The Health Ministry on Monday urged rapid vaccination for teens and began working on measures to curb COVID-19 infections linked to international arrivals, amid signs that the extra-contagious Delta variant is spreading in Israel.
Ministry officials strongly recommended that 12- to 15-year-olds get
vaccinated against COVID as soon as possible. The vaccine has been
available to that age group for several weeks, but until now the
ministry stopped short of recommending teens receive the shot.
Without the backing of Ra’am and several MKs from the left-wing Meretz and Labor parties, the coalition currently lacks a majority to extend the law. Most lawmakers in the opposition also back the legislation in principle, but many have indicated that they will nevertheless vote against it to undermine and embarrass the new coalition.
A source within the coalition told Channel 12 that the only potential
solution to the impasse would be to offer Ra’am something significant,
such as a freeze of demolition orders in Arab communities, in exchange
for their votes.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/308510
Following reports of missionaries targeting the haredi community in Israel, the Yad L'Achim anti-assimilation organization has reported that a non-Jewish woman who drives expectant haredi women to the hospital on the Sabbath is in fact a Christian missionary.
The problem came to light last week when a yeshiva student in Jerusalem called Yad L'Achim asking for help. His wife had seemed worried and distracted for several weeks and finally revealed to him that she was on the verge of converting to Christianity.
When he pressed for details, he learned that a Christian missionary by the name of Jan Comeaux had taken advantage of his wife's distress and fragile condition in the wake of recent trauma to get her to convert.
https://www.bhol.co.il/news/1240270
בהמשך לסערה שהתעוררה לאחר הגילוי כי משפחה באחת השכונות בירושלים התחזתה
ליהודייה, הורה הגר"ד לאו לעשות כל מאמץ להוציא אותה מקברה. "מדובר באשה
שאינה יהודייה שהתחזתה לחרדית והייתה מסיונרית ואף ניסתה להעביר על דת
ישראל"
https://www.tau.ac.il/education/muse/maslool/boidem/170foreword.html
We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy
didn’t, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The
roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had
happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares.
But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell’s dark vision, there was
another—slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling:
Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. Contrary to common belief even among
the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell
warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression.
But in Huxley’s vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of
their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come
to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their
capacities to think.
What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley
feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would
be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would
deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so
much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared
that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would
be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a
captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture,
preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and
the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World
Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the
alert to oppose tyranny “failed to take into account man’s almost
infinite appetite for distractions.” In 1984, Huxley added, people are
controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled
by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will
ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.
This book is about the possibility that Huxley, not Orwell, was right.
The central argument of Amusing Ourselves is simple: there were two landmark dystopian novels written by brilliant British cultural critics – Brave New World by Aldous Huxley and Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell – and we Americans had mistakenly feared and obsessed over the vision portrayed in the latter book (an information-censoring, movement-restricting, individuality-emaciating state) rather than the former (a technology-sedating, consumption-engorging, instant-gratifying bubble).
Unfortunately, there remained a vision we Americans did need to guard against, one that was percolating right then, in the 1980s. The president was a former actor and polished communicator. Our political discourse (if you could call it that) was day by day diminished to soundbites (“Where’s the beef?” and “I’m paying for this microphone” became two “gotcha” moments, apparently testifying to the speaker’s political formidableness).
Plaintiffs and other Sabbath observant residents of the building, most of whom are elderly and/or physically handicapped, are religiously prohibited from operating the building’s elevators on the Sabbath, and have relied on building staff for assistance for more than 16 years. In May 2019, shareholders of the building voted in favor of a Sabbath elevator program, which operated in the service elevators only, and allowed the Sabbath-observant residents greater independence and dignity.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/308394
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-57442175\
A recent graduate of the Yeshivat Maharat Orthodox egalitarian rabbinical school in New York has been banned from teaching at the London School of Jewish Studies (LSJS), whose president is UK Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis.
The disqualification of Dr. Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz, who has won praise across religious denominations for pursuing her rabbinic studies, brings to the fore an ongoing controversy about Orthodox semicha, or rabbinical ordination, for women.
An increasing number of those in the Modern Orthodox community would like to see recognition of women rabbis, while those on the religious right continue to maintain that it is against tradition. At the same time, the coronavirus pandemic has tempted some Modern Orthodox Jews to join Progressive congregations that offer options such as Zoom services on Shabbat — something prohibited by Orthodox law.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/308263
The billboards, which were hung at intersections near the Bennett family home in Raanana, display a quote from the new Prime Minister who in November 2019 called to "eliminate the Hamas leadership in Gaza.” Also prominent on the billboards is a demand of the new government to enunciate and enact a new policy toward the terrorist organization, as well as the words: "The people demand victory!" The aim is to remind Prime Minister Bennett of his promises every time he leaves and returns to his home.
In addition, a video has been published on social media featuring Prime Minister Bennett’s past statements and other promises from recent years, such as: “The entire security concept of the State of Israel over the past 20 years is based on a lack of understanding that we are in the Middle East vis-à-vis Hamas,” “Hamas must understand that it will pay a massive price for any harm to Israeli citizens,” “The State of Israel must not give in to Hamas' threats,” and “I will deal with Hamas.”
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/308248
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/308269
In his reply to Zamir, Rabbi Eliyahu wrote: “I heard your question, and the answer is clear and self-explanatory. It is forbidden to discriminate against any Jew in the matter of aliyot la’Torah due to his sexual orientation. (Of course we are not talking about people who actually engage in behaviors that the Torah forbids.) Anyone who is struggling with such an inclination and is trying to live a holy life is of course eligible to receive an aliyah without any reservation.”
https://www.bhol.co.il/news/780113
Mr. Hermann Fried (Known as Hershey Fried, 66),a Viznits Chosid, after being in Cheirem for more than a year, is still refusing to grant a divorce (Get) to his wife Susi. Surprisingly there are still few synagogues and Rabbies that don't fully respect the Cheirem in several ways and the the refusenik finds his way around Shuls and Shiurim, hiding the truth and giving over twisted versions of the case. The background story is as following:
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/06/16/middleeast/israel-gaza-incendiary-balloons-cmd-intl/index.html
The Israeli military launched airstrikes against Hamas targets in Gaza overnight after militants floated dozens of so-called "incendiary balloons" over the border fence into Israel.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/308032
“I split with Bennett when he himself signaled that his goal was replacing Netanyahu, making him a friend of the Left.”
“I am a big critic of Netanyahu, but the hatred against Netanyahu is pathological. There is nothing holding this new government together besides this. Bennett is serving as a useful idiot. I can’t complain about the Left, people can think differently from me, everyone is doing what they think will help Israel.”
https://time.com/6073594/merrick-garland-trump/
Take the DOJ’s defense of religious exemptions to anti-LGBTQ discrimination laws. Title IX, the law banning discrimination on the basis of sex in education, includes an exemption for religious beliefs. The job of the DOJ is to defend the law as it stands. And as journalist Mark Joseph Stern recently argued in Slate, in defending Title IX as it is written, the DOJ may be trying “to prevent a Christian organization from taking over the defense and mounting extreme arguments that could lead to a devastating subversion of civil rights law.” In a possible acknowledgment to the backlash from LGBTQ advocates, the DOJ amended it’s June 8 filing a day later, removing the word “vigorously” and making it clear the Department of Education’s review of the policy was ongoing.
https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/hamas-launched-three-rockets-into-the-sea-n12-report-671070
The IDF struck a number of military sites belonging to Hamas in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday night in response to 20 fires sparked by incendiary balloons earlier in the day.
