It's a Great Mitzvah to be Happy

UNRWA Goes to War

I've blogged about UNRWA several times in the past. Look at what they are up to now:

Mahmoud Mansour Arrested for Drug Trafficking and Assaulting a Police Officer

Do you remember the "intermarriage of the year", when Moral Malka "wed" Mahmud Mansour a couple of months ago? Well, it looks like Moral picked a real "winner":

Media outlets two months ago touted "coexistence" as Muslim Arab Mahmoud Mansour (26) married Moral Malka (23), a Jewish woman he met in their native Yafo - now Mansour has been arrested for drug trafficking and assaulting a police officer.

Mansour was arrested last weekend after more than 10 grams of cocaine were found on him, Channel 2 reported on Sunday.

Police say that he was riding on a motorcycle in Yafo when he saw officers in the area, at which he threw aside a bag containing 20 additional grams of cocaine. As he was being arrested, police say Mansour struck one of the officers.

Not only that, according to the Walla web site:

למנסור עבר פלילי עשיר בעבירות של סחר בסמים. הוא ריצה בעבר עונש מאסר ואף נושא עונש של מאסר על תנאי של 40 חודשים בגין עבירות סמים, אשר הפרקליטות תבקש לממש. זאת, בנוסף על העונש שהיא רוצה שייגזר עליו בגין העבירה שהוא נחשד בה כעת

For those of you who (still) do not understand Hebrew, here's a translaton:

Mansour has a rich criminal background in dealing narcotics. He has spent time in jail in the past and currently has a 40 month suspended sentence for drug related crimes, which the prosecution will request to implement, in addition to the punishment which it (the prosecution) wants him (Mansour) to be sentenced for his current crime.

Now the question is what will Moral do? It seems that in Islam it is not easy for a woman to initiate divorce:

Khula is the right of a woman in Islam to seek a divorce or separation from her husband. A Muslim woman may petition a qadi, or in non-Islamic areas an Islamic community panel, to grant her divorce if the husband refuses. The waiting period (iddah) of a woman who seeks a divorce is one menstrual cycle or one month if she is post-menopauseal, i.e. ceased menstruating. This is to ensure she is not pregnant.[27] If the woman is pregnant, then the waiting period is until she gives birth.

Women's right to initiate divorce is very limited compared with that of men. According to shari'a law, there are two reasons for a wife to be divorced: when she can prove that the husband did not have intercourse with her for more than two months or if the husband does not provide her with what she needs for living such as food and shelter. While men can divorce their spouses easily, women face legal and financial obstacles.[28][29] For example, in many cases the woman must repay her dowry and marriage expenses. In general she also has to forfeit child custody, if the child is older than seven years. Even if she gets child custody, she has to give it to the father, when the child reaches the age of seven.[28][29]

I, in any case, hope that Moral does the moral thing and returns to her people.

Congratulations to Jerusalem's New Chief Rabbis

Finally:

After more than a decade without, Jerusalem finally has two new Chief Rabbis.

The capital city's 48-member council began voting at the Jerusalem Municipal Hall at 4 p.m., with an initial list of 19 candidates for the Chief Ashkenazic and Sephardic positions whittled down to just nine, after several candidates withdrew over the past few days.

Polling closed at 7 p.m., and results were announced just before the 8 p.m. deadline.

Former Israeli Sephardic Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar was elected as the new Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, with 28 votes, while Rabbi Aryeh Stern of the Halacha Brura Institute was voted in as Ashkenazic Chief Rabbi with 27.

Following the results' announcement, Rabbi Stern - who was a close student of the late Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda Kook - vowed to represent all the people of Jerusalem.

"It is in my intention to serve as the rabbi of all Jerusalemites: secular, modern-orthodox and charedi alike," he said in a statement. "The Jerusalem rabbinate is a great merit, but it also comprises a hefty responsibility. I will make sure that the religious services will become accessible and friendly and will serve as an outstanding model for all of the other rabbinates in Israel"

Count the Sukkahs

Today is the last day of Sukkot, Hoshana Rabba. Soon we will be parting from the precious Mitzvah of dwelling in the Sukkah.

"Ye shall dwell in booths seven days; all that are home-born in Israel shall dwell in booths; that your generations may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in booths, when I brought them out of the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God."

I was in Ramat Beit Shemesh B the other day and took this picture after Minchah. Click on the pic and count the Sukkahs that you see:

The Lost Ark?

On my way to the Western Wall today I saw this just outside of Jaffa Gate:

No, it is not the Holy Ark, just a reproduction. In any case it caused a lot of excitement. Many people gathered around it, snapping pictures. I was one of them.

May it be Your will, O my God and God of my fathers, that the Temple be rebuilt speedily in our days.

Bad News From Scotch Plains, New Jersey

For those of you that don't know, I grew up in New Jersey. However, it's been a long time since I've been there. For the majority of my sojourn in This World I have been privileged to live in the land of Israel. I am everlastingly grateful to God for giving me the wisdom and fortitude to leave the comfortable and familiar, and to pack my bags and return to the land of my fathers. I am grateful to live in a generation in which one can do so for the price of an airplane ticket.

That being said I still have a place in my heart for New Jersey, especially its Jewish community. One of the advantages of the age of internet is the ability to read news from the old country, to see "What's going on?" and "Whatever happened to?". One of the sites I visit regularly is the New Jersey Jewish News.

Recently I came across a disturbing report there from Scotch Plains, N.J.:

Bernard “BJ” Solomon and his husband Zev, better known as “Duncan” (ne William Hines, now Solomon also) called their huppa ceremony at Congregation Beth Israel on Saturday evening, Sept. 13, an “upgrade.” While it wasn’t exactly a first for them, it was the first same-sex wedding held at the Conservative synagogue in Scotch Plains.

The couple, who have been together for 12 years, had a Jewish marriage ceremony marking their civil union five years ago. But the celebration at CBI added the religious and secular recognition they wanted. “We feel more complete,” BJ said.

Held after the Havdala ceremony concluding Shabbat, it followed a bar mitzva celebration for Duncan, 35, during the Ma’ariv service that afternoon, and his conversion to Judaism last May. Their new license reflected New Jersey’s 2013 law granting gays full marriage rights.

How do you say, "Conservative Judaism is imploding!"?

I took a peek at Congregation Beth Israel's web site. If the Conservative Temple that I attended as a youth had a web site, it would probably have been similar. (Of course the Rabbi of my Temple, ob"m, would never have taken part in a "gay wedding" any more than he would have sold pork chops to his congregants.) Browsing the site, I saw that they have youth groups, "kadimah" and "USY".

The mention of USY took me down memory lane: the USY meetings, dances and conventions. I thought of those youth there in Scotch Plains, seeing their "rabbi" perfoming a gay marriage, and then going to Temple on Yom Kippur and hearing the Torah reading during Minchah:

1 And the LORD spoke unto Moses, saying: 2 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them: I am the LORD your God. 3 After the doings of the land of Egypt, wherein ye dwelt, shall ye not do; and after the doings of the land of Canaan, whither I bring you, shall ye not do; neither shall ye walk in their statutes. 4 Mine ordinances shall ye do, and My statutes shall ye keep, to walk therein: I am the LORD your God.
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22 Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind; it is abomination. 23 And thou shalt not lie with any beast to defile thyself therewith; neither shall any woman stand before a beast, to lie down thereto; it is perversion. 24 Defile not ye yourselves in any of these things; for in all these the nations are defiled, which I cast out from before you. 25 And the land was defiled, therefore I did visit the iniquity thereof upon it, and the land vomited out her inhabitants. 26 Ye therefore shall keep My statutes and Mine ordinances, and shall not do any of these abominations; neither the home-born, nor the stranger that sojourneth among you-- 27 for all these abominations have the men of the land done, that were before you, and the land is defiled-- 28 that the land vomit not you out also, when ye defile it, as it vomited out the nation that was before you. 29 For whosoever shall do any of these abominations, even the souls that do them shall be cut off from among their people. 30 Therefore shall ye keep My charge, that ye do not any of these abominable customs, which were done before you, and that ye defile not yourselves therein: I am the LORD your God. {P}

I imagine that they were quite perplexed. The Torah says one thing, yet the rabbi seems to be doing something else entirely!

The good news is that we are in the internet age. Authentic Torah is readily available on line. These confused youth, if they are interested, have the truth available at the click of a mouse.

After recovering from the shock I received from reading the article, I left the following comment at the NJJN web site:

The job of a rabbi is to uplift them to the Divine ideals of Torah and not lower tham down into the depravity of ancient Egypt:

“Lesbian relations are forbidden and it is among the “doings of Egypt” that we have been warned about as it is said, “After the doings of the land of Egypt, wherein ye dwelt, shall ye not do”. The sages said, “What did they do? A MAN MARRIES A MAN, and a woman marries a woman, and a woman marries two men.”

From Maimonides, Laws of Forbidden Relations 21:8