U.S.-Led Air Strikes Kill 32 Civilians In Syria, and the entire world is silent!

Why is it, that the US can kill civilians with impunity, and the entire world watches and doesn't say one word? Where is CNN? CNBC? ABC? CBS? Reuters? AP?
Only Israel that was so careful not to kill civilians gets chastised by the UN!
Bunch of hypocrites!

Thick smoke from an airstrike by the US-led coalition rises in Kobani, Syria, as seen from a hilltop on the outskirts of Suruc, at the Turkey-Syria border, Wednesday, Oct. 22, 2014. (AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis)

read the following from the AP bastards!

U.S.-led coalition airstrikes on Syria have killed more than 500 people, mainly Islamic militants, since they began last month, activists said Thursday, as fighting flared in the northern Syrian border town of Kobani.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of activists on the ground, said 553 people have been killed since the airstrikes began on Sept. 23, including 32 civilians. The civilians included six children and five women.

The group said it has documented the deaths of 464 fighters with the Islamic State group, adding that the real number could be much higher. Another 57 fighters with the al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front were killed in airstrikes on the northern province of Aleppo and Idlib, the Observatory said.

Many of the Islamic State fighters have been killed in or near Kobani, the target of a massive jihadi offensive since mid-September. IS fighters have captured dozens of surrounding Kurdish villages and forced more than 200,000 people to flee for safety in neighboring Turkey.

Earlier this week, The U.S. Central Command said its forces have conducted more than 135 airstrikes against Islamic State militants in and around Kobani, killing hundreds of fighters.

“Combined with continued resistance to ISIL on the ground, indications are that these strikes have slowed ISIL advances into the city, killed hundreds of their fighters and destroyed or damaged scores of pieces of ISIL combat equipment and fighting positions,” Central Command said in a statement.

An Associated Press journalist on the Turkish side of the border said heavy machine gun fire could be heard from Kobani, which is also known as Ayn Arab, on Thursday.

“The fighting has been ongoing since last night on the eastern and southern fronts. It is some of the longest clashes in Kobani,” said Kurdish activist Farhad Shami by telephone from the town. “The fighting usually only takes place at night.”

Shami said the Islamic State group launched an attack from three fronts late Wednesday but failed to advance. Still he said that Kurdish fighters withdrew from the Tel Shair hill that overlooks parts of Kobani.

The Observatory said Islamic State fighters captured the hill, closing in on the town from the west. It said Islamic State fighters are also trying to advance from the eastern side of the town, saying there were casualties on both sides.

The hill was captured by the Kurds from Islamic state fighters earlier this month.

Idris Nassan, deputy minister for foreign affairs in a Kurdish civil administration controlling Kobani, said that although Islamic State fighters moved onto Tel Shair hill, the heavy fighting there was ongoing.

“Kobani has been witnessing fierce clashes since last night. It was one of the bad nights,” Nassan said.

The Observatory meanwhile reported four coalition airstrikes on oil wells in the Jafra field in the eastern Syrian province of Deir el-Zour late Wednesday. The Local Coordination Committees, an activist group, also reported the airstrikes in areas held by the Islamic State group.

The U.S.-led coalition has aggressively targeted IS-held oil facilities in Syria, which provide a key source of income for the militants. But such strikes also endanger civilians, which could undermine long-term efforts to destroy the militant group.

The attacks on the oil industry, including refineries, have also led to a sharp rise in the price of oil products in rebel-held areas of Syria.

Grandfather Of Murdered Baby Says Child Born To Parents After Years Of Waiting

3 month old infant Chaya Zisel Braun who was killed in an apparent terrorist attack on Oct. 22, 2014

The grandfather of an infant who died after a car rammed into civilians near a light rail station in Jerusalem addressed reporters outside of the hospital on Wednesday night, saying that the baby girl was born three months ago after her parents had tried for years to have a baby to no avail.

“They had just returned from the kotel (Western Wall). It was the first time in her life that the girl was at the site. She looked at the kotel, they took pictures, they [her parents] held her up to face the Temple Mount, and they told her this is the holy place, this is the temple mount,” Shimshon Halpern said.

He linked the killing to “the Arabs’ merciless hatred of thousands of years”, saying that they killed “a pure girl with a holy soul that never did anything bad to anyone in her life and was murdered for no reason.”

He said that Chaya and her parents were on the sidewalk when the car sped up and hit the baby stroller, sending the infant flying 10-20 meters in the air and landing head first on the pavement, causing her massive cranial bleeding.

IDF Finally Admits: Hamas Planned Terror-Tunnel Massacre

Attack, potentially timed for Rosh Hashana, would have involved 200 heavily-armed terrorists and been on an unprecedented scale.

The IDF has confirmed rumors, circulating since last summer's war with Gaza terrorists, that Hamas was planning a massive attack on Israeli communities by hundreds of terrorists who would infiltrate into Israel via the vast network of "terror-tunnels" dug from Gaza into Israeli territory.

n an exclusive Vanity Fair report, IDF spokesperson Lt. Colonel Peter Lerner finally revealed that in destroying the tunnel Israel may have prevented a coordinated massacre of its civilians on an unprecedented scale.

"Hamas had a plan," he said. "A simultaneous, coordinated, surprise attack within Israel. They planned to send 200 terrorists armed to the teeth toward civilian populations. This was going to be a coordinated attack.

"The concept of operations involved 14 offensive tunnels into Israel. With at least 10 men in each tunnel, they would infiltrate and inflict mass casualties."

An unnamed senior military intelligence figure elaborated further on how the attack was meant to pan-out: "First, get in and massacre people in a village. Pull off something they could show on television. Second, the ability to kidnap soldiers and civilians using the tunnels would give them a great bargaining chip."

Information about the plan was pieced together by an intensive Israeli intelligence operation, including "electronic intercepts, informants, interrogations of Hamas operatives, as well as computers and satellite imagery obtained from Hamas compounds during the war," according to the report.

Among the evidence, Lerner said high-resolution maps pinpointing potential sites in Israel, including civilian areas, were seized by soldiers.

Hamas's political leader Khaled Mashaal admitted to Vanity Fair that the tunnels were seen as a way of gaining the upper hand over Israel, which had effectively minimized the threat posed by rocket-fire via the Iron Dome missile defense system.

"In light of the balance of power which shifted towards Israel, we had to be creative in finding innovative ways. The tunnels were one of our innovations. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention," he said.

According to the Israeli Security Agency (Shin Bet), Hamas began building "crude" tunnels under Gaza as early as 2000. But the breakthrough came with the kidnap of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, and the subsequent one-sided prisoner-exchange deal with Israel in which 1,027 terrorists were released.

"This was a proof of concept for them. Tunnels work," said a top Israeli military official.

After that, Hamas created "a secret commando unit", dubbed Nukhba (the “selected ones”), to train terrorists "to fight and maneuver through the tunnels on foot and on small motorcycles."

"They were an elite force... [trained] to execute strategic terrorist attacks... [For the eventual operation, they would be] heavily armed: R.P.G.s, Kalashnikovs, M-16s, hand grenades, and night-vision equipment," a senior Shin Bet official said. Terrorists also possessed IDF uniforms in order to launch surprise attacks.

Regarding rumors that the planned massacre was meant to be timed for Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, a top intelligence official admitted it was a possibility - but that Hamas had changed its plans after the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teens in June sparked an escalation in hostilities with Israel.

"It may have been, but ultimately everything was moved up. Hamas’s grand plan for the tunnels failed because the kidnapping set things in motion before Hamas had everything ready."

After initially denying (but praising) the abduction and murder of Naftali Frenkel, Eyal Yifrah and Gilad Sha'ar, Hamas eventually took responsibility for the attack. However while that "operation" was ordered by senior Hamas leader Salah Al-Arouri, it was evidently not coordinated with the group's military command in Gaza.

Khaled Mashaal admitted as much in the interview, explaining that individual terrorist cells in Judea and Samaria are given a significant degree of autonomy in the kinds of attacks they carry out.

"It turned out that a Hamas field group in the West Bank had killed those three settlers. This was a legitimate operation . . . [but] we never gave orders to execute this operation, or to stop that one. We present general policies."

But even after the tunnel threat has been neutralized in the south (at least for now), the IDF has immediately turned its attention northwards.

As recent Arutz Sheva reports have noted, the IDF is seriously concerned that Hezbollah - which is known to possess an extensive network of tunnels inside Lebanon - is digging its own "terror tunnels" into Israel to carry out attacks against communities and military outposts along the northern border.

Despite trying to play down the threat, the army is actively working to scour the region for signs of such tunnels by Hezbollah - signs which some residents say couldn't be obvious, with some reporting clearly hearing the sounds of heavy digging equipment from the ground beneath their own homes.

Syrian rebels have also been learning from Hamas's success, using tunnels with increasing frequency to target static Syrian regime positions - and to at least some extent they were aided in their efforts by Hamas operatives.

As one rebel commander put it: "They said they had some success in Palestine, so I decided to try it."

Frum Yiddin Cause Huge Chillul Hashem on Delta Airline Flight to Israel, Refusing to sit with Women, Causing 75 Minute Delay

"ZU Torah" ....the frummies are crazy and getting crazier, they don't care if flights get delayed, they don't care if people will get delayed getting to their destinations, they don''t care!

They don't care that the Ribono Shel Oloim's Name is getting desecrated! 

And they won't charter their own planes!

The Delta flight was over an hour late because Charedi men and women preferred to disembark rather than take their assigned seats.

A Delta Airlines flight from New York to Tel Aviv was delayed Monday night after frum men and women refused to take their seats next to members of the opposite sex. Instead, the Charedi passengers decided to get off the plane, rather than take their assigned seats for the flight to Israel. Their baggage then had to be located and removed from the baggage compartment, causing the 75 minute delay!

The Sick Logic of Wealthy Jewish Met Opera Donors

Leon Klinghoffer

by Mark Langfan

On October 20, 2014, I finished a short three-minute speech to about 1,500 Jews in front of the New York City Metropolitan Opera House on the occasion of the opening of the snuff Palestinian terrorist opera, “The Death of Klinghoffer.”  As I was getting off the podium, a rabbi, who shall remain nameless, said to me, “You really shouldn't have attacked the Jews here."  I nodded politely, and went my way.  However, to that rabbi, I can now respond, "I didn't attack rich American Jewish Metropolitan Opera donors severely enough."  

Here is why.

One of the things I said in my speech was that if there were 100 rich black Metropolitan Opera donors, and the Metropolitan Opera put on an opera ‘explaining’ the ‘perspective of a white lynch mob’ lynching a black man, the day that the black lynching Opera opened, there would be zero rich black Metropolitan Opera donors.  But, today, with this evil opera glorifying the terroristic Palestinian murder of an American Jew, there are still many, many rich American Jewish Metropolitan Opera donors who are still going to donate millions upon millions to the Metropolitan Opera. 

And, that, I said to the crowd, is “sickness.”

I can hear those donors saying:, “There are two sides to every story.  And, since there are two sides, you have to hear what the other side has to say.  Even if it means turning the other side’s ‘story’ into ‘Art.’”

Let's assume, arguendo, that there may be ‘two sides’ to the argument of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

  But, are there really two sides to the argument that because there exists an Arab-Israeli conflict, the murder of an unarmed American Jew in a wheelchair on a cruise in the Mediterranean Sea by a bunch of armed Palestinian murderous terrorists can be justified?

Because, saying there are two sides to the story means is that an argument can be made for one side and an argument can be made for the other side.

What these wealthy American Jewish Metropolitan Opera donors are, in fact, really saying when they say that “there are two sides to the conflict” to rationalize their continued donations of millions and millions of dollars to the Met Opera despite the Met’s showing of the Palestinian terrorist glorification opera, is that an argument can be made for the cold-blooded terrorist murder of an American Jew in a wheelchair by a Palestinian terrorist. Why? Because there exists an Arab-Israeli conflict, and because the Palestinians are, therefore, somehow ‘aggrieved.’

These American Jewish Metropolitan Opera donors have just legitimized the murder of any, and all, American Jews, in, and out of, wheelchairs specifically, because there exists an Arab-Israeli conflict.

Why not?  If there is an argument for murdering Leon Kinghoffer because there is an Arab-Israeli conflict, then there’s an argument for murdering any American Jew because there is an Arab-Israeli conflict. 

These same wealthy American Jewish Metropolitan Opera donors have also legitimized the murder of any non-Jewish Americans who get in the way of a Palestinian terrorist trying to murder an American Jew - because there exists an Arab-Israeli conflict. 

And if these wealthy American Jewish Metropolitan Opera donors think that there is an argument for the murder of American Jews because there exists an Arab-Israeli conflict, then can you imagine the argument that now exists for the terrorist murder of Israeli Jews because there is a Arab-Israeli conflict.  After all, if a Palestinian terrorist can murder American Jews because the Arab-Israeli conflict exists, why can't he be understood for the murder of Israeli Jews simply because an Arab-Israeli conflict exists?

The  American Jewish Metropolitan Opera donors have legitimized the murder of all Jews everywhere simply because there exists an Arab-Israeli conflict.  Sick, indeed.

USA Air-drops weapons for ISIS by mistake???

In a new video, ISIS shows American-made weapons it says were intended for the Kurds but actually were air dropped into territory they control.

At least one bundle of U.S. weapons airdropped in Syria appears to have fallen into the hands of ISIS, a dangerous misfire in the American mission to speed aid to Kurdish forces making their stand in Kobani.

An ISIS-associated YouTube account posted a new video online Tuesday entitled, “Weapons and munitions dropped by American planes and landed in the areas controlled by the Islamic State in Kobani.” The video was also posted on the Twitter account of “a3maq news,” which acts as an unofficial media arm of ISIS. The outfit has previously posted videos of ISIS fighters firing American made Howitzer cannons and seizing marijuana fields in Syria.

ISIS had broadly advertised its acquisition of a broad range of U.S.-made weaponsduring its rampage across Iraq. ISIS videos have showed its fighters driving U.S. tanks, MRAPs, Humvees. There are unconfirmed reports ISIS has stolen three fighter planes from Iraqi bases it conquered.

The authenticity of this latest video could not be independently confirmed, but the ISIS fighters in the video are in possession of a rich bounty of American hand grenades, rounds for small rockets, and other supplies that they will surely turn around and use on the Kurdish forces they are fighting in and around the Turkish border city.

On Monday, White House Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes said the U.S. government was confident that the emergency airdropped supplies for the Kurdish forces near Kobani were falling into the right hands.

“We feel very confident that, when we air drop support as we did into Kobani… we’ve been able to hit the target in terms of reaching the people we want to reach,” Rhodes told CNN. “What I can assure people is that, when we are delivering aid now, we focus it on the people we want to receive that assistance. Those are civilians in need. Those are forces that we’re aligned with in the fight against ISIL [the government’s preferred acronym for ISIS], and we take precautions to make sure that it’s not falling into the wrong hands.”

Rhodes was responding to questions about a Monday report in The Daily Beast that U.S. humanitarian aid was flowing into ISIS controlled areas near Kobani by truck. That aid was mostly food and medical supplies, not the kind of lethal weapons in the new ISIS video.

Chief Rabbinate declares validity of conversions by "Voyeurer Rebbe"

Voyeuer Rebbe heading to the Mikvah with his Rebbeshe shirt

B"H "Geloibt ze-Gut" thank G-d for that, otherwise we would have massive problems... Many Rabbonim are found to be frauds years later, so are we going to invalidate their prior conversions? "Ein L'dovor Soif" this would be a catastrophe C"V..

The Chief Rabbinate declared that any converts who converted under the auspices of US Orthodox Rabbi Barry Freundel, who was arrested earlier this week and charged with voyeurism, remain entirely valid.

The decision comes following a report on Monday that the rabbinate was reviewing the status of such converts because of the revelations about Freundel, but this has now been denied.

The rabbi is accused of clandestinely filming women showering in the synagogue’s mikveh.

According to the allegations, Freundel spied on women in the mikvah at least since 2012, according to documents filed in Washington Superior Court. He allegedly hid a camera in a clock radio and installed it in the shower area of the mikvah.

Freunel denies the charges and has pleaded not guilty.

Under certain conditions in Jewish law, if a rabbi on a conversion court is deemed to be unobservant of Jewish law then his conversions might be invalid.

But on Tuesday, the Chief Rabbinate said categorically that there was no question over Freundel's converts.

"After thoroughly reviewing the various aspects of Jewish law on the issue, the Chief Rabbinate of Israel now announces that past conversions of Rabbi Freundel will not be affected by recent events," said the chief rabbinate's spokesman Ziv Maor.

Maor emphasised that "anyone who goes to a local rabbinate in Israel with a conversion certificate signed by Freundel is not expected to face any special problems whatsoever."

It was Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef who took the decision.

Maor noted however that any conversions conducted by Freundel in the future would not be acknowledged by the chief rabbinate.

On Monday, the Rabbinical Council of America, the largest modern Orthodox rabbinical association in the US of which Freundel was a member and a member of its executive committee, ruled that his conversions were valid and that converts who converted with him "remain Jewish in all respects."

Rabbi Seth Farber, director of the ITIM religious services advisory and lobbying group, welcomed the decision having previously held concerns that the chief rabbinate would not follow the RCA's lead.

"I am gratified that the chief rabbinate has learned from its past mistakes and has reassured those who converted that their status is assured," said Farber. "I hope that the rabbinate will use this as an opportunity to review other conversions which they have in the recent past dismissed."

JTA contributed to this repor

Hiker describes how Frum girl IAF Pilot died in Blizzard in Nepal

Tamar Ariel A"H

An Israeli backpacker that survived a snowstorm on the Annapurna Circuit in Nepal almost a week ago recalls the loss of three Israeli hikers and their fight to survive.

Eitan Idan was one of the Israeli survivors of the storm, which took the lives of Nadav Shoham, Tamar Ariel, Agam Luria and Michal Cherkasky, reports the Times of Israel (http://bit.ly/1oq2B61 ).

Idan said Ariel, 25, and the first female Orthodox combat navigator in the Israeli Air Force, was exhausted by helping other hikers and reached the point where she could not walk. Shoham helped Ariel by picking her up as she fell over and over again into the snow.

“I remember that Nadav didn’t stop; he kept on catching her. She fell, and he caught her, and she fell, and I’m helping him from the front, and you reach a point where you closely follow the person clearing the snow from the path so as not to waste your own strength clearing it,” said Idan.

The group of Israeli hikers were following a French group of backpackers who had a GPS unit, however, because of Ariel’s exhaustion, they were not able to keep up with them and soon lost site of the group.

Idan said he made the decision to leave Ariel because he knew they wouldn’t be able to continue with her. In that moment, Idan said, “it was clear to me that if we stay, we die.”

He recalled Ariel’s strength in trying to keep moving forward even through severe exhaustion.

“The whole time it was difficult for her, and she fought and even pressed on,” he said, “far more than any other person would have continued, which revealed her strength.”

Idan and another hiker, Shani, made it through the night, but Shoham had frozen to death overnight.

Approximately 40 people hikers, including those from Canada, India, Israel, Slovakia, Poland and Japan, died in the blizzards in the Himalayas last week. Nepalese officials rescued 407 people total, 226 of them foreigners.

Information taken from Times of Israel

Chareidim riot in Yerushalyim like the Shvartzes in Ferguson

"Women of the Wall" campaign posters encouraging girls to celebrate their bat mitzvah with "WOW" seen being posted on public transportation buses in Jerusalem. October 12, 2014.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think they should put these ads on buses that pass thru Chareidie neighborhoods, but to riot? And damage properties? What are these guys teaching their children?

 Dozens of ultra-Orthodox Jews hurled stones and slashed the tires of buses bearing ads promoting female worship at a key Jerusalem holy site, Israeli police said Tuesday.

The attack, which happened on Monday night in Jerusalem’s ultra-Orthodox Mea Shearim neighborhood, underscores the still simmering tensions in Israel over religious extremists who want to separate the sexes in public spaces.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said police units were dispatched to quell the violence in Mea Shearim where about 50 men slashed tires and pelted the buses with stones.

The ads were posted by the group Women of the Wall, 

which seeks to achieve gender equality at the Western Wall, the holiest place where Jews can pray. The advertisements showed girls and women wearing prayer shawls and holding a Torah scroll - rituals seen by many Orthodox Jews as reserved for men only.

Video footage on the YNet news site showed the words “end the obscene pictures” spray-painted on a bus.

The ads aimed to promote Bat Mitzvah ceremonies for girls at the Western Wall. The coming-of-age ceremonies for girls are only allowed to be held at a nearby prayer site, designated for worshippers who don’t follow the Orthodox tradition adhered to at the main area of the Western Wall.

For boys, Bar Mitzvah ceremonies are held at the main Wall area. The Women of the Wall does not consider the nearby area an appropriate worship site.

“This is only about gender roles and discrimination against women and the image of women,” said Shira Pruce, a spokeswoman for Women of the Wall. “If those were boys in the ads, this would not be a news story.”

Many ultra-Orthodox oppose the Women of the Wall’s struggle for rights to equal worship at the Western Wall and view the group as provocative. The women have endured arrest, heckling and legal battles in their struggle to worship at the Wall as men do.

The extremists have faced criticism in recent years from Israel’s predominantly secular society, which has complained about attempts to ban mixing of the sexes on buses, sidewalks and other public spaces. Ultra-Orthodox have defaced posters and billboards bearing photos of women, which they consider immodest.

A court last year decided that the women should be permitted to pray as they choose but the Women of the Wall says it is still prevented from worshipping with a Torah scroll at the Wall.

About half of the Women of the Wall ads, which have run on dozens of buses since the campaign began on Oct. 12, have been vandalized, Pruce said, citing the company that handles the advertisements. The ad campaign was the group’s first and it had no role in deciding what routes the ads would run, Pruce said.

The religious practice at the Western Wall follows Orthodox traditions, meaning wearing skullcaps and prayer shawls and reading from Torah scrolls is reserved exclusively for men.

By contrast, the more liberal Reform and Conservative streams of Judaism, the largest denominations in the United States which are marginal in Israel, allow women to wear prayer shawls, be ordained as rabbis, lead services and read from the Torah.

Will Tzippy Livni leave the Coalition? Netanyahu opposes her "Conversion" Bill that would allow Reform Rabbis to Convert Geirim!

Tzippy "the bitch" Livni, never met an Arab that she didn't love. It's high time for her to leave the coalition and crawl  back to the  Gaza tunnels!

She is the architect for calling for the uprooting of communities in Judea and Samaria.

Tzippi with Abbas

Now, let's see if she actually does what she threatened! 

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has announced that he opposes the Conversion Bill sponsored by Justice Minister Tzipi Livni and her Hatnua party, and that he supports the hareidi position regarding conversions, reported Amit Segal on Channel 2 Monday.

After months in which heavy pressure against the bill was brought to bear by hareidi factions, elements in the Jewish Home and the chief rabbis, Netanyahu decided to remove the bill that was sponsored by MK Elazar Stern (Hatnua) from the agenda of the next government session.

Netanyahu reportedly told the heads of the coalition factions that if the law comes up for a vote as a privately sponsored bill, he will make sure it does not pass.

If the report is accurate, Netanyahu's decision could lead to a coalition crisis, since 

Livni has threatened in the past that she will bolt the coalitionwith her party if the law is not advanced.

The bill would allow the rabbi of any city to open a religious court for conversion – thus ending the Chief Rabbinate's control of the conversion mechanism. 

The Jewish Home demands – along with the Chief Rabbis – that only a rabbi who is recognized as being capable of acting as a dayan (religious court judge) or one who has been approved for performing conversion by the Chief Rabbinate will be able to open a beit din for conversion.

"In the face of the wave of anti-Jewish legislation, we will take action to strengthen the Jewish identity of the state of Israel,” Jewish Home Head Naftali Bennett told his faction's MKs several months ago.

Beit Shemesh politicians present plan to divide city in half, FINALLY!

Finally! They are coming "tzim seichal" ...(they are finally getting smart).   The Non-Chareidim work their tuchess' off, place their children in the IDF, pay taxes and they have absolutely no say in governing their own city! This is asinine! It gets worse, the Chareidim throw stones on the their Non-Charidie neighbors that are in the army, and spit on their little girls on the way to school!
I would also erect a huge wall dividing the city.
Read the following Jerusalem Post Report!

Eight members of the City Council in Beit Shemesh have drawn up preliminary proposals to divide the community between its haredi and non-haredi neighborhoods and create two municipal authorities.

Beit Shemesh resident and Yesh Atid MK Rabbi Dov Lipman presented the proposals to Finance Minister Yair Lapid on Sunday.

Beit Shemesh has been a center of intercommunal fighting between haredi and non-haredi residents in recent years as the two communities have clashed over the allocation of municipal resources, the expansion of the city, and a general cultural confrontation.

Local elections in the city in October 2013, won by incumbent mayor Moshe Abutbul of Shas, were found by the courts to have been unduly perverted by haredi activists. Repeat elections were held in March in which Abutbul prevailed by a narrow margin.

According to eight of the nine members of the opposition within the Beit Shemesh municipal council who now advocate splitting the city, Abutbul and his administration has refused to bring them into the coalition.

Shortly after the vote, Eli Cohen, who lost the mayoral election to Abutbul, along with leaders of the other non-haredi parties, presented a document setting out the basis on which they would agree to join Abutbul’s coalition.

The document stipulated that plans for the expansion of the city be revised to ensure construction for the non-haredi sector, requested that neighborhood administrations be established and given their own budgets, and that the administration for the Old Beit Shemesh district be entrusted to a non-haredi representative.

In addition, they requested a cultural center, sports center and library whose construction has suffered from extensive delays be completed along with other municipal amenities but did not make any demands for administrative portfolios, the party leaders emphasized.

Cohen and other non-haredi leaders argue that their requests have been ignored and Abutbul has not worked to include them in running the city.

“We wanted to build a model for cooperation in this city, but it hasn’t happened,” Cohen told The Jerusalem Post.

We weren’t the ones to build a separation wall in a school, it was the municipal administration, and it was the municipal administration which refused to include the opposition in the running of the city.

“We have set principles for cooperation, but they have been rejected. There is no option now but to divide the city, because there is a complete chasm in the perspective of how to run the city. The haredim are building a haredi city without care for the city’s diverse and multi-cultural nature.”

Lipman, who came to public prominence campaigning against the haredi municipal administration, said basic services have not been provided to the city’s non-haredi community for years, and mentioned the failure to build the cultural center, library, soccer field or city swimming pool, as well as the designation of “tens of thousands of housing units” for the haredi population.

“As a resident of the city and one of the leaders in the battle against religious extremism in the city, I have come to the sad conclusion that the only way to save the city is to think out of the box,” he said. “Given the direction which the city leadership has chosen, coexistence is not a possibility, and separate municipalities is the only way to insure that the city survives and that all residents have all of their needs met.”

A request for comment from Abutbul’s spokesman was not received by press time.

A Giyores that the Voyeur' Rebbi Converted, Speaks Up!

A bill of rights for Jewish converts

BETHANY S. MANDEL OCTOBER 20, 2014, 2:51 PM

​ [Israel Time]​

I am one of Rabbi Barry Freundel’s converts. He was my sponsoring rabbi and is the first signature on my RCA conversion documents. For a long time, I’ve been angry about my conversion, conversion in general and how I have been treated in the Jewish community post-conversion. I’ve been hesitant to speak out because I was afraid of rocking the boat, which holds not only myself, but also my husband and child(ren). Given this scandal, which has rocked my whole world, including my conversion boat, I’m no longer afraid to speak my mind.

Much of what is written about conversion is from the perspective of born-Jews and rabbis. Few converts are willing to speak out. We are afraid. We are victimized. We are threatened and judged. Which is why I’ve decided to make for myself and other converts a Bill of Rights. These are the things I deserved during my conversion and deserve now, afterwards, but have been too afraid to demand.

1. Converts are in a state of persistent limbo. During the process we are never told how long it can or should take. We cannot get married if we are dating, we cannot date if we are single. We lose control over the most important choices in our lives and hand them over to men with whom we are unfamiliar for an indeterminate amount of time. I was unable to give a new job a start date, to give my former job proper notice, sign a lease on a new apartment or set a wedding date because I was kept in the dark about how much longer my conversion could possibly take. Days? Weeks? Months? A year? Several? This is psychological torture. A rough estimate and a clear plan for how to move forward to get to the finish line, the mikvah, is the least that a convert deserves.

2. We have no safe governing body or individual to turn to if we feel as we have been victimized, manipulated or lied to by our rabbis. The RCA is not this body.

3. The reasonable costs associated with conversion should be clearly laid out from the outset. This is a complaint I have heard many times, though thankfully not from my converting Beit Din. Conversion candidates well into the process, after having invested a significant amount of time with a Beit Din, have been told about mandatory fees in the thousands of dollars they were unaware of at the outset of their work with a group of rabbis.

4. Communities have welcoming committees for Jews who move to the area but nothing in place for converts in the process. In order to convert many individuals have to leave their
homes and move to strange towns or cities. They are left to eat Shabbat meals alone, isolated from the social groups that born Jews form via their families, camps, schools and youth groups. Welcome the ger, even before they become a ger. This obligation stands for both communities on the whole, and for rabbis. I do not know a single convert who, after finishing the process, did not have trust issues with rabbis after the treatment they received during their conversion. My conversion personally taught me to be fearful and wary of rabbis, and given the situation that has transpired with my conversion rabbi, that personal wariness has been validated this week. Rabbis should be aware of the damage that the process does to the spiritual and emotional health of their congregants during conversion and take special care to rebuild rabbinic trust and relationships with those among them that went through a conversion process.

5. Converts are constantly asked to discuss extremely personal questions by strangers in social settings. We are not aliens from another planet. Most converts, including myself, try to avoid mentioning my status at any cost to strangers at meals, parties and events in order to prevent these sorts of intrusions into our personal lives and choices. So no, random person across a 15-person Shabbat lunch table, I don’t want to yell over the din of conversation my personal spiritual journey. I refuse to even entertain this conversation from now going forward. It’s an invasion of my privacy for the sake of someone else’s curiosity.

6. Help us with matters of Jewish ritual. This falls on rabbis and community members alike. When a convert gets married, makes a bris or bar mitzvah for their sons, we are flying blind. We have no mother to call to ask how things are done (though I am personally blessed with an incredible mother-in-law). If you know a convert about to go through a significant life change, ask them if they need help. If a congregational rabbi knows a member of their community is about to make a wedding, bris or bar mitzvah, offer to help not only with logistics and halachic advice on how it is done properly, but also with suggestions how non-Jewish family could be included in some way if they choose to be. We should not have to ask with fear how a parent or sibling could participate in our wedding in a meaningful way.

7. If converts are expected to provide their “papers” proving their Jewishness for a school, synagogue, or wedding ask born Jews for the same. I will never again provide my documentation until my husband is also asked to provide a photo of his parents’ ketubah or a photo of a gravestone of an ancestor.

8. The conversion process for those of Jewish heritage should be accelerated and unique. I was born to a Jewish father and was raised Reform. I didn’t know I wasn’t halachically Jewish until a college Birthright trip (thank you to my tour guide who gently explained that inconvenient truth to me). While in the process I was treated with the same unacceptable dismissiveness and disdain afforded to girls who were converting for marriage. Intermarriage is the biggest threat to Jewish life in America. Help those of patrilineal descent, many of whom try to convert Orthodox, correct the mistakes of their fathers. They should be welcomed back into the Jewish people, not turned away like mutts at a dog show.

9. Converts deserve to be treated with the same love and care as Jewish orphans from the moment we become Jewish. We are given new names, we become the sons and daughters of Avraham, the patriarch, who is no longer with us. We are asked to renounce our families in many ways. My deceased father, a born Jew, is not listed as my father on my
ketubah. Even I, as a patrilineal Jew, have given up a great deal of my relationship with my Jewish family to become Orthodox. I can no longer spend holidays with my family, I can no longer eat their food. Immediately after conversion, I married into a wonderful family with whom I can do this, but I will never again sit at my aunt’s Passover table and hear my uncle complain about the length of the Haggadah, and that brings me much sadness. Jews who enter this people as adults without a significant other, as I did, have even less. They spend Shabbats alone, they scrounge for holiday invitations, they receive the absolute worst shidduch recommendations for potential marriage partners, if they receive them at all. A corporate lawyer does not deserve to be constantly matched with the likes of a janitor just because he happens to be another black convert (yes, this happened to a friend on a serial basis). There is no group in the United States or Israel (that I am aware of) whose sole mission is supporting converts acclimation into the Jewish community after their conversion. A fraction of the money spent doing kiruv could be set aside for a project of this nature. A convert may not be a born Jew, but we are still Jews in need of outreach and support.

10. We should not have to live in fear about the status of our conversions in perpetuity. I should not be afraid that the actions of a rabbi on my Beit Din could mean my conversion won’t be universally respected somewhere down the line. My first instinct hearing reports of Rabbi Freundel’s improprieties after shock was fear. Fear for my status, fear for what it would mean for my daughter and unborn child. I have lived an Orthodox Jewish life since the moment I emerged from the mikvah. I should not have to be afraid of how the actions of others who I have no control over (but who at one time yielded plenty of control over me) could affect myself or my children. I have no indication that my conversion is in any way jeopardized at this moment, and I have asked around plenty to ascertain if there is (I want to make that crystal clear for other Freundel converts). Yet, I live in the real world where I have seen this happen too many times already.