Models for the Post Office

If you go into most post offices here in Israel, while waiting (for ever and ever it seems), you can watch advertisements of the Postal Authority's services.

Like here:

But at a post office branch in Ramot I visited, in a Haredi area, I saw these adverts with these models:

 

Long live pluralism.

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Hareidi Girls Caught Outdoor Bathing

At the Lions' Fountain next to the Begin Center this morning:

(photo credit: YMedad)
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My Daughter on the Tal Law Annulment

Here:

Opponents of the Service Deferral Law, on the other hand, could not hide their glee.

"An historic decision," said [Tzruya] Medad-Luzon, of the Movement for Quality Government in Israel. She told DPA that she hoped parliament would now "really invest effort and thought" into a more balanced law.

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What Does NIF Stand For?

Some think this is anti-Hareidi, NIF = New Israel Fundamentalism.

I think it is anti-New Israel Fund:

What do you think?

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Laor's Looney Left Lashing

One never knows from whence comes salvation.

In this case, a sensible contribtuion from radical poet Yitzhak Laor who doesn't yield on his anti-nationalist camp prejudices but inbetween, he has some wonderful points in these excerpts from:

Israel's suicidal left

For example:

...Every few months, the Israeli anti-Semitism comes out of the closet and takes the form of what sociologists call "moral panic," which seems to give people license to distort and confuse various issues, especially when you add the beards and traditional dress of ultra-Orthodox men into the mix. Those who are especially meticulous even make sure to give the Jew-boy in their cartoons a hooked nose. This isn't the first time this has happened...The fact that ultra-Orthodox women work in professions including teaching, social work and occupational therapy while the men are increasingly cooking and taking care of the children - even those alternative gender roles are thrown into the distorting pot of incitement.

The enlightened revolutionaries demand a single set of standards for everyone - their own standards. "How much are they costing us?" ask the learned professors, who enjoy financial benefits that no yeshiva head (or professor in France or Germany ) gets.

...It should be no surprise, then, that the periodic incitement against the Haredim leads to right-wing extremism. Incitement always ends up with adoration of the state. Thus, Meretz's efforts in the 1990s to make Ashkenazim scared of Shas gave birth to the centrist and secularist Shinui party, which swallowed up the left-wing Meretz party...It's about time that the average liberal acquired some historical perspective and asked himself, "What are we really doing when we pursue Haredim and make believe we are battling the right wing?"

There are indeed thugs in Beit Shemesh, and there are a few bus lines that have come to represent those territorial battles - characteristic of all the Jewish contradictions of the Zionist project - that exist between the Haredi minority and other parts of the population. But what does this have to do with the "social protest"?

...the question isn't who needs the constant incitement against "the Haredim." There are different interested parties at different times, and television, for its part, needs to have a steady target so it can glorify freedom of the press - and promote equality for women, as espoused by beautiful female broadcasters who will be tossed as soon as they show a few wrinkles.

The question is, how does this periodic panic succeed in becoming anti-Semitic psychosis?...

Thank you Laor.

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Three Latest Hareidi Wall Posters

In the name of the Satmar Rebbe, on the issue of the transfer of the ownership of the Meron grave area from the various hekdeshim religious trusts to a state authority - war!

the secularist attacks on the Hareidi standards of modesty began back in 1972 with the Eros store in Tel Aviv which two Hebron Yeshiva students attempted to torch and continued through the years with a one year jail punishment being applied until now, when two years were adjudicated against a Hareidi who didn't actually cause physical injury upon a store owner selling MP4s but as a warning:

and more responses to interference in the standards of modesty between the sexes - we the Hareidim are also guilty in that there is "something wrong in our neighborhoods" with Hellenists gathering against them:

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Three New Wall Posters

I've uploaded three new wall posters, 2 against vacationing in Eilat and one banning the Hareidi weekly, HaMishpacha, at my Facebook album.

And review the previous uploads.

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Jerusalem vs. Bowling Green, Kentucky

Have you read about the Conservative Movement's initiative via the Kehillat Ohr synagogue to combat feminine discrimination in the defacing of bus stop ads that picture women?

Well, welcome to Bowling Green, Kentucky:-

Controversial bra display for cancer awareness set ablaze

BOWLING GREEN, Ky. — A public display of bras outside a Bowling Green business has been set ablaze.

The cancer-awareness display at Western Kentucky Diagnostic Imaging Center had created some controversy in the south-central Kentucky town, prompting calls to the business and letters to the paper.

On Monday night, vandals set fire to the display, burning some of the bras, according to WBKO-TV.

Any Hareidim down south?

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Is This Religious Persecution - or Nigh Stupidity?

What do make of this?

Settler violates house arrest in bid to fly to Uman

Petah Tikva Magistrates' Court extends remand of 25-year-old man from Elon Moreh over suspicions he flew to Uman with another man's passport despite being under house arrest

The details

...The impersonation was exposed at the airport in Kiev when the young man was heading back to Israel. He was arrested immediately upon landing at Ben Gurion Airport. During his interrogation he claimed that his rabbi told him to go to Uman.

The suspect was put on house arrest over a year ago and was indicted for threatening police officers and reeking havoc at a police station...He managed to visit Nachman of Breslov's gravestone in Uman and then attempted to make his way back to Israel...During questioning the suspect claimed he violated his house arrest because "the rabbi ordered me to fly to Uman and I knew I wouldn't be able to issue a passport."

At a Petah Tikva Magistrates' Court hearing, the suspect's attorney claimed that aside from violating house arrest, her client hasn't committed any other felony. She also mentioned that the young man has been under house arrest for quite some time and has not violated it until now, requesting the court release him under restrictions.  However the judge ruled the police should be allowed to proceed with its investigation and extended the remand of the suspect by two days, fearing he might try to escape given recent circumstances.

Nu. Is he back in Israel? Is he under house arrest?

So, he tok a few days off.

Now, this guy would be another problem:

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Hareidim Get Very Hareidi

Here is the front page of a four-page pamphlet I picked up.  Issue #1, Adar 5771, Topic: Hotels during Pesach.

It's entitled "Machaneinu", or "Our Camp" (like in verse in Exodus 14:19 - "the camp of Israel" [מַחֲנֵה יִשְׂרָאֵל] or 2 Kings 3:24), published by the "Committee for the Purity of The Camp", POB 57049 -

The blue-outlined headline reads:

"The Rabbinical Committee for the Character of Holiday Leisure Sites Calls for: The Pesach Holiday should be celebrated at home in a Jewish family atmosphere as is the age-old custom throughout all the communities".  The 'Rabbinical Commission' will supervise hotels and other leisure location during the holiday...and is not intended to oversee the Kashrut [of the food] but elements of modesty"

The red-outlined section reads:

"Holy letter concerning total separation on public transportation from our Revered Rabbi Yosef Sholom Elyashiv...'I encourage the community as fixed in 2006 to be careful concerning complete separation on public transportation..."

There you have it.

The rest is no better.

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Defintely Not-Kosher

This week there is a "Festival of Flavors" taking place in Jerusalem.

The Jerusalem Development Authority and the Jerusalem municipality invited the public to partake of an unprecedented culinary tourism event with the Old City Flavors Festival. For the first time ever, the gates of the four quarters of the Old City were opened in the evening and at night to reveal a wealth of unique, authentic restaurants along with music events, ethnic food markets, and arts and crafts fairs and workshops. The festival began on Sunday, March 27 and runs through Thursday, March 31, every evening between 18:00 and 23:00.

But the religious and hareidi elements of the city's populace is very upset at what they see as official sponsorhsip of non-Kosher food.

The wall posters I snapped today (the thrid one is published by Jerusalem's Chief Rabbinate; the others represent various Hareidi groups, the first two anonymous and the last, the official Eidah Hareidit):

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New Series of Wall Posters

For those new at my blog, among other interests, I amm fascinated by the "wall poster" media of the Hareidi community. They are known as pashk'villim and announce warnings related to behavior and moral practice and deall with bans, excommunications, deaths, and other news.

a)  The boys who attacked the Spiced store, damaging it for selling immoral merchandise, are now in police custody and the store owner is being berated for causing them trouble:

b) again against video clips and films:

c) burial sites were empitied near the railline of Ramleh-Lod over Shabbat, it is claimed:

d) educational institutions should have nothing to do with the Zionist establishment like building a school unless they have bought it absolutely:



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Words From The Depths of Hareidi Meah Shearim

The latest publications of Toldos Aharon, Toldos Avraham Yitzchak and Neturei Karta.

The first above is Divrei Kodesh of Toldos Avraham Yitzchak, their weekly Torah portion sheet.
The second is Dibrot Kodesh of Toldos Aharon, their weekly Torah portion sheet.
The third is HaChoma of Neturei Karta, a bi-monthly hate sheet against Zionism.

Confused?

Try this from this:-

The Rebbe Aharon "Reb Areleh" Roth (d. 1946) was the founding Rebbe of Shomrei Emunim dynasty in the town of Satmar, Hungary, and Jerusalem.
Rebbe Avrohom Chaim Roth, present Shomrei Emumim Rebbe in Jerusalem and Bnei Brak is the son of "Reb Areleh" Roth.
Rebbe Avrohom Yitzchok Kohn (d. 1996) was the previous Toldos Aharon Rebbe of Jerusalem, son-in-law of "R' Areleh" Roth.
Rebbe Shmuel Yaakov Kohn - present Toldos Avrohom Yitzchok Rebbe in Jerusalem is the eldest son of the previous Toldos Aharon Rebbe.
Rebbe Dovid Kohn - present Toldos Aharon Rebbe in Jerusalem - is the son of the previous Toldos Aharon Rebbe.
Rabbi Avrohom Yitzchok Kohn, the previous Toldos Aharon Rebbe, died during Hanukkah of 1996. Rabbi Kohn had many sons, two of whom are rebbes today. After Rabbi Kohn died, these two sons came to an agreement whereby the younger son Rabbi Duvid Kohn from Monsey, New York, a disciple of the Klausenburger Rebbe, inherited the title "Toldos Aharon Rebbe". The eldest son, Rabbi Shmuel Yaakov Kohn, a disciple of the Viznitzer Rebbe, became a rebbe as well, of a group that was entitled Toldos Avrohom Yitzchok named after his father, the previous rebbe of the group. The main beis medrash of Toldos Avrohom Yitzchok is also in Meah Shearim, one block away [actually a block an a half and across the street] from the Toldos Aharon building. Both live in Jerusalem.

It's not all that bleak. A short tantz at a wedding:



Reb Areleh chassidim are big on covering theri eyes lest they see something they shouldn't.

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Egged Warns You: Sit Where You Want And Don't Harass

To understand this sticker I photographed this morning:

You need to read this news item:

The High Court of Justice on Thursday officially abolished the so-called “mehadrin” public buses operated by the Egged bus company, but it is far from clear that the ruling will put an end to the gender separation arrangement in which female passengers are frequently forced to sit at the back of the bus. According to Justice Elyakim Rubinstein, “There is a common understanding today that the operation of the buses as they were run until 2007 is forbidden. This is the current opinion of the Transportation Minister and, as the regulatory body, that is what he will instruct the public bus companies. For those who are not clear on this, we will say that a public transportation operator (like anyone else) may not tell, request or order women to sit in a specific place on the bus just because they are women, or to tell them how to dress, and they are entitled to sit anywhere they wish.”

The sticker translates:

Every passenger is entitled to sit anywhere he chooses (except for those places limited to persons with disabilities).  Harassing a passenger in this matter could be a criminal offense.

 
So sit down and be quiet.  Or just keep standing.
 
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Not So Big In Japan

The above poster, requesting that prayers and psalms be recited (as was done last year) for two young Hareidi men, including schools and educationbal institutions, relates to a case in which Hareidi yeshivah students were caught with drugs in Japan.  Last year there was also a ladies campaign.

More here.

Strange that young pupils were involved.  How do they explain to them the circumstances of the case?
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Is This Ovadiah Yosef Speaking? Or Shalom Elyashiv?

Is the following content from the mouths of Israel's Hareidi Rabbis?

[he] lashine[d] out at women who leave the house “painted like a clown” and “confuse the street with striptease.”...he said a woman wearing a miniskirt “can provoke...a man”...“If she is drunk on top of that, she will provoke him even more,” he said. “If she is actively inviting contact, and then is surprised that this contact ends with a rape, she is all the more at fault.”

Nope.

Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Source

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For Men Only?

I found this Torah weekly portion sheet yesterday:-

And then I noticed the phrase there boxed off:-

That Aramaic translates as "only between men".  In other words, that sheet can be passed about the congregants, the male congregants.

Gee.

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Wall Posters - The Latest From the Hareidi Communities

This one renews the demand that modest women wear a shawl over their shoulders and upper body from a decade ago:-

And this one prohibits listening to any radio, even the so-called "holy stations":-

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No National Service Accepatable for Hareidim

That's what this says:-

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Latest Wall Posters

Basically, anti-films, anti-cultural programs sponsored by Jerusalem Municipality:

Headlines read (l-r): To Remove the Masque, A Culture of Sinnermen, My son, don't go with them.

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