chadrei charedim has a discussion of the claims against Hadassa and Rav Sternbuch's letter
Another discussion is on L'daat forum
Another discussion is on L'daat forum
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Police blamed for recent violence
YNet
[...]Welfare Ministry Director-General Nahum Itzkovitch is scheduled to meet later this week with Jerusalem District Police Commander Major General Aharon Franco amid claims that it was the police's conduct that caused the rift between the social workers and the haredi community.[...]
Abusive Beit Shemesh mother convicted
JPost
A Beit Shemesh woman was convicted on Sunday of severely abusing six of her 12 children. Her husband was convicted of taking part in the abuse and failing to prevent it.
The decision of the Jerusalem District Court was given behind closed doors in order to protect the identity of the children.
According to the indictment, the woman, dubbed "Taliban Mother" in the Israeli media due to her custom of wearing multiple layers of clothing cover her whole body and face, abused her young children "at least" 25 separate times.
According to the charge sheet, the woman repeatedly beat and otherwise physically abused her children, giving them electric shocks and hitting them with belts and sticks.
In one instance, the charge sheet said, the woman beat one of her daughters in the face with a rolling pin and slammed her face into the marble kitchen countertop.
She was also accused of forcing her children to sleep outside in a locked shed when she felt they had come home late, tying up her mentally impaired son for hours at a time and ignoring his cries for help, cutting her daughters' hair as punishment, and throwing water on her children to wake them up.
In addition, the physically and psychologically abused children committed incest when they were locked up in the shed, the indictment stated. [...]
Chareidi violence abating
It is important to note that JPost, Haaretz and YNet - did not report that Rav Sternbuch had come out against the violence - despite the fact that I sent them a copy of his letter. I guess they didn't have room for it.
JPost
After days of some of the worst haredi rioting in Jerusalem in years, a Jerusalem court on Friday placed a woman suspected of abusing her child under house arrest, leading to a dramatic drop in violence over the weekend.
The woman, who is alleged to have nearly starved her three-year-old son to death, was released on NIS 400,000 bail by the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court as part of a court-prodded accord between the two sides worked out by court president Judge Shlomit Dotan, which will see the suspect undergo a psychiatric evaluation on Sunday.
The woman's family and lawyers previously opposed such an examination.
The woman, a resident of the city's Mea She'arim neighborhood who is a member of the Toldot Aharon community, is believed to be suffering from Munchausen-syndrome-by-proxy, a psychiatric disorder in which a person deliberately abuses someone else, typically a child, in order to draw attention or sympathy to themselves.
News of the mother's arrest had sparked three days of intense rioting in the capital in which hundreds of protesters vandalized public property and pelted police and motorists with stones.
Saturday did not pass without violence, however, as four people were hurt on Rehov Bar-Ilan when their cab was pelted with stones by haredim, police said. Two of the passengers were hit in the head by the stones in the attack.[...]
After days of some of the worst haredi rioting in Jerusalem in years, a Jerusalem court on Friday placed a woman suspected of abusing her child under house arrest, leading to a dramatic drop in violence over the weekend.
The woman, who is alleged to have nearly starved her three-year-old son to death, was released on NIS 400,000 bail by the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court as part of a court-prodded accord between the two sides worked out by court president Judge Shlomit Dotan, which will see the suspect undergo a psychiatric evaluation on Sunday.
The woman's family and lawyers previously opposed such an examination.
The woman, a resident of the city's Mea She'arim neighborhood who is a member of the Toldot Aharon community, is believed to be suffering from Munchausen-syndrome-by-proxy, a psychiatric disorder in which a person deliberately abuses someone else, typically a child, in order to draw attention or sympathy to themselves.
News of the mother's arrest had sparked three days of intense rioting in the capital in which hundreds of protesters vandalized public property and pelted police and motorists with stones.
Saturday did not pass without violence, however, as four people were hurt on Rehov Bar-Ilan when their cab was pelted with stones by haredim, police said. Two of the passengers were hit in the head by the stones in the attack.[...]
US passports can't say Jerusalem Israel
JPost
NEW YORK - Parents of a Jerusalem-born American boy who want "Israel" listed as their son's country of birth on his passport have been dealt another blow with the dismissal of their case by a US court of appeals.
The US Court of Appeals in Washington, DC, on July 10 upheld a lower court's decision that the courts lack jurisdiction in the matter because foreign policy - including the recognition of foreign governments - belongs exclusively in the domain of the executive branch. According to the State Department, US passports for those born in Jerusalem do not list a country because doing so would interfere with and pre-judge Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
The case had been filed by an American couple living in Israel, Ari and Naomi Zivotofsky, on behalf of their son, Menachem Binyamin Zivotofsky, born in 2002.
Reached by telephone during a recent trip to Ethiopia, Ari Zivotofsky told The Jerusalem Post that though his son's American passport is valid, the outcome of the case is laden with symbolism. "This is about the US recognizing the sovereignty of Israel over any [part] of Jerusalem," he said. "We like to believe the US is our strongest ally, yet something so fundamental like this, even that little bit, our strongest ally refuses to recognize, it just sends a message," he said.
The Zivotofskys have two older children who were born in the US. An attorney for the family, Nathan Lewin, said they were mulling an appeal to the US Supreme Court. "I'm appalled by the decision," he said. "The court is clearly wrong that it's a political question... It's clearly a matter of law." [...]
Obama orders Israel to stop building in Jerusalem
JPost
A senior Israeli diplomatic official on Sunday morning said that Israel would continue to build in Jerusalem, responding to a demand from the US that the government put an end to a housing project to be built in east Jerusalem.
Following a complaint by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Ambassador to Washington Michael Oren was summoned to a meeting at the US State Department over the week-end where he was told that the Obama administration wanted Israel to put an end to work at the site of the historic Shepherd's Hotel in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.
The compound, which was acquired by American businessman Irwin Moskowitz in the 1980s, originally belonged to Grand Mufti Haj Amin al-Husseini, and then served as a hotel from 1945 until the 1967 Six Day War. Most recently, the site was rented to the Jerusalem border police as a base.
Abbas reportedly told the Americans that allowing Jewish housing in the Muslim neighborhood would shift the demographic balance in east Jerusalem.
According to the diplomatic official, "Israel builds in Jerusalem and will continue to do so in the future as well. Those in charge of this are Israeli enforcement and planning officials.[...]
Friday, July 17, 2009
Arrested woman's family calls for end to violent protests
Yeshiva News reports
Moshe Friedman, who is a member of the Munchausen mother’s family has released a message calling for calm and an end to the violence. “I repeat, in the name of the rabbonim and the family, please, stop, the violence is counter-productive and hurts our case. It diverts the public’s attention”. Friedman calls for calm law-abiding protest, tefilla, and tehillim.
Moshe Friedman, who is a member of the Munchausen mother’s family has released a message calling for calm and an end to the violence. “I repeat, in the name of the rabbonim and the family, please, stop, the violence is counter-productive and hurts our case. It diverts the public’s attention”. Friedman calls for calm law-abiding protest, tefilla, and tehillim.
Mayor's chareidi advisor accused of collaboration
JPost
Long before it became a synonym for computer spy programs, a Trojan horse was a metaphor for an ingenious weapon that takes the enemy by surprise. In ancient Greece, the Trojan horse was used to bring a beautiful woman back home. But today in politics, it is not unusual to find representatives from one side giving advice to the other side.
For example, if you are a prime minister you might like to keep on hand an expert in haredi affairs in order to prevent painful errors.
The same goes for a mayor. And ours nominated a young and some say ambitious young haredi to advise him on how to handle delicate issues regarding the haredi community in the city.
Our adviser is a fine young man, known and appreciated by his haredi peers and by secular figures in the media. Until recently, a bright future was predicted for him by all. Until, that is, the Kikar Safra parking-lot issue erupted and dimmed Uri Kroizer's prospects.
Whatever the reasons were that compelled him to act the way he did - naivete or lack of deep understanding of the society he grew up in - the results, so far, are rather gloomy. Last week Kroizer (and his family) were accused of desecrating Shabbat, causing blasphemy and, perhaps the worst accusation of all, having become a collaborator with evil forces.[...]
Haaretz protests collective punishment against chareidim
Haaretz
Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat presents himself as the secular leader who came to rescue Israel's capital from the control of the ultra-Orthodox and give it an open, pluralistic character. But his announcement that he is halting municipal services to the neighborhoods of Geula and Mea She'arim in response to violent rioting by some of these neighborhoods' residents constitutes collective punishment, which will merely further inflame already stormy tempers.
For several weeks now, Barkat has been facing off against the Eda Haredit - a group of sects and rabbinical courts that reject the Zionist state and boycott its institutions. In an effort to score points on the ultra-Orthodox street, the Eda Haredit launched a battle against the opening of the municipality's Safra parking garage on Shabbat and won support from the most important ultra-Orthodox rabbis and halakhic arbiters. Barkat, rightly, stood up to them: He refused to give in to the demonstrations and left the parking garage open.
The protests against the parking garage waned, and no protests developed against the Gay Pride Parade in Jerusalem. But then the ultra-Orthodox found a new pretext for battling the authorities: the arrest of a woman from an ultra-Orthodox neighborhood on suspicions of starving and abusing her infant son. Harshly worded posters against the police and the welfare services appeared in ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods, and rumors were spread that the baby had been the victim of a medical experiment and that the police had exploited the mother's visit to a welfare office to ambush and arrest her.
Haaretz
This time, the protests deteriorated into open violence, which included rioting, vandalizing municipal welfare offices, torching trash bins, damaging sanitary equipment and violent demonstrations by thousands of ultra-Orthodox residents.
Barkat responded by announcing a halt in the provision of municipal services to the two ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods where the riots took place, Mea She'arim and Geula. He justified this decision by the need to protect municipal workers from attacks, given the vandalizing of the welfare offices. But his hasty announcement was a mistake. Both neighborhoods are inhabited by tens of thousands of people, of which only a tiny minority participated in the violence. There is no reason to punish the many for the sins of the few.
One can understand Barkat's fears for the safety of municipal welfare and sanitation workers, but the solution is not collective punishment of the ultra-Orthodox community. Instead, he could have the welfare offices guarded and bar trash collection when and where demonstrations are occurring. But for the municipality to declare war on an entire community will only further inflame passions and push Jerusalem's ultra-Orthodox community into a "them or us" stance toward the authorities. And this is happening at a time when the violent riots over this issue, unlike the protests against the parking garage, have failed to win the backing of the rabbis - not even those of the most extremist factions. [...]
Rosh Yeshiva teaches conversion is desirable
Anonymous wrote:
my rosh yeshivah said it is better for a goy to convert than even to keep the sheva mitzvos bnei noach because they s'char for being a Jew is greater. What issur is there to proselytize? As long as you tell, like Shulchan Aruch says, "why do you want to be Jewish, don't you see there is anti-semitism, don't you know you have to keep mitzvos now, before you could eat what you want, now only kosher, there is gan eden but also gehinom" you fulfill what you need to push away, then you have to draw near like the shulchan aruch says "kdai l'chababan l'mitzvos". Too many people push away yosair m'dai and they are making new amalek like when Timna went to Eisav. If we don't make kosher gerus, then too many people will wind up going to reform and conservative r"l. As long as they will be frum it is a mitzvah v'ahavtem es hager!
I wish someone would show me a halachah somewhere that it is assur to proselytize - it is only assur to do gerus without kabalas hamitzvos, but if we can make them frum, it is a mitzvah!
my rosh yeshivah said it is better for a goy to convert than even to keep the sheva mitzvos bnei noach because they s'char for being a Jew is greater. What issur is there to proselytize? As long as you tell, like Shulchan Aruch says, "why do you want to be Jewish, don't you see there is anti-semitism, don't you know you have to keep mitzvos now, before you could eat what you want, now only kosher, there is gan eden but also gehinom" you fulfill what you need to push away, then you have to draw near like the shulchan aruch says "kdai l'chababan l'mitzvos". Too many people push away yosair m'dai and they are making new amalek like when Timna went to Eisav. If we don't make kosher gerus, then too many people will wind up going to reform and conservative r"l. As long as they will be frum it is a mitzvah v'ahavtem es hager!
I wish someone would show me a halachah somewhere that it is assur to proselytize - it is only assur to do gerus without kabalas hamitzvos, but if we can make them frum, it is a mitzvah!
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