העורך Editor

Exposing Horrific State Crimes to the Victims Would Change… Nothing at All!

  1. Has anything changed since Edward Snowden showed how America and Britain spy on their subjects?
  2. Did revealing The_Shakshuka_System in Israel get anyone fired?
  3. Does anyone care the Vietnam and Iraq wars were launched based on False Flags?
  4. Open secrets, like the Israeli judicial dictatorship?

Only small state crimes are prosecuted. I could add countless more examples, but I cannot think of a single counter-example. The vast majority firmly believe the state can do no wrong, no matter what. That’s democracy.

Why write of these things, then?

To strengthen (and discover) the tiny minority.

There Are No Philosemites!

Say I, otherwise, they would convert to Judaism (see the article here)!

That’s also how I understand Rabbi Miller below:

Q: Is [X] an אוהב ישראל? Does he love the Jewish People?
A: Well, that’s a very big order to expect of a Gentile. The question we ask is: How much is a Gentile not a שונא ישראל? And therefore, I think that on that question he would pass. [X] is not a שונא ישראל.
And since I understand what you’re getting at, I presume that I will have to speak a few words on this subject of…

The Achronim Just Make Stuff Up

I don’t know how else to put it.

Here is an English summary of the highlights in a pseudo-halachic discussion of eating food left under the bed:

One may not store food and drink under a bed, even enclosed in metal, and these receive an “evil spirit”, and so should not be eaten. As the Shulchan Aruch (Y.D. 117:5) says:

ולא יתן תבשיל ולא משקים תחת המטה, מפני שרוח רעה שורה עליהם… וכל אלו הדברים הם משום סכנה, ושומר נפשו ירחק מהם ואסור לסמוך אנס או לסכן נפשו בכל כיוצא בזה. (ועיין בחושן משפט סימן תכ”ז).

  • It is customary to be lenient if the food was under a mattress or pillow or plane seat or a recliner (even though it is sometimes used for sleeping) or in a sleeping man’s pocket.
  • If it was under a child’s bed or stroller or double-decker bed, there is doubt. Some say the food is permitted if no one slept under the bed, or if it was slept on during the day, but it’s better to be stringent since the Gemara doesn’t go into these details.
  • If medicine was left under the bed, there is room to be lenient.
  • Some say one person cannot forbid another’s food (אין אדם אוסר דבר שאינו שלו – responsa Rav Pe’alim).
  • For more of this (Cooked or uncooked? Esrog for Succos? Chanukah oil? Hefsed Merubeh? etc.), see here.

The ugly truth is, there is no good proof for any of this. Since we don’t observe any danger in our time, we have no tools to analyze any of this. One needs to take some general approach, and either forbid everything or permit everything (see Pischei Teshuvah on the Shulchan Aruch).

There are hundreds of such pointless discussions in the Achronim and countless ink poured.

If you don’t know something, just admit it!

The State of Diaspora Orthodox Jewry

In a major center of so-called Orthodox Jews outside the land of Israel:

  • Men work a full day on Friday, park their cars as Shabbos arrives, then walk to shul by foot.
  • Boys and girls of all ages are given entirely unfiltered smartphones so “they are exposed to the world”.
  • Youth are sent to a papist Catheterlick (Catholic) prep school for a year before going on to college.

All of this is considered normal and in no need of change.

A Missed Opportunity

We have said so before already.

For as long as Israeli arabs remain here, it’s forbidden to harm them, besides being counterproductive. But the state, by criminalizing the private supply of  genuine security services, and at the same time, doing a horrible job of providing Arabs with security, themselves, are exposing regular Arabs to crime. Neither “Right” nor Left desire to improve things (for fear of false appearances of persecution), the same way they don’t make them pay all taxes (and their own sectorial parties do nothing about it either).

From 972 Mag:

The Arab public wants better policing — and Israeli police don’t care

Israel’s state comptroller released recommendations for improving policing in Arab communities. But none of them seem to address the real problem: police indifference.

By Nisreen Salameh Shahbari

Palestinians citizens of Israel participate in a vigil in the town of Ramle marking the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, on November 25, 2015. (Yotam Ronen)

 

On a cold February morning this year, my four-year-old son’s daycare was broken into. Sights of happy children singing and drawing were replaced with photos of horrific destruction and looting. This was the third break-in at Daburiyya, an Arab village east of Nazareth, that month. Previous incidents included an armed robbery in broad daylight, during which a person was shot and severely injured.

In a radio segment discussing the incident, police claimed they are handling all criminal activity in the village without delay, and that in cases where the investigation is paused or unsolved, it is because residents are refusing to cooperate. This is a known accusation that is too often regurgitated, a “golden ticket” used by police to explain their incompetence in enforcing the law in Arab communities. When pieced together, the daily acts of violence, from murder to vandalism, reflect a sad reality for 20 percent of the country’s population.

Two years ago, in an attempt to improve the sense of personal safety among Arab citizens, the government established a community policing center in my village. As many Arabs, I, too, hoped that building police stations near crime hotspots will lead to results. But when the police were slow to respond to the above-mentioned crimes, our hope dissipated.

Last week, at the height of the Arab community’s struggle against the Jewish Nation-State Law, the state comptroller released an evaluation of how police manage illegal firearms and shootings in Arab communities. For us, Arabs, the acute flaws in police conduct which were pointed out in the report were far from new. The report’s main contribution was the detailed data outlining Arab citizens’ deep lack of trust in law enforcement, and the sense of abandonment they have grown accustomed to.

Trump proved you can garner a large number of votes by saying you will “solve” a sore issue other distant politicians claim does not exist. This electoral opportunity is foolish to ignore.

Continue reading on 972 Mag here.