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I doubt the Agudah will ever hold an open Q&A again. The answers given by our Torah leaders were filled with double talk, evasiveness, and in some cases statements that were simply untrue (I’ll address those separately in a different post).
The most surprising moment came right at the beginning. Rabbi Uriel Deutsch, Rav of the Forest Park Shul in Lakewood, responded to the question by saying that the question isn’t really the question—and then proceeded to reframe it into something entirely different.
“How are people supposed to reconcile the following: the very same leaders who speak strongly against gashmius—even in its minor forms—are seen attending extremely lavish events, perhaps because supporters pressure them to attend. Many feel this is a busha. How do we explain this contradiction?”
A fair question. Now listen to the convoluted answer.
Before anything, Rav Deutsch warns that no one should take his words out of context or extract soundbites. Fine. The video above contains the full exchange.
Then he says:
“Whenever we discuss gashmius, we always talk about someone else’s gashmius. It’s never about my own. It’s about why I feel pressured by someone else’s gashmius… The question is about how I should make decisions, not about what someone else does…”
Does anyone understand what this has to do with the question? How does this explain why Gedolim attend the very events they publicly condemn?
“When we see our Rabbanim seemingly attending a simcha whose level of extravagance is inconsistent with the message… what does that have to do with me?”
“Seemingly”? It’s not “seemingly”—it happened. Everyone saw the videos. They went viral.
And what does he mean by “What does that have to do with me?” If our Torah leaders attend these events, doesn’t that send a message to our children that the leaders themselves don’t take their own warnings seriously?
But it didn’t end there. Rav Deutsch then claims that the question itself is “not really the question,” and reframes it into something entirely different—something that conveniently fits his answer.
Rav Elefant begins by saying the question is a “good one,” but then claims it was “kidnapped” by a micro‑question of whether a Rosh Yeshiva should attend weddings by x or y.
He then launches into a strong condemnation of luxury and gashmius—ironically making the original question even stronger.
He later calls the question of “who went to whose wedding” absurd and “not important,” while continuing to emphasize how destructive luxury is. The contradictions pile up.
Now he insults and belittles the one who asked the "good question" and tells him that the question is "absurd" and "not important"
At 17:42 he asks:
“If a Rosh Yeshiva publicly refused to attend an over‑the‑top simcha because it contradicts the values he teaches—would that be beneficial? Would that be a Kiddush Hashem? And if yes, why isn’t it incumbent to do so?”
Rav Elefant responds:
“The action of a Rosh Yeshiva going to a one‑time event has no relevance and means nothing.”
Then he circles back to condemning luxury again, and repeats that the topic is being “kidnapped.”
At 19:40 he notes that the real issue is that Roshei Yeshiva attending these events puts the baalei simcha on a pedestal. Perhaps that is the core problem.
He then asks whether this relates to the idea of “Rebbe mechabeid ashirim.”
At 21:00 Rav Deutsch explains that if Hashem gave someone wealth, it must be because they have a zechus, and that even people with serious flaws can be conduits for supporting Torah. He cites sources to support this.
He then suggests:
“Imagine what those simchos would look like if the Roshei Yeshiva weren’t there.”
Why not simply say the truth? Why dodge the question? Why twist it into something else?
The honest answer is simple:
Roshei Yeshiva attend these events because of money. The Benjamins! כסף יענה את הכל.
President Donald Trump hit it out of the park (again) with his 2026 State of the Union address, perhaps his most remarkable speech yet.
The frame was an unabashed celebration of America in its 250th year, hailing heroes from the Olympic hockey champions to 100-year-old veterans — and with a close reiterating why the nation’s best days are yet to come.
He was the happy warrior we’d asked him to be, with a strong clear message untainted by grievance — even as he expressed his disappointment with last week’s Supreme Court ruling on tariffs and drew clear distinctions between his program and the opposition’s.
He deftly drew out the lunacy of Democrats’ positions on illegal immigration, crime and trans issues — time and again flagging their obsession with peculiar “rights” at the expense of common sense.
And of course rightly delivered a powerful economic message.
He flagged the inflation, wage stagnation and other horrors produced when Democrats ran Washington as the causes of the “affordability” crisis.
He explained how Americans’ lives are now getting better — rising wages, lower gas prices, fat tax rebates coming — and should keep improving.
He got the opposition to rise in applause for some things — the gold medalists, the other military and civilian heroes he honored — then called out how they refused to stand even when he called for justice for Charlotte murder victim Iryna Zarutska.
How stark the line, a clear choice for voters in the midterms, when he declared that our government’s first duty is to protect US citizens, not illegal immigrants — and Democrats sat silent as Republicans cheered.
“These people are crazy,” he rightly declared as he pointed to the left side of the chamber.
He had policy brags — Trump accounts for kids, lower prescription drug prices, victories over crime in DC and nationwide — and big themes like cheering religious revival and denouncing political violence as he honored the late Charlie Kirk.
He had poetry, particularly in his closing peroration.
He innovated a whole new kind of State of the Union drama, not just recognizing his guests but having many enter on cue, awarding medals and other signal honors as appropriate and leading the room in both applause and profound sympathy.
Even in a record-long speech, he couldn’t cover everything he and his team are doing for the country nor all the reasons to expect a brighter future this year and in the long term.
Yet he gave listeners good cause to believe that the state of the Union is indeed strong — and solid reason to know which party deserves the credit.
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| Director Yoav Potash greets Yaacov Goldstein |
A documentary about the murder of five Jews in a Polish town is being threatened with a ban in Poland - not because they were killed in the Holocaust, but because they weren’t.
The Jews at the heart of "Among Neighbors," from California-based filmmaker Yoav Potash, died six months after the end of Nazi occupation. They were among a handful of survivors from Gniewoszów, a town where about 1,500 Jews made up half the population before World War II. When they returned home in 1945, they were killed by their Polish neighbors.
Since premiering at the Warsaw Jewish Film Festival in November 2024, "Among Neighbors" has been screened in six countries and qualified for Academy Award consideration. But its release on TVP, the Polish public broadcaster, has prompted uproar from right-wing politicians and a national investigation.
Potash stumbled into making "Among Neighbors" on a 2014 trip to Gniewoszów, where he planned to document a modest rededication ceremony for the Jewish cemetery. As he began talking with the oldest residents, one woman, who has since died, told him that Jews were killed there well after the war.
"That just really struck me as a very different kind of story, because it was not the Germans doing the killing, it was the Poles," said Potash. "It was not during the war, it was well after, when it should have been a time of peace."
When "Among Neighbors" appeared on televisions across Poland in November 2025, it was hit with backlash from the office of Polish President Karol Nawrocki, a right-wing historian who led nationalist efforts to rewrite Poland’s Holocaust history. His Law and Justice party, which governed Poland from 2015 to 2023, promoted historical narratives about Polish victimhood and resistance to the Nazis while delegitimizing research on Polish antisemitism or Poles who killed Jews.
Dick Carlson, Tucker's dad, loved Israel.
— Joel Mowbray (@joelmowbray) February 23, 2026
I should know. I was with him in Israel for 10 straight days.
Every bus ride, every tour, every meal.
At Yad Vashem, I'll never forget what he said:
"Thank God the Jews have Israel."
Dick Carlson knew that Jews have faced unique… pic.twitter.com/UV0rHTm5GM
🚨 84 years ago today
— Jews Fight Back 🇺🇸🇮🇱 (@JewsFightBack) February 24, 2026
February 23, 1942
Nearly 800 Jews fleeing Hitler climbed aboard a rusting ship called the Struma.
It was a livestock vessel built in 1867. The engines barely ran. Overcrowded and breaking down.
But for Jews escaping the Holocaust, even a dying ship meant… pic.twitter.com/eOBdfGnLDI
Saudi Arabia, which was behind the greatest slaughter of Americans on 9/11, is leading a smear campaign against Amb. Huckabee, a former Christian pastor, in coordination with the lie spread by Qatarlson about Israel having a biblical basis to acquire the entire region — which…
— Mark R. Levin (@marklevinshow) February 22, 2026
According to a news report on Sunday, an investigation by the Democratic National Committee to discover what went wrong in the 2024 presidential election found that Kamala Harris lost because of her support for Israel and the Democratic Party policy on the Gaza war.
DNC Chairman Ken Martin ordered the investigation but said he would not publish the findings because it served no purpose.
The DNC “completed a comprehensive review of what happened in 2024,” he said in December. The organization was “putting its learnings into motion.”
“Here’s our North Star: Does this help us win?,” he added. “If the answer is no, it’s a distraction from the core mission.”
Representatives from the IMEU Policy Project, a Palestinian advocacy group, met with the DNC and told the DNC that the party lost the election because of Harris’ policy on Gaza. The DNC confirmed that its own findings matched that conclusion. IMEU accused the DNC of keeping the report secret because of its potentially explosive findings, which the DNC has denied.
Divisions over Israel policy within the Democratic Party have created tension between the far-left progressive flank of the party and the moderate Democratic wing. Harris tried to strike a balance between sympathy for the people of Gaza and support for Israel, but while she didn’t break with Biden on Israel, she took a harder stance. This may have cost her votes with swing voters and moderate Jewish Democrats who are pro-Israel. On the other hand, the progressive left that is virulently anti-Israel felt she didn’t go far enough, costing her votes with that demographic as well.
On her book tour for her memoir describing the events of her presidential campaign, Harris said that the Biden administration should have more forcefully criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and shown greater empathy for the people in Gaza.
In her book, 107 Days, Harris wrote that she believed her support for Gaza cost her votes. She said that she had urged Biden to show more sympathy for the people of Gaza and that his unpopularity, which she partly blamed on his stance on Israel, hurt her electoral prospects.
