I have been reticent to write anything too negative here during the Nine Days but feel that the situation is becoming intolerable. Nothing will ever be solved by writing anonymous pieces on the internet but some things just need to be said anyway.
Over the last month or two we have seen the politicisation of Lubavitch around the world. Obviously none of us is happy with the situation in Gush Katif - people being expelled from their properties, giving away land in Eretz HaKodesh and seemingly surrendering to the arabs. We must do all we can to try to stop this from happening but in the way observant Jews always do by teshuvah, tefillah and tzedokah. As Lubavitchers we should not be getting involved in politics and denigrating Israel's Prime Minister and politicians. We should not be doing anything that would lead people to feel we are advocating violence or even civil disobedience. We are supposed to be chassidim of the Rebbe and should act accordingly.
From it's inception Chabad/Lubavitch has always concentrated on Jewish education and hafotza to all yidden irregardless of who they are or what they believe in. We used to hear stories of how Chadadniks had access to any part of Israel to bring chizuk to the soldiers - even to the front lines. That is not the case now. Chabad is seen as a political movement and viewed with mistrust by many in Israel. There are many, many shluchim still doing fantastic work but they are being overshadowed by the "lunatic fringe" who are very loud but do not have much substance.
In Melbourne over the last couple of months we have seen a similar situation. A few individuals, not all of them Lubavitchers, have adopted the disengagement cause and handled it in a very disorganised and unprofessional way. The rally which came across as a children's party with balloons and loud music and dancing with a few tehillim thrown in for good measure. Now the fiasco of the "psak din" in which the original and translation did not match - there were even different versions of the translation posted in shuls and in the Jewish News. The organisers seem to have made this a Chabad cause. I know that there are many frum yidden in other communities in Melbourne who are also against the disengagement but it seems that they have either been ignored or not encouraged to express their opinions.
In general I do not like the hashkofa of the Australian Jewish News but the editorial this week makes a some good points. The last sentences read "The Lubavitcher Rebbe called on his emissaries to rekindle the Yiddishe spark in Jews dispersed in all corners of the globe. His rabbis should not be responsible for sparking a major division within the Jewish people either in Israel or Australia."
I know that many people will quote sichos of the Rebbe saying that we cannot give back land etc etc etc. Unfortunately we do not have the Rebbe to guide us in these dark days and have to use our seichel. Denigrating people who do not agree with us was never the Rebbe's way. We must act bedarkei noam ubedarkei sholom as true Lubavitcher chassidim.
Let us hope that the disenagaement and all this discussion is all made irrelevant with the coming of Moshiach now.
There was a brilliant formula that the Rebbe provided for his shluchim as to how to approach their work: "bedarkei noam, uvetoikef hamasim". These two seemingly conflicting statements can be discussed, debated and argued at great length, but one yardstick that can most definitely be used is the following: no matter what side you prefer to side with most, have your statements or opinions in any way fallen short with any one of these two statements? if it has, then you have a lot of room for improvement.
ReplyDeleteoh, and by the way, the Rebbe definitely demanded everyone to have a mashpia. did you pass bythis comment with yours?
AE,
ReplyDeleteDitto that!
"Nothing will ever be solved by writing anonymous pieces on the internet"
ReplyDeletepretty much sums up this entire blog.
couldn't have said it better myself.
I saw it myself last Friday outside Glicks.
ReplyDeleteA bocher walks up to a guy to put him on tefillin. They guy angrily expresses his disgust for the Chabad petition in the paper, which he claims is an absolute disgrace. A small arguement breaks out and they guy huffs off.
What are the chances of him ever again putting on tefillin or walking into a Chabad house? A lot lower than had the psak not appeared in the Jewish News.
Its called cutting off your nose to spite your face.
Not to mention the chances of regular shuls being willing to hire Chabad rabbis. Actually this petition alsmost cost some of them their jobs.
ReplyDeleteI am FURIOUS at these so called activists who decietfully cut and pasted my name to their propaganda!
ReplyDeleteI am FURIOUS at the irresponsibility of these people who have no common sense and with their stupidity are destroying the good name of Chabad in this city.
WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE????
WHO GIVES YOU THE RIGHT AND THE AUDACITY TO ACT IN THE NAME OF CHABAD AND THE REBBE?????
WHO DO YOU THINK WILL BE LEFT SUFFERING AFTER YOU ARE OFF THE SCENE?????
AND WHOS IS SUPPOSED TO CLEAN UP THIS MESS????
AE, I will not attack you for remaining Anonymous, bacause I am anonymous too. But I will attack this nonsence article, which has no conclusion or practical advise.
ReplyDeleteYes, you highlighted in bold teshuvah, tefillah and tzedokah. But you failed to mention an exact time and date. So now I will issue a huge challenge to Mr or Ms Assie Echo. This will be the litmus test of your true worth!!! The gloves are off, so to speak!
AUSSIE ECHO, FOR THE SAKE OF AHAVAS YISROEL, I IMPLORE YOU, I BEG OF YOU, (please picture me actually kneeling on the floor in front of you, this is not a joke) WOULD YOU PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE instigate and organise one or more of the following -
1. A Tzivos Hashem rally, so our kids can doven for Israel together!
2. A 24 hour roster from now till the disengagement gets called off. People sign on for just 5 minutes Tehillim each, around the clock, 24/7
3. A campaign to stop Loshen Hora. People sign onto 2 hour blocks, no talking for 2 hours, not even to answer the phone! A 24/7 roster for men or women.
4. A community-wide rally with speakers - Torah, teshuva, tefillah and giving tzedoka for Israel (the 3 things YOU advised)
5. A "Shabbos guest roster" for people with no family, but too shy to ask for a host for a Shabbos meal.
6. Establish a new tzedoka fund for Gush Katif evictees, who are in temporary tents or caravans. They get no money to eat because they didn't cooperate with the Government's Eviction Taskmasters.
Of course, you have the huge advantage of using this blog to easily publicise the above activities. Again, I literally BEG you to organise these because no one else is. If you refuse, the only possible reason can be - you are scared of the critics! I certainly hope you are not afraid of the bloggers that you yourself helped cultivate!
Please do it very soon indeed, as time is running out for our brothers and sisters in Eretz HaKodesh. Judging from your writings, I have full confidence in your abilities to organise something concrete. Do you have enough self confidence and guts?
oj
ReplyDeletewhy don't you organize it yourself? or else you can pack your bags and make aliyah, now! Go before it is too late! Please, i am down on my hands and knees begging you. just leave.
oj
ReplyDeleteKol hakavod on lots of positive practical suggestions.
I have just as much clout as you or anyone else to do these things. I for one will certainly support you in this.
What I am saying is that these gatherings and initiatives should have been thought of weeks ago and could all have been arranged with support of the complete Melbourne community not just Chabad. This issue is not a Chabad one but is relevant to Jews everywhere.
"Peace Now leader Yariv Oppenheimer warned that the rally was "more dangerous than protests that preceded the assassination" of Yitzhak Rabin. He warned that blocking roads to and from Gush Katif next week will cause bloodshed in confrontations with police and soldiers" from today's Arutz Sheva.
ReplyDeleteThe left wing creates all the problems and then whines just like the guy who kills his parents and then asks the judge for mercy because he is an orphan.
I've got to say this, and forgive my impudence, but it's either "regardless" or "irrespective". There's no such word as "irregardless".
ReplyDeleteOn Erev Tisha B'Av, let's stop being cynical. I have sincere intentions to "elevate" this blogspot, in accordance with Aussie Echo's article.
ReplyDeleteI just gave 6 suggestions, can you guys do some "brainstorming" on more practical ideas. The main thing is not just the idea, but as the Rebbe always said "bring it down to 4 amos" ie. bring it down to within 4 feet of the ground" ie. an actual action on planet earth.
Irregardless is a word that many mistakenly believe to be correct usage in formal style, when in fact it is used chiefly in nonstandard speech or casual writing. Coined in the United States in the early 20th century, it has met with a blizzard of condemnation for being an improper yoking of irrespective and regardless and for the logical absurdity of combining the negative ir- prefix and -less suffix in a single term. Although one might reasonably argue that it is no different from words with redundant affixes like debone and unravel, it has been considered a blunder for decades and will probably continue to be so.
ReplyDeleteFurious rabbi should be writing to AJN and complaining.This blog does not reach the masses.
ReplyDeleteWhat is a sichos ?
ReplyDeleteA board member from Caulfield told me last night that Kluwgant has lost every chance he had for the Caulfield job. He doubls if they would touch any chabadnik. In fact even for the time being they don't want to use Kluwgant any more and are bringing Zaichik for the Yom Tovim!
ReplyDeleteThank you Oliver and co.
And who will hire Oliver now either? No one in their right mind. He has done himself in and will not even admit it.
ReplyDeleteJews are very forgiving people. If Elkman & Oliver came out with a public explanation and apology, not only would they be forgiven, but it would also go a long way to heal the rift they created between Chabad and the rest of the Jewish velt.But so far they are saying nothing and will not answer questions of the AJN on this. Funny how they had alot to say when it sutied them. Perhpas they have not got the sense to regret what they have done because they do not yet realize it was wrong?
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteI am told that Chaim Tzvi Groner had a big hand in this Psak!
ReplyDeleteAnon, another thing they taught me in Adass, was the importance of citing a source. Both according to Talmudic traditions (meivi ge'ileh leoilom) and secular law.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.thefreedictionary.com/irregardless
pinkus, Chaim Tzvi is a close friend and a mentor of Moshe Elkman. Moshe confides in him and looks up top him for advice. Chaim Tzvi has been known to take radical positions in the past, but usually stays in the background encouraging others.
ReplyDeleteSo now I understand everything, except why is everyone attacking Moishe rather than Chaim Tzvi?
ReplyDeleteWith G-d's assistance
ReplyDeleteDear friend,
Find below the online report from the Australian "Jewish" News forbidding the threatened expulsion of Jews, G-d forbid, in the strongest, most unequivocal terms.
My part in it, in which I have a tremendous privilege, is that I adapted and wrote it.
It is such a tremendous Kiddush Hashem to openly declare the view of Torah, and it makes me very proud of my Rabbinical colleagues, and I pray that it will indeed be effective in nullifying the wicked decree.
This ruling is consistent with the timeless teachings and directives of the Lubavitcher Rebbe:
"It is irrelevant whether or not protesting will be effective, because the reason for protest is not that a logical reason exists to indicate that protest will be effective, but rather because we are pained by the situation! .... when dealing with matters of life and death, we cannot be silent! This is the clear ruling in the Code of Jewish Law, based upon an undisputed ruling in the Talmud, that it is forbidden to remain silent in matters of life and death! ...It is impossible to know what the outcome would be if even one person would protest. All the more so when there are, thank G-d, quite a few protesting. Some are protesting behind the scenes, others publicly; some in Yiddish, others in other languages, etc. If people were not protesting, who knows what the situation would be like now?"
"The Talmud says that all positive things must be done even a hundred times until the result is achieved. The rabbinic authorities imply that this directive is not an exaggeration but is meant literally. ... But if the world is in balance, then with one isolated act of protest, one could "swing the balance for himself and the whole world to the side of merit, and bring salvation and rescue to himself and humanity." No one knows When there could be a more propitious time than the present.
"...The very fact that there are certain rabbis who issued a rabbinic ruling and sent it to the Israeli government (despite the fact that they knew it would not be effective), is already proof, that this is what needs to be done. This is because inasmuch as they are rabbis they must protest, and they must not be concerned with the notion that they may not be adhered to.
"....When the Torah says, "You shall not stand idly by your brother's blood," it does not mean, that you are only required to involve yourself when you are certain that your efforts will be successful. Rather, even if there is only a slim chance — even only the slightest of chances — that you will succeed in your protest being heard, you must do this, for it is the unequivocal ruling of the Code of Jewish Law!"
"May it be G-d's will that all those who remain silent (and they are many) finally involve themselves in this issue, since it is easier to deal with an acknowledged opponent, than with someone who remains silent. It is impossible to engage the latter in discussion when he insists on remaining silent: he listens, he hears the arguments, and proceeds to do nothing about it." 11 Shvat 5731.
"Whether one is accustomed or not, if there is a chance that his silence will be misinterpreted, then he has no choice. Whether he likes it or not, he must articulate his position, at least briefly...." Purim 5730.
http://www.truepeace.org/thecry/five.htm
I encourage you to browse the other pages on that site: http://www.truepeace.org/index.asp
Furthermore, it should be noted that the purpose of a Halachic ruling is not just to sway public opinion of those under Sharon--obviously a very necessary thing in its own right--but to have a spiritual impact on the world, just as the Lubavitcher Rebbe spoke of the power of Rabbis to rule that Moshiach should come. In that sense, a Halachic ruling from the dispora is also be very powerful (aside from the fact that swaying public opinion in the diaspora is also essential--not only because of the indirect effect the people of the Holy Land of Israel, but to promote the spiritual wellbeing of the Jews in the diaspora). A story told by the Lubavitcher Rebbe illustrates this:
"A story is told of the ga'on [genius] of Rogatchov, who lived under the Communist regime. Upon receiving a letter informing him that he owed two types of tax to the government, he called his grandson and ruled that since only one of the taxes was binding according to Jewish law, the ga'on would only pay that one. Soon afterward, the ga'on received another letter from the government office, this time apologizing for erroneously imposing a tax—the same one from which he had ruled he was exempt!" Hisvaduyos 5745, Vol. 3, p. 1833
G-d willing, our aim is to have many more Rabbis sign on the ruling.
May we hear good news from our brothers and sisters in the Holy Land, and the nullification of the evil decree, and may these days of mourning be transformed into days of rejoicing with the arrival of Moshiach, now.
yours,
Rabbi Yehoishophot Oliver
_____________________________________________________
pinkus, Having Chaim Tzvi as a friend does not free Moshe Elkman from culpability. Beside, Chaim Tzvi functions in a stealth-like manner and his role in all this may be difficult to nail down.
ReplyDeleteJust because Chaim Tzvi is hard to pin down is no reason we should let him of the hook/cross?
ReplyDeleteWho cares if Rabbi Klugwant doesn't get the job at Caulfield shule. It's his own fault. He admitted he knew about the deceitful ad and he had time to take his singature off and warn the other Rabbis before it was published but he didn't do anything. His excuse was that he failed to act because of 'time constraints.'
ReplyDeleteSince when is Kluwgant a posek on areas besides Shechita? How can is give a psak re Gaza?
ReplyDeleteIf the IDF slaughters settlers isn't Rabbi/Shochet Kluwgant the right authority?
ReplyDeleteNot only has the AJN “psak” against leaving gaza done public damage to chabad, but it also achieves nothing in preventing the disengagement. To the instigators of the ad, it was bad idea, that has led to a bad result. Apologise now for the deceit. Both to the rabbi’s who were tricked into signing it, and to the Jewish community.
ReplyDeleteYehoishofot,I don't think anyone from Chabad has denied that we must protest about the terrible "disngagement" and that is what the Rebbe wanted. So why are you quoting the Rebbe's sichois to us?
ReplyDeleteHowever WHAT SOME PEOPLE NEED TO GET INTO THEIR HEAD IS THAT SUCH A PROTEST SHOULDN'T JUST BE WILD FOR PROTEST'S SAKE, BUT NEEDS TO BE EFFECTIVE!!!!
Any one with any common sense understands that a protest in a form that is going to turn people even further away is NO PROTEST and is worse than no protest at all!!!!
Unfortunately some of the action to-date (including the ad in last week's AJN and the accompanying controversy)has obviously been counter-productive.
I certainly hope that no other Rabbis will be stupid enough to agree to the suggestion to add their signatures to the offending version of the "psak" that has caused so much negative publicity.
I have actually heard confirmation of the the report earlier on this blog that the Rabbis have organised another more appropriate text that has already been signed by over sixty communal Rabbis (including non-Chabad rabbis) from all round Australia (and not including teachers and others who made a joke of the previous version by signing the psak in the first instance). I also heard that there would have been even more Rabbis signing had some of them not have been distanced by the bad publicity cause by the Elkman/Oliver version.
Let us hope that this new version will have a more positive effect and that this new psak of the Rabbonim should do what the Rebbe wanted and rather than generating negative publicity it will generate an effect that will indeed help to break this terrible gezeirah.
Kesser-
ReplyDeleteno one is hiring Oliver anyway, both before or after this pask.
As for Kluwgant, he tires hard but at the end of the day he lacks the wisdom of the senior rabbis such as Levin, Gutnick and Barber. And Caulfield woud'nt have hired him anyway, the only reason why it was even spoken about was because he was running around telling everyone he'd get the job.
whats the point we have the the rebbe s shliach for shleimos eretz yisrael in melbourne who has done nothing again so speak with him he is who the rebbe left to deeal with the issue from AUSTRALIA
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThis is the first time that I have seen this blogspot and at first I thought thatthis was not a Lubavitcher site. It is shocking to see the painful ignorance of fellow lubavitchers about our Rebbe's clear, consistent and open opinion- regardless of potential consequences.
ReplyDeleteIt seems that here is a confusing of issues in the article. On one hand the writer is frustrated about the unprofessional and disorganized way the campaign for Shleimus Haaretz and on the other he seems to be saying that even if it was done properly according to the Rebbe's instructions it would work at cross-purposes for lubavitch's primary goal to awaken and inspire other yidden. Please excuse me, it is important to remind us all- every now and then - that lubavitch is the Rebbe and the Rebbe is lubavitch. The rebbe determines what are our priorities and the Rebbe has ben very clear on thuis issue that it is importnat and vital that Rabbonim issue a psak publicly. The Rebbe actually addressed the fact that it may harm our outreach efforts but stressed that pikuach nefesh overrides everything. I agree that this psak stepped out of line with some of it's wording which can be understood to encourage refusal but let's be honest, even if it was worded correctly and the focus was about the fact that Halacha forbids giving land because of pikuach nefesh we would have the same outrage and negative publicity for criticising the Israeli government and Sharon.
I hope that the next psak will do a better job in conveying the Halacha- without inserting any additions.
Over the weekend it was pointed out to me by a number of non-Chabad baalei battim that in the crticial comments in this week's AJN, every single critic of the Elkman/Oliver psak specifically allows the Rabbis the right to comment on their opposition to giving back land. If you read the comments you will clearly see that EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM INCLUDING LEIBLER indeed acknowledges this and ONLY CRITICISES THE INFLAMATORY LANGUAGE AND INCTEMENT IN THE IMPLIED CALL FOR CIVIL AND ARMY DISOBEDIENCE.
ReplyDeleteAnnonymous - This shows quite clearly that if the published psak would have been less inflamatory and more focussed on the real basic issue of "land for peace" only IT WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN THE SUBJECT OF THE SAME LEVEL OF CRITICISM and presumably WOULD have been better received.
The original English and Hebrew versions of the psak of the hundreds of Rabbonim in Israel on this topic and other oficial Chabad notices from elsewhere that have been circulated, actually only address the issue of shleimas haaretz without any inflamatory comments or any commment whatsoever on the other issues such as civil disobedience.
Unfortunately whoever translated and made changes to those texts and was/were responsible for the final text published here has/have a lot to answer for the fiasco that has resulted and the failure of the local campaign to effectively wake the public to the terrible crisis that the disegagement is causing
in Israel.
We still need to get trhat message across as effectively as possible. Yeshuas Hashem keheref ayin.
Hopefully, despite our own bungling, Hashem will still have rachmonous on us and fulfil the promise to turn this day of Tisha B'Av into a Yom Tov with the nullification of this decree and the coming of the geulah shlaimoh STILL TODAY!
There is no question if not for all the radical stuff like "Deportation" Street Marching, Psak for civil disobidience the anti disingagement campaign would be far more effective. You can win over people only if they are spoken to as civilised people with logical mature arguments. Some of the arguments used by the orange people including "Jerusalem is next" just made people turn the other way. Melbourne Jewry don't go for hype and exaggerations!
ReplyDeleteFrom J.Singer, Israeli journalist.
ReplyDeleteModern people are not attached to land. They flit about from place to place. The rich ones have multiple homes. They are citizens of the world.
Settlers, therefore, aren't modern. Politics aside, most Israelis, who are modern, can't relate to settlers, and vice versa. Who can explain, to those who don't understand it, the attachment to austere hilltops from which, with a little imagination, one can envision our ancestors grazing their flocks 2,000 years ago?
One might think that modern people could appreciate the romantic and spiritual side of such an endeavor. To some extent Israelis do, as reflected in the relative tolerance of most of the public for the extremism of some settlers. But there remains a huge gap between the post-modern Israeli and the pre-modern settler.
The great mistake of the settler movement and the fanatical elements of Chabad, is that they have never seriously attempted to bridge this gap and become mainstream. Fanaticism, after all, is a form of elitism. The fanatic, whether of the religious, political or secular variety, considers himself to be in a rather exclusive category of righteousness. The fanatic, by definition, projects a holier-than-thou attitude, because otherwise it is impossible to justify the usually high societal cost of separation from the mainstream.
The fact that settlers have become fanatics in the public eye should not be blamed entirely on them. Most, after all, quietly set an example of incredible fortitude and restraint, particularly over the last almost five years of terror war. There could hardly be a more pure example of sacrifice and of the opposite of the hypocrisy we all claim to hate. Labeling the settlers as fanatics is an easy way out for the mainstream, since if they are fanatics there is no need to take their moral example seriously.
It should be obvious that there is nothing more important for the settler movement than to bridge the yawning gap between it and mainstream Israeli society. Had that gap not existed, disengagement would never have happened. It may be too late even to prevent further unilateral withdrawals. But it is hard to imagine preventing such withdrawals so long as the rift between the settlers and the mainstream remains.
WHAT CAN the settler movement do to defanaticize itself?
First, it must be noted that the movement has recognized the need to bond with other Israelis. The largely successful orange ribbon campaign was an attempt to demonstrate popular support. "The people are with the Golan" campaign seemed effective, but this is not a fair example because the Golan settlers did not have to confront the accusation of blocking a Palestinian state. The Gush Katif slogan "We have love and it will win," based on a popular song, was of this mold, but it actually combined the soft touch and a power play, as if to say: We're lovable, but don't try to stop us.
The problem has been that opposite every jingle that has taken the softer, bonding approach, the thrust of the settler argument has been deliberately extremist and alienating. Though those who actually wore yellow stars or tattooed numbers on their arms were a tiny minority, the anti-disengagement campaign was permeated with terms recalling the Nazis: deportation, expulsion, transfer and Judenrein, to name a few. There has been a constant effort to claim that there is "no difference" between what the Nazis did to the Jews, and what the government of Israel is doing to the citizens of Gush Katif.
If that were not enough, a giant prayer vigil at the Western Wall leading up to and on Tisha Be'Av plans to draw a direct line between disengagement and the destruction of the Temple.
Equating the government and, by extension, the public that supports disengagement with the greatest enemies of the Jews is not a promising way to win friends and influence people. It is not a serious attempt to persuade, rather to intimidate, shock and shame. It also seems to reflect a resignation that the majority will never be won over, and so democratic values must be trumped rather than appealed to.
All this might make some sense from the settler perspective were there nothing to lose. Yet the settlers themselves feel they have everything to lose, and must struggle all the more bitterly precisely because this withdrawal is only the beginning.
Their strategy, indeed, seems to be to make the evacuation of 10,000 settlers close to impossible, so that removing many times that number from other settlements outside the security fence in Judea and Samaria will be unthinkable.
But the settlers' apocalyptic strategy is detracting precisely from this aim. As will be seen, the obstacle to dismantling settlements, now or in the future, will not be the physical, or even emotional difficulties. The only way further withdrawals will be stopped is if a large majority of Israelis can be persuaded that it is a dumb thing to do.
The Palestinians, given their own well-known penchant for squandering opportunities, might be counted on to do the settlers' job for them. But this can hardly be relied upon, given that Israel is now setting the precedent that it may withdraw unilaterally, with terror happening and the threat of further terror openly on the table.
Accordingly, becoming mainstream is the settlers' only real possible salvation. Can they do it, especially after the extremely polarizing path they chose to take?
A telling picture of a teenager and her toddler sibling cheerfully planting new rows of tomatoes in Gush Katif this week illustrates both the problem and the solution. It shows an intense faith, almost completely alien to the average modern Israeli, that God will not let disengagement happen. But it also shows that the settlers are capable of a fanatic dignity, and of not being defeated by defeat.
History won't remember much about all the rhetoric leading up to this point, but it will remember whether next week is characterized by violence or by dignity.
In the settlers' mind, Israeli society has failed. But in the public's mind, next week will demonstrate which value the settlers hold higher - the democratic will of the Jewish state, or an invented right to substitute their own religious or political will for the state's judgment.
The settlers still have the chance to become heroes of democracy. Ironically, such a "gallows conversion" to what is a deep value both of Judaism and of secular modernity is their only chance, in the long run, to win.
its all the PTB. GET A LIFE ! this is the sick'st thing i'v ever seen all you people think your going to save Melbourne you may have points but this is not the way to go about it, make meetings i dont know this is alll just Loshon Horoh.
ReplyDeleteMizrachi member, I think you've posted on the wrong thread. This thread is dealing with the kush katif campaign. unless you are saying that the PTB are the ones behind Elkman and/or the rabbis who signed his psak. Now that's a good extension of the conspiracy theory...
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteMizrachi member, You sound just like one of the PTB!
ReplyDeleteOne of my friends who spoke to Oliver today claims he is so militant and hyped up against the disengagement, that he could become dangerous once the settlers start being removed from Gush Kati. He has apparently lost all logic and is spaced out!
ReplyDeleteSuch a situation must be dealt with!
Shiffy said...
ReplyDeleteSome of the arguments used by the orange people including "Jerusalem is next" just made people turn the other way. Melbourne Jewry don't go for hype and exaggerations!
------------
Exaggeration?????
The Sunday Age reports that the Palestinian PM - said exactly those words: "Jerusalem next!"
Hoyoi lo sihyeh
I believe that is what Abas would want! But no normal person things that is what Sharon would want or would do.
ReplyDeleteMaybe some are confusing Sharon and Abas.
According to Olver & co Sharon is much worse than Abas!
ReplyDeleteAmerican Blog!!
ReplyDeleteAustralian Jewish News Rebukes Chabad For Ties To Extremists
The Ausralian Jewish News writes:
IT seems easy, if short-sighted, to cast off the controversial petition effectively calling on settlers and Israel Defence Forces soldiers to illegally disobey orders as the work of fringe elements on the extreme end of Australia’s Orthodox spectrum.
But it is much harder to understand why so many of the 33 mostly-Chabad rabbis, including their venerated Melbourne chief, Rabbi Yitzchok Dovid Groner, signed it. Many of the signatories apparently saw their leader’s name and simply followed suit, without reading the fine print. And, regrettably, the fact that Rabbi Groner — whose contribution to the Yiddishkeit of this community is arguably unparalleled — was unwell at the time did not seem to bother them one bit.
While many of our more esteemed Chabad rabbis were wise enough not to agree to sign this inflammatory document, the Chabad movement as a whole has let itself and the entire Australian Jewish community down by publicising such extremist terminology at such a sensitive juncture in Jewish history. For whether Rabbi Groner was too unwell or whether the other 32 rabbis were duped into signing a petition they thought was intended for the Israeli Government, as some claim, is almost a moot point. By doing so they crossed a red line, and although some of them have now publicly distanced themselves from the incendiary rhetoric in the petition (as opposed to the halachic injunction to oppose the withdrawal from Gaza), the good name of Chabad in Australia has been tarnished.
The tragic terrorist attack in Shfar’am last week — perpetrated by an Orthodox Jew — should be a clarion call to us all of the danger of inflammatory words in such a volatile political climate.
The politicisation, and indeed subsequent radicalisation, of the Chabad movement since its first foray into Israeli politics in 1990 has been the Achilles heel of an organisation whose outreach work in the Jewish world is second to none. Chabad should return to its roots of imbuing Jews with Yiddishkeit instead of allowing, and even encouraging, its rabbis to invest their energy on the front-line of a divisive political battle.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe called on his emissaries to rekindle the Yiddishe spark in Jews dispersed in all corners of the globe. His rabbis should not be responsible for sparking a major division within the Jewish people — either in Israel or Australia.
August 11, 2005 in Chabad
Chabad Linked To Mentor Of Jewish Terrorist
The Forward reports:
… Natan-Zada had spent his last months in Kfar Tapuach, a tiny West Bank settlement that is a stronghold of the banned Kach movement founded by the late Rabbi Meir Kahane and branded as a terrorist group by the Israeli and American governments. In April, Natan-Zada participated in a march to the Temple Mount — banned and blocked by the Israeli police — that was led by a right-wing Tapuach rabbi, David Ha'ivri. Both men were among the 30 or so people arrested at the event, according to Israeli Defense Ministry officials.
Ha'ivri, a student of Kahane, is one of a number of Tapuach residents with ties to American organizations. He was hosted during a fundraising tour last fall by a number of Chabad-Lubavitch synagogues in the United States as well as by Americans for a Safe Israel, the organization that has led the most prominent anti-disengagement rallies. The tour came just six months after Ha'ivri was arrested by Israeli authorities for "incitement to violence." …
When reached by the Forward, Ha'ivri said his organization had no links to terrorism.
"Violence is a terrible thing," Ha'ivri said, avoiding direct condemnation of last week's shooting. In one recent essay on his Web site, Ha'ivri wrote, "We don't use violence and break the law for its own sake."…
In recent years Israeli and Jewish spokesmen have frequently condemned what is described as a failure of Arab and Palestinian leaders to disassociate themselves from terrorist groups and their supporters. But given the links between some American opponents of disengagement and Kach associates in Tapuah, it is unclear whether the American Jewish community has established a firewall between Israeli extremists and mainstream organizations.
In recent months, a small group of Chabad activists in Israel have come under the scrutiny of security forces because of militant anti-withdrawal activism. A few days after Natan-Zada's attack in the Israeli Arab town of Shfaram, Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz ordered that an American teenager living in Kfar Chabad, a Lubavitch stronghold, and two other young men be put under administrative detention for two months.
A Los-Angeles based American leader of the Chabad movement, Rabbi Dovid Eliezrie, told the Forward that "there's nobody in any official position at Chabad that advocates for violence. Chabad has an anathema to any kind of violence."
When asked about Ha'ivri's appearance at numerous Chabad synagogues last fall, Eliezrie said the congregations were under the impression that Ha'ivri was raising money for victims of terrorism in Israel.…
[S]ome Chabad groups have cooperated with Kach-linked activists in the past to oppose Israeli territorial concessions and settlement evacuation..…
[M]any scholars of terrorism say that from the facts that have already emerged, it is clear that Natan-Zada was not an aberration, but a clear outgrowth of the current atmosphere of incitement in Israel.
"As with Palestinian terrorism, it's clear that although he was one man executing the act, there is no doubt he was relying on assistance, both spiritually and logistically," said Jonathan Fighel, a senior researcher at the Herzliya Interdisciplinary Center's International Policy Institute for Counter Terrorism.…
Perhaps the most disturbing foreshadowing of Natan-Zada's attack was a shadowy mystical ceremony, known as a "pulsa dinura," in which participants prayed, just two weeks before the killing spree, for Prime Minister Sharon's death. The participants made an explicit point of performing the ritual at the grave of Shlomo Ben Yosef, a pre-independence Israeli resistance fighter who was hanged by the British after opening fire on an Arab bus in 1938.…
Mizrachi Member,
ReplyDeleterelax, the nagative anti Yeshivah/chabad /establishment/ PTB messages you see on this blogsite are written by either;
1. The 5 - 10 well known anti PTB memebrs in the Yehivah community (using multiple names) who are always complaining - every community has these people (we all know who they are)and they have now found a new forum for their venting
2. Kids, just having fun
3.People who are not from the yeshivah community who are posing as lubavitchers, in order to stir and create anit lubavitch / yeshivah sentiment, which unfortunately is always going to happen when you are successful.
This blogsite does not in any way represent the mainstream chabad / yeshivah community, and I think any normal memeber of the Yeshivah community can attest to that, assuming that they have even heard of this site.
What is very clear here, is that the community, as it has in the past, continues to lack any capable leadership and even the majority of those with any true capabilities continue to be corrupted by self-interests.
ReplyDeleteIt is important that this vacuum be filled by people with real integrity and credibility.
Sad thing is this is a real catch-22 as people of this nature are not inclined to do so.
As has been pointed out elsewhere, Chabad in Melbourne is notorious for losing its most capable individuals. Just look at the talent that hes left in the last few years, Rabbi Gidon Fox being the most recent.
Time to get our act together and not just act or react to a newspaper add.
Let this be a call for truly principled people to step up to the plate.
As all can see there are 3 types of people in our community (as most communities)
ReplyDelete1) Those who see a problem and want change.
2) Those who live in their own little world and don't care.
3)Those like PTB who fight against change, and try to tell us that everything is fine.
The people in the third catergory need to silence those who highlight problems.
It's pretty simple.
Besides the underhanded, unethical and halachically incorrect methods and tactics employed by Elkman, Oliver, & Co., there is another serious problem with their activism. Some of Elkman's ads have been inflammatory and libelous. For instance, the latest ad he put in in shules over the nine days depicts one of the cages built by the IDF. The ad strongly implies that these cages are going to be used to jail the settlers. This is a lie. The cages are merely to be used to retrieve those settlers who climb the roofs and refuse to come down. It is nothing but sensationalism to imply, as Elkman's ads do, that they are planning to use these as mini prisons. After retrieving the settlers they will be free to leave.
ReplyDeleteThis is but one of the many examples of how ELlman, Oliver & Co. have distorted the truth with hysterical rantings.
As someone who is ANTI-disengagement, I strongly feel, as I wrote on this blog from the beginning of the forming of Elkman's group, that these radicals have hurt our cause.
Politics is strange in that extremists on either side of the political spectrum, will often employ the same unethical tactics and use the same types of imflammatory rhetoric in order to justify their respective extremism. Each side accuses the other side of exactly the same despicable actions that they themselves are guilty of. Ariel Sharon is a perfect example of this--once an extremist against land giveaway, he has now become a extremist in favour of land giveaway, and is guilty of all the terrbile undemocratic actions he and the Likud party once accused the left of being guilty of.
We just read the Gemorah over Tisha B'av about how the Zealots played a significant role in the churban. While the Zealots had a certain yiras shamyaim and a certain bitochon in believing that Hashem would help them to win over impossible odds against the Romans, their extremism took away their powers of rational judgement. They wound up accomplishing the exact opposite of their intended goal so instead of saving Yerushalayim, the Zealots wound up having a big part in destroying her.
In the same vein, Elkman, Oliver, & Co., although they have a certain belief that is rooted in holiness and Torah, they accomplished the exact opposite of what they set out to do, because they became overtaken by hysterical egoistic, irrational emotionalism, and also because their approach is that the ends justify the means. The result is that not only did they destroy their own credibility, but they have destroyed the credibility of the entire anti-disengagement camp in our city. This lack of credibility caused us to miss a golden opportunity to educate the general Jewish public in the issues of shleimas haeretz. Elkman, Oliver, & Co.'s over-zealousness caused a great chilul Hashem, a chilul Lubavitch, and their repugnant actions accomplished the opposite of their intended goals of getting support in Melbourne for the anti-desengagement cause.
The Rabbis silence and inaction of the face of all this could be compared to Reb Zechacria, whose lack of leadership at a critical moment in history, some commentators hold, is the one mainly responsible for the churban.
Could everyone posting here please use any other name other than anonymous -even if it's Tom, Dick or Harry (or Tam, Pehtzadik or Hershel on this forum). I'ts hard to answer if anonymous is being used for ten different comments and topics.
ReplyDeletethis whole thing is anonymous - HOW APPROPRIATE!!!
ReplyDeletesuggestion,
ReplyDeletegood idea
my question:
ReplyDeletewhy are chabad the only ones that publicly hang up their dirty laundry and plaster self negativity on the W.W.W. via this site for all to see?
Every community has problems, does it not?
There are ways and there are ways.
just wondering-
ReplyDeleteyou make a good point.
However, a good mashpia once told me the following: A Chossid is like a rodent. A non -Chossid is like a beautiful portrait.
What does this mean?
Observe a rodent. It is always busy. digging holes, throwing dirt, crawling in and out of its burrow, it is always moving, always hyperactive, always twitching, running, searching, moving.
A beautiful portrait on the other hand is always pleasant to see. A magnificent work of art, hanging on the wall for all to admire. No dirt, no crawling, no twitching, no searching, no movement.
A portrait, however, nice as it looks, is not alive. It's dead.
Ever gone to a Chassidic fabrengen? You see lot of twitching and crawling going on. you see dirt throwing. you see searching and movement.
I must confess that this blogsite is a far cry from a genuine chassic fabrengen. But by nature, Chabad chassidim aren't stagnate. They are not fake. Sure, some might be dirt throwing rodents, (and that might annoy some people). But a true chassid is always searching, always growing, always honest, always real.
We may not be 100 % perfect and beautiful all of the time, and we arent ashamed to admit it. But at least we are real, not dead.
Gaza is Shut – Disengagement Begins at 7:00am
ReplyDelete05:13 Aug 15, '05 / 10 Av 5765
"Arutz Sheva today:
(IsraelNN.com) With military precision, at midnight, a sign in Hebrew and English was hung on Kissufim Crossing, the corridor to Gush Katif, declaring the area a ‘closed military zone’. On Monday morning at 7:00am, Operation Yad L’Achim will get underway, better known as the Gaza/Samaria Disengagement Plan or the expulsion.
During this 48-hour period, soldiers will go house-to-house requesting that residents leave the area voluntarily in compliance with the IDF dictate. No force will be used and those not wishing to comply will not be compelled to do so.
Following the completion of stage one, the end of 48 hours, the security forces will once again go house-to-house, this time removing residents by force as Prime Minister Ariel Sharon makes good on his plan to forcibly evict the Jews of Gaza, then northern Samaria, to hand over the areas to the Palestinian Authority "
Let us daven the settlers leave without resistance because if they try and fight the IDF, which is one of the best and strongest armies in the world, they cannot gain anything, and would then run the risk of injury, G-d forbid. They have made their point that this disengagement is wrong, and it is not worth them getting hurt over it.
Hashem should help all the Yidden in this dark hour, and bring the GEULAH SHLEIMA NOW!
Shoshana get a life already!
ReplyDeleteI work on a computer, am a free lance writer, so I get to look at the net alot and I read and write very fast, so what may take others a long time only takes me afew seconds. I have a life and I am very interested in current affairs in Lubavitch.
ReplyDeleteDoes a frum woman with ideas, opinions, and the inclination to make her views known bother some people? Probably. Some people think frum women should just smile and not say anything controversial.
If Moshe Elkman were a woman, I venture to guess he would have been crucified in the arena of public Chabad opinon by now. But boys tend to give each other a pass, while we woman are exepected to shut up and put up, aren't we?
And I am no feminist, but this is the reality of present day frum society.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteWas my message deleted ae b/c you are related to shoshana?
ReplyDelete"I read and write very fast"
ReplyDeleteQuickly?
thanks for your advice. What are you interested in, anonymous, besides my life? anything intelligent or interesting to add to the blog? Any ideas, opinons, reflections, experiences, perceptions, or even jokes? Does your life mean anything to you that you would like to share?
ReplyDeleteThe level of this blog has gone down since the beginning. I ask AE if we could do soemthing to bring it up to a higher more intelligent level of discourse. We started out discussing real issues of urgency regarding chinuch and kiruv etc., and now after myself and others vented our long held grievances against the PTB, we seem to have descended to posting dribble with the occassional bickering.
The Jewish world is on fire with urgent issues, our own community has burning issues, and the only things most (not all) people seem to want to type here are not really worth thinking about.
Are we all really so shallow? Or are the deeper thinking people just not writing here?
SHOSHANA! YOU ARE A BREATH OF FRESH AIR. OF COURSE THE SOTON WANTS TO SHUT YOU UP. HE IS SCARED OF CHANGE, BUT AS NACSHON BEN AMINODOV JUST FIGHT FOR YOUR PRINCIPLES.Fight for the sake of our children.
ReplyDeleteRemember a little light removes much darkness.
Yeah shoshana keep on talking. Welove to hear from you coz thats all you do thats right your a freelance writer but what about action?
ReplyDeleteI am not a Chabadnik, but read this blog because I am interested in the views expressed here, particularly regards to our relationship with Israel. I think that the next month will be crucial in the history of our Melbourne community, and that of Israel. If we can all think of nice things to say about one-another, and, as hard as it may be, be supportive of Israel in public, we will get through this unscathed.
ReplyDeleteto yet another anonymous-the Rebbe supported and encouraged writers very much since he valued it as a positive activity and I use it to not only put in my 2 cents worth here but to spread Yiddishkeit around the world as well.
ReplyDeletei am an israeli living in melbourne.
ReplyDeletein israel (just a few weeks ago) i saw the spillage of oil and nails on the road to jerusalem near kfar chabad.( "bedarkei noam" )
i listened to a few of the talmidim from zfat reprimanding an idf officer for wearing a kipa.( you should take it off ect`) . what a discrase.
i listen to your self righteous holier than thou opinions whilst you have never served nor will ever send your kids to the army defending aza ,all said with more hate then love.
"We used to hear stories of how Chadadniks had access to any part of Israel to bring chizuk to the soldiers "? as one of those soldiers i would have prefered to see cabadnikes serving in my unit actually. but as long as it was done with love i acceppted it with all the faults i thought it had.
for a while i was wrong . i looked at chabad as the real thing , full of ahavat israel ,and i got pretty close , too close maybe . until now i had still some affinity , some soft spot but i can see the real thing now.
from diamond explorations in the name of the rebbe to israeli politics...and the odd courtcase.
dont you think that your name is mud in israel? dont you think that beside fanatic mashichist and road signs all over the place you do not really exist anymore even here? where besides the lubavitches mind does chabad have the clout it used to have not so long ago?
lo chval?
and shoshana :"The left wing creates all the problems and then whines just like the guy who kills his parents and then asks the judge for mercy because he is an orphan".
i can not express my disgcust regarding this sentence as it sounds like a quote from a nazi newspaper about the jews.
who brainwashed you with that hatred? "creates ALL the problems"? who built the jewish state? right wing chabadniks?
"Does a frum woman with ideas, opinions, and the inclination to make her views known bother some people? "
with your opinions the answer is yes yes and yes.
and for oj who wrote:" Establish a new tzedoka fund for Gush Katif evictees, who are in temporary tents or caravans. They get no money to eat because they didn't cooperate with the Government's Eviction Taskmasters."
are you out of your mind? i have family and friends there . no money to eat ? you talk about the israeli armed forces and government officials that are as jewish as you are in the same way as you are talking about the germans.
i intend to circulate your views and more so the way they are expressed as a warning of how much hate can come from the mask of outreach. suddenly ahavat israel means love of aza and hate of the first jewish army in 2000 years , after sinat chinam destroyed the last one.
it looks like mr Israeli anonymous has goteen everyone to shut up (at least fro 30 minutes).
ReplyDeleteWho is going to reply to this guy? AE, Shoshana, Yehoishofat Oliver, Felafel, gefilte Fish???
Where are the big bloggers now?
anonymous, while your frustrations are understood, you misunderstand the perspective of those whose views you are attacking.
ReplyDeletethose here who speak harshly against the army, disengagement etc do so out of love and concern for the welfare of every person in israel, who will following disengagement C'V be much more vulnerable to the tentacles of terror.
As the Rebbe was wont to say 'ven es tut vey shrayt men', when one is in pain one screams out.
i am by no means condoning such speech, but rather as you are an outsider here, you need a bit of background to understand the views expressed and to put it all in perspective.
bahavat yisroel navi et hagoel!
To:- love a fellow jew!
ReplyDeleteWHERE IS YOUR LOVE. Talking about our leaders as if they were Nazis! The Rebbe respected Sharon and knew that Sharon has done more for Jews than all of Australian jewry put together. The settlers lived in luxury while the IDF risked their lives protecting them. We are big experts to say that if 7,000 settlers are moved millions will be in danger. For fanatics to
put jews lives at risk is sick, and for Chabad Rabbis `to encourange civil disobidience is even sicker. Chabad must reign in the extremists before they demolish all the Rebbes work.
Our Mishiachisten and orange fanatics have recently undone more than 50 years of hard work where nearly all jews respected Lubavitch.
ReplyDeleteThank you and keep up your shameful work, but don't blame anyone except yourselves for the bad light people view Lubavitch with today.
anonymous israeli again:
ReplyDeleteto love a fellow jew . do not comfort yourself by thinking i have no background , i do . i was part of you for a while . i was at the mikva when a young lubavitche was celebrating the deth of the prime minister of israel. murdered in another act of concern to the welfare of the people of israel. i stopped my lessons with one of your rabbis after his delight on as well that occassion.
i have learnt and keep on studying the rebbe hoping that its you that misrepresents all he stood for and not me misunderstanding his message that i see of love and hope.
for that soldier that is refered to here as eviction taskmaster has more messirout nefesh probably , risking his life , then any rabbi siting in melbourne or manchester or brooklyn. and the parents of that soldier , well you can only guess , because you will never know the feeling.
i have great respect for the settlers , they are my blood . but not for the real outsiders like you . not me.
pity you didn't bother to properly read my post.
ReplyDeletei'm not going to bother repeating it as there is no logical reason to suggest that you'll bother to try understanding it more than the first one.
lechayim tovim ulsholom
love a fellow jew
ReplyDeleteyou just do not have anything to say.
How dare the chabad hooligans talk disrespectfully to soldiers and cause havoc. The Chabad Rebbe I believe respected our soldiers who defend us with mesirat nefesh. For chabad Rabbis in Australia to critisize soldiers show that they are not Rabbis. How caqn anyone sitting in comfortable Australia open their mouths. Come here and join the IDF rather than look like a hippie in orange putting our country in danger. Sharon will get more Gan Eden than all you fellows together.
ReplyDeleteshow me the love
ReplyDeletecabad extremists :
in a rare move, Attorney General Menachem Mazuz decided to deport Sa'adia Hershkopf - a dual American and Israeli citizen to the United States for 40 days. The deportation of Hershkopf,
an 18-year-old resident of Kfar Chabad,
will replace his administrative detention.
anonymous israeli wrote-"intend to circulate your views and more so the way they are expressed as a warning of how much hate can come from the mask of outreach. suddenly ahavat israel means love of aza and hate of the first jewish army in 2000 years , after sinat chinam destroyed the last one."
ReplyDeleteI do not hate the IDF at all. In fact, if you have been folllowing my comments, which you obviously have not because otherwise you would know what I think, you would then know that I have been calling for an end to the radical rhetoric of the Melbourne orange people. I have written in the AJN and on this blog that the IDF and Sharon are not our enemies, and I detest any reference to them as nazis. The IDF and the Sharon government are our fellow Jews. My position has been the same one held by the offical Lubavtich position--that I am against the disengagement but I do not believe in doing anything against the IDF or anything that would undermine the Jewish State. As Rabbi Moshe Gutnick in Sydeny posekened--The Rebbe was against anything that would entail breaking the law or going against the government. All protests the Rebbe taught, should be done through peaceful democratic means.
I feel for the IDF soldier who is a young man and must have respect for the army and follow orders. I do not believe the IDF soldier should be demonised, in fact they are the heroes of the Jewish people. As I wrote in the AJN, I do not agree with the settlers who are calling for violence against the IDF as I do not want to see any Jew on either side of the political issue get hurt, G-d forbid. I wrote in the AJN I am totally against any talk of or acts of civil war between Jews. I am on record as having written this! Do not try and portray my views as being anything different to this becuase to say so would be a bold faced lie!
I also do not believe Sharon is a traitor, but I believe he is making a great mistake with this disengagment. I have written that Sharon is in my view, a great war hero, who bled and suffered for Israel, and I could never believe that he would become a traitor to Israel, but that he must believe that what he is doing is in Israel's best interest. I just do not agree that he is correct about this.
You are correct that the IDF soldiers have mesiras nefesh and that we Diaspora Jews cannot compare our mesiras nefesh to them. I agree with you, but we still have a right to voice our opinions because as you know, Diaspora Jews still have a special relationship to Israel.
I am upset you took some of my written statments out of context and distorted them because that is unfair to me and you misrepresent my views. While you accuse our side of having hatred for the left wing, this may be true of some people but certainly not of all of us and certainly I do not hate the left wing or any Jews. But is that hatred I feel coming from your posts on this blog? I do not hate the left, I disagree with the left, and there is a big difference. I did not ever call any Jews nazis, G-d forbid, and please do not put words in my mouth. And while the left wing did establsih the state, and they were truly great heros for that, we now have to move on and evolve from what they have created if the state is to survive, because at this point in time, it is the left wing, in my view that is destroying the state through their policies of appeasment and land concessions.
Am I not entitled to express my views? Is this not a democracy? Or are you going to distort my views as being something they are not, as being full of hatred and inflammatory rhetoric when they are not, just because you do not agree with me? Can't you disagree in a civil and respectful manner?
There have been hotheads on both the left and the right wings of the political specturm who have done reckeless and foolish things. And the incitement to violence has come from both sides. We must tone down the inflammatory rhetoric on both sides. The right wing must repsect the government's decision, and while the right wing has the right to protest, it must do so peacefully and legally. I have said that from the beginning.
I prefer one Shoshana Silcove to 33 Rabbis!
ReplyDeleteYechi Shoshana!
G-d bless Shoshanna Silcove, someone has to keep these guys in line and she's the one to do it.
ReplyDeleteWhat does PTB mean ?
ReplyDeleteptb=powers that be
ReplyDeleteto all you chabad bashers.
ReplyDeleteNo normal (self respecting) chabadnik / lubavitcher seriously reads or posts on this site.
Therefore I don't think you will get a proper response to the issues you have raised.
(shoshana silcove & Co. are not spokespeople for chabad.)
If you wish to properly discuss or clarify Chabads position on any of these issues, I suggest you contact your local chabad sheliach or institution.
To find your local sheliach or institution, you may look it up on www.chabad.org
Hey
ReplyDeleteAt least she's good entertainment value.
"shoshana silcove & Co. are not spokespeople for chabad"
ReplyDeleteI never claimed to be a spokesperson for anyone but myself. You want to give me that title, then that is your business, but I am not accepting it. I only state my own views which I have a right to do, as you have a right to do so also.
I protest you saying I am not 'normal' or 'self respecting' just because you may not agree with me. Do you always anonymously insult and denigrate people who have opinons you do not like? If so then you are immature and lack integrity.
I am also no Chabad basher. I am a Chabad loyalist and am fed up and sick and tired of the so-called Chabadniks who betray the Rebbe's teachings and ideals in his name. I have never deviated from the original teachings and directives I learned from the Rebbe over the past two decades of my life, while some in Chabad, and especially those in the PTB, have deviated from the Rebbe's teachings.
Many of the sentiments are being expressed on this blog because the PTB does not represent Chabad in its ideals and has not been responsive to the justifiable grievances of many good and G-d fearing Chassidish balabatim. But many people like myself (and their is no 'Silcove & Co.' as you put it)are tired of having our Chabad views and goals repressed by the PTB and are tired of having our children given a bad chinuch in Chabad mosdos.
The tide is changing though, as more and more people recognize that what I have been saying all along publicly, and what many others have been saying privately, is actually correct, and more and more respectable and learned Chabadniks are speaking out. Thank G-d for this, as it wil definitely bring to positive changes, and this is what is needed to save our next generation so they are raised with Chabad ideals, not as the PTB defines them,, but as the Rebbe does.
and the israeli again:(for the last time)
ReplyDeleteshoshana , : "it is the left wing, in my view that is destroying the state through their policies of appeasment and land concessions."
destroying (could not find a better way of saying it?
appeasment. (again reference to ww2)
"statments out of context" really?
this is not what you call " a civil and respectful manner"
its your language. not mine.
and its the overwhelming and mutual dehumanization process that is the necessary precondition for any confrontation - and, God forbid, for war. that i am talking about.
We should all take a deep breath right now and remind ourselves that, in the final analysis, the days to come are days of mourning for all Israelis. Mourning for the personal and ideological pain of the settlers whose dreams have been shattered; mourning for the fact that Israel was drawn into such a dangerous and unrealistic adventure like the creation of Gush Katif; mourning for the fact that the state brought itself to the place where it was forced to do such a violent, warlike and brutal thing to thousands of its citizens; mourning for the abyss that is being created inside our home, and for the disaster that could befall us very soon;
mourning for the situation in which we are trapped, Jew against Jew with a foreign, naked hostility that stands in complete, existential contradiction to our own interests.(d.g)
I haven't seen anywhere on this blog where AE says that he/she represents Chabad. This blog seems to represents individual views whether for or against chabad or anything else. Why is it wrong for people to have their own opinion on things? Do we always have to agree with thise in power even when they are wrong?
ReplyDeleteTo Israeli anonymous:
ReplyDeleteshoshanna says-I see nothing in my language that is not respectful or civil. 'Appeasment' is not a WWII word, it has been in the dictionary since before WWII. It describes the Oslo process. What is inflammatory about that word? Nothing. But if you are too sensitive for that word 'appeasement' then how about the words 'retreat' or surrender'? Are those politically correct enough for you? They also describe the current disengagment.
On the other hand, the words 'Nazi' , 'traitor' and 'deportation' are inflammatory words, and I never used them, the orange Melb people did, not I.
And yes, land concessions will destroy the state. But if you are so sensitive I will use the words 'undermine the state' instead, okay? You are really nitpicking since there is not hatred in my words, only disagreement.
And you did take my words out of context. I was referring to Peace Now who were bemoaning the possibility of violence between Jews, and said that they are like the orphans who killed his parents and then asks for mercy from the judge, because I believe it is people like the leftists in Peace Now that have caused this strife between Jews, by supporting this diesngagemnt in the first place.
Before you go off on a rant, learn how to argue issues sensibly, please
to shoshana it appears that you have nothing really to say as a response to anonymous israeli other than sound defensive and bruised as you have been challenged
ReplyDeletere"before u go off on a rant" i fail to see how he is ranting one can speak powerful messages and simultaneously be very calm or do u assume that if he is israeli then he must be hotheaded and do u assume that if he strongly disagrees with your choise of semantics then he must be sensitive why dont we just leave ego out of it as u clearly have a strong bond with yours.
anonymous-at least I have the integrity to put my name! maybe your ego is too fragile and you suffer from low self esteem so you are embarrassed to identify yourself!
ReplyDeleteby the way, I am not 'bruised' as you say. My feelings ar not the issue. I simply answered anonymous Israeli's unfounded criticisms one at a time. Do not put words in my mouth as I never said that anonymous Israeli is hotheaded because he is an Israeli, please do not read into my words, or make up things that I said. I do not think such things about Israelis and the thought of them being hotheaded is a prejudice that never entered my mind and was never put in this blog by me. This is unfair and low to pretend I meant things when there is not indication that I did mean them.
ReplyDeleteA 'rant' is a commonly used internet term for anyone who blogs at length on a subject. This blog post I am writing now is a 'rant' too. Once again, stop nitpicking.
And the anonymous israeli :
ReplyDeleteTo red adair or should I say Bat Yaana (ostrich)
“500,000 people at the Kossel, clearly demonstrate the clout Chabad has and will continue to have.”
wow, really?
Why not a million?
Or two?
and all to just to demonstrate the clout Chabad has.
by the way my red ostrich friend on what side of the fence in that picture are you?
the one that settled Israel?
the army?
I was and am both. Yes i was " fortuitous " enough to serve 5 years there, and i am "fortuitous" enough to have family there , that will have to be uprooted . and friends that farmed that land .
i love them all ,we are the same. And I will go back to them, while you sit here and pleasure yourself with the game of who is following the rebbe more.
you are the one with the clout .not me. i am just "left winger" who voted sharon the " left winger" in, that sent his " left wing " task masters" . Suddenly in one day I became ‘ one of them” the one that “. 'Appeases” that “destroy”.
i am all for stating your opinion that it might be dangerous and wrong to disengage. Heck i might even agree with that . its just the way its said, but you don’t get it do you.
its not moraly wrong to disagree , but if I disagree with you then my posts are "diatribe and inflammatory post". just prove my point.
but really if you think chabad still has the same regard it used to , just keep your head deep in the sand. red Ostrich .
I am sure things will change , chabad will find its way and voice , just for the sake of all of us don’t take too long.
and to:
” Our Mishiachisten and orange fanatics have recently undone more than 50 years of hard work where nearly all jews respected Lubavitch.
Thank you and keep up your shameful work, but don't blame anyone except yourselves for the bad light people view Lubavitch with today.”
I love you man , you are my hopes. Things will change.
Things better change as Chabad in Melbourne are the new experts of Israels security and preachers of doom and gloom of the millions of Jews they claim will now be (God Forbid) harmed.
ReplyDeleteIf they would return to spreading Jusaism rather than trying to run Israel by remote control they would do all of us a favour expecially themselves!!
Anonymous said...
ReplyDeleteto all you chabad bashers.
No normal (self respecting) chabadnik / lubavitcher seriously reads or posts on this site.
If you wish to properly discuss or clarify Chabads position on any of these issues, I suggest you contact your local chabad sheliach or institution.
......
or read their latest statements in the AJN....
To Shalom.
ReplyDeleteAs a Lubavitcher, I was embarrased from last weeks AJN.
And if you read this blog you claim you are not normal or not self respecting. What would you call someone who actually writes on this blog?
"but you have nothing else beside your attack on Chabad"
ReplyDeletedont flatter yourself.
"You are very transparent, who has fed your animosity? Let me guess!"
who? yasser arafat?
"
How true is the saying RELIGION AND POLITICS DON'T MIX!
ReplyDeleteNot by Hamas nor by Habad!
<< Police Detain Bus of Activists For Hours With no Water or Bathroom
ReplyDelete12:18 Aug 16, '05 / 11 Av 5765
(IsraelNN.com) A bus of anti-expulsion activists was stopped just before the Re'im Junction on the way to Gush Katif.
The bus is now being driven toward Be'er Sheva.
One of the passengers told Arutz-7 that the police are not allowing those on the bus to obtain water or use the bathroom. He says there are people on the bus who are on the verge of fainting and one man has a broken thumb >>
If this report is true then this is torture by the police.
I am sorry I do not accept this Loshon Hora against the police. Didn't the Rebbe speak very highly re the police and IDF?
ReplyDeleteIf someone faints as he can't get water on the bus how are they going to manage while protesting against a strong IDF.
Sounds rather typical!
Protesters will say anything to make a point!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeletethey came to protest in the desert without water, how lame.
ReplyDelete"Well now they have learned the bitter truth. the secular and anti-religious zionist have more in common with non-jews than religious jews of any stripe."
ReplyDelete'was that the rebbe way?
shoshana is it your way?
red?
someone.
or can you just atack the israelis here?
"And if you are richer than he in your knowledge of Torah and mitzvos? To quote again from R. Shneur Zalman: "Who can know their greatness and excellence in their root and source in the living G-d?" Judge not by appearances, for his soul may be loftier than yours. Never regard yourself as the magnanimous giver and he the needy recipient -- for it is perhaps you who is the inferior in spirit."
d.l " and their jewish[?] masters"
ReplyDeletei think that if the rebbe was with us today he would have cried for you.
sharon now is a safek jew is he?
did the rebbe told him that when they met.so are mofaz? zhal comanders?
and who else? are you the true jew?
i am not too young to remmember. but nor too old to forget what the rebbe stood for .
yes AE PLEASE DO NOT LET THE REBBE'S VIEWS BE DISTORTED HERE!!!!!
today in aljazeera:
ReplyDeleteSilent tears rolled down the face of one female soldier in the barricade as a young settler woman was knocked to the floor and nearly crushed under the feet of the raging crowd.
thats how our enemies describe our soldiers. the ones that d.l says They must be thrilled to bash other jews.
mR aNON - READ THIS FROM TODAY'S PAPER
ReplyDeleteTwo more IDF soldiers caught looting homes in Gush Katif
By Itim
Two Israel Defense Forces soldiers were caught Tuesday trying to loot the evacuated homes of settlers in the Gush Katif settlement of Pe'at Sadeh. This is the third time soldiers have been caught attempting to loot homes in that settlement this week.
The soldiers were in the midst of stealing pieces of silverware when a female soldier caught them in the act and reported the incident to a commander. The battalion commander then summoned the suspected soldiers and questioned them.
Advertisement
According to IDF officials, the soldiers have already admitted their guilt. The military prosecutor had ordered the Military Police to conduct a probe of the incident.
Two soldiers from the Givati Brigade were caught on Sunday night trying to steal home appliances from evacuated Pe'at Sadeh homes. Evacuated residents who had returned to their homes to remove equipment they had left behind complained when they saw other houses had been broken into and looted.
The two are being investigated on suspicion of theft charges.
The IDF has still not decided whether to open a file in the criminal investigation division against the three soldiers who on Sunday night were caught by Channel 10 cameras stealing a refrigerator during the evacuation of Pe'at Sadeh, because the initial investigation into that incident has not been completed.
Prequel to a cultural war
ReplyDeleteIsraelis will be asked to determine relation between Judaism and democracy
By Yossi Elituv [Y-Net, Yediot]
When historians analyze the turbulent summer of 2005, the “Summer of Disengagement,” they will uncover an intriguing fact: The ultra-Orthodox community, approximately 600,000 strong, stood at the forefront of the anti-disengagement campaign.
Despite the presence of the ultra-Orthodox party (Degel Hatorah) in Sharon’s coalition, ultra-Orthodox public opinion and the community leaders’ fervidly object.
Without a doubt, the ultra-Orthodox community in its entirety has aligned itself with its ideological cousins - the National-Religious
pro-settlements crowd - and has come together in an uncompromising, powerful resistance to the process.
What processes are behind this phenomenon? What mysterious force united Rabbi Ovadya Yosef – a dove and a supporter of the Oslo accords, Rabbi Yosef Elyashiv – the leading adjudicator of the ultra-Orthodox community, and Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu – the settlers’ rabbi?
This astounding harmony is not necessarily an expression of unflinching belief in an undivided Land of Israel. In contrast to stereotypes, the strong opposition of the religious and ultra-religious communities to the pullout is not based on Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda Kook’s messianic texts.
Public opinion surveys conducted in Jerusalem and Bnei Brak indicate a surprising willingness of substantial parts of the ultra-Orthodox community to hand over territories as part of a peace agreement. In a narrower, more focused discussion about Israel’s future borders, the segmentation among the ultra-Orthodox population resembles that of the population at large.
The real forces behind the shift in the ultra-Orthodox community’s attitudes about the disengagement are twofold. The first, relates to the general public debate; the other focuses on the disengagement plan.
The victims’ alliance
The first is not new. Its core lies in the notion that in the estranged, tribal Israel, one is considered a right-winger even without believing that the Land of Israel lies on both banks of the Jordan river.
If you are somewhat observant, belong to a lower socioeconomic layer – you are a right-winger. The categorization of “right” or “left” relies on four factors: Socioeconomics, religion, ethnic background and political affiliation – in this order. On the left are the rich, the Ashkenazi, secular, and politically moderate; on the right, the observant, Sephardic, the poor and politically to the right.
If you belong to three of the four groups of the right, you wouldn’t be able to participate in a pro-peace rally.
The ideological conflict between security experts from right and left over the pros and cons of the disengagement goes over the head of the typical ultra-Orthodox person: He can’t and won’t distinguish between senior Defense Ministery official Amos Gilad’s complex rational and Knesset Member Effi Eitam’s (National Union) ominous vision; both are equally articulate and self assured.
Thus the ultra-Orthodox are instinctively drawn to tribalism; i.e. if Yossi Sarid, clearly anti-religious, represents the yearning for peace – than, I am with the other camp; If I need to choose between Uri Avneri and Bentzi Lieberman as my neighbor -I rather live next to the latter even if we don’t see eye-to-eye politically. Lieberman, at least, does not threaten my faith and way of living.
The absolute identification with the settlers flows from the alliance of the cultural minorities in Israel; the “Alliance of Victims.” In today’s reality, a Jew who feels his faith, his home or his worldview are threatened, finds a niche in the right and, unconsciously, begins to repeat Lieberman’s mantras. Even without knowing if Aztmona is a name of a settlement or a war.
Current processes strengthen the connection between faith and land. Essentially the ultra-Orthodox crowd views the evacuation of Gush Katif as another step in the “disengagement” of the people from the heritage.
Shabat, Talmud and the bible, were abandoned. Jewish education is disregarded. Now the land itself is being deserted, Jews are uprooted from their homes.
Prequel to a cultural war
Beyond the “victims’ alliance,” there is another, more specific, factor that better explains the hawkish attitude adopted by the ultra-Orthodox. It relates to the current social crisis in the National-Religious camp. The ultra-Orthodox are shocked by the Israeli bourgeois’ indifference to the suffering of the settlers;
Basic societal rules must be upheld at all costs: while the world of some is collapsing, others must land their brothers a hand. Instead, sated Tel Aviv is gloating.
This melancholic bewilderment is nurtured when one considers the target; the consensus is that the national-religious sector breeds Israel’s future stars. Israel will not be able to fight the next war without these dedicated youngsters. Who will replace them? None of the MKs and journalists who are willing to forgo the services of the religious Zionist youths offer an alternative.
You might not like the extreme nationalism of these youngsters; you might disagree with the quality and priorities of the national Zionist movement’s values. Nevertheless, nowadays, where is the teenager who will give up a comfortable night’s sleep for an ideal?
The ultra-Orthodox observe how the settlers are treated and wonders what will happen in the day after the Arab-Israeli conflict is no longer on the agenda and a battle over Israel’s Jewish identity ensues? In this scenario, the ultra-Orthodox minority will confront an entire nation.
It seems that the current altercation is but a prequel of things to come in the near future; the face-off between the ultra-Orthodox minority and the government. On that junction, Israelis will be asked to determine what should be the ratio of Judaism vs. democracy; Bnei Brak and Tel Aviv will face one another. Then, in that tragic encounter, the traces of sympathy the government manages to direct at the settlers, will be lost.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3126150,00.html
THE FEMALE SOLDIER WHO CRIED WAS A RUSSIAN SHIKSA OR DRUZE??
ReplyDeleteThe Rebbes Shita was never to call all Israeli soldiers goyim?
"G-d Loves Every Jew as He Is
ReplyDeleteIt is therefore utterly out of place to belittle the virtues of those of our people who do not yet fully observe the Torah. Moreover, unloving rebuke is likely to break their spirit and dampen their innate Jewish zeal. With a more positive approach, however, the response is heartening indeed. In the last few decades, thousands of individuals and families have chosen to return to a lifestyle inspired by the Torah. In overwhelming proportions, the immediate reason for their choice is that someone reached out to them warmly and lovingly; a fellow Jew showed them how the practice of Judaism can infuse joy and meaning into their lives -- because it attunes them to their innermost selves.
G-d Alone Can Judge
There is a yet more fundamental flaw in criticizing the conduct of one’s fellow man. No person has the right to sit in judgment over his colleagues. Maimonides writes:[4] "The reckoning [of sins and merits] is not calculated on the basis of the mere number of merits and sins, but on the basis of their magnitude as well. Some solitary merits can outweigh many sins. The weighing of sins and merits can be carried out only according to the wisdom of the All-Knowing G-d: He alone knows how to measure merits against sins."
thats the rebbe i know
not your view of him
These are very inspiring quotes. Can you please cite the source.
ReplyDeleteit sure is inspiring. and its from
ReplyDeleteAn Adaptation of the Public Addresses of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, on the Tenth of Teves and on Shabbos Parshas Vayechi, 5751
it called: Every Jew Has a Silver Lining
"his words are a classic exposition of the underlying principles that have motivated Lubavitch outreach activities for years. In the most powerful manner, the Rebbe explains the unique spiritual potential each Jew possesses, and how that potential can be activated when one reaches out with love and joy. Conversely, the Rebbe notes how fruitless, inappropriate and incorrect are harsh criticism of one’s fellow Jew"
http://www.sichosinenglish.org/
Dear red, I appreciate that.
ReplyDeleteI would really hear your response to d.l. as I want to understand the position among Chasidim. Is the term “jews (?) “bothers you? . are you upset by depiction of Israeli soldiers as thieves? “
UBABIZA LO SHOLCHU ES YADAM with sheer happiness said...
“mR aNON - READ THIS FROM TODAY'S PAPER
Two more IDF soldiers caught looting homes in Gush Katif”
this is not an attack on you , so please don’t get defensive . I wanted to see if the like of you and others here has any sympathy to the militantly in d.l.
I have been with chabad on off for a long time , there is no hate , just sometime a total disbelieve in what I hear and see.
And yes , I was in chabad of zfat just over a month ago and I know them as I am on anshinu list and visit the mosadot that ask for my donations.
and for you son of mask, how do you know the origin of the soldiers . you do not sound jewish to me , in your midot anyway. and whats with your hatred to my brother lochamim the droze , i have served with them , it is the envy of them doing and you writing.
the beduim where good enough to guard our settelments but your view , racist that it is see every goy ... i do not even want to continue.
To son of Di!
ReplyDeleteYou missed the word "ALL".
The Rebbes shita was never to call ALL Israeli soldiers goyim!
It was said that ALL the soldiers evacuating Gush Katif are Russian, Arab or Druze!
Thanks RED ADAIR, It's about time that someone speaks nicely about our soldiers.
ReplyDeleteI have no idea of the status of the IDF soldiers and nor does Son of Di. WHAT I DO KNOW IS ALL THE SOLDIERS WILL GET MORE GAN EDEN THAN SON OF DI.
ReplyDeleteWhile you are sitting in Australia pointing your finger and deciding what their religous status is, they are putting their lives on the line defending Eretz Yisrael.
Please don't be the Rebbes spokeman that the Rebbe knew they will "bash Jews and get paid for doing so"
It's time to rid yourself from all your hate!
Shame- Son of Di -Shame
From the Herald Sun of today. Heading- NOT ALL EXTREMISTS ARE MUSLIM
ReplyDelete"Recently extremist Rabbis in Melbourne issued a religious ruling against an Israeli withdrawal from any part of the Gaza strip"
Who is causing the Chillul Hashem Rabbi Oliver?
When are we going to see the original Hebrew Psak?
ReplyDeleteFrom the Herald Sun of Augsut 18, on page 19, under 'MY SAY" with a photo of Jerusalem, showing the dome of the mosque next to an Israeli flage. Heading- NOT ALL EXTREMISTS ARE MUSLIM
ReplyDelete"Recently extremist Rabbis in Melbourne issued a religious ruling against an Israeli withdrawal from any part of the Gaza strip.....The problem here seems to be not the nature of the views expressed, but rather the potential association wiht violence.....Recently, it is Muslims--whether in Londn, New York, Madrid, Bali, or Israel--who have been the major perpetrators of religious based violence. Whe should not forget that other religions have a long hisotry of inciting violence." by Philp Mendes.
Thanks to the much mentioned AJN ad by Rabbi Oliver and Moshe Elkman, the Jews who are against the disengagement, have now been made comparable to Muslim terrorists in the mainstream press.
This is an outrage!
correction-the above letter was in yesterday's Herald Sun.
ReplyDeleteThe rabbis will never show the original hebrew psak for obvious reasons.
ReplyDeleteis that story true?
ReplyDeletethe leader of the ultra-Orthodox Lubavitcher Jews, Rebbe Joseph Schneersohn, members of his family, and some close associates were rescued from war torn Warsaw, by a small group of German soldiers ably led by half Jew Ernst Bloch, a dedicated, professional soldier. Bloch, whose application for Aryanization had been approved by Hitler himself, was a decorated soldier, who was working under the direction of Admiral Canaris, the head of the Abwehr. He and a small group of other half Jewish soldiers were able to take the Rebbe and his group from Warsaw, through Berlin, to the Latvian border where they awaited the next leg of an amazing journey that would eventually lead them to America
Many things help to make an army strong and successful. Let's talk about three very important rules.
ReplyDeleteThe first is to obey.
We all know that we should listen to our parents, our teachers and other people who guide us. Still, we sometimes say: "Sure, Mommy, I'll do what you say, but please tell me why I have to do it?" Or "Why does the teacher tell me to do it this way?"
Soldiers on the front don't ask why.
They listen to their commander, who may or may not explain why, and do just as they are ordered.
Based on the teachings and talks of the Lubavitcher Rebbe
Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson on the weekly Torah Portion
Adapted for Youth
from the Sicha of 5th Day of Sukkos, 5741
hopefully this post will not be deleted
My chabad rabbi said that if a soldier in Israel would have asked the Rebbe if you should obey orders, my Rabbi said that he is 100% sure that the Rebbe would say definetly YES!
ReplyDeleteWell the Rebbe would be called by Oliver and co a left winger.
ReplyDeleteThis is no news.
From Israeli Press!
ReplyDeleteAn armed right-wing extremist leader, Aryeh Yitzhaki, threatened Thursday afternoon to open fire on any soldiers who attempt to enter his house in the Gaza settlement of Kfar Yam, which is slated for evacuation Thursday.
At least 500 soldiers were surrounding the house, and additional forces were being sent in. Forty other extremists were holed up in Yitzhaki's house, including Women in Green founder Nadia Matar and her children. The protesters set a fire in the yard.
Standing on his balcony and holding an M-16, Yitzhaki announced on a megaphone that blood would be spilled if security forces entered his home.
----------------------------------------
Is this the type of people we should feel sorry for. This is the famous nut NADIA MATAR that Elkman keeps quoting. She should be locked up with the rest and the keys thrown away.
sue d.
ReplyDeleteStop deciding what should be done with people who are on the other side of the world not living in a peaceful country where everyone has a right to sleep in their own homes.
Put yourself in her shoes and see how you would enjoy being shunned upon by people who live in a nice safe and unthreatening environment.
You make me sick. You want to make a statement go to gush and give them support otherwise shut your mouth.
chaya mushkah said...
ReplyDelete"
sue d.
Stop deciding what should be done with people who are on the other side of the world"
is that a right reseved for chabad only?
"You make me sick. You want to make a statement go to gush and give them support otherwise shut your mouth."
exactly , bediouk. chaya moshka , you do
chaya look at the mirror , didnt the rebbe zecher zadik livracha told us to look at ourselves first
I have just been shown a sheet that someone is distributing that claims to be the original Hebrew version and the published English version of the psak that the 33 Chabad Rabbis signed. The sheet actually offers a $100 gift voucher to The Coatman to anyone who spots the difference.....
ReplyDeleteApparently it's was distributed anonymously so I don't know if it's a joke or serious.
In any event I quickly found seven differences - at least two of them pretty MAJOR. One changes the Shulchan Aruch's psak that talks about resisting "Akum" that come against a jewish city to the word "maurauders" who come to fight Jews - so that the whole psak now could be (and was) interpreted as being a call for civil disobedience by saying it is a mitzvah (worthy of even Shabbat desecration)to take up arms and fight against the TZAVA AND POLICE who are involved in disposessing the settlers. The other six were additions added in the text that significantly raised the militancy and rhetoric of the English version over the Hebrew (adding words such as calling the disengagement "perilous' and "suicidal surrender").
So it looks like the Rabbis were right when they claimed that they had been misrepresented by having their signatures lifted from the Hebrew version to the English version.
One day, I asked the Chabad Rabbi, Rabbi Minkowicz for his definition. I said, "Rabbi, what is a Jew?"He stroked his beard, and then said: "A Jew is someone with a Jewish soul." "But Rabbi, how can you tell if someone has a Jewish soul?" He said, "That's easy. If they like to eat onion bagels with cream cheese and lox ..."
ReplyDeleteNo, that was not his answer. He said, "Only God can tell who has a Jewish soul." I should have expected that answer. Chabad tries to refrain, as much as possible, from judgements. They want to allow people freedom to grow, and change, while they learn, without the burden of being judgmental. Compassionate? Yes.
anonymous israeli said...
ReplyDeletezecher zadik VEKODOSH livracha....
next time, please take the time to write the FULL proper befitting title, or just use initials. (and if your whole point is to make a statement, then leave the Rebbe out of your personal agenda and problems.)
G.m
ReplyDeletethe agenda is all yours.
by no doubt you are a bigger chosid then me , as you can give bigger titles.
adhear to your own advice and please leave the Rebbe out of your own personal agenda
Good shabbos,
ReplyDeleteBy the way while you are fighting I am claiming my victory.
g.m
ReplyDeletei have s atory for you that i hope that even you can understand:
Levi Yitzhak replied, "I will tell you the real reason for my behavior. When I rose to the bima and took my tallit in my hand, ready to begin the verses, the Evil Inclination followed up behind me.
"He said that he wanted to recite the verses together with me! So I said to him, 'Who do you think you are to be honored like that?'
"And he replied sarcastically with his own question, 'And who are you?'
"I answered him, 'I am a learned scholar.'
"To which he replied, 'So am I.'
"And I answered him, 'If you're such a great scholar, then tell me, where did you study? I studied under, Rabbi X, Rabbi Y, and Rabbi Z.'
"He looked surprised, and said, 'I also studied with them. I was there together with you.'
"Then I retorted, 'But I am a chasid!'
"And he looked me straight in the eye and said, 'No more than I!'
"And with that I became angry at him. 'How could you be a chasid. I learned from chasidim, studied their habits and ways. I spent my time among them. But you, where were you?'
" 'Why, I was there together with you all that time. Whatever you learned I also learned.'
"And then I realized that I could never win the argument. He would go on arguing forever, wanting to stand on the bima with me and recite the holy verses alongside me. So I gave up. I put down my tallit, and I turned to him and said, 'If you are such a great scholar, and you are such a great chasid, then you stand here and recite the verses yourself!'"
Thoughts that Count
anonymous israeli said...
ReplyDeletea very beautiful story with a great lesson to learn from. thank you for sharing, (although in the future please post the full story, so that someone that doesn't know the story can understand it).
however.. what has that got to do with your agenda. do people in australia still make an issue of it, or is it just you...
oj
ReplyDeleteyou have great ideas, have you implicated any of them yourself, or are they just good suggestions for other people
sue d.
ReplyDeletethis Aryeh Yitzhaki that you bring proof from, he's not even frum, he's a nut who sent a letter to kofi annan for help against the israeli govenment!
what a reliable source! please get your information right before you post.
Funny,
ReplyDeleteIt is no secret that the Friedeker Rebbe and his family did get help from Bloch who was half jewish and in the German High Command to escape from Nazi Germany .Needless to say the Gerrer Rebbe supporters paid enormous amounts of money (said to be US$100000 in 1940s)to get the Gerrer Rebbe to Switzerland from Poland.
No Chassidic group ever details this information as it does please the palate.
There were also Israelis in Yitzhakis group of terrorists.
ReplyDeleteSorry I meant to say :- There were also Chabadniks in that terrorist Yitzhakis group!
ReplyDeleteTo Chaya Mouska.
ReplyDeleteNobody in Australia can decide what should be done to these trouble makers, but sus d. has a right to wish they should be thrown into jail for good. I imagine thisw would be a rather mainstream wish. But the Israeli judicial system will of course decide. That people in Australia should not give opinions, I believe if it is not an anti government opinion rather to support a civilized society where people can't go round harming others and get away with it, should be fine to express such an opinion!
Facts not palateable thank you. i just read it and did not know if its true.
ReplyDeleteI also think that those protesters that threw acid, paint etc. at soldiers should receive severe punishment.
ReplyDeleteElkman has announced he is going to Jerusalem to establish a new religous government and recapture Gush Katif!
ReplyDeleteHe says "THE FIGHT IS ONLY BEGINNING"
This subject is called CHABAD AND POLITICS!
ReplyDeleteMy observation is for Chabad to stick to Kiruv as when it comes to politics they make fools of themselves! Chabad seem to be rather lousy politicians.
Anonymous said...
ReplyDeleteSorry I meant to say :- There were also Chabadniks in that terrorist Yitzhakis group!
please back up your baseless claim with some proof
Barricaded Chabad Group Threaten Suicide
ReplyDeleteThe mostly American Chabad group barricaded in a bomb shelter in Neve Dekalim, Gaza are threatening mass suicide:
Members of a New York-based ultra-Orthodox Jewish movement were threatening to commit mass suicide on Wednesday in protest at the Gaza Strip pull-out, security sources and associates said.
The members of the Lubavitch movement had barricaded themselves inside a communal bomb shelter at the main Gaza Strip settlement of Neve Dekalim with gas cylinders, said their local leader, Rabbi Yigal Kirshenzaft.
"There are about 20 of them shut inside a bomb shelter and say they have gas there," he said.
An AFP correspondent said border police officers and two rabbis were trying to negotiate through air vents with the group, mostly Americans, inside.
One security source put the number inside at about a dozen, but said it had not been confirmed that the group also had gas canisters.
The group are followers of the late Rabbi Menacham Mendel Schneerson, who headed the ultra-Orthodox Lubavitch movement until his death 11 years ago.
Appt
what proof are you after ? dna?
g.m something for you
ReplyDeletethe words of the Rebbe on pg. 38, "If a person lacks the courage to stand before the truth then he will try to justify his negative behavior with all sorts of pretexts and justifications instead of changing...in this case, because he became enmeshed in complications from which he finds no escape, he will try to invent a 'personal philosophy' for himself which will justify his negative behavior and he will go from failure to failure."
now you can attack my agenda again.
very negative personality for a chasid.
to anonymous israeli!
ReplyDeleteEveryone knows the Rebbe fought for Darkei Noam. If the Rebbe would be alive he would never stand by and let young hooligans drag the name of Chabad through the mud. Using Sefer Torahs, Tefillin, Babies the Holocaust for politics to defame Israel in the eyes of the goyim is pathetic. These so called lubavitchers are really our biggest enemy. Chabad has become a joke thanks to these fanatics.
Excuse me, Lubavitch is against civil disobedience? Since when? Anyone who can say such a thing is obviously unfamiliar with the history of Lubavitch in Russia. A movement which is proud of being led by jailbirds, who openly defied the authorities to do what they thought was right. The previous rebbe went to jail for the first time at the age of 7, for denouncing a policeman who was acting unjustly. And his father, the Rebbe Nismaso-Eden, was proud of him for this criminal behaviour, as he himself was throughout the rest of his life!
ReplyDeleteThose who subscribe to the Zionist philosophy may claim that there is a difference between resisting the Russian government and a Jewish government in Eretz Yisrael. But Lubavitch has always firmly rejected Zionism, and in principle regards the Israeli government exactly the same as that of any other country where Jews live. When it acts as a malchut shel chesed it deserves our support, and to the extent that it acts to the contrary we must resist it.
i donot remember stories about chasidim in russia throwing acids from roof ,its a totally different situation .
ReplyDelete"regards the Israeli government exactly the same as that of any other country where Jews live"
and the israeli army and poice exactly like the bolshvic one?
they sure can not act like that with australian police.
the chabad that i love:
ReplyDelete"Aharon approached only with love and drew them to Torah through love. In this case, the way that Aharon pursued the performance and the spreading of Yiddishkeit, here the goal and the manner are all the same. The goal is to produce light and kindness and the manner was a manner of light and kindness. So that even on the surface it was obvious that the love for the creatures was there and it was through that that Jews were drawn closer to Torah."
"
The style that the Rebbes of Chabad used to light the neshamas in other Jews and particularly the Previous Rebbe was that of love, which was obvious and visible to all. Not only was the end goal one of light and of joy, but also the style and approach to bring a Jew to Yiddishkeit was only through ways of kiruv and pleasantness. They lit the neshamas of all seven categories of Jews."
"Behaaloscha"
I cannot believe that milhouse is serious when he compares Soviet Russia to Israel!!!!! Or the Tzava and Israeli police to a Soviet policeman!!!!
ReplyDeleteIf that's where the debate is seriously going, Heaven help us all!!!!
That chochom Millhouse believes that it is the derech of chabad to treat Jewish police and jewish soldiers as soviet anti semitic soldiers were treated.
ReplyDeleteWell my Lubavitch and my Rebbe is a different one than yours!
All the problem of Jews being thrown out of Gaza only started after the Yellow Mashiach flag went up on Hotham street opposite Yeshiva!
ReplyDeleteIt should be on the shule!
I am sure that if the Rebbes flag would be on the shule we would have the whole Gaza!
mhm, so you think that all we need to do is to fly a yellow flag and that will make all our problems go away?
ReplyDeleteHundreds of years of Chabad Chassidus, of mesiras nefesh, of Torah learning, and it all comes down to flying a yellow flag?
How pathetic! This is not Chabad Chassidus, this is a cult!
Silco!
ReplyDeleteYOU ARE OLD FASHIONED
mhm, I live my life according to Chabad the way it was before the Moshiachists and yellow/orange flags ruined it, and made us a laughing stock. The Chabad I signed up for stood for old fashioned ideas like that one works on oneself and actually does the hard work of learning and internalising Chassidus. this is not popular today with the young am'haratzim who wish only to make an empty shturim and degrade everything the Rebbe built over 40 years.
ReplyDeleteYup, those foolish yunguns'---tsk! tsk!
Yechi Hamelech! Yechi Hamelech! Yechi Hamelech!
ReplyDeleteSilco get yourself a life!
Everyone should support Felafel king (ex zavdiel) in Kooyong Road. His sign is the holy blue on Yellow and he has the same crown as on the Moshiach flag.
ReplyDeleteYechi Adonenu Moireinu VeRabeinu Melech HaMoshiach LeOlam Voad!
shoshana, you say that all these chsidim do is wave thier flags, well that's not true. stop criticising every body and look at yourself. fix your self up first
ReplyDeleteshoshana,
ReplyDeletethere is a story of Reb Hillel Parcheve. Being a chosid he always wanted to see his rebbe, the Alter Rebbe. whenever he would come to the Alter Rebbe's house or the hotel that he was staying in the Alter Rebbe was never there. One timeReb Hillel PArchave foound out the which the room the rebbe was going to be in and Reb Hillel ran to that hotel and hid under the bed in the room where the Alter Rebbe was going to stay.
When Reb Hillel was under the bed he was thinking of a good question he couls ask to the Alter rebbe on Gemmorah. he thought of a very difficult questiion uin Gemmorah in Mesechtos Eirchin about evaluating.
WHen the Alter Rebbe cmae into the room he said straight away, before Hillel could reveal himself, " some one who has a shaila (question) aobut evaluatign, he should evaluate himsaelf. moral of ths stroy. Perfect yourself then you havre the right tro perfect others.
P.S. When Reb Hillel heard what the Alter Rebbe said he fainted and he never ended up seeing the Alter Rebbe.
and after that story reb hillel knited himself a yellow flag , and started singing yechi....
ReplyDeleteoh sorry ,those chsidim were not "real" they were "old fashioned" unlike todays story tellers
The tragic irony, is that the whole messianic movement has not strengthened belief in Moshiach it has ultimately weakened it. It has become an object of ridicule among Jews and non-Jews alike, who look askance at the whole concept of Moshiach, which has been trivialized by the ads, billboards, bumper stickers and petitions.
ReplyDeleteLikutei Sichos Volume 19, p533:
ReplyDelete"...regarding the order of Moshiach first being victorious, then building the Beis Hamikdosh, and then gathering the exiles...it is clear that the Rambam wrote this in Hilchos Melachim chapter 11 (twice), and since none of the Rabbinical commentarieson this section we indicate any objection, it must be that this also concurs with their opinion. This includes Raavid, the Beis Yosef, the Radbaz, etc. How can anyone be so brazen as to dispute all of them!?...Certainly and absolutely the Rambam and all the authoritative Rabbinical commentators above were not ignorant,Chas v'Shalom, of the well known sayings of our sagesin Talmud Yerushalmi and in Shir Hashirim Rabba....and as for the contention that what the Rambam wrote there--in Chapter 12, and that there are things which are in doubt, etc.--this refers to the items he adds in Chapter 12, but not in reference to what he wrote in Chapter 11, which he wrote explicitly and repeatedly etc."
So, according to the Rebbe, Moshiach must come after he builds the Beis Hamikdosh, and he is not here yet.
Regarding Moshiach coming from the dead, even a cursory examination of the Moshichist so-called 'sources' reveals that truly none of them provide any support for the Moshichist thesis at all. These sources--Gemora, Midrash,Sedei Chemed, Arbarbanel, Zohar, Kisvei Hoarizal--are clearly speaking about the SOUL of Moshiach, NOT HIS BODY, are discussing Moshiach ben Yosef, not Moshiach ben David, or they are discussing the lofy SPIRITUAL ELEVATION Moshiach will attain in his ardous quest to bring redemption, and not a Moshiach which arises from the dead.
ReplyDelete"anonymous israeli", in claiming that "they sure can not act like that with australian police", shows the typical Israeli's utter ignorance of what living in a free country is like. This ignorance is very noticeable whenever Israeli politicians pronounce about "democracy", as when Yossi Sarid demanded that America ban some religious group or other for "hate speech".
ReplyDeleteI assure "anonymous israeli" that if the Australian government ever decided that Jews would not be allowed to live in Brunswick, and sent the police in to forcibly remove them, the entire community would be up in arms, and it would simply not be allowed to happen, no matter how much force it took to stop it.
In any case, the claim was not that Lubavitch is against fighting, but that it's against civil disobedience; whoever made such a claim showed only his own ignorance of the history of Lubavitch, which is very much about civil disobedience, refusal to obey laws and orders which go against the demands of yiddishkeit, and a complete refusal to be overawed by authority.
"flabbergasted" cannot believe that I would compare "Soviet Russia to Israel!!!!! Or the Tzava and Israeli police to a Soviet policeman!!!!". I'd like him or her to explain what exactly is the difference, without resorting to zionist theology about Israel being part of the geulah. Lubavitch is an anti-zionist movement, and rejects the notion that Israel is in any way special. The current Israeli regime has the same status as the British mandate, or the Ottoman rulers before that. And remember that one of the most famous incidents of civil disobedience in Mandatory times, the blowing of the shofar at the kotel on motzaei Yom Kippur 1930, was done davka by a chabadnik (R Moshe Segal). He ignored the danger, he ignored the law, he was not prepared to give up even a minor minhag out of deference to the so-called "authorities". Because that is what Lubavitch is about.
shoshana I don't know if you realise but mhm is not a mishichist and I doubt he is lubavitch at all. All I know is that he is laughing b/c he has gotten you all hyped up like a little kid who is being teased with a lolly.
ReplyDeleteI can get into a whole discussion if you really want (like last time)but i was asked not to provoke your narrow minded views.
Which clarifies for me that you and anyone else that doesn't believe the rebbes prophecy that moshiach is coming in OUR generation should be called chassidim of the freidiker rebbe. I know of people who called themselves that. I recall someone saying on this blog that chabad had six rebbes before the rebbe and they were all holy people which is correct so why don't you become ONLY their chassidim if you only want to pick and choose what the rebbe said.
Of course I realized mhm was joking around. So what? Who is 'hyped up" Not I.
ReplyDelete"Which clarifies for me that you and anyone else that doesn't believe the rebbes prophecy that moshiach is coming in OUR generation should be called chassidim of the freidiker rebbe"
Are you a nar? I just copied words from the Rebbe above. Can't you read? Or do you just pick and choose the words the Rebbe said that fit into your point of view?
YU\es, the Rebbe said this is the generation of Moshiach. But why is your interpretation of his words so linear and simplistic? Anyone with the any powers of analysis would understand that there could be several interpretations of that. What did the Rebbe mean by 'generation'? No one can say for certain what that meant, how long, from when till when?
Also, the Rebbe may not have said that as a prophecy. How do you know the Rebbe meant that as a prophecy? Did he announce it was a prophecy? NO he did not!
The Rebbe was a complex genius and said many things we cannot fully comprehend. Sometimes he was talking directly to us, somethimes he was talking out loud to himself, sometimes he was talking to Hashem. The problem is that we are limited people and he was a great tzadik, thus we could not always know exactly who the Rebbe was addressing his words to. Perhaps when the Rebbe said "Moshiach is here' or that this is the last generation, he was trying to bring down the koyach from Himel in order for this to be true. This is a Chassidish concpet and it is known the Rebbeim often said things in order so the spiritual energy of their words could bring down bruchas. The Rebbe told Rabbi J.J. Hecht he would live to see Moshiach but we just past Rabbi Hecht's 15th yartzeit. What did that mean? Do you or does anyone else fully understand why the Rebbe said that and Rabbi Hecht did not live to see Moshaich? Perhaps it was a brucah the Rebbe tried to bring down. The REbbe gave many Chassidim bruchas and many of the bruchas did not materialize. Do you undersand that? Of course not, since none of us can fully comprehend the Rebbe.
Perhaps when the Rebbe said this is the generation of geulah he was saying it as a brucha much like a Jew gives an other Jew a brucha like for instance,'You will have good health.' You see, anyone who understands how complexly the Rebbe operated would understand that no one can be certain the Rebbe meant this as a prophecy.
The Chassidim closest to the Rebbe taught me this. I know some of them, closely, and the ones closest to the Rebbe do not say YECHI because they understood that this was never the Rebbe's intention.
But the Moshiachists have taken a giangantic complex genius like the Rebbe and have made his words into simple pat slogans. Perhaps it is you who are not being true to the Rebbe's words, by turning them into simplistic narrow minded interpetations and creating a dogma which does not reflect the spirit of the Rebbe's great awesome personality or his kavanah.
Chabad is the greatest movement in Judaism today. Chabad is the driving force of Yiddishkeit.
ReplyDeleteChabad transformed my life and gave me purpose and direction. As a young woman, The Rebbe's shluchim gave me their time, their care, and worked hard to help set me on the path of Torah.
The Rebbe was the most glorious human being I have ever encountered. I lived in his dalad amos for 14 years I witnessed his supernatural powers, and was always humbled and awed by the Rebbe's greatness.
In the years when the Rebbe was in his prime he had the world at his feet. Living near the Rebbe gave one the sense of not only being a part of monumental historical events but also of having a hand in shaping them. The greatest inteelectuals in all fields came to the Rebbe on a daily basis for his blessing and advice.
I watched as the Rebbe toiled day after day, in all kinds of weather and in all kinds of conditions, around the clock without rest. He stood each day for hours on end at the Ohel, without food and drink. One could go past 770 at all hours of the night and see his office light was still on, as the Rebbe was still working far into the wee hours of the night.
The Rebbe carried the burden of thousands of Jews on his shoulders and gave without a hint of ego or self interest. The Rebbe brought original thoughts of Torah into the world and opened up the gates of Torah scholarship far beyond horizins anyone could have imagined.
And there were miracles,hundreds of them, falling off his table and onto the streets, giving us all tremendous hope, inspiration and uplifiting us to heights of lofty elevation on his shoulders.
I love the Rebbe. And to see his name besmirched, to see his ideas degraded, to see him being turned into a parody of what he truly was hurts me deeply.
The Rebbe told us to bring Moshiach, not that he was Moshiach. Rabbi Leibel Groner goes around the world telling this story--he went to the REbbe and said 'Nu, Rebbe reveal yourself!" And the Rebbe answered Rabbi Groner,'Moshiach does not even know who he is until the time of Redemption."
Ad Mosai!
Shoshana, I would love to farbreng with you. You would a most inspiring participant. If only we could share our thoughts etc. over a little bit of mashkeh!
ReplyDeletefinder of truth, that would be nice but I do not know who you are!
ReplyDelete"shows the typical Israeli's utter ignorance of what living in a free country is"
ReplyDeletemilhouse , you just showed your true colours , as a typical jew. typical arab, everything to a narrow minded racist.
chabad wake up.
you do not have the love the rebbe talked about .
Our halachah is full of differences between jews and non-jews. I will not elaborate on an open forum but anyone with any knowledge of Halachah knows this. Laws of mesirah in particular show this. I still ask how could seriosuly one make the comaprison that because certain actions were prokoted or condoned gaimansy Soviet police or officials that the same action should be condoned gainst Yidden (veaf al pi shechoto yisroel hu)?! This is a total perversion of halachah and darkei hachassidus.
ReplyDeleteOh shoshanah, if it is meant to happen, we will meet and have that farbrengen.Of that I am sure. My mission is to find the truth, and it shall be found.
ReplyDeleteMillhouse would be well suited to be the propoganda minister for the PA.
ReplyDeleteHurry up before Elkman gets the job!
Your anti semitism is legendary!
Millhouse wrote--"Lubavitch is an anti-zionist movement, and rejects the notion that Israel is in any way special."
ReplyDeleteMillhouse, this comment shows your complete and utter ignorance of the Lubavticher view of EY. Maybe you are mixing Lubav up with Nuteri Karta? Lubavitch is as Zionist as you are if not more so.
"The current Israeli regime has the same status as the British mandate, or the Ottoman rulers before that."
What can I say about the utter ignorance of this statement above? The current Israeli government is the legitimate elected democratic government of the soverign state of Israel. The British Mandate and the Ottoman rulers were foreign powers and Israel was not yet a state when they ruled EY.
For goodness sakes Millhouse, read some history before you go on and on ponitificating as if you actually know what you are talking about. Then maybe you can stop asserting the most blatantly innacurate and ignorant statments!
Yes Millhouse! you are such a nong.You seem to know nothing about everything.Go away and read up on life and a little bit of history, then change your lifestyle, it must be boring you no end. Goodness gracious mio such nonsense this millhouse writes.
ReplyDeleteMillhouse have you applied yet for the job of Palestinian Propoganda Minister?
ReplyDeleteYou and your mates show that fanatical chabadniks are a very dangerous lot.
Elkman, Oliver and you should be shipped to Gaza on a one way ticket.
So Rabbi Groner clearly states in todays AJN that opinions like Millhouse are contrary to the derech of Lubavitch.
ReplyDeleteNow it is officially confirmed.
A could have told you that weeks ago. Rabbi Groner only found out today as Chaim Tzvi only taught him this today!
ReplyDelete