RaP discusses Shavei Israel search for 'Hidden Jews" in Poland

Guest post by RaP:

Shavei Israel looks for 'Hidden Jews' in Poland and All Over!

"The Jewish Press

Friday, January 20, 2012

Page 18

(Display advertisement:)          

HELP  US  UNCOVER  THESE  HIDDEN  TREASURES

After decades of oppression, Poland’s ‘Hidden Jews’ are finally emerging from the shadows, seeking to reclaim their Jewish identity. The downfall of the Iron Curtain has opened up new worlds, and allowed previously-buried family secrets to come to the fore.

Across Poland, countless young people are suddenly discovering the Jewish roots that their parents or grandparents sought to hide because of fear or persecution, and an increasing number are seeking to learn more about Judaism.

Shavei Israel is leading the way, reaching out to Poland’s ‘Hidden Jews’ with a helping hand and a welcoming heart.

Please join us in assisting these brave young men and women to reconnect with the Jewish people.

[Photos six young people surrounding Shavei Israel logo]

Please send your US tax-deductible contributions to:

American Friends of Shavei Israel

25 West 45^th Street, Suite 1405. New York, NY 10036. Tel: (212) 840 – 1166

www.shavei.org”

The Jewish Press is unique among the English language Orthodox weekly newspapers and magazines in that for many years, someone or other in its ownership/editorial department has consistently pushed and allowed and even promoted articles and ads from organizations and individuals such as the defunct EJF, Shavei Israel and a variety of events.

The American Yated is the most conservative in this regard. It has basically never allowed any information on its pages that in way seem to be promoting proselytization of gentiles by any sort of rabbis or organizations. Perhaps in the early history of the EJF when many roshei yeshiva were induced to attend its earliest meetings, there was something, otherwise nothing. The American Hamodia at one time had regular articles and ads about EJF's work, but it stopped that when the Tropper scandal came into the open. the American Mishpacha once used to have more articles about finding lost Jews and promoted the work of the Shavei Israel  organization headed by Michael Freund. But without missing a beat, The Jewish Press has never given up on the theme of publishing articles, ads and promoting outright proselytization to gentile by Jewish organizations and rabbis. This seems to have come about in the period after the passing of its founder Rabbi Sholom Klass (d. 2000), but since then there has been a constant blizzard and drumbeat for this cause. The Jewish Press was among the leadership of the EJF from its inception in various ways and even wrote editorials and op-eds to support EJF. The Jewish Press has been the greatest supporter of Shavei Israel and it hosts a regular column by Michael Freund who has made it his life's mission to go searching for all manner of "lost Jews" that's part of a greater Zionist vision as he is also a Zionist activist. (The New York Jewish Week is not considered an Orthodox paper as it's funded by the secular UJA).

This past week was no exception, and space was given not to events to help "Anusim" but raise money for finding lost Jews in Poland.

----------------------

The following is a closer look at the latest Shavei Israel infomercial:

"HELP  US  UNCOVER  THESE  HIDDEN  TREASURES"

RaP:  The word "uncover" here is ambiguous, it easily means "proselytize"!

"...Poland’s ‘Hidden Jews’ are finally emerging from the shadows, seeking to reclaim their Jewish identity."

RaP: Almost all of them are not Halachic Jews and would require proper conversions. The wording jumps the gun, it tells the reader that they are already "Jews" albeit "Hidden" -- meaning they are "real" Jews just "hidden" away somewhere, when the facts are far from that. They are mostly gentiles with very tenuous links and claims to Jewish ancestry, and to repeat, almost every single one of them would require a proper geirus. So this is really a masquerade to cover up another mass proselytization effort.

"The downfall of the Iron Curtain has opened up new worlds, and allowed previously-buried family secrets to come to the fore."

RaP: Many of these claims are useless in a court of law, let alone a Bais Din because they almost all lack the proper kind of documentation that their parents or grandparents or great-grandparents were truly verifiable Halachic Jews.

"Across Poland, countless young people are suddenly discovering the Jewish roots that their parents or grandparents sought to hide because of fear or persecution, and an increasing number are seeking to learn more about Judaism."

RaP: This is true EVERYWHERE, not just in Poland, but that does not mean that they should be ENCOURAGED to do so for obvious reasons that no one knows who these people are really descended from. This is certainly not classical "kiruv rechokim" by any stretch of the imagination, its going way beyond the normal parameters of what an Orthodox-run organization should be doing. There should be many lessons learned from the recent mass Aliya from the former USSR that dredged up all sorts of people with very unreliable and false and even no claims to being Jewish and they amount to at least a third of the million who came from the USSR who are not Halachic Jews. The Jewish state of Israel does not need more problems because it is already choking Halachically on this bone of contention of nebulous "hidden Jews"!

"Shavei Israel is leading the way, reaching out to Poland’s ‘Hidden Jews’ with a helping hand and a welcoming heart."

RaP: There are plenty of priorities to work on and help bring back to authentic Judaism the millions of secular or marginal Jews who have a closer connection to provable Jewish ancestry.

"Please join us in assisting these brave young men and women to reconnect with the Jewish people."

RaP: They may be brave but Shavei Israel, and The Jewish Press that's promoting this are clearly pushing the envelope of and clearly crossing the line from kosher kiruv to painful proselytization. 

"Please send your US tax-deductible contributions to:

American Friends of Shavei Israel

www.shavei.org ”

RaP: There can surely be more important things to support in the Jewish world today. A further look at the web link opens the wide window into Shavei Israel's growing network, that unlike EJF has not been stopped or derailed. Michael Freund is NOT Leib Tropper even though they are merchants in the same bazaar of bartering for "lost Jews" and having no qualms in trying to have them converted, no matter how many there are, they're still the same type of very dangerous undertakings from the point of view of Jewish identity according to Jewish law.

--------------------

Prominent Zionist rabbi Moti Elon denies sexual assault charges

Haaretz

YNet

Prominent Rabbi Mordechai ‘Moti’ Elon denied on Sunday the charges against him that he sexually abused two male students.

Elon, until recently considered one of the spiritual leaders of religious Zionism, is the former head of Yeshivat HaKotel in Jerusalem, went on trial at Jerusalem Magistrate's Court in December last year on charges of forcible sexual assault against the two students, who had sought his emotional support.

Jerusalem Police wage war against chareidi extremists

Haaretz

The short history of the current conflict begins in 2003, with the anointing of Rabbi Yitzhak Tuvia Weiss - an elderly Belgian Jew who lives in Antwerp and who earned a respectable living as a rabbi and a rabbinical court judge - as leader of the anti-Zionist Eda Haredit community in Jerusalem. In his years as the Gavad (Genius Father of the Court ), pragmatic elements have been shunted aside and radical elements have grown stronger, dragging the sect into a series of struggles, most of them violent failures: against the gay and lesbian community's Pride parades; against opening the Karta parking lot and the opening of the Intel plant in Jerusalem; against the construction at the Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon; against the arrest of a mother from the Toldot Aharon Hasidut for starving her son; and more. 

In the last of these cases, in 2009, top police officials continued to treat the Gavad with respect due to his being the great rabbi of the generation. But the soothing words they extracted from him at late night meetings remained within the room, while activists around him continued to fuel the struggle in the streets. 

At about the same time, a group of Sicarii attacked a busload of ultra-Orthodox children with special needs driving down Mea She'arim Street in the capital. There were no physical injuries but some of the children suffered prolonged psychological trauma, which led representatives of the ultra-Orthodox public to realize that their internal institutions are not enough. They demanded, in no uncertain terms, that the police intervene and do what no rabbi dares to do: suppress the fanatics.

'He masterminded systematic rape of over 100 kids' :The nightmare of Nachlaot

JPost

Members of the haredi community in the capital’s Nahlaot neighborhood are calling it “The Holocaust.” At least 10 pedophiles molested more than 100 children for six years, reaching nearly every family in this close-knit community.

One mother couldn’t figure out why her two sons would get hysterical every time she left the house, begging her not to go. They were chewing their clothes to pieces and having uncontrollable outbursts. She brought them to different doctors and psychologists to try to determine what was wrong, but no one could figure it out.

Then community doctors started seeing strange marks, possibly indicative of abuse, on many of the children. Finally, one young boy was injured in a way that was unmistakably sexual abuse. He was the one who finally broke the silence, and talked about the horrific abuse happening in the neighborhood.

Members of the community call this “the miracle.”[,,,]

Responding to abuse - interview with Dr. Yitzchok Schecter of CAPS of Rockland County

The yawning chasm between American & Israeli Chareidim

Cross Currents by Rav Yitzchok Adlerstein

Many people, myself included, believe that the fallout from Beit Shemesh and Kikar Shabbos will have a longer half-life than others suppose. One item to keep an eye on is the fault line that has surfaced, much as those that sometimes appear on the earth’s surface after an earthquake. 

This fault line separates Israeli charedim from many of their American counterparts. Two different narratives developed. Americans could not accept the Israeli one, while Israelis were deaf to the arguments of Americans.

Americans by and large rejected the suggestion that protest was unnecessary, because there is no reason the rest of us should be responsible for the actions of a relatively small number of extremists. Witness the wall-to-wall condemnations of the activities in Beit Shemesh and Yerushalayim. Americans understood what was at stake: if you don’t distance yourself from ugliness, you are considered complicit in it. It didn’t matter to us whether lumping us all together was just or not. The honor of Torah, our relationships with non-Jews and non-religious Jews, our ability to attract baalei teshuvah in the future – all these would be imperiled by our remaining silent. So we spoke up, and couldn’t understand that in Israel, our cousins seemed not to understand. [...]

Constructive gossip proven to be healthy

Medical News Today

It seems as social animals we have a strong urge to pass on unsavory information to others, and people even spent their own money in the study, using a "gossip note" they had to pay for during an economic game in which participants could warn people about to play against cheaters. The researchers suggest that people shouldn't feel bad about passing on information if it is likely to help those involved, exposing vices or protecting someone against exploitation.

Willer points out, however, that the study was focused on the positive sides of gossip, passing on useful information or "prosocial" warnings about untrustworthy or dishonest people. The study did not look at the typical tabloid type gossip involving celebrities and their personal issues. This author would suspect that this type of gossip is an almost imaginary or invented version of the more positive prosocial / protective gossip, in that the behavior of a celebrity with a drug or marital problem doesn't necessarily have any real or immediate effect on our daily well-being, although perhaps studying the behavior and mistakes of famous people, might help those spectators avoid those kinds of life path mistakes themselves.

Shabbos problem of using water in high rise buildings

YNET

Bnei Brak's Rabbi Moshe Yehuda Leib Landa has warned that turning on faucets in some multi-story apartment buildings leads to the desecration of Shabbat

The rabbi issued a halachic ruling explaining that the using the tap directly turns on an electrical water pumping system – an offense which, according to the Torah, can be punished by stoning. [...]

According to the rabbi, the long-term solution is to install a high water reservoir enabling natural rather than electrical pumping. In the meantime, however, "there is no other choice but to ensure that the pump is turned throughout Shabbat and Jewish holidays."

Four Mea Shearim Men Released in Charity Scam Scandal

Artuz Sheva

Judge Dan Pollock of the Jerusalem Magistrate Court ordered the release of four men who were suspected of assisting a scam in the Mea Sharim neighborhood. The accusations involved keeping money that was advertised as being collected for charity. The arrests involved a popular community rabbi and his arrest this week led to street protests in the Mea Shearim and Geula neighborhoods of Jerusalem.

Controversy regarding report on the serious problem of Ethiopian domestic killings

Haaretz

The Immigration and Absorption Ministry has withheld a landmark research project documenting the murder of women in Israel's Ethiopian community. Only sections of the report, completed in 2009, are now coming to light. 

The research was conducted by Dr. Shalva Weil, an anthropologist who has researched Ethiopian Jewry for over 30 years. It offers a comprehensive profile of what Weil claims is the typical wife-killer, based on the examination of 16 such cases and extensive interviews with women and other family members who survived murder attempts.

Yiddish in Japan

Haaretz

הרב מרווין טוקאייר מגרייט נק שבמדינת ניו יורק לא ישכח את השיחה המפתיעה שקיבל לפני 43 שנה. "ב-1969, כשגרתי בטוקיו, צלצל לפתע הטלפון בבית. "שמעתי קולות לא ברורים", נזכר טוקאייר, שכתב 20 ספרים ביפאנית על יהדות והיה הרב היחיד ביפאן באותה העת. "השיחה היתה מטלפון ציבורי ברחוב, שמעתי את המכוניות ובכלל לא הבנתי על מה האיש מדבר. אז שאלתי אותו: אילו שפות אתה מדבר? והוא ענה: יפאנית, גרמנית, קצת אנגלית ויידיש. אז אמרתי לו: יידיש?! קענסט דעדן יידיש? (אתה מדבר יידיש?) והוא ענה: יו (כן). אז אמרתי לו: קום אהער! בוא מיד, אני רוצה לפגוש אותך!"

French police suspect rabbi raped underage girls

JPost

Police in France have questioned Rabbi Daniel Farhi, a prominent member of the Jewish community in that country, over suspicions that had he had raped an undisclosed number of underage girls, French media reported Tuesday.

The 70-year-old rabbi, who founded the Liberal Jewish Movement of France, the nation's tiny Reform Judaism group, was grilled by investigators at a police station in Paris earlier today.

Amsterdam chief rabbi suspended for signing document saying homosexuality can be changed through therapy

JPost

The chief rabbi of Amsterdam, Aryeh Ralbag, was temporarily relieved from his post Wednesday by the board of the Orthodox Jewish community, after he signed a document describing homosexuality as an inclination which “can be modified and healed.”

Ralbag, a US-born Orthodox rabbi nominated to head the Amsterdam community in 2005, had recently cosigned the document titled “Declaration On The Torah Approach To Homosexuality,” which called on “authority figures” to “guide same-sex strugglers towards a path of healing and overcoming their inclinations.”[...]

Historic Reconciliation between Satmar & Belz

Arutz Sheva

A wave of excitement is gripping parts of the hareidi religious world as a historic reconciliation between the hassidic dynasties of Belz and Satmar is underway.

The Admor of Belz sent a delegation of ten dayanim (rabbinic judges), headed by his personal assistant, to the graves of Satmar Admorim, Baal Ha"Divrei Yoel" and Baal Ha"Berach Moshe," at the Kiryas Yoel cemetery in New York City. [....]