Frum Girl running for New York State Senate!

An ultra-tan and, like, totally cool 22-year-old from Brooklyn is running for state Senate, landing on the usually stuffed-shirt political scene in an explosion of pink and bling — and sporting a Web site that’s more “Legally Blonde” than “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.”

“I’m Senator and I Know It,” newbie candidate Mindy Meyer’s Web site declares in tricked-out letters as an instrumental version of LMFAO’s “Sexy and I Know It” plays.

The clearly fun-loving, Orthodox Jewish law-school student cites Rudy Giuliani as her political idol and hails Reese Witherspoon’s character in the comic movie “Legally Blonde” for showing her that “you can take pink and make it sophisticated.”

n one photo on MindyMeyer4Senate.com, the cute candidate is superimposed over the dome of the US Capitol — not the Senate chamber she’s running for in Albany.

In another photo, she’s holding a bow and arrow as Katniss from the “Hunger Games,” alongside her position on poverty and unemployment: “No more ‘Hunger Games’ in our district!”

Meyer may be a political neophyte, but “I can tell you one thing, I have no experience in corruption,” says the Touro College alum, who majored in political science.

The site also claims: “A lifelong Flatbush resident, Mindy is the first young woman in the history of New York to run for New York State Senate.”

Meyer, who works for a Flatbush real-estate lawyer, said her Web site “was 100 percent my own. We need to get young people involved in politics. The Senate doesn’t have to be a senior citizens home.”

She said she “fell asleep” looking at other state senators’ Web sites. She called hers “substantive — the only difference is it’s actually exciting.”

Running as a Republican and Conservative, Meyer will face Democratic incumbent Kevin Parker.

Parker didn’t return calls from The Post but told the Web site City & State he’s taking her campaign seriously.

“Every challenge is a credible challenge,” he said. “This is the American democratic process, but I don’t know Ms. Meyer at all. She is rather young.”

But her candidacy is making Brooklyn’s Conservative Party chairman very happy.

“She’s a law-school student, she’s extremely intelligent, she is very focused on this race, and I’m excited to have a candidate who’s getting all this attention!” gushed Jerry Kassar.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/brooklyn/pink_can_gal_bold_sen_bid_mqhoZFFgQxFqtFGkiiFqtO#ixzz21ZaRWPkZ

'Batman shooter' worked at Jewish camp

James Holmes, who allegedly murdered 12 people in Colorado movie theater on Friday, worked at Jewish summer camp.

The alleged shooter who killed 12 in a crowded Colorado movie theater worked at a Jewish summer camp for underprivileged children.

James Holmes spent a summer working as a counselor for Camp Max Straus in Glendale, Calif., which is run by Jewish Big Brothers and Big Sisters of Los Angeles, the Los Angeles Times reported on Saturday.

Holmes, 24, is suspected of setting off a smoke bomb late Thursday night in a midnight screening in Aurora, Colo. of the new Batman film "The Dark Knight Rises" and then opening fire on the crowd, killing 12 and injuring dozens. He was arrested early Friday morning

In a statement to The Los Angeles Times, Randy Schwab, chief executive of Jewish Big Brothers Big Sisters of Los Angeles and director of Camp Max Straus, said of Holmes: "His role was to ensure that these children had a wonderful camp experience by helping them learn confidence, self-esteem and how to work in small teams to effect positive outcomes," he said. In a later e-mail, he added: "That summer provided the kids a wonderful camp experience without incident."

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu sent a letter to US President Obama on Saturday, expressing his condolences and those of the Israeli people to the families of the Americans who were murdered in the Aurora movie theater.                                                                                                   

"All Israelis stand alongside the American people in mourning over this terrible tragedy which claimed the lives of so many. We well understand the pain and loss that you are experiencing," Netanyahu wrote.

Monsey Pedophile, Shmul Dym withdrawing guilty plea!

A 21-year-old confessed pedophile from Monsey, New York wants to withdraw the guilty plea he entered, the Journal News reports.

Shmul Dym pleaded guilty in June to two felony counts of sexual conduct against a child and two misdemeanor counts of endangering the welfare of a child. He admitted in court to repeatedly touching the genitals of two young brothers, one 6-years-old and the other 8-years-old.

Rockland County prosecutors reportedly will oppose Dym’s bid to withdraw his guilty plea when the case returns to court Wednesday.

He could have been sentenced to as much as 14 years in state prison, but instead was offered a sentence consisting of no prison time and 10 years’ probation in what prosecutors said was an attempt on their part to save the young children from having to testify in court.

Dym would have also been compelled to register as a sex offender. His younger brother Betzalel is already registered as a Level sex offender after being convicted of repeatedly molesting a young boy six years ago.

Shmul Dym now wants to withdraw his plea and go to trial, his attorneys Kenneth Gribetz and Deborah Wolikow Loewenberg said.

The attorneys said that Dym has retained new counsel from Maryland

Gribetz was once the county’s district attorney. Loewenberg is a former prosecutor.

The two said they asked state Supreme Court Justice William A. Kelly on on July 17 to remove them from the case, but the judge refused to do so until Dym’snew attorney had actually notified the court that Dym had retained him.

Rockland County D.A. Thomas Zugibe noted that to have his guilty plea voided, Dym will have to show that it wasn’t made voluntarily.

He also reportedly said that he was confident his prosecutors would convict Dym if the case does go to trial.

The victims’ parents were harassed and pressured by some local rabbinical leaders to drop the charges against Dym, the D.A. said. Among the threats made was to ostracize the family from their religious community, he said.

“It would be a travesty to put the victims and their families through this emotional roller coaster, again. They were intimidated not to cooperate and they did cooperate. We’re going to vigorously oppose letting him withdraw his plea,” Zugibe reportedly said.

Lipa Schmeltzer sings for Rabbi Elyashiv's 98th birthday, Video

Lipa Schmeltzer sings for Rabbi Elyashiv on his 98th birthday.

Judge Noah Dear thrown off criminal court!

Judge Noach Dear has been booted from Brooklyn Criminal Court a month after his bizarre ruling barred police from ticketing public drinkers unless cops lab-tested their booze.

The ouster comes amid outrage over his June 14 decision, which dismissed a case against a Brooklyn man, Julio Figueroa, who admitted he was sipping a beer on the street.

The judge concluded that enforcement of laws on drinking in public is racially biased.

Dear, 59, a scandal-scarred ex-city councilman elected to the bench in 2007 and relegated to hearing low-level debt disputes in recent years, had volunteered to take criminal cases on the weekends in a bid to get promoted, courthouse insiders said.

“Somebody here messed up,” a court source said. “He never should have been given that assignment.”

The state acknowledged that Dear’s part-time gig was over.

“The judge was, in fact, volunteering on the weekends because of a resource shortage, but at this point his services are no longer needed,” said courts spokesman David Bookstaver.

Dear’s ruling nullified a long-accepted police practice — sniffing a suspect’s beverage — and meant police would be required to conduct a chemical analysis to make their cases stick.

Open-container summonses are a widely used policing tool, resulting in more than 12,000 arrests for other crimes in 2011, by one police supervisor’s estimate. Cops wrote 124,498 drinking tickets during the year.

“I’d say 10 to 15 percent of the time we issue a violation, we find they’re wanted for something else,” a NYPD source said.

Legal experts slammed Dear’s ruling for going well beyond the scope of a judge’s authority.

“He’s legislating from the bench,” said legal analyst Arthur Aidala. “He’s saying we’re not going to enforce the law even though people of color violate the law. That’s ludicrous.”

The ruling raised memories of how Dear got his gavel — in a backroom deal orchestrated by Brooklyn Democratic boss Vito Lopez.

Dear, who spent 18 years as a Democratic city councilman before being term-limited out in 2001, was dogged by scandals, many involving improper overseas junkets paid for by charities. When he ran for Congress in 1998, his staff allegedly forged signatures to duck campaign-donation laws.

In 2003, after two years as TLC commissioner, he tried to run again for City Council but was knocked off the ballot for accepting campaign financing from taxi companies.

Because he had nearly defeated Kevin Parker in a state Senate race in 2002, Lopez saw him as a threat to the party’s candidates.

So the boss backed him for judge — even though Dear was never a practicing lawyer and got a thumbs down from the Brooklyn Bar Association.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/testy_judge_sacked_after_beer_blunder_ZO7vrjarJD716CtPLYuZqL#ixzz21OBRwOW5

The "Holy" Vishnitzer Rebbe will boycott Siyum HaShass because Rabbi Lau the "Zionist" will speak!

Rabbi Lau Shlita went thru the seven gates of hell when he was only a child in concentration camp, and was invited by Agudah to address the Sium Hashas. The Vishnitzer Rebbi refuses to attend because Rabbi Lau is a Zionist! Well, listen to me Rabbi Hager, the "Zionists" gave him a country to escape the horrors of Europe, after his parents were brutally murdered by the Nazis! The Zionists also saved the Satmerer's Rebbi life! The Zionists also gave thousands of boys and girls the opportunity to learn our Holy Torah! Have some "hakoras hatoiv."

According to a Kikar Shabbat report, the Vishnitzer Rebbe from Monsey Shlita may boycott the main Siyum HaShas because “Zionist rabbis” are expected to address the tzibur. This apparently may also lead to other prominent rabbonim and admorim shlita to boycott the event.

Until this announcement, residents of Eretz Yisroel were envious of Jews in North America which was holding one major siyum for all as opposed to in Eretz Yisrael there are siyumim for Ashkenazim, Sephardim, litvish and dati leumi. The rebbe’s announcement however changes all of this.

Invited to address that forum is Tel Aviv Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau Shlita as well as Rosh Yeshivas HaMekubalim Ahavas Shalom HaRav HaGaon Yaakov Hillel Shlita.

The Vishnitzer Rebbe Monsey, told organizers earlier in the week he cannot attend since the “Zionist rabbis” will be attending in an official capacity.

Leaders of Agudas Yisrael in the United States are working to find a solution, and they are quoted anonymously by Kikar Shabbat as saying “we are taking about important admorim, rabbonim and mashpi’im, but on the other side of the coin, we must remain cognizant of the fact that 80% of those who will be participating in the siyum are identified with the Modern Orthodox world, and for them, dafka the addresses from these “Zionist rabbonim” as it were is what is drawing them to attend.

Anti-Semitic Public School Parents trying to oust Frum School Board!

The Jew Haters at the  Journal news printed the following article on the front page....
please write comments to the Journal News to set the record straight.
Also its time to register ALL our children in Public School and see what they will do then.
Here is the link:
Journal News
Critics of the East Ramapo Board of Education are asking the state education commissioner to remove Orthodox and Hasidic board members they say have spent millions of taxpayer dollars to support private religious schools while ignoring the growing needs of students in the public schools.
The New York-based public interest law firm Advocates for Justice, on behalf of 14 East Ramapo parents and community members, said it is calling for the removal of five board members and the appointment of a state monitor to oversee all spending and special-education placements at the district.
The nonprofit organization said it sent the state education commissioner a 52-page document Wednesday that accuses the East Ramapo school board of, among other things, improperly placing students with disabilities in private schools, conducting real estate transactions based on faulty appraisals, and buying religious textbooks to loan to religious schools.
The petition addresses school board President Daniel Schwartz, Vice President Yehuda Weissmandl, and members Moses Friedman, Moshe Hopstein and Eliyahu Solomon, and calls on the state education commissioner to bar them from holding future office.
The men are part of the seven-member board majority that often represents the interests of the Orthodox and Hasidic Jewish communities of the East Ramapo school district. These communities send their children to private schools within the public district and receive textbooks, transportation, special education and other services provided by the district, which account for millions in East Ramapo’s budget each year.
The petition “emerges from several years of problems and tensions” within the district, as public school parents have become increasingly concerned about the board’s financial decisions, including budget cuts that have eliminated hundreds of teachers and curtailed kindergarten programming, the group said in the statement.
“The East Ramapo school board has repeatedly snubbed the parents, students and teachers of the district. ... The board members have abused their authority and then thumbed their noses at the state, which gives them their authority,” said petitioner Steven White, a former school board candidate and frequent critic of the board whose son is a graduate of the district.


The petitioners’ major concerns include:

• The district’s noncompliance with rules governing placement of students with disabilities, which have resulted in the state withholding money this year.

• The board’s attempts to sell two former elementary schools to yeshivas that are leasing the buildings —- using what petitioners say were “fraudulent” appraisals that wouldn’t garner a fair price for the district. Following petitions by White and others, the state annulled the Hillcrest school sale and has stayed the Colton school deal while it conducts a review. The real estate dealings are the subject of an investigation by the state attorney general.

• Buying religious textbooks to loan to private religious schools using public funds.

Petitioners also find fault with the lack of “no trespassing” signs on school grounds that they say the board has ignored requests for despite repeated trespassing by strangers; and the replacement of the district’s attorney several years ago with a firm that costs at least double, according to the document.

Friedman said the board has acted “100 percent legally” and the petition would drive up the district’s legal fees and subsequently “hurt children” by taking money away from them.


“It bothers me that they get up there and they say that they’re there for the children and meanwhile, they’re the ones hurting the children,” Friedman said, referring to White and other vocal opponents of the school board who have filed complaints in the past.


In addition to White, petitioners include two parents, Hiram Rivera and Kim Foskew, who ran unsuccessfully for seats on the school board during the spring, and the president of the district’s Parent-Teacher Association Council, Rebecca Montesa.


Schwartz said the board intends to “vigorously and aggressively defend” itself and has approved hiring two law firms, in addition to using the district’s regular attorneys, to do so.
He dismissed the petition as an attempt by the former board candidates — White, Foskew and Rivera — to “usurp the electoral process,” and called the petition a “quest to deprive Orthodox Jews of their civil rights” by removing them from an office they have the right to hold.
White said Schwartz’s comments about the board election were baseless personal attacks that didn’t warrant a response.
The state Education Department declined to comment on the petition. Under state education law, the commissioner has the right to remove board members if “willful misconduct or neglect of duty” can be proved. School officers have the right to legal representation at a hearing before any decision is made.
Attorney Arthur Z. Schwartz, president of Advocates for Justice, said the group was seeking to oust the board members “not because they’re Jewish, but because they’ve so offended the trust that the public” puts in elected officials.
“I happen to be an observant Jew,” he said. “But I also ... believe that public money should not be used to further anyone’s religion and that’s a concept that’s firmly ingrained in our Constitution.”
Arthur Schwartz said the organization took on the East Ramapo case pro bono.
The group expects to follow the petition with a lawsuit that could focus on the alleged purchases of religious textbooks by the district with public money, he said. He added that a separate 2011 petition to remove board members is under review by the state.

Frum 12 Year Old Killed after "sand Tunnel" he built collapses! Video

The scene at the sand tunnel

A Frum boy suffered a fatal injury when a sand tunnel he was building at the beach collapsed.

The  12-year old Ezra Cornman was enjoying a day at Long Branch beach, New Jersey, with his mother and brother.

The tunnel, which measured about six feet long and was about two to three feet below the surface, completely submerged him.

A witness, Iris Tergola of Staten Island, told DelawareOnline.com what happened.

'We were sitting on the beach, looking at the ocean, and we saw someone jump with a shovel, who ran over to a little boy,' she said.

Ms Tergola said that lifeguard responded to the trapped boy immediately.

The boy was unconscious and had blood coming out of his nose after he was pulled from the sand.

A local policewoman, Officer Heather Valdes, gave him CPR until the rescue crew arrived.

'I didn't know if he was alive at that time or not,' said Ms Tergola.

The boy was taken to intensive care at Monmouth Medical Center.

Unfortunately, the accident provoked another incident, which resulted in further injury.

A fire truck responding to the emergency hit a 46-yer-old man who was carrying his four year-old daughter on the nearby paved promenade.

Richard Polasdas, from Lakewood, Colorado, was in Long Branch for a family reunion.

He had to throw his child to the ground, out of the way of the truck, and suffered a broken hip when he was struck.

The infant was treated for abrasions. 

NJ.com reports that the truck was travelling at low speed and had its flashing lights and sirens on when it struck Mr Polasdas.

View more videos at: http://nbcnewyork.com.

Rav Yosef Shalom Elyashiv niftar at age 102: BDE

Rabbi Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, the leading rabbi of the Ashkenazi haredi community, died Wednesday afternoon at Jerusalem's Shaarei Zedek Medical Center, aged 102. Elyashiv, one of the leading forces behind the formation of the haredi political parties, had suffered from congestive heart failure and been hospitalized several times in recent years.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu expressed great sorrow at Elyashiv's passing and said that the "nation of Israel has lost a great rabbi, an unmatched and sharp authority."

Rabbi Elyashiv had been in the cardiac intensive care unit of the Jesselson Heart Center under the supervision of cardiology branch head Prof. Dan Tzivoni and his personal physician.

The medical center’s entire 10th floor is dedicated to cardiac care, from diagnosis and treatment to prevention and rehabilitation. Thus the large foyer managed to accommodate the rabbi’s family members who came to pray for him, consult with the medical staff and “stand guard.” But police were needed to keep out curious onlookers and nonrelatives, who reached the main fourth-floor lobby.

Only months ago, Elyashiv – who lived in a modest Mea She’arim apartment – underwent the insertion of a supportive stent in his aorta because of a leak.

During previous hospitalizations, surgery to implant a ventricular support device to strengthen the pumping of his own heart was ruled out because of the patient’s age and condition.

Elyashiv, an only child, was born in Siauliai (Shavel in Yiddish), Lithuania, came to Mandatory Palestine in 1922 when he was 12 years old. He lost his wife, Sheina Chaya, (a daughter of the famed Rabbi Aryeh Levin) in 1994, as well as five of their 12 children; his surviving “children” are in their 70s and even older.

Elyashiv controlled the “Lithuanian” Degel Hatorah political party that, which together with the hassidic Agudat Yisrael party, make up the United Torah Judaism faction in the Knesset. Additionally, Elyashiv, as the leading figure in Lithuanian haredi Jewry, had huge influence over the outlook and stance of the community toward contemporary issues within Israeli society.

He was widely seen as having continued along the same conservative path that was laid out by Degel Hatorah founder Rabbi Elazar Shach, who split from Agudat Yisrael in the late 1980s.

Shach, who died in 2001 at age 103, came to lead the Lithuanian, or non-hassidic, haredi world and opposed haredi integration within Israeli society, such as service in the army and integration in the workforce.

Elyashiv, on the other hand, having less charisma and dynamism than Shach, had sought to preserve the established order and has opposed what some refer to as the “new haredim,” those from a small but growing community who serve in the IDF and have joined the mainstream labor force.

There are two leading haredi figures who may succeed Elyashiv as the spiritual and political leader of the Lithuanian community: Rabbi Aharon Leib Shteinman, who lives in Bnei Brak and heads the Ponovitz Yeshiva kollel; and Rabbi Shmuel Auerbach, who lives in Jerusalem, heads the Maalot Hatorah yeshiva and is the son of Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, who was the greatest haredi arbiter of Jewish law before his death in 1995.

Shach, in the years before he died, unofficially designated Elyashiv as his heir apparent, overlooking Shteinman, who is now 97.

Shteinman is seen as slightly more moderate than Elyashiv was, and has supported the Nahal Haredi army battalion set up to enable ultra-Orthodox Jews to serve in the IDF and preserve their lifestyle. He also does not oppose the increasing trend of haredim joining the army and the general workforce.

Auerbach, however, was closer to Elyashiv and more inclined to his conservative outlook, opposing the “new haredim” and seeking to preserve the old order. He is charismatic and has many devoted followers.

Need a "pilegesh" a concubine? Rabbi says its ok!

Jerusalem - The Chief Judge of the Jerusalem Rabbinical Court and a Sephardic Rabbi in Israel has ruled that the taking of a concubine is an act that in certain instances is permissible by halacha, the code of Jewish law.

Rabbi Eliyahu Abergel

Rabbi Eliyahu Abergel, a Talmudist who has published dozens of books and thousands of responsa on Jewish law, wrote in his recent publication Divrot Eliyahu (Eliyahu’s Words) that a man prevented from having children, whether because his wife refuses to procreate or because she is unable to, may take a concubine with whom to procreate, because his first wife is “preventing him from building a family and spreading his seed,” adding even that “the concubine may also live with the couple.”

According to some Jewish legal definitions, a concubine is a woman who does not receive a kesuba, or marriage contract, from her husband, emphasizing the difference in social and domestic status between the main wife and the concubine, considered a mistress.

he 64 year old Rabbi Abergel is by no means a fringe voice, holding the title of Chief Judge of the Jerusalem Rabbinical Court and heading the Tzuf Dvash rabbinical school in Jerusalem. Rabbi Abergel was also a previous contender for the title of Sephardi Chief Rabbi of Israel, a position that eventually went to Rabbi Shlomo Amar in 2003.

It is unclear if concubinage is practiced significantly in communities in Israel, or if it will increase based on the new ruling. However, Rabbi Abergel does relate that his ruling had practical implications for a head of a major Jewish institution, who was allowed to take a concubine after learning his first wife could not bear children.

Polygamy in its many forms has been a hotly contested subject of debate in centuries of Jewish law, most notably under the ban instituted by Gershom ben Judah’s synod of circa 1000 CE. The current ruling is specific to those whose childbearing attempts have been frustrated, and is additionally localized to Sephardi Jews, who have divergent legal customs from their Ashkenazi counterparts. Sephardi and Ashkenazi traditions are sufficiently different to necessitate a separate post of Chief Rabbi in Israel for each of the two traditions.