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| Dov HaShoteh Lando seen after being awaken from his nap during a meeting to discuss the drafting of ultra-Orthodox jews to the IDF in the ultra-Orthodox city of Bnei Brak |
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| WEISS HOUSE & GOLDBERG LAKEWOOD -WHERE RESIDENTS FEEL LIKE PRESIDENTS |
Rabbi Dov Landau, one of the most senior leaders of the Lithuanian ultra-Orthodox community in Israel, has directed representatives of the Degel HaTorah political party to withdraw from all participation in Zionist institutions, citing irreconcilable ideological differences with Zionism's secular foundations.
In a letter published Tuesday in the ultra-Orthodox daily Yated Ne'eman, Landau wrote: "Zionism is a movement whose purpose is to establish the Jewish people on an explicitly secular foundation, rooted in heresy and rebellion against divine sovereignty." He further stated, "There is no allowance to participate with them, serve in any role within their institutions, or vote in their elections in any form whatsoever."
The rabbi emphasized that involvement in these institutions constitutes support for beliefs contradictory to traditional Jewish values, warning that it leads to "desecration of God's name."
Landau's statement came amid broader debates over the role of ultra-Orthodox and religious communities in Zionist institutions. The World Zionist Organization (WZO), founded in 1897 by Theodor Herzl, oversees critical institutions such as the Jewish Agency for Israel, the Jewish National Fund (JNF), and Keren Hayesod.
A shift toward religious, right-wing factions in these institutions has been evident in recent years. As reported by The Jerusalem Post in 2020, elections for the 38th World Zionist Congress (WZC) saw Orthodox slates gain significant ground, with the Eretz HaKodesh faction—a coalition of conservative religious-Zionist and ultra-Orthodox figures—receiving over 20,000 votes. Their platform notably avoided the terms "Zionist" or "State of Israel" and reassured potential voters that participation in WZO elections did not imply ideological alignment with Zionism.
The Post also reported that Eretz Hakodesh appealed to ultra-Orthodox voters by highlighting what they perceived as efforts by liberal Jewish movements to erode traditional religious practices in Israel. One of their campaign messages warned against growing religious pluralism, including non-Orthodox prayer services at the Western Wall.
Landau's opposition to Zionist institutions is rooted in long-standing ultra-Orthodox theology, which rejects the Zionist project as a secular-nationalist enterprise. His letter underscored this view:
"Zionism is a movement whose purpose is to establish the Jewish people on an explicitly secular foundation, rooted in heresy and rebellion against divine sovereignty. All the national institutions are built upon this ideology. There is no allowance to participate with them, serve in any role within their institutions, or vote in their elections in any form whatsoever. Doing so constitutes support for heresy and desecration of God's name," he wrote on Tuesday.
*Putzadik Clarification:*
Landau clarified that participation in Israeli parliamentary elections is permitted based on directives from earlier rabbinic authorities, who saw it as a necessary measure to protect the religious character of the Jewish state. However, involvement in the Zionist Organization or affiliated bodies is seen as fundamentally incompatible with religious principles.
Dr. Yizhar Hess, deputy chairman of the World Zionist Organization (WZO) and a representative of the Conservative movement, expressed disappointment over the potential resignation of Degel HaTorah representatives:"I admit I would feel sorrow if Degel HaTorah representatives are forced to resign from the Zionist Congress and national institutions. The fact that ultra-Orthodox, Reform, and Conservative representatives were able to rise above their differences and sign a joint coalition agreement gave me a sense of optimism. We learned to get to know each other, to argue, but also to find agreement on many issues—and even to share moments of laughter. When you work together for common goals, you draw closer."
Hess added that the connections forged through these interactions have had a humanizing effect:
"More than once, I wondered if Shmuel Litov (Degel HaTorah/Eretz Hakodesh) and Ronit Beitner (Women of the Wall/Reform Movement) would have had the chance to meet—let alone become friends—if not for their countless meetings around the same table and joint visits to various projects."
The decision to withdraw from Zionist institutions could have practical implications for Degel HaTorah, which is part of the United Torah Judaism (UTJ) faction in the Knesset. UTJ has historically avoided ideological support for Zionism while engaging with state mechanisms to secure funding for religious education and other community needs.
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| AGUDATH ISRAEL BANK COLLAPSED - THIS POOR POLITICIAN, MENACHEM PORUSH, BUILT THE MERCAZ CENTRAL HOTEL IN JERUSALEM MORTGAGE FREE |
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| ORIGINAL MERCAZ HOTEL - THE HOTEL WAS SOLD |
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| THE AGUDATH ISRAEL CONVENTION BUFFET REMAINED |
Menachem Porush (Hebrew: מנחם פרוש, 2 April 1916 – 22 February 2010) was an Israel politician who served as a member of the Knesset for Agudat Yisrael and its alliances between 1959 and 1975, and again from 1977 until 1994. He was known for his efforts to curb secularization in Israel, leading campaigns to enforce strict Jewish laws through legislation. *EXCEPT LO SIGNOV*
The Bank of Israel, the nation’s central bank, is preparing legislation for the Knesset that will give it extensive new powers of supervision over the country’s banking business, it was learned from reliable sources today. The more stemmed from the recent failure of the Agudath Israel Bank under circumstances that hinted at the emergence of a new financial scandal.
The Agudath Israel Bank which was on the verge of bankruptcy, has been taken over by the Bank Leumi, one of Israel’s major banking institutions, in order to save the deposits of its 19,000 clients. The Cabinet yesterday discussed the transaction and the circumstances leading up to it. The collapse of the Agudath Israel Bank was attributed to improvident loans, most of which went to the bank’s principal shareholders, and to the bank’s involvement in dubious outside ventures.
https://www.jta.org/archive/bank-scandal-prompting-new-banking-legislation
The Movement for Quality Government in Israel watchdog group called on Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara and the Israel Police to open a criminal investigation into the Hasidic Agudat Yisrael party on Sunday, citing reports that it had encouraged draft evasion and instructed its constituents on how to circumvent a High Court ruling restricting daycare subsidies for children of yeshiva students who fail to enlist.
The conduct of Agudat Yisrael officials “raises serious suspicion of committing serious offenses of fraud and breach of trust,” the organization, which has long advocated for ultra-Orthodox enlistment, said in a statement.
The Movement for Quality Government in Israel watchdog group called on Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara and the Israel Police to open a criminal investigation into the Hasidic Agudat Yisrael party on Sunday, citing reports that it had encouraged draft evasion and instructed its constituents on how to circumvent a High Court ruling restricting daycare subsidies for children of yeshiva students who fail to enlist.
The Movement for Quality Government’s appeal cited reporting by The Times of Israel and the Ynet news website, which last Thursday both published investigations into a hotline established by Jerusalem Affairs Minister Meir Porush.
Worried Haredi yeshiva students and parents who called the hotline have repeatedly been advised to ignore draft orders and lie to the Israel Defense Forces, The Times of Israel found.
Zalman, a member of the ultra-Orthodox community who spoke on condition of anonymity and asked to be identified by a pseudonym, said that he was told to disregard any draft orders sent to his son.
“What they are suggesting at this stage is to ignore it, not deal with it,” he said, claiming that he was told: “If you received an initial call-up order, you are like thousands of others. You don’t have to do anything, just ignore them.”
The Agudat Yisrael faction represents the Hasidic community’s interests within the coalition’s United Torah Judaism party (the other faction in UTJ is the non-Hasidic Degel Hatorah).
“Let us recall that the penal code stipulates severe prison sentences for anyone who incites or solicits a person liable for military service not to serve, and that the things described… may amount to committing a criminal offense, especially at a time when the State of Israel is at war,” Movement for Quality Government attorney Tomer Naor told The Times of Israel last week.
Yesh Atid MK Vladimir Beliak, who coordinates the opposition’s activity in the Knesset Finance Committee, demanded Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara open a criminal investigation into officials in the hassidic Agudat Yisrael party over its attempts to evade sanctions against draft dodgers that are expected to come into effect on March 1.
Yeshiva students whose wives work are eligible to receive state-subsidized daycare for children below age three. However, this subsidy is set to expire at the end of February for students who are required to enlist for IDF service but have refrained from doing so. The loss of the subsidy is a significant financial sanction for many haredi families, as it could raise expenditures by hundreds, if not thousands, of shekels per month.
Recordings published in Ynet last week revealed that Agudat Yisrael officials were instructing yeshiva students to open fictitious small businesses since these will enable the students to continue receiving the subsidy for an additional six months. While technically legal, this was a clear attempt to continue avoiding sanctions against draft dodgers, and its promotion by Agudat Yisrael amounted to a potential crime of fraud and breach of trust, Beliak said.
Beliak added that he intended to use all parliamentary tools at his disposal to ensure proper oversight on the issue.Finance Ministry Budget Department head Yoav Gardos reiterated in a letter to Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee (FADC) legal adviser Adv. Miri Frenkel-Shor the necessary conditions for sanctions to be effective. Gardos wrote the letter at Frenkel-Shor’s request, ahead of a series of committee meetings this week regarding sanctions on haredi draft dodgers.
According to Gardos, the first necessary principle was that there not be a “cutoff age” after which haredim will be exempt from service since this serves as an incentive for haredim to remain in yeshivot and out of the workforce until reaching this age.
A second principle was there had to be a link between the individual’s choice of whether or not to enlist and the sanction in question. If the sanction, for example, is applied to the entire pool of potential haredi draftees, or even to a specific yeshiva, the individuals themselves will not bear direct responsibility for their actions, and therefore may not change their behavior.
A third principle, according to Gardos, was that sanctions needed to apply immediately, since any “adaption period” would likely lead more haredim to the conclusion that a solution to exempt them from service will eventually be found, and therefore they will hold off on enlistment.
Finally, Gardos argued that there needed to be a guarantee in the law that the sanctions not be offset by other benefits to haredim. This will completely undermine the sanctions’ effectiveness, and not lead haredim to enlist, he wrote.
https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/article-842308?
“Let us recall that the penal code stipulates severe prison sentences for anyone who incites or solicits a person liable for military service not to serve, and that the things described… may amount to committing a criminal offense, especially at a time when the State of Israel is at war.”
Worried Haredi yeshiva students who call a telephone hotline linked to Jerusalem Affairs Minister Meir Porush have repeatedly been advised to ignore draft orders and lie to the Israel Defense Forces, a Times of Israel investigation has found, prompting calls for a criminal investigation into potential violations of the 1986 Security Service Law.
The hotline was established amid a push by the IDF to draft ultra-Orthodox youths, who until recently enjoyed exemptions from the military, and a campaign by Haredi parties to ensure that a new law being crafted on the issue would largely enshrine the exemptions.
Addressing a gathering of his Shlomei Emunim movement in December, Porush announced that “in recent days, we have established an assistance center for those facing the threat of conscription at the central office for public inquiries of the Agudat Yisrael Jerusalem Center.
“Although the situation seems insoluble and it is unclear to what extent it will be possible to assist every request and rescue those who turn to us from the danger of conscription, we will do our best to assist Torah scholars as much as possible to immerse themselves back into the sea of Torah without unnecessary worries,” he said.
Shlomei Emunim is a part of the larger Agudat Yisrael faction, which in turns represents the Hasidic community’s interests within the coalition’s United Torah Judaism party (the other faction in UTJ is the non-Hasidic Degel Hatorah).
Following Porush’s announcement, The Times of Israel called the hotline to ask about its activities. A representative stated that he was unable to provide “any advice” for young men of draft age.
Instead, he claimed, the hotline was only set up to provide pro bono legal advice for “older people who got married and have all sorts of personal issues that could exempt them from the draft.”
However, this was only partially true, with multiple current and former members of the ultra-Orthodox community who called the hotline reporting that they were actively advised to ignore enlistment orders and obstruct authorities’ efforts to follow up on the matter.
Zalman, a member of the ultra-Orthodox community, said that he was told to disregard any draft orders sent to his son. All the hotline callers who spoke with The Times of Israel agreed to do so on condition that they be identified by a pseudonym due to fear of reprisal.
“What they are suggesting at this stage is to ignore it, not deal with it,” he said, claiming that he was told: “If you received an initial call-up order, you are like thousands of others. You don’t have to do anything, just ignore them.”
The hotline similarly told Dovid, a former Hasid, to lie to the IDF about his son’s whereabouts.
“Generally, with a boy of 17 there is nothing special to do. You need to be careful, if somebody calls, say that you are not in touch with your son and you don’t know where he is. Don’t say that he saw the draft orders,” the hotline told him.
Dovid was further instructed to tell his son not to attend any demonstrations or give the police any excuse to ask for his identification number and see that he is a draft dodger.
Speaking with Chaim, a 19-year old yeshiva student, the hotline did not explicitly advise ignoring orders. Instead he was told to relax and only come back for further advice when an arrest warrant was issued against him.
“They kept saying that you haven’t received an arrest warrant yet and there is nothing to fear and nothing to worry about. And I said to them, What if there is an arrest warrant? ‘Call us and we will help you,'” Chaim recalled.
Since last summer’s High Court of Justice ruling that the government must draft ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students, the IDF has sent out thousands of draft orders and subsequently issued 1,212 arrest warrants. Last week, an ultra-Orthodox yeshiva student was arrested at Ben Gurion Airport for trying to evade an IDF draft order by leaving the country.
Some members of the community charged that the hotline and similar efforts were doing more harm than good and misleading them about the ramifications of their actions.
The approach is highly ill-advised and has the potential to cause widespread damage, complained Moshe, an ultra-Orthodox man in his late twenties who has been in touch with several of the competing hotlines being run by elements of the Haredi community.
“These organizations are just a cover for a larger failure of members of Knesset and politicians who are unable to do anything. Establishing these organizations on a large scale is quite ridiculous because they actually have no solution to offer,” he said.
“I think it’s irresponsible to tell people to [avoid the army] and hide from them the meaning of being AWOL. You need to tell people, listen, you are going to be deserters, that is, to be a criminal with a criminal background. They don’t say this and a person doesn’t know what he’s getting into.”
“There is no doubt that this is illegal,” former IDF manpower chief and Yesh Atid MK Elazar Stern told The Times of Israel, calling the advice given by the hotline “unethical” and insisting that he was unsurprised that Minister Porush “encourages people to cheat.”
Stern is a member of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, which is currently debating a controversial enlistment law demanded by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ultra-Orthodox coalition partners.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, a senior official in Netanyahu’s ruling Likud party agreed, stating that Agudat Yisrael’s hotline was “definitely violating the existing law.”
“I think that we all understand the coalition reality, but at the least the prime minister has to make it quite clear that he won’t tolerate this behavior from any member of the coalition,” the official said.
In an email to The Times of Israel, Tomer Naor, an attorney for the Movement of Quality Government watchdog group, said his organization was planning to contact the police and attorney general to demand a criminal investigation into the matter.
Responding to the quotes shared by hotline callers, Naor wrote: “A very disturbing picture emerges, according to which elements that are directly connected to a party in power are allegedly operating an entire system that assists in violating the laws of the State of Israel.”
“Let us recall that the penal code stipulates severe prison sentences for anyone who incites or solicits a person liable for military service not to serve, and that the things described… may amount to committing a criminal offense, especially at a time when the State of Israel is at war.”
When The Times of Israel visited the premises of Agudat Yisrael’s hotline on Wednesday morning, an employee referred all questions to a spokesman for the initiative, who turned out to be Minister Porush’s representative Shmuel Kramerski.
Asked for comment, Kramerski replied that those manning the hotline had been told that everybody should “act in accordance with the instructions of their rabbis.”
“The purpose of answering the phone is to advise and guide the person who decides to act in accordance with the instructions of his rabbis, and not a determination or recommendation to a person on how to act,” Kramerski said. Any representative behaving otherwise would be disciplined, he added.
A spokesman for Housing Minister Yitzhak Goldknopf, the Agudat Yisrael chairman, denied any connection between his boss and the hotline, telling The Times of Israel that “this is related to Porush, the institutions of Agudat Yisrael Jerusalem belong to [him].”
The Israel Police did not answer requests for clarification regarding the legality of the hotline’s activities, while the IDF spokesman’s office declined to comment.
The Prime Minister’s Office likewise declined to discuss the issue, instead directing The Times of Israel to speak with Netanyahu’s Likud party, which did not respond.
No, no, zayt nisht meshuge! Loz im geyn! Abi gezint! Take off! Hosti gezen in dayne lebn? (Don’t be crazy! Let him go. As long as you’re healthy! Take off! Have you ever seen such a thing?).
As of Tuesday, 22 children and two adults had been infected, all of whom were unvaccinated, local officials said.
A worsening measles outbreak has taken root in Texas, sickening two dozen and hospitalizing nine on the western edge of the state, where childhood vaccination rates have dwindled in recent years.
As of Tuesday, 22 children and two adults had been infected, all of whom were unvaccinated, local health officials said. The outbreak comes as Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a staunch critic of childhood vaccines, has been nominated to be the country’s next health secretary, causing public health experts to worry that similar upticks of preventable illnesses will become more frequent.
“There’s a feeling this is going to be more and more common,” said Dr. Cameron Wolfe, an infectious disease expert at Duke University.
The Texas outbreak has so far been limited to residents of Gaines County, which borders New Mexico and has roughly 20,000 residents. Last year 82 percent of kindergarten students received the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine, according to state data. That figure is roughly 10 percentage points lower than the average vaccination rate in Texas public schools and far below the federal target of 95 percent for measles vaccination.
Vaccination rates have been declining nationwide since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 and now sit below 93 percent. An estimated 280,000 kindergartners in the United States do not have documentation of an M.M.R. vaccine, according to federal data.
Texas public schools require children to have received certain vaccines, including the M.M.R. shot, but parents can apply for an exemption for “reasons of conscience,” including religious beliefs.
Last year, more than 13 percent of K-12 students in Gaines County received a vaccine exemption, according to state health department data. That is one of the highest exemption rates in the state.
Lara Anton, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of State Health Services, said that the cases had been concentrated in a “more insular” community in the county, among people who attend church and private schools together. Many of the children are also home-schooled, Ms. Anton said.
Local health departments have set up drive-through vaccination clinics in Seminole, a city at the center of Gaines County known for its large Mennonite community. So far, these have been well attended, Ms. Anton said.
The most common side effects of measles — a high fever and a blotchy red rash — typically resolve on their own within a few weeks. But serious complications, including pneumonia and brain swelling, are possible, especially for children younger than 5.
Roughly one in five unvaccinated people who become infected with measles is hospitalized, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Ms. Anton said that all nine of the hospitalized patients were school-age children, and that many of them had spent time in the intensive care unit.
“It is a serious disease,” she said. “We are trying to impress that upon the community, that you need to take steps now to protect yourself.”
State health officials warned that cases would likely pop up in surrounding communities because of the “highly contagious nature of this disease.”
The New Mexico Department of Health reported this week that a teenager who lived in a county bordering Texas tested positive for measles, though the child did not have any known exposure to the Gaines County outbreak.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/12/science/measles-vaccination-texas.html
NEW JERSEY HEALTH DEPT.
https://www.nj.gov/health/cd/topics/measles.shtml
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| Supporters and family members of hostages kidnapped during the deadly Oct. 7, 2023 |
“As soon as you settle in America, gather your children, and go to Israel. Then, once you see that land, I want a letter from each of you, telling me in detail how it is over there.”
Those were the words of my grandfather, Misha, the family’s great patriarch, who was born in a tiny shtetl near Vitebsk in 1902 into the family of a rabbi.
He grew up to become an important surgeon, fought in three wars, had most of his immediate family murdered by the Nazis, survived Soviet antisemitism, and finally outlived his wife and all his children, including my father.
My grandfather was a Jew by faith, by race, and by identity. He was a true Zionist who believed that Jewish destiny was not just in its religion, but also in its absolute right to be able to determine its own independent future. For him, as an unbreakable Soviet Jew, betrayed by his country’s promises about egalitarianism and equality, bruised by the most humiliating acts of antisemitism, he believed in the State of Israel, the only place in the world that would not compromise a Jewish life.
My grandfather carried that Zionist flame within him for the rest of his life, but never got to see his promised land. Years and years later, I traveled there on his behalf, but I fell in love with it all on my own.
Jews in Israel learned not to compromise. They defended their state, so their land would never be taken, and their children would never be without a home. Israel knew how to listen to its own voice — until 2011, when Gilad Shalit, held captive by Hamas for 1,934 days, was exchanged for 1,027 Palestinian and Arab-Israeli prisoners. Of these, 280 were sentenced to life in prison.
Among them was Yahya Sinwar, serving four life sentences, who masterminded the October 7, 2023, attack.
As of late, while in the midst of its existential crisis, Israel is trying in vain to seek the world’s understanding and respect. It mistakenly believes it can achieve both. The world does not want to understand Israel, nor the Jewish plight within the context of Israel.
In 1976, Palestinian and German terrorists hijacked an Air France plane with Israeli passengers, diverting it to Entebbe, Uganda. Demanding prisoner releases, they threatened to kill hostages. Israel launched a daring rescue mission, freeing nearly all hostages but losing three in the process, including mission leader Yoni Netanyahu. The most heated debate took place before the actual resolution of this operation between then Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who strongly believed in the deal in the absence of the military option, and Shimon Peres.
Rabin later shared with his speechwriter Yehuda Avner: “When it comes to negotiating with terrorists, I long ago made a decision of principle, well before I became prime minister, that if a situation were ever to arise when terrorists would be holding our people hostage on foreign soil and we were faced with an ultimatum either to free killers in our custody or let our own people be killed, I would, in the absence of a military option, give in to the terrorists. I would free killers to save our people.”
Peres, on the other hand, who at the time was Israel’s Defense Minister, held a different view. To him “deal” meant giving in to hijackers for the first time in Israel’s history. Although we all know Peres as the ambassador of peace, during that crisis he strongly believed that negotiation with terrorists was off limits because it was not part of Israel’s make up.
He said: “If we give in to the hijackers’ demand and release terrorists, everyone will understand us but no one will respect us. If, on the other hand, we conduct a military operation to free the hostages, it is possible that no one will understand us, but everyone will respect us, depending of course on the outcome of the operation.”
Israel under Rabin was on the verge of negotiations, but once the IDF presented the military plan, the decision to proceed was made, despite the risk of casualties. Thus, another chapter in Israel’s history of rescue missions was written. This demonstrated to both its enemies and the unfriendly international community that Israel would not compromise its national integrity to gain society’s understanding and insincere sympathy.
Why does Israel’s usually unbreakable spirit seem so influenced by actors with, at best, marginal interest in it? This may sound naive, as Israel needs major players like the US. However, that shouldn’t justify pushing Israel into bad deals.
The October 7, 2023, attack presented Israel with its most devastating hostage crisis. As of February 10, 2025, eighty of the 251 hostages abducted by Hamas remain in Gaza, with at least a third believed dead. Hasn’t Israel been here before? How could this deal be made after such a tragedy and most complex military operation, which drastically diminished Hamas?
There is intelligence that Hamas is regrouping; this cancer will grow. If Israel retreats after receiving hostages, some in body bags, it has every reason to anticipate a repeat of October 7th. Mothers embracing their children today may tomorrow be replaced by other mothers agonizing over their children’s fate all over again. The job of a parent is to shield their child from danger for as long as they can, but the job of a government, in this case the Israeli government, especially its leadership, is to protect the entire nation from all foreseeable danger, so that “Never Again” is Never Again FOREVER.
Throughout my life, first under the hypocritical iron fist of the Soviet empire and later as an immigrant in America, where some of the most important values and traditions of America’s greatness are too frequently compromised, I have always admired Israel, a nation salvaged from near extinction. I have revered Israel for its unwavering commitment to its core mission since its founding as a sovereign nation: the defense of its land and its people. For at least 63 years, it never faltered in this.
After the first three women were released this year, I heard: “Why not celebrate with them? They feared this day wouldn’t come. Celebrate with those young women!” or “Happy now? You got your deal, your hostages. Move on, stop this bloodshed.”
Frankly, it doesn’t concern me that non-Jews refuse to see this deal’s weakness; it saddens me that my people neglect how harmful it is for Israel and Jews.
As a human and mother, I want every hostage home, no matter the price. Seeing mothers with daughters breaks my heart with happiness, heartbreak, and disappointment. As a Jew, mother, and Zionist, these people are in hell because of deals like this, like 2011’s, which led to October 7th. Today’s rushed deal anticipates similar tragedies, different mothers lamenting, children orphaned. A new government will seek a new solution.
An understanding world is a luxury Jews and Israel cannot afford. To survive, Israel must fight.
The world will never understand or forgive a nation which, after losing 6 million to genocide, created its own state from the ashes and became a maverick of modern civilization. Had Jews and their promised land been losers, surrounded by enemies, swallowed by neighboring states, and became Israelis with a victimhood mentality, the world might have forgiven their roughness. But Israel’s story is different. The past 77 years, however difficult, have been a victory for Israel and every Jew there. Strong, courageous victors fighting for their people, knowing they are all potential hostages, these Israelis will never be sympathized with. All that remains is respect, existing without love or understanding, founded on reason. It would be impossible not to respect Israel’s refusal of weak deals — its only duty being to protect its country from future tragedies.
https://www.algemeiner.com/2025/02/11/israels-hostage-dilemma-in-search-of-the-worlds-understanding-and-respect/
A company trying to import kosher for Passover pizzas from abroad was met with an unexpected demand by the Israeli Chief Rabbinate.
The Chief Rabbinate's Rabbi Avi Kozman updated the company with the news that in order to receive kosher certification, there needs to be a "mountain of cheese" in the center of the pizza, Ynet reported.
The Rabbinate explained that this would differentiate the kosher for Passover pizza from regular pizza eaten year-round.
The Rabbinate also said that the pizza's appearance must be changed from round to square or rectangular. In a letter sent to the importer, the Chief Rabbinate demanded: "In the center of the pizza, there must be double the amount of cheese, so that it creates a shape resembling a mountain."
The importer attempted to explain that such demands are impossible to meet, since the pizza is packaged in a carton, and that additional cheese would raise the cost for the importer by 15%, estimated to equal 8-10% of the price of the product in Israel.
"Why does the Chief Rabbinate demand changing the shape of the pizza, if the package clearly states, 'Kosher for Passover under the supervision of the Chief Rabbinate,' both on the front and on the side of the package?" the importer queried.
UOJ EITZA TO IMPORTER: MEET THEM IN THE BATHROOM AT THE DAN WITH A FEW LARGE PAPER BAG$. יישר כח - חזק וברוך
Senior intelligence officers spoke of the lessons learned from the past, primarily the need for humility and caution, while being blind to the fact that they themselves were symptomatic of the same disease
When the roots of a failure remain untouched, it is no surprise that past flaws resurface, headed by the tendency to impose our own logic on our object of study
