Smotrich’s 1st Day as Finance Minister: Revokes Taxes on Disposables implemented by Lieberman to hurt Chareidim

 

Newly sworn-in Finance Minister Betzalel Smotrich on Sunday instructed his staff to prepare for the cancellation of the taxes on disposable tableware and sweet drinks that were implemented by former minister Avigdor Lieberman.

Smotrich had already announced in the past, even before the elections, that he’ll revoke the taxes if he’s elected. “The taxes on disposables and sweet drinks will be canceled unequivocally, there’s no question about it at all,” Smotrich said last month in an interview on Radio 103FM.

Finance Committee chairman Moshe Gafni responded to the announcement by stating:
“I congratulate Finance Minister Betzalel Smotrich for his first decision in the ministry to cancel the ‘Lieberman Tax’ on disposable utensils and sweetened drinks, which was intended to harm the Chareidi sector. This was one of our commitments that we said we’ll implement immediately upon the establishment of the government.”

MK Uri Maklev commented on the decision: “These taxes did not come to help the public but only as a negative unprofessional decision intended to harm the public. We congratulate Finance Minister Smotrich for canceling this tax as we committed in the coalition agreement.”

“This action brings the new government’s policy to work for the citizens and not against them. Now, that the order is canceled, we will take action via educational means to preserve the environment and encourage the consumption of healthy drinks.”

Outgoing Environmental Protection Minister Tamar Zandberg (Meretz) responded to Smotrich’s decision by saying: “The new government is allowing petty politics to destroy the environment and health. Instead of moving us forward, this decision is setting us back light years.”

Islamist Terrorist Attacks Police in Times Square and They are Investigating the Motive? Crazy!

 

It's crazy and getting crazier!

Authorities in New York City are investigating whether a man who attacked three police officers at a New Year’s Eve celebration, striking two of them, was inspired by radical Islamic extremism, according to a law enforcement official familiar with the matter.

The attack happened a little after 10 p.m. about eight blocks from Times Square, just outside the high-security zone where revelers are screened for weapons. Two of the officers were struck before an officer shot the man in the shoulder. The two officers were hospitalized, one with a fractured skull and the other with a bad cut, and were expected to recover.

Religious Givat Shmuel Parents Form Separate Class After 8-Year-Old Pupil Revealed As Transgender

 

In a move which received the approval of leading Religious Zionist rabbis, parents in a Givat Shmuel school have moved their children into a separate class outside the school in protest over a transgender girl studying with them.

The story broke last September after teachers at the Moreshet Neria religious school in Givat Shmuel discovered that one of the students in the third grade class was actually female but identified as male. The teachers were extremely perplexed but also angry and insulted that they had not been informed of the situation by the principal. Some teachers considered resigning as they saw this as “the end of the religious school system” if such children can legally be accepted and take part in studies without their gender being revealed.

The school principal, under pressure from the National-Religious Educational Authority, asked the teachers to refer to the student as a male but teachers and parents were incensed at the strange request. Meanwhile the girl, still dressed as a boy with Tzitzis and Kippa, has suffered socially and has no friends in her class from either gender. Attempts to persuade her parents to transfer her to another school have also failed.

Currently the class is mixed-gender but from 4th grade the class will split into two separate classes for boys and girls, making the situation even more awkward for the boys who will learn with the girl.

In the wake of the publicity the issue received, parents who became aware of the situation started demonstrating against the school for keeping the girl in the class. The parents warned that they would take legal steps if “the girl does not come to school dressed according to the school’s directives.”

When the school refused to change its policy, the parents of boys in her class removed their children and set up a new class outside the school, attempting to raise funds for the class, psychological assistance for their children and their public fight against the local school.

In a campaign entitled “Our children, our education, our decision. Stopping the progressive coercion”, the parents argued that “the class is a test for the entire national religious system- tomorrow it could happen in your child’s school.”

Rabbi Yaakov Ariel and Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu offered support to the parents and visited their children. Rabbi Ariel, rabbi of Ramat Gan, said that this was a class where “Torah is studied and halacha is maintained properly as it should be in a religious school.” Rabbi Eliyahu praised the parents for their courage in preventing their children from “spiritual confusion” by mixing with a girl “born like any other girl but whose parents decided that if she dressed and acted like a boy, people would relate to her normally.” He said that this could sow confusion in the minds of the young children as to their gender and “they are forced to live a lie” in accepting the girl as a male. “We need to stop this madness,” Rabbi Eliyahu concluded.

 

Finally a Rabbi Comes Out Strongly against the ""light Rail Protestors" "A Massiv Chillul Hashem"

 

הרב הראשי לישראל ונשיא מועצת הרבנות הראשית, הראשון לציון הגאון רבי יצחק יוסף, יצא הערב (מוצ"ש), במהלך שיעורו השבועי בבית הכנסת 'היזדים' נגד ההפגנות המתקיימות ברחוב בר אילן בירושלים במחאה על סלילת הרכבת הקלה.

במהלך השיעור התבטא הראשון לציון: "זה גם טורח ציבור, אתה סוגר את כל רחוב בר אילן, פקקים, אדם רוצה להגיע לבית, להגיע לבית הדין,  הם מעכבים הכל".

הרב הראשי קרא לציבור: "צריך להימנע מהדברים האלו, הרב (מרן רבינו עובדיה יוסף זצוק"ל. י-כ) לא בעד הדברים האלו, זה גם גרם לחילול ה', מצלמים את זה בכל העולם. בשביל מה? חסר לנו את ההסתה שיש, צריך להוסיף עוד הסתה?".

The Chief Rabbi of Israel and President of the Chief Rabbinate Council,  the Gaon Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef, came out this evening (Motzei Shabbos Koidesh), during his weekly class at the 'Yazidim' Synagogue, against the demonstrations taking place on Bar Ilan Street in Jerusalem in protest of the construction of the light rail

During the class, the Rabbi said:

 "It's also a public nuisance, you close the entire Bar Ilan street, causing traffic jams, a person wants to get to the house, to get to the court, they delay everything."

The chief rabbi called out to the public: 

"These things should be avoided, the rabbi (Maran Rabbino Ovadia Yosef Zatzuk'l. 10-20) was not in favor of these things, it also caused a chillul Hashem, this was  filmed all over the world. for what? We have a lack of incitements? we have to add more incitement?

Sefer Torah Falls Down on Shabbos in Ponovitz

 

This Shabbos, as they were taking out a Sefer Torah to lein  in the Ponovitz Beis Medrish "ohel kedoishim" another Sefer fell down to the floor. This in front of all who were there. 

Rabbanim of Bnei-Brak are questioning whether the ones who witnessed this will have fast a seperate fast or will it be ok to combine this fast with Asara Be'Teves that is coming up on Tuesday. 

A searing analysis of leftist censorship exposes the progressive mob's cynical drive to silence YOU and wage war on The West

A group of Yale students scream and curse at Yale sociologist Nicholas Christakis (right in blue) for what seems like an eternity, preventing him from addressing them. 'Be quiet,' shrieks one, 'you are disgusting!' 

This piece is adapted from Heather Mac Donald's remarks at the 2022 Encounter Books Gala, upon receiving the Jeane Kirkpatrick Prize for Academic Freedom. A longer version appeared on EncounterBooks.com

In 1982, student agitators protesting U.S. policy in Central America silenced Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick at the University of California, Berkeley, and at the University of Minnesota. Smith College told her that it could not assure her safety during a commencement address, so that address was cancelled too.

Business as usual, you may be thinking.

In fact, the reaction of campus administrators, and even of students themselves, to these shutdowns seems to come from a different world.

The chancellor of the University of California announced his embarrassment that his university had 'succumbed to mob rule.' That university's Board of Regents demanded that an apology be sent to Kirkpatrick. Even the group that organized the Berkeley protest, Students Against Intervention in El Salvador, admitted that the heckling had gone too far.

The group had no intent, it said, to curtail the speech of 'those who disagree with us.'

As anti-military protests spread across the country, the American Association of University Professors, the United States Student Association, and other academic bodies denounced the use of the 'hecklers' veto' and asked faculty and students 'to reaffirm our traditional commitment to freedom to speak and to listen.'

Fast forward to 2015.

A group of Yale students scream and curse at Yale sociologist Nicholas Christakis for what seems like an eternity, preventing him from addressing them. 'Be quiet,' shrieks one, 'you are disgusting!'

Christakis had defended his wife, another Yale professor, who had suggested that students could choose their own Halloween costumes without bureaucratic oversight.

'It's not a debate!' screamed another Yale student. Merely invoking free speech, said a third, creates a 'space to allow for violence to happen on this campus.'

Yale's President Peter Salovey rushed to express his sympathy–not with the beleaguered Christakis–but with his tormentors and their allies: 'their concerns and cries for help made clear that some students find life on our campus profoundly difficult.'

As if this were not nauseating enough, Salovey thanked Yale's students for offering him the opportunity to 'listen to and learn from you.'

This episode proved a template.

In 2016, students at Atlanta's Emory University demanded protection from a few Trump 2016 slogans that had been chalked on campus sidewalks. Trump's name exacerbated the 'unsafety of minority students,' they said.

The chalkers (writing above) would be tracked down and potentially subjected to the 'conduct violation process,' and Emory would implement yet more diversity bureaucracy to protect students from 'harmful speech.'

Emory's president validated what he called the students' 'pain in the face of this perceived intimidation.' The chalkers would be tracked down and potentially subjected to the 'conduct violation process,' and Emory would implement yet more diversity bureaucracy to protect students from 'harmful speech.'

Ukraine Refuses to Support Israel on the UN Resolution and instead Just Skips Out!

 

Zelensky is not a friend of the Jews and certainly not of Israel. The Ukrainians are notoriously known as being the worst antisemites; Nazis used the Ukrainians to torture the Jews. 

Time to tell Zelensky to go to hell! Israel has to to what's best for her own interests and it's best not to piss off Putin at this juncture. 

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky prior to the country’s decision Friday to skip the UN General Assembly vote to have the International Court of Justice weigh in on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Netanyahu’s office said Saturday.

According to a tweet by Zelensky, the two “discussed bilateral cooperation between our states, including in the security sphere and interaction on international platforms.”

Axios and Walla reporter Barak Ravid said he was told by Israeli and Ukrainian officials that Netanyahu had asked Zelensky to vote against the measure.

Ravid said Zelensky had wanted to know how Netanyahu intended to change Israel’s policy on providing his country with defensive aid to intercept Russian strikes using drones and missiles, but that Netanyahu would not commit to any steps.

This irked Zelensky, who decided not to vote against the resolution, but to miss the vote “in order to give a chance to the relationship with Netanyahu,” Ravid cited a Kyiv official as saying,

The measure ended up passing by a vote of 87 in favor, 26 against, with 53 abstentions. Israel knew in advance that it would pass in the Assembly, which is regularly able to muster votes for resolutions critical of the Jewish state, but Kan news said Foreign Ministry officials viewed the vote as something of an achievement for Israel, as the number of votes in favor had fallen since an initial committee ballot on the matter in November.

TV icon Barbara Walters dies at 93

 

Television news broadcaster and longtime ABC News anchor and correspondent Barbara Walters died on Friday at the age of 93.

Walters joined ABC News in 1976, and was the first female anchor on an evening news program.

“Barbara was a true legend, a pioneer not just for women in journalism but for journalism itself." Bob Iger, the CEO of The Walt Disney Company the parent company of ABC News wrote. "She was a one-of-a-kind reporter who landed many of the most important interviews of our time, from heads of state to the biggest celebrities and sports icons. I had the pleasure of calling Barbara a colleague for more than three decades, but more importantly, I was able to call her a dear friend. She will be missed by all of us at The Walt Disney Company, and we send our deepest condolences to her daughter, Jacqueline.”

During 50 years of her TV career, Walters won 12 Emmy awards.

Walters made her final appearance as a co-host of "The View" in 2014 on ABC News and she remained an executive producer of the show and did some interviews and specials for ABC News.

According to ABC News, Walters said then: "I do not want to appear on another program or climb another mountain. I want instead to sit on a sunny field and admire the very gifted women -- and OK, some men too -- who will be taking my place."

One of Walter's famous interviews was a first joint interview with Egypt's leader Sadat and Israel's Prime Minister Menachem Begin.

In Shabbat vote, General Assembly votes to have The Hague issue decision on 'occupation' of Judea and Samaria.

 

The United Nations General Assembly on Friday approved a resolution calling on the International Court of Justice in The Hague to give an opinion regarding the legal consequences of the Israeli "occupation" of the territories of Judea and Samaria that were liberated from Jordan in the Six Day War in 1967.

The resolution was passed by a majority of 87 to 26, with all the Arab countries that have diplomatic relations with Israel supporting the measure, as well as Russia and China.

The resolution prejudged the status of the Jewish presence in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, stating that Israel's presence in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria is illegal and asks the Court to recommend the steps that the UN and countries around the world should take against Israel which, according to the proposal, constitutes "annexation" of the territories.

Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations Gilad Erdan said ahead of Friday’s vote, "The outrageous resolution calling for the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice is a moral stain on the UN and every country that supports it. No international body can decide that the Jewish people are ‘occupiers’ in their own homeland. Any decision from a judicial body which receives its mandate from the morally bankrupt and politicized UN is completely illegitimate.”

 Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations Gilad Erdan said ahead of Friday’s vote, "The outrageous resolution calling for the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice is a moral stain on the UN and every country that supports it. No international body can decide that the Jewish people are ‘occupiers’ in their own homeland. Any decision from a judicial body which receives its mandate from the morally bankrupt and politicized UN is completely illegitimate.” “The Palestinians have rejected every peace initiative, while supporting and inciting terror. Instead of pushing the Palestinians to change, the UN is doing the opposite: helping them to harm the only vibrant democracy in the Middle East which recently signed 4 peace agreements with Arab countries. We will not take part in this disgraceful show of lies," he added.

Ambassador Erdan continued, "The decision to hold a vote that deals with Israel on Shabbat is another example of the moral decay of the UN, which prevents Israel's position from being heard in a vote whose results are predetermined."

In light of the voting time taking place on Shabbat, Ambassador Erdan announced that he would not speak at the meeting and that the United States Mission to the UN would vote against the proposed resolution on behalf of the State of Israel.

The office of Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas said following the vote: "This vote is a testament to the support of the entire world for our people and their indisputable historical rights. President Mahmoud Abbas thanks all the countries that stood by the Palestinian and their rights, and all the parties that worked to bring about this decision."

Beutiful Aron Koidesh of Forest Hills Jewish Center Is Yours if You can get it Out of the Building

 

They don’t want it to become a lost ark.

The Forest Hills Jewish Center is searching for a new home for its monumental Aron Koidesh — that holds its Torah scrolls — as it prepares to move to smaller quarters.

The gold leaf, bronze, and plaster Aron stands 32 feet tall and 19 feet wide.

“Finding a place or building with a 32-foot ceiling to accommodate the ark isn’t likely to happen,” said Deborah Gregor, the Jewish center’s executive director.

The Aron Koidesh.  sits at the front of the synagogue’s sanctuary and holds the sacred scrolls behind bronze doors.

Designed in 1949 by Polish-born artist Arthur Szyk, the ark is decorated in a Baroque style with symbols of the Jewish faith, including the tablets with the Esares HaDibrois , a shofar, a candlestick, and a challah.

Alanna Cooper, chair of Jewish studies at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, said the design was in contrast to the more typically mid-century minimalistic style.

“It was very innovative and bold,” said Cooper, who wrote about the Aron Koidesh for the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “Szyk kind of bucked the trend and just said ‘I’m doing my own thing.'”