NPR Abuse scandal plagues Chasidic Jews in Brooklyn

NPR

Gene therapy success in eye disease

Wall Street Journal

A small but provocative study showed that a form of gene therapy significantly improved the vision of patients left legally blind by a rare genetic eye disease. The benefit was especially striking among children.

Researchers said the findings amount to an important advance toward medicine's ambitious but generally unrealized dream of replacing disease-causing mutant or missing genes with normal DNA to treat and cure debilitating illnesses. [...]

Obama attacks Fox to stop growing criticism

Wall Street Journal

Blogger Donald Sensing has a fascinating analysis of President Obama's war against Fox News. He describes the effort as "directly out of the Saul Alinsky playbook." Alinsky was the author of "Rules for Radicals," bible of left-wing community organizers. One of his rules, or "power tactics": "Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it." Sensing analyzes how Obama is carrying out this advice: [...]


NYTimes

Late last month, the senior White House adviser David Axelrod and Roger Ailes, chairman and chief executive of Fox News, met in an empty Midtown Manhattan steakhouse before it opened for the day, neutral ground secured for a secret tête-à-tête.

Mr. Ailes, who had reached out to Mr. Axelrod to address rising tensions between the network and the White House, told him that Fox’s reporters were fair, if tough, and should be considered separate from the Fox commentators who were skewering President Obama nightly, according to people briefed on the meeting. Mr. Axelrod said it was the view of the White House that Fox News had blurred the line between news and anti-Obama advocacy.[...]

Falashmura:Never ending Ethiopian immigrantion

Haaretz

The menu in the kitchen at the Falashmura transit camp in Gondar, northern Ethiopia, is written in English, even though none of the camp's residents or kitchen workers speak that language. In any event, says Ori Konforti, the menu is not there for the benefit of the diners. It is for the guests, Jews from around the world whose contributions finance the camp's operations. In his book "Tzionut Hafuh al Hafuh" (Zionism Upended, recently published in Hebrew by the Zionist Library), Konforti writes: "There are no intact tables there, no sink and no running water. Everything seems to the Western visitor derelict and dirty. Clearly it is all designed to generate empathy and contributions."

Konforti, who until last year was the Jewish Agency's representative in Ethiopia, says that American-Jewish groups wish to keep the immigration of the Falashmura going in order to generate more contributions from supporters who want to be involved in tikkun olam ("repairing the world" activities), enhance the bringing together of Jews from around the world and improve their own relations with the black community in the United States. Israel, he says, became entangled in commitments to the Falashmura, a group with an almost infinite potential for immigration, due to pressure by nongovernmental organizations and politicians, especially from the Shas party. [...]

Christian donor will reveal chareidi recipients

Jpost

Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, chairman of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, said Thursday that his organization was compiling a list for publication of haredi institutions that receive its donations.

The move comes after Rabbi Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, considered the most respected and influential halachic authority among Ashkenazi haredi Jews, signed a declaration saying that receiving money from Eckstein's organization was "close to idolatry."[...]

Michael Freund starts Chinese immigration

Arutz Sheva

(IsraelNN.com) For the first time, a group of seven descendants of the Jewish community of Kaifeng, China has moved to Israel.The new arrivals, who were brought here by the Shavei Israel organization, arrived at Ben-Gurion airport late Tuesday night. [...]

Billionaire to fight charges in Florida

Haaretz

Guma Aguiar said this week the court deal he had worked out last month to rid himself of two misdemeanor charges was off. The American-Israeli multimillionaire added that with the help of Alan Dershowitz - who is part of his legal team - he would sue the police officers who he says physically abused him after arresting him in June.

In July, Aguiar had pleaded not guilty and threatened to sue the Broward County Sheriff's Office located in southern Florida for the alleged abuse.

On September 17, Aguiar's lawyers entered a "no contest" plea, which means he neither accepts nor denies guilt for the two charges, possession of cannabis and drug paraphernalia. According to the deal, Aguiar has to pay $536 in court costs and attend a three-hour drug abuse education course.[...]

'Basement rapist' :Mistake of giving a molester a second chance

JPost

A Tel Aviv court on Thursday indicted a 29-year-old Givat Shmuel resident on charges of attempting to sexually assault a minor, kidnapping and false imprisonment. The alleged incident occurred only six months after the suspect was released from prison after serving 10 years on previous child sex crimes convictions.[...]

Justice - Harvard Prof Michael Sandel #4

EJF & Rav Reuven Feinstein (video)

Daas Torah - Interview with Prof Lawrence Kaplan

Seforim Blog

Baruch Pelta: I guess my first question has to be if you changed your position since writing your famous essay on Daas Torah [1] and also, has Daas Torah evolved as a conception since then? [...]

Discussing accusations of rabbinic malpractise

THIS IS TO NOTIFY READERS THAT A LOT OF MISINFORMATION IS CONTAINED IN THESE LETTERS AND THEIR ASSERTIONS SHOULD BE PRESUMED TO BE MISTAKEN UNLESS CONFIRMED BY RELIABLE SOURCES.

FURTHERMORE SINCE THIS IS NOT A BEIS DIN AND THERE ARE NO WITNESSES - AT MOST THE ASSERTIONS MADE IN THE COMMENTS CAN BE REASON FOR FURTHER INVESTIGATION, BUT THEY ARE NOT TO BE BELIEVED TO BE TRUE. FINALLY EVEN IF THE LETTERS AND OTHER PROOF ARE IN FACT VALID DOCUMENTS - THERE IS NO CONTEXT OR PROPER DESCRIPTION OF PRECEDING OR SUBSEQUENT EVENTS IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO COME TO A PROPER UNDERSTANDING OF EVENTS

IN SUM THESE SOURCES ARE UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES TO BE TAKEN AT FACE VALUE AND ARE NOT TO BE BELIEVED WITHOUT DISCUSSION WITH COMPETENT RABBIS.


THE MATERIAL PRESENTED IN THE COMMENTS IS ONLY SO THAT A PERSON SHOULD BE AWARE OF POSSIBLE CONCERNS SO THAT HE CAN PROTECT HIMSELF FROM POSSIBLE HARM - BUT THE MATERIAL BY ITSELF CAN NOT ESTABLISH THE TRUTH OF THE ASSERTIONS.

Pischei Tshuva (O.C. 156): I want to note here that while all the books of mussar are greatly concerned about the sin of lashon harah, I am greatly concerned about the opposite problem. I want to protest about the even greater and more common sin of refraining from speaking negatively when it is necessary to save someone from being harmed. For example if you saw a person waiting in ambush to kill someone or breaking into someone’s house or store at night. Is it conceivable that you would refrain from notifying the intended victim to protect himself from the assailant - because of the prohibition of speaking lashon harah? By not saying anything you commit the unbearable sin of transgressing the prohibition of Vayikra (19:16): Do not speak lashon harah [but] do not stand idly by when the blood of your fellow man is threatened? By not speaking up, you violate the mitzva of returning that which is lost to its owner Devarim (22:2). Now if you can understand the obvious necessity of speaking up in these cases then what is the difference between a robber breaking into someone’s house or store or seeing that his servants are secretly stealing from him or that his partner is deceiving him in their business or that another person is cheating him in commerce or that he is lending money to someone that you know doesn’t repay? How is this different from stopping a proposed marriage to someone you know is a wicked person who would be a horrible husband. Saving a person from these situations is clearly included in the command (Devarim 22:2) to return to the person himself or his money. From where do we get the mistaken idea that in the case of murder, I will speak up but that it is prohibited to say anything in other situations where someone is being harmed? The general principle is that these are matters which depend upon the speakers motivation. If the informant’s intent in relating these matters is entirely to cause harm that is lashon harah. However if his intent is to bring about benefit to the other person and to save him and to protect him – then it is a great mitzva. In my opinion this is the underlying intent of the Yerushalmi which the Magen Avraham brings which says that it is permitted to speak lashon harah about people who cause disputes. … It is obvious that even concerning those who cause disputes it is not permitted to speak lashon harah gratuitously about them in all matters. It is only permitted for those things directly related to the particular dispute. It is only permitted concerning that which they are trying to harm others. In such a case it is permitted to reveal degrading things about them in order to save others. … Unfortunately I have seen many times where someone witnesses another person trying to cause harm to someone – and he suppresses the information and says, “Why should I get involved in a matter which isn’t my business…However one needs to be very careful about these and similar matters. Our Sages have said – when the permissibility depends on motivation - it says, “And you should be afraid of your G‑d.”

Anyone who feels the above is not sufficient justification to read assertions and charges against others - should skip this post.

meinyan leinyan beosso inyan said:

Rav Shraga Feivel Mendlowitz's shita is that such things as corrupt rabbonim being machshil the rabim need to be publicized.

RSFM was a fearless man who took a lot of petch for doing the right thing. Not everyone is necessarily mechuyev to do the same. I could not quote the rabbonim who spoke to me on certain items because they must maintain a low profile unless they want to invite certain dark forces to harass them or worse.

=====================
Chazon Ish(2:133)… My opinion is that it is appropriate to have true knowledge about a talmid chachom who shapes yiddishkeit. If it is permitted to tell someone who needs to know about the bad points of an artisan in regards to his qualifiation for doing a job, then it is surely permitted in regards to conveying information about an influential talmid chachom for those who need to know. That is because knowing about the great scholars of the generation concerning their thoughts and characteristics – is itself considered Torah. [In other words just as one is permitted to convey accurate information about an artisan if there is to'eles so it it permitted to reveal information about a gadol if there is to'eles. Nevertheless it is necessary to be extremely careful not to distort the facts in the slights, because that would lead to slandering a talmid chachom.

This indicates that expressing negative information about others is relevant specifically for those who are considered influential authorities and only concerning isssues that are critical for the listener – in order to understand the degree to rely on them.

Shabbos elevators - Belz doesn't prohibit

Chareidim

Words of Gedolim: Apparent contradictions

Berachos (27b): It is related that a certain disciple came before R. Joshua and asked him, Is the evening Tefillah compulsory or optional? He replied: It is optional. He then presented himself before Rabban Gamaliel and asked him: Is the evening Tefillah compulsory or optional? He replied: It is compulsory. But, he said, did not R. Joshua tell me that it is optional? He said: Wait till the champions enter the Beth ha-Midrash. When the champions came in, someone rose and inquired, Is the evening Tefillah compulsory or optional? Rabban Gamaliel replied: It is compulsory. Said Rabban Gamaliel to the Sages: Is there anyone who disputes this? R. Joshua replied to him: No. He said to him: Did they not report you to me as saying that it is optional? He then went on: Joshua, stand up and let them testify against you! R. Joshua stood up and said: Were I alive and he [the witness] dead, the living could contradict the dead. But now that he is alive and I am alive, how can the living contradict the living?

Multimillionaire takes plea deal in drug case

South Florida Sun Sentinel

A Fort Lauderdale multimillionaire has quietly taken a plea deal in a misdemeanor drug case after telling Israeli media that Broward sheriff's deputies beat him and made anti-Semitic remarks during his arrest. [...]

R' Tropper: Charisma from the Torah

Charisma From the Torah

Posted by Rabbi Tropper Posted in torah Posted on 17-10-2009

Question:

I really enjoyed your words and comparative study regarding a topic not often discussed. I want to ask you about Charisma. Again is there any meaning from a Torah perspective to this 'thing' called charisma?

I understand that you were gifted with a tremendous amount of charisma, so I guess you are probably aware of it's spiritual value?

Nosson Velvel A.
Miami Beach, FL

Rabbi Tropper Responds:

Thank you for the generous remark. I do not believe that I possess charisma.

A Torah Jew believes in 'Chayn' or 'Nesias Chayn' which in most cases represents virtue though in of itself is not a virtue. Charisma and its seductive power do not even represent virtue. Charisma and it's power to create social revolutionary change can be extremly dangerous. Hitler, ym'sh had charisma. He used it to become the planet's worst criminal.

Moralists have discounted charisma as 'deplorably superficial'.

Psyhcologists have said that the proverb 'familiarity breeds contempt' has a corollary "foreign breeds charisma".

Rav Reuven Feinstein: Kiruv and mixed couples

I was sent a recent recording of Rav Reuven Feinstein,shlita regarding kiruv and mixed couples. He explicitly says that it is prohibited to advertise and promote seminars to attract mixed couples to come with the hope that they will eventually convert. He says that is only permitted to strengthen those couples that come on their own with a genuine interest to learn more about Judaism and without an awareness that mixed marriages are prohibited. Only such couples who are interested lshem shamayim are to be converted while those who know that intermarriage is wrong are to be rejected. He says it is not only his view but it is one Rav Eliashiv, shlita, expressed when they asked him what was permitted. Rav Reuven's view is the one I have long defended as normative against R' Tropper and his representative Roni - while they defended the view which Rav Reuven explicity rejects on this recording. Below is an example of EJF's advertisement for attracting mixed couples to a seminar - exactly that which Rav Reuven says on this recording is clearly prohibited.

Hidabroot Org BNRImgDetail ASP Qs3czfsi

Eternal Jewish Family - funding

The following is information freely and readily obtainable on the internet. It was sent to me by an interested party.

Lillian Kaplan 2006-300127083-0373d0e6-F-1

Lillian Kaplan 2007-134077539-048af66a-9-2
Lillian Kaplan 2007-300127083-047134f5-F-1

Roni is having a breakdown

Despite my banning Roni, he is still compulsively sending me emails about how I am promoting intermarriage and phony conversons and am really a secret agent for all the people he has been condemning for the last year. He has even complained again to Rav Sternbuch about what an evil person I am.

Roni - I think it is best for your mental health to take a long vacation - maybe in your local mental hospital.

wishing you a refuah shleima

Eternal Jewish Family's Application Form

Application Form - EJF website

Application Form - EJF

Justice - Harvard Prof Michael Sandel #3

R' Tropper's universal conversion - "Do it my way"

Had an interesting chat with a well known talmid chachom. His complaint - Eternal Jewish Family

He said he had a conversation with one of the main machers of EJF R' E. who explained to him what universal standards means

"We found out about a convert with a couple of kids who had forgotten to take out her contact lenses. Since this is a chatzitza the tevila was not kosher and she and her children are not Jewish." The talmid chachom replied, "But Rav Moshe Feinstein and Rav Wosner both say that contact lenses are not a chatziza so she is a valid convert." R' NE - "where do they say that I never heard of this before. Besides Rav Eliashiv says it is a chatzitza." Talmid chachom, "The fact that Rav Eliashiv is machmir - doesn't mean that she is not a kosher convert, he is machmir on many things. You don't posul a convert because of Rav Eliashiv's view if there are other gedolim who disagree." [See Rabbi Tropper's Blog 1 & 2]

I asked him about R' Bomzer, "He is a fine yid. Do you know that there was once a rebellion in his shul and Rav Moshe wrote a letter defending him."

He had other things to say but they are not for publication.

שו"ת אגרות משה יורה דעה חלק א סימן קד

בענין עין תותב מזכוכית אם חוצץ, ובדבר המשקפים שנעשו מחדש שקורין קאנטאקט /עדשות מגע/ שמשימים מתוך להעפעפים אם חוצצין. ה' מנ"א תשי"ט. מע"כ ידידי הרה"ג מוהר"ר אפרים גרינבלאט שליט"א.

הנה בדבר עין תותב מזכוכית שעשו לאשה שאין לה עין שיראה כשיש לה עין לנוי אם חוצץ או לא, שהבאת משו"ת שואל ומשיב שני טעמים להיתר אחד שאינו מהודק ועדיין הוא ראוי לביאת מים, ואם הוא אמת ודאי הוא טעם ברור להתיר. וטעם שני מפני שהוא לנוי ואינה מקפדת ואף שצריכה להסירו כדי שלא יתקלקל הוה זה כעומד ע"מ לכתף, ואף שצער לה מ"מ כל שהוא לנוי מקבלת הצער כדי שלא תתבזה ולא מקפדת. הנה ס' שואל ומשיב אין אצלי וטעם שני שהעתקת לא נראה כלל דאף שמקבלת הצער ונוח לה לסבול בשביל הנוי, הרי ודאי במקום שאין צורך לה בהנוי כגון בלילה ואף ביום כשהיא לעצמה בביתה מסירה בשביל שלא תצטער שלא לצורך ולזה יש דין מקפיד לעולם אף בשעה שרוצה לסבול בשביל הנוי. דהא אף בשביל הקפידא דלישה שהוא רק פעם אחת לזמן גדול ואין הקפידא כ"כ גדולה בשביל זה נמי חוצץ אף בשעת הנוי כהא דטבעות בסימן קצ"ח סעיף כ"ג עיין בט"ז שם ס"ק כ"ג בשם הראב"ד, וכ"ש בכאן שמסירה מפני הצער שהוא בכל יום והקפידא היא גדולה.

וגם יש לדון מהא דרטיה שעל המכה שחוצצת, שאף שעתה בשביל המכה אינה מקפדת, כיון שבלא המכה היתה מקפדת נחשב מקפיד שחוצץ. וא"כ גם בכאן בשלמא אם לא היתה מצטערת אין להחשיב מקפיד, משום דאחרי שכבר אין לה עין הרי אצלה הוא דבר נוי ואין לדון עליה כעל שאר נשים, אבל במצטערת אף באופן שלא תסיר כלל נמי כיון דבעצם היתה מקפדת בשביל הצער רק שמוכרחת שלא להקפיד הוא ממש כרטיה שג"כ אינה מקפדת אבל כיון שבעצם היתה מקפדת רק שמוכרחת שלא להקפיד נחשב מקפיד.

והנה אף באינה מצטערת אף כשיהיה שם תמיד אבל צריכה להסירו כדי שלא יתקלקל ולתקנו או להחליפו באחר נמי יש בזה לדון הרבה. ומש"כ בס' שו"מ דהוא כעומד ע"מ לכתף וכוונתו לדמות להא דלא נחשב הנחה בעמידתו לכתף לענין חיוב שבת בשבת דף ה' לא מובן הדמיון והשייכות לשם. דהנחה לחשיבות המלאכה היא להשאיר כאן החפץ אפילו שהוא רק לרגע, ושלא לצורך הולכת החפץ כמו בעומד לפוש שעל הזמן שרוצה לפוש הרי משאיר כאן החפץ שטעון אבל בעומד לכתף הרי עמידתו הוא אדרבה שלא להשאירו אף לרגע דהוא כדי שלא יפול החפץ ולא ישאר שם. ומתוס' שבת דף ח' ד"ה לא משמע דהוא מטעם דכן הוא דרך הולכת חפצים כבדים ולכן לא שייך להתחשב להנחה שהוא ההיפוך ממה שעושה. אבל הכא אין שייכות לשני הטעמים דכיון דאינה יכולה להניחו שם לעולם בשביל הקלקול איך יתחשב אינה מקפדת, וכ"ש כשיש לחוש לקלקול הגוף כשישאר שם תמיד שודאי נחשב מקפיד.

אבל אם הגוף לא יתקלקל אף כשיעמוד שם תמיד אלא שיצטרך לתקנו כשהוא יתקלקל, תלוי זה בטעם מעלת אינו מקפיד דאם הוא מחמת שנבטל להגוף כשאינו מקפיד יש לו לחצוץ דהרי אינו יכול לבטלו להגוף כיון שיהיה מוכרח עכ"פ להסירו. ואם הוא משום דנבטל אותו המקום שאינו מקפיד עליו שיהיה בחציצה מלהתחשב מקום גלוי אינו חוצץ, אין לו לחצוץ מאחר דאף כשמסיר אינו משום דרוצה שיהיה המקום גלוי אלא כדי לחזור ולסותמו במתוקן ובאחר שיותר עדיף לסתום ודבר זה צריך לראיות. ובארתי באורך בתשובה לאחי הגאון ר' מרדכי הגאב"ד שקלאוו זצ"ל בדבר הפילינגס /הסתימות/ בשנים באורך ומסקנתי שם להתיר אף בפילינג זמני אם השן כבר נרפא לגמרי שמה שתחליף הוא לא משום שרצונה שיהיה לפעמים גלוי אלא כדי לסותמו בפילינג יותר חזק, וכן הוא בעין תותב שאם תצטרך להסירו משום צער גופה או משום שע"י סתימה זמן רב יש לחוש לקלקול בגוף שא"כ רצונה שיהיה גלוי לפעמים יחצוץ ואם אין לה צער ואין לחוש לקלקול הגוף אלא שהעין יתקלקל ותצטרך להחליפו בחדש או לתקנו שיהיה טוב לסתום ביותר לא יחצוץ.

אבל הנה בארתי בתשובה אחת בענין מוך באזן לידידי הגאון ר' שמעון טרעבניק שליט"א דבר חדש בחציצה דבית הסתרים, שאינו חוצץ שם אלא חציצה מדברים המתדבקים כמיני דבק וטיט וכדומה שהמקום נעשה מזה אינו ראוי לביאת מים אבל דברים שאין מתדבקין רק מחמת שמונחים שם אין מניחין להכנס שם מים אין חוצצים בביה"ס שא"צ שיבואו שם מים והוכחתי זה מכמה דברים שנתיישבו בזה (והוא נדפס לעיל בסימן צ"ח) ונמצא לפ"ז גם בהא דעין תותב אף אם מהודק יפה ואף במקפדת להסירו לפעמים מצד צערה וחשש קלקול הגוף נמי לא יחצוץ כיון דחציצה כזו אינו חוצץ בבית הסתרים ותוך העין הוא ביה"ס.

ולטעם זה נראה דהמשקפים שנעשו מחדש שקורין קאנטקט שמשימים מתוך להעפעפים ומקיפין את כל העין שהוא מקום בית הסתרים שג"כ כיון שלא נתדבקו שם בדבק שאינם חוצצים ואם שכחה להסירם א"צ טבילה אחרת ורק לכתחלה כיון שיכולה להסירם בעצמה צריכה להסירם משום מהיות טוב. ובזה לא שייכי טעמי השואל ומשיב. והנני ידידו, משה פיינשטיין.

Turkey:"Just criticising Israeli war criminals"

Haaretz

Children of abusive mother ask for leniency in sentencing

YNet

Jerusalem District Court debates sentencing of Beit Shemesh woman convicted of abusing six of her 12 children. Eleven of them appear in court, say abuse was result of mental illness, ask for leniency

Obama, Big Pharma, & you (mimus you)

Newsweek

So it looks as though we are going to get a health-care-reform bill. Now the question is whether it will be reform, or "reform": whether it will improve the way we care for people in this country or, for the most part, be a taxpayer-funded boon to the warped and wasteful industry we already know. Call me naive or cynical—or both—but I can't quite get my mind around the notion that the way to bring "change we can believe in" is to cut an upfront deal with Billy Tauzin.  (Click here to follow Howard Fineman).

Nothing against Billy, of course. At 66, Wilbert Joseph "Billy" Tauzin II is what he is: a Louisiana politician and former congressman with the Bayou-bred knack for cloaking brainpower and bare-knuckle tactics in bonhomie; a masterful mixologist of power and money; and, since 2005, the president of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, which he joined (for a reported $2.5 million a year) shortly after playing the key congressional role in enacting a Medicare prescription-drug plan that is a bonanza for the industry he now (officially) serves.

Barack Obama ran on the claim that he would be the new sheriff in town, that he and his posse of fresh-faced Rhodes Scholars would tame the capital's ruling class. But the first thing that he and his tacticians, Rahm Emanuel and Jim Messina, did on health care was to strike a bargain with Tauzin. Big Pharma, it was agreed last June, would kick in $80 billion over 10 years to help shrink the "donut hole" in seniors' Medicare prescription-drug coverage and would spend $150 million on a pro-reform ad campaign. In exchange, the White House would oppose congressional attempts to extract more, and would specifically fight two common-sense, long-overdue reforms that Big Pharma fears most: allowing imports of cheaper drugs and empowering Medicare to negotiate directly with the industryto keep prices down, as the VA long has done. The administration has similar understandings with other stakeholders, such as the hospital and doctors' groups—and still hopes to engineer one with the health insurers. [...[

Ebay offers honeycake from Skverrer Rebbe

EBAY

Sex offenders barred from places of Worship

Time

North Carolina is a proud member of the so-called Bible Belt of states that take their religion seriously. So some eyebrows were raised when James Nichols was arrested for attending church.

His offense? Nichols, a convicted sex offender, had chosen to worship at a church that has a nursery where kids play while their parents pray. Now Nichols, 31, who only recently got out of prison, is fighting back, challenging the legality of a new law that took effect in December prohibiting registered sex offenders from coming within 300 ft. — nearly a football field's length — of any facility devoted to the use, care or supervision of minors. (See pictures of John 3:16 in pop culture.)

As more states have adopted laws regulating where sex offenders can go, it was only a matter of time before the noble goal of protecting children butted heads with the sacrosanct First Amendment right to worship where and when you choose. Which takes precedence? [...]

Change in the Arab Middle-East

CNN

The Arab Middle East teaches minorities some tough life lessons and shapes them in ways that might surprise you. While the effect of a conservative patriarchal society is expected to keep people under the thumb of tradition, culture and tribal and religious beliefs — sometimes too much oppression and control yields opposite results.

Having lived in several parts of the Middle East as a child, I learned that a woman doesn't exist except as someone's daughter, sister, wife or mother. Her opinion is not required, her emotions don't count and she has no rights whatsoever – except those granted to her by a male.

With a few recent exceptions, an Arab woman's testimony is not accepted in court. Most Arab women can't travel outside their countries without permission from a male guardian, and most Arab women still can't give nationality to their children. In Saudi Arabia women are not even allowed to drive cars. A popular Arabic saying describes it best: a good woman "has a mouth that eats but not one that speaks." [...]

Gra: Torah comes from the poor - not the rich

כתר ראש אורחות חיים

סח] הזהרו בבני עניים שמהם תצא תורה' [נדרים פא.], והיינו שבני עניים מקבלים פעולה בהישיבה יותר מבני העשירים, מפני שאבותיהם לא הרבו עליהם בהוצאות שכר למוד ונשאר אצלם הכל בכח ובהישיבה מוציאים מכח אל הפועל, ולא כן בני חעשירים. שכבר הוציאו עליהם למלמדים מופלגים כו׳ כל מה שהיה בכוחם הוציאו אל הפועל, ומזה תקיש לשאר אופניםל פ ):

לט)להתחבר עם עניים והמתנהגים בשפלות, ולישב עמהם בכדי שיסתפק במה שימצא את עצמו (באור רבינו משלי ט״ז ייט) < וכמו מעשה דר״ע שמצא הצשיר יושב בין הנגניים.

Shabbos Elevators - view of Tzomet Institute

Shabbos Elevators Tzomet Oct 11 2009

Muslim Anti-Semite - formerly an Orthodox Jew

Fox News

A New York bicycle cabbie who last year used his Web site to mock the beheading of journalist Daniel Pearl posted a prayer calling for the murder of Jews and exhorting Muslims to "throw liquid drain cleaner in their faces." And there's nothing authorities can do about it.

Yousef al-Khattab, who runs RevolutionMuslim.com and pedals a pedicab in New York City, insists the words he has posted on his Web site are a prayer, and not a threat — and that his hatred is protected by the First Amendment.

"If it was a threat, I'd be in jail," the 41-year-old al-Khattab told Foxnews.com from his home in Queens. "I'm asking my God, that's what it is. Every supporter of Israel is an enemy combatant and the immune system is not anti-Semitic for resisting disease."

Al-Khattab removed the Oct. 7 post a "few days ago" and replaced it with a post about a mosque in Jerusalem.

An American-born Jew formerly known as Joseph Cohen who converted to Islam after attending an Orthodox rabbinical school — al-Khattab called on Allah to carry out "wrath on the Jewish occupiers of Palestine & their supporters." [...]

Reporting abuse is becoming more acceptable

NYTimes (hat tip to Joseph & Efraim)


For decades, prosecutors in Brooklyn routinely pursued child molesters from every major ethnic and religious segment of the borough’s diverse population. Except one.

Of some 700 child sexual abuse cases brought in an average year, few involved members of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community — about 180,000 followers of Hasidic and other sects who make up the largest such cluster outside Israel. Some years, there were one or two arrests, or none.

But in the past year, there have been 26. District Attorney Charles J. Hynes has brought charges against a variety of men — yeshiva teachers, rabbis, camp counselors, merchants and relatives of children. Eight have been convicted; 18 await trial. [...]

Virus might cause Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

NYTimes

Many people with chronic fatigue syndrome are infected with a little known virus that may cause or at least contribute to their illness, researchers are reporting.

The syndrome, which causes prolonged and severe fatigue, body aches and other symptoms, has long been a mystery ailment, and patients have sometimes been suspected of malingering or having psychiatric problems rather than genuine physical ones. Worldwide, 17 million people have the syndrome, including at least one million Americans.

An article published online Thursday in the journal Science reports that 68 of 101 patients with the syndrome, or 67 percent, were infected with an infectious virus, xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus, or XMRV. By contrast, only 3.7 percent of 218 healthy people were infected. Continuing work after the paper was published has found the virus in nearly 98 percent of about 300 patients with the syndrome, said Dr. Judy A. Mikovits, the lead author of the paper. [...]

ACORN legally extorts money from banks

Yahoo reports

WASHINGTON – Conservative Republicans are capitalizing on the troubles of community activist group ACORN — ranging from charges of voter registration fraud to embarrassing videos of its employees — to revive their long-standing fight against a federal law that grades banks on their investments in poor and minority neighborhoods.

The 1977 Community Reinvestment Act was intended to end redlining, a practice in which banks in effect walled off many inner-city neighborhoods from mortgage loans. But some GOP lawmakers say it has outlived its purpose and is being used inappropriately by ACORN to shake down banks for money. They want to repeal the law, scale it back or at least block a Democratic proposal to expand it.

Critics of the law are linking it to ACORN — a subject many Democrats wish would go away — at every opportunity. [...]

Advice & appeal for R' Tropper and his opponent

I wish to offer some gratuitious advice to both sides of what looks like an awesome battle of attrition with terrible waste of time, effort and opportunity for both sides. I speak as someone who admires both of you but at the same time has been viewed as an enemy by both of you. Thus I view myself as a neutral observer.

I wish to commend R' Tropper for the change of tone and/or commentators who are defending him. It certainly makes a much more positive and convincing impression than the previous.

As you are aware this blog is carefully monitored by both sides of the dispute. And thus you are able to get a feel for the arguments your opponent will likely use in court as well as a chance to test your own.

R' Tropper your previously posting was typified by arrogant rage i.e., you lost it. It clearly was to your detriment. Why you used that approach - despite having access to the top people in public relations is a real puzzle. Hopefully the current postive change will be permanent and we can respectfully talk and agree and disagree.

On the other hand, a word of free advice to the plaintiff. You are not doing yourself any good by your video's and photo spreads showing you associating with major Jewish icons and themes - while at the same time there is an equal number of video's and photo spreads showing what an outsider with money is capable of getting. You also severely damaged yourself by threatening to sue me in civil court for merely allowing discussion of the issues - despite the fact that the vast majority of posts were very positive. It wasn't consistent with the image of a sweet hearted do gooder that you have tried to cultivate. It was the steel fist without a velvet glove

You can't be an outsider and insider simultaneously. In sum your public relations department needs to be more reality oriented and be concerned with producing an authentic public image for you - instead of the caricature that they have succeeded.

Please remember what you acknowledged to me - that you have surrounded yourself with people whose main concern is to maintain influence over you and profit from you - not necessarily to do what is in your best interests.

What is occuring is that neither side has real supporters - the major concern of most is to watch the spectacle in the sense of Roman gladiators fighting each other to the death before a crowd of excited on lookers. It isn't too late to change the situation and to back off from confrontations in court - whether beis din or secular. Perhaps you can get a panel of arbitrators. There will be not be a clear winner in this dispute - but the Jewish people will clearly be losers. Instead of devoting both your enormous energies and talents to helping others - your energy is are being directed to destroy your hated opponent.

Schooling should not be started to soon

ספר החינוך מצוה תיט

מדיני המצוה מה שאמרו זכרונם לברכה [סוכה מ"ב ע"א], מאימתי מתחיל האב ללמד את בנו תורה, משיתחיל לדבר מלמדו תורה צוה לנו משה [דברים ל"ג, ד'], ופסוק ראשון מקריאת שמע שהוא שמע ישראל [שם ו', ד']. ואחר כך מלמדו מעט מעט מפסוקי התורה עד שיהא בן שש או בן שבע שמוליכו אצל מלמדי תינוקות. וראוי לכל בן דעת שיתן לבו שלא להכביד עול הילד בלימוד בעודנו רך האברים ורך הלבב, עד שיגדל ויתחזק כח לבו ותוקף אבריו, ועצמותיו ימלאו מוח, ויוכל לסבול יגיעת הלימוד ולא יקרנו חולי ההתעלפות בסיבת היגיעה רבה עליו, ואולם אחר התחזק כוחו ויאורו עיניו להבין לקול מוריו, אז ראוי וכשר הדבר ומחוייב להביא צוארו בעולה של תורה ולא ירפוהו ממנה אפילו כחוט השערה, ישקוהו תמיד מיין רקחה ויאכילוהו מדבשה.

Killing rapists to stop attack:R' Aviner

YNet

Fight off your attacker: Women attacked by rapists are permitted to kill them to ward off the attack, Beit El Chief Rabbi Shlomo Aviner ruled in a newsletter published Saturday.

“In either word or deed, fight him off. Yell out loud so that everyone can hear you. If he touches you, slap him. If he attempts to do worse, and there is no other choice, you can kill him…yes, kill him,” Rabbi Aviner wrote.

The rabbi also noted in his article that his advice falls well within the guidelines of Israeli law, which is also on his side. ”A young man broke into a woman’s apartment and wanted to have his way with her. She killed him and the court ruled that in this instance she had the right to use reasonable force in order to defend herself, and that her actions were justified.”

In an article entitled “Don’t Let Men Harass You” the Rabbi urges women to resist all forms of sexual harassment, either in word or deed, and advises women “to not allow men to treat them like an object for their own use and pleasure.” [...]

Rav Sternbuch warned against demonizing Hadassah

מכות ואלימות באמבולנס שפינה את הרב רוזנברגר

update

A billionaire's Sukkos celebrations

http://www.bhol.co.il/news_read.asp?id=12656&cat_id=1

Justice - Harvard Prof Michael Sandel #2

Abuse - Statuatory rape is taken more seriously

NYTimes

At the end of "Manhattan," the celebrated movie romance from 1979, a teenager played by Mariel Hemingway delivers some good news to the 42-year-old television writer, portrayed by Woody Allen, with whom she has had a long-running sexual affair.

"Guess what, I turned 18 the other day," said Ms. Hemingway, in what was framed as a poignant encounter. "I'm legal, but I'm still a kid."

That was then.

Roman Polanski's arrest on Sept. 26 to face a decades-old charge of having sex with a 13-year-old girl stirred global furor over both Mr. Polanski's original misdeed and the way the authorities have handled it — along with some sharp reminders that, when it comes to adult sex with the under age, things have changed.

Manners, mores and law enforcement have become far less forgiving of sex crimes involving minors in the 31 years since Mr. Polanski was charged with both rape and sodomy involving drugs. He fled rather than face what was to have been a 48-day sentence after he pleaded guilty to unlawful sex with a minor. [...]

Shabbos elevators: Rav Meir Triebitz's Teshuva

NYTimes

Tangible things occupy the days of most building managers in New York City. Hot water, floods, bugs, rent checks and so on.

But last week, newly added to the tenant issues facing building managers like Harold M. Jacob, who runs a co-op on the Lower East Side where Orthodox Jews inhabit a substantial portion of the 2,500 apartments, was this almost ontological question:

Does that elevator "know" how many people are on it?

The question is at the core of a ruling issued by a group of prominent rabbis in Israel on Sept. 29 that seems to ban the use of many so-called Shabbos elevators: elevators fixed to stop on every floor from Friday evening until Saturday evening so that observant Jews do not have to press any buttons.[...]

YNet discussion of the recent ruling YNet new developments

The issue of Shabbos elevators - after the acceptance of the view of Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach as a tolerated leniency for many years - has recently been brought into crises by a ruling by leading chareidi rabbis saying that there is now no basis for being lenient. The following is a teshuva written by Rav Meir Triebitz which addresses their concerns. It has been carefully reviewed by Rav Moshe Sternbuch. Rav Sternbuch has personally sent it to those who recently prohibited the Shabbos elevators. This does not mean of course that Rav Sternbuch necessarily agrees with the conclusions but only that the teshuva is worthwhile considering.

Afikei Torah 5 R Triebetz Elevator

Astor's conviction: Deterrent to abuse of the elderly

NYTimes

During the long months of testimony in the Astor trial, as the courtroom emptied of spectators and the headlines shrunk, prosecutors and other professionals involved in elder abuse cases were still paying close attention. In fact, some were biting their fingernails, especially as the jury's deliberations grew heated and stretched to 12 days.

"I've been very worried about it," confessed Lori Stiegel, senior attorney at the American Bar Association Commission on Law and Aging. If the prosecutors, including the head of the Manhattan District Attorney's pioneering elder abuse unit, had failed to win a conviction, she said, "it could have been perceived as reinforcing the notion that these cases are just too difficult to bring and that juries will have trouble understanding the issues."

Around the country, a growing number of district attorneys' offices — Los Angeles, San Diego, Seattle, Brooklyn — have set up elder abuse units on the theory that specialization can help them uncover and fight these particularly thorny cases. (Manhattan's unit, dating to 1992, is among the oldest.)[...]

Jewish Billionaire sues Prominent US Rabbi

Arutz Sheva

(IsraelNN.com) Energy industrialist and billionaire Guma Aguiar has filed a suit in the Jerusalem Rabbinical Court against prominent U.S. Rabbi Leib Tropper claiming that he misallocated funds intended for institutions and poor people in Israel. Rabbi Tropper's American attorney, Glenn Waldman, told Israel National News that his client categorically denies the charges. [...]

R' Haskel Lookstein's critque of conversions

The Jewish Week - Interview

The Jewish Week - Corrections to interview

False sex-abuse charges dropped by judge

LoHud.com

NEW CITY — Prosecutors this morning dropped all charges against a Monsey man and a fired Ramapo police officer who had been accused of sexually abusing a Rockland woman.

Rockland prosecutor James Mellion told acting Supreme Court Justice Catherine Bartlett that the charges against former office Andrew Dale and Monsey resident Zalman Silber were being dropped "in the interest of justice."[...]

The Anxious Mind - innate temperament

NYTimes

Jerome Kagan's "Aha!" moment came with Baby 19. It was 1989, and Kagan, a professor of psychology at Harvard, had just begun a major longitudinal study of temperament and its effects. Temperament is a complex, multilayered thing, and for the sake of clarity, Kagan was tracking it along a single dimension: whether babies were easily upset when exposed to new things. He chose this characteristic both because it could be measured and because it seemed to explain much of normal human variation. He suspected, extrapolating from a study he had just completed on toddlers, that the most edgy infants were more likely to grow up to be inhibited, shy and anxious. Eager to take a peek at the early results, he grabbed the videotapes of the first babies in the study, looking for the irritable behavior he would later call high-reactive.

No high-reactors among the first 18. They gazed calmly at things that were unfamiliar. But the 19th baby was different. She was distressed by novelty — new sounds, new voices, new toys, new smells — and showed it by flailing her legs, arching her back and crying. Here was what Kagan was looking for but was not sure he would find: a baby who essentially fell apart when exposed to anything new.

Baby 19 grew up true to her temperament. This past summer, Kagan showed me a video of her from 2004, when she was 15. We sat in a screening room in Harvard's William James Hall — a building named, coincidentally, for the 19th-century psychologist who described his own struggles with anxiety as "a horrible dread at the pit of my stomach ... a sense of the insecurity of life." Kagan is elfin and spry, balding and bespectacled. He neither looks nor acts his age, which is 80. He is one of the most influential developmental psychologists of the 20th century.[...]

Death & psychotherapy - Learning & teaching

NYTimes

Some years ago I was consulted by a psychologist, a man in his 60s who wanted help with relationships and in thinking about his life, which was threatened by heart disease. At the time I was in my 70s, and his condition had special resonance for me: my father had died of congestive heart failure, and I have feared I will die in the same way.

"Do I want to work with a man who may die, and who may be closer to death than I am?" I reflected. If we have a good relationship, I will have to experience grief. If I do not come to care about him, the therapy will not be helpful. On the other hand, I might not outlive him, and losing a therapist is painful. Should he be subjected to that loss too?

But I liked the new patient and thought that in his situation, I would want someone to have the courage to be with me. So we began meeting from time to time.[...]

What Psychologists don't know

Newsweek

Today, I recommend checking out the British Psychological Society's Research Digest. BPS asked over 20 of the world's leading psychologists to confess (in 150 words or less) to one nagging thing they still don't understand about themselves.

Witty, charming, and by definition insightful, the psychologists' answers are well-worth reading. Richard Wiseman's piece wondering where comedy comes from made me chuckle; Robert Plomin's thoughts on parenting and genetic influence reminded me how much Po and I want to delve into this work – and how many questions are still left unanswered.

But, read the essays as a group, and I think the scholars' replies offer an even broader insight. [...]

Poisonous meat: The E Coli problem

NYTimes

Stephanie Smith, a children's dance instructor, thought she had a stomach virus. The aches and cramping were tolerable that first day, and she finished her classes.

Then her diarrhea turned bloody. Her kidneys shut down. Seizures knocked her unconscious. The convulsions grew so relentless that doctors had to put her in a coma for nine weeks. When she emerged, she could no longer walk. The affliction had ravaged her nervous system and left her paralyzed.

Ms. Smith, 22, was found to have a severe form of food-borne illness caused by E. coli, which Minnesota officials traced to the hamburger that her mother had grilled for their Sunday dinner in early fall 2007. [...]