notes and Sources Figure 1: Less
immigration, more natural growth Source: Statistical Abstract of
Israel, different years (1992-2012), Table 2.4, “Source of
population growth by district, population group and religion.”
Settlers reside in the district of Judah and Samaria.
http://www.cbs.gov.il/reader/shnatonenew_site.htm Figure 2: Ultra
Orthodox Trump Card Number of all settlers in 1991 and 2011:
Statistical Abstract of Israel, different years (1992- 2012).
Table 2.4. Number of Ultra Orthodox Settlers is the number of
people in Ultra Orthodox settlements (4,620 in 1991 and 100,880 in
2011). Source for population in Israeli communities:
http://www.cbs.gov.il/ishuvim/ishuvim_main.htm Data Sources and
estimation method for 2020: All (445,782): Our calculations,
assuming that the settler population in 2011 (325,100) will
increase by 3.57% per year until 2020. 3.57% is the average
natural growth rate (births minus deaths) in the district of Judah
and Samaria during 2009, 2010 and 2011. Source for natural growth
of settler population: our calculations, based on information in
Statistical Abstract of Israel, 2010, 2011, 2012, Table 2.4. Ultra
Orthodox (170,435): Our calculation, assuming that the Ultra
Orthodox settler population in 2011 will increase by 6% per year
until 2020. 6% is the latest estimate (2001) for the natural
growth rate of all Ultra Orthodox in Israel. Source: Gurovich,
Norma and Eilat Cohen-Kastro. 2004. “Ultra-Orthodox Jews
Geographic Distribution and Demographic, Social and Economic
Characteristics of the Ultra-Orthodox Jewish Population in Israel
1996–2001,” Working Papers Series No. 5, Israel Central Bureau of
Statistics. Page 54. Other settlers (275,348): All settlers minus
Ultra orthodox settlers. Figure 3: High Birthrate and Natural
Growth Rates a. Natural Growth Rates All Israeli Jews and all
Settlers: Our calculation of average natural growth (births minus
deaths) for 2010, 2011, and 2012 for all Israeli Jews (1.48%), and
for the district of Judah and Samaria (3.57%). Source: Statistical
Abstract of Israel, 2010, 2011, 2012, Table 2.4. Ultra Orthodox
Settlers. Gurovich and Cohen-Kastro 2004 above. Palestinians: Our
calculations of average growth in 2008, 2009, and 2010. Source:
International Data Base, US Census
http://www.census.gov/population/international/data/idb/region.php
b. Number of Children: Palestinians: Total Fertility Rate (TFR)
for 2010. Source: same as above. All Jews and all settlers:
Statistical Abstract of Israel 2012, Table 3.11. Data are for TFR
in 2011. All Ultra Orthodox: Hleihel, Ahmad. 2011. “Fertility
among Jewish and Muslim women in Israel, by level of religiosity,
1979-2009.” Working paper number 60, June 2011. Page 32. Ultra
Orthodox Settlers: The TFR (7.7) is the average for TFR in Betar
Ilit (7.5) and Modiyin Ilit (8.2), where the vast majority of
Ultra Orthodox settlers reside, adjusted for a slight estimated
decline between 2007 and 2011. Source: Central Bureau of
Statistics, Press release, Patterns of Fertility in 2007. Number
231/20082007, page 5 (in Hebrew).
Rav Yaakov Medan Shlita, a Rosh Yeshiva in Yeshivat Har Etzion
speaks out following Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein addressing
the ‘exclusion of women’, attacking the chareidi way of life and
declaring gender separation illegal.
Rav Medan explains that the decision to declare these areas of
life illegal is no accident, but “malice”. In his column in the
weekly Makor Rishon the rav states “I posit the attorney general
would not take the same measures against Muslims or Druse which
are also careful to maintain a standard of modesty between men and
women. I believe it is being done against the chareidim davka at
this time, because he now feels the blood of the chareidi tzibur
is hefker as a result of statements from Finance Minister Yair
Lapid and his assistant, Mickey Levi.”
“The attorney general at present permits himself to set
guidelines for people brushing against one another in a line, on a
bus or elsewhere, and this is no mistake – it is malice. Chareidim
already view themselves persecuted for their beliefs vis-à-vis the
government, and they are already entrenched in their homes, and we
are now in danger of losing the achievements, the integration seen
to date in the IDF and society at large.”
Rav Medan adds “We are the ones who should be shouting, not the
chareidim for after they are taken out of the picture we will be
next in line.”
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
Aryeh Zelasko says:
May 13, 2013 at 9:56 am
The central social and political problem in Israel today is the
refusal of the unJews to abandon their psychotic fantasy of
turning Israel into a communist utopia. This has not changed since
the pre-State days of the Jewish Agency. In their utopia, they,
the Ubermenchen, will rule and be served by a docile and obedient
proletariat who will operate their factories, farm their land and
serve in their army. It has always been the Torah community that
has prevented their tyrannical plans from fruition. Any time they
felt strong enough to attack the Torah community they have. The
moment Rabin could rule without the white Kippot, he threw them
out of the Government. Now that the Betrayer of Hevron can rule
without the black Kippot, they are out. The unJews have no loyalty
to the Jewish people at any level whatsoever. Their loyalty is
either to themselves or to some enemy of the the Jewish people.
Having realized that they have lost both the demographic and
ideological battle for Israel, they are now engaged in a full
press to loot as much of the country as possible and then open it
up for destruction. We will see more and more malicious and
irrational decrees by them. Each one more obnoxious than the
previous. This will continue until the public will no longer be
able to hide from the fact that the greatest danger to the Jewish
people today is the Government of Israel.
akuperma says:
May 13, 2013 at 10:09 am
1. The Dati Leumi camp will be increasingly getting
uncomfortable with the direction the Lapid/Bennett coalition is
going. The coalition is now talking about mass arrests of yeshiva
students and seizing funds raised abroad by non-zionist yeshivos,
and this is not going to go well with Bennett’s primary
constituents. Cutting off money from a group of yeshivos they
disagree with is one thing, but now that the plan involves
throwing people in prison one should expect even the most “modern”
kipah srugah to object. More will realize that an attack on
hareidim is also an attack on all Shomer Mitsvos.
2. At some point, Bayit Yehudi can pull the brake, since there
is always the option of “trading” the Hareidi parties for Lapid in
the Netanyahu coalition. Netanyahu is also going to get
increasingly uncomfortable with the way things are going.
3. Already both Shas and the Ashkenazi hareidi parties are
putting out feelers to the “peace camp”, and this is starting to
show up in the secular press as well. The Israeli left could
suddently realize they don’t approve of consciption, and that the
hareidim agree with the socialists on economics (as opposed to
Bayit Yehudi which favors fiscal responsibility, meaning cutting
welfare state benefits). It is in the interests of both Likud and
Bayit Yehudi to prevent an alliance of Hareidim and Labor, meaning
they need to stop pushing the Hareidim into the arms of Labor.
zionflag says:
May 13, 2013 at 12:58 pm
#4 The Dati Leumi as the Charedi communities are not homogenous.
There are loud voices in various directions, the Dati Leumi lets
those voices speak while the Charedi quiet the dissenting voices.
PEACE CAMP & Socialist agenda will destroy the kehillos of
Beitar, Ramat Shlomo, Pisgat Zev and Emanuel and the socialist
agenda will destroy the economy. Arabs aint the Arabs of the early
20th century, they died just like the socialists of the early
Medinah died…
akuperma says:
May 13, 2013 at 1:32 pm
#6– There are many voices in both communities. The Eidah
Hareidis has always said the state is a mistake, whereas the rest
of the Hareidim since De Haan’s assassination have made their
peace with the zionists – a peace the zionists have broken. The
dissenting voices, calling for an end to zionism and rejecting
ties with zionists, have always been there but now they are
increasingly appearing to have been vindicated.
There are also dissenting voices in the Dati Leumi community and
they are beginning to be heard, since not all Dati Leumi types are
anti-Torah and contemptous of mitzvos (though the elected leaders
are).
Most of the hareidim living in the West Bank are on border
settlements rather than ones separated from the Green Line (the
1949 armistice line) by areas with Arab populations. In any event,
if hareidim are being actively persecuted what value is living in
the West Bank. The Labor party has advocated keeping much of the
West Bank, so it won’t be hard for the Hareidim to ally with them.
THe more radical religious zionists will be discovering that by
supporting Bennett’s decision to stab the Hareidim in the back,
they will lose their outpost and dreams of keeping the whole of
the West Bank. Given their agreement on economics, if the Israeli
left can support an end to conscription, and allowing autonomy for
the hareidim minority, there will be lots of room for productive
collaboration – much to the chagrin of the religious zionists who
thought to gain by attaching the hareidim.