kol isha alert..

looks like a good movie.. peek-a-Jew happens at about 1:21.. no idea what he adds..

Bibi should wander around Israel every now and then as well and greet his own citizens...

this report on Kikar is weird, but might even be brilliant!

According to the report, there has been an uptick in the number of people hospitalizing their elderly parents, who need care, just for the holidays as they are too difficult to deal with and provide the necessary care over the holidays. This is referring specifically to people who normally are caring for their elderly parents, but it just becomes too difficult during holiday season, so they hospitalize them instead. Obviously the elderly parents qualify for hospitalization and need to medical care, but usually the kids take care of them, perhaps with an on-call nurse or perhaps not, but it just becomes too difficult during the holidays.

This is a brilliant solution. I am going to look more into this option... I guess I'll find out firsthand if my parents read this or not... :-)

You are saying that for decades football has been played on Shabbos, but you are forgetting that our tradition and Torah have been around for 5777 years.

  -- Chief Justice Noam Solberg, responding to a claim made in the Supreme Court as to why it is important to continue allowing the football games to be played on Shabbos

WATCH how brave American diplomats handle Rosh Hashana delicacies Gefilte fish and Regel Krusha (p'tcha), and can they keep it down? Every year new American diplomats arrive in Israel to serve at the Embassy. This year we decided to test their "guts" with a couple of dishes that are most-closely associated with Rosh Hashana. These reactions you DON'T WANT TO MISS (and the surprise visitor at the end)!

get a bit into the High Holiday spirit...

There is a minhag that women do not wear gold jewelry on Yom Kippur. Personally I never was aware of it until after I was married. In more recent years it seems to have spread to also men removing any gold jewelry (usually a watch, sometimes a ring) and also to Rosh Hashana.

the supposed reason for this custom is to not raise the memory of the Golden Calf on the day we stand in judgement. Presumably wearing gold jewelry would cause God to remember the sin of the Golden Calf.

Personally I do not believe in "new" minhagim so I wear my watch on Yom Kippur (and Rosh Hashana), in addition to the practical reasons to wear it (i.e. to tell the time, and I have no other watch - during the week I use my cellphone or other digital contraptions for telling time).

Someone asked Rav Bentzion Mutsafi about wearing a watch on Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur with a silver strap that has gold stripes on it.

Rav Mutsafi responded that both men and women can wear gold jewelry on Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur and there is absolutely no source for the minhag to not wear such jewelry. Only the kohen gadol would remove his gold jewelry and garments when he went into the kodesh kodashim on Yom Kippur. nobody else needs to remove anything. Rav Mutsafi exhorts the questioner, and I guess everyone else, to not make up things from their imagination.
source: Kikar

as an aside, Rav Mutsafi also criticized another new custom.

While everyone talks about going to Uman for Rosh Hashana, there is also a custom, common in Breslav among those who do not go to Uman along with some other people, to spend Rosh Hashana by the grave of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai in Meron, also often leaving one's family behind.

I first learned of this custom a few years ago when a friend went with a hassidic rebbe with whom he was close.

Rav Mutsafi said one should preferably daven calmly and peacefully in a shul close to home and eat is meals at home with his family.

New customs all around. None of them are real. People can make up whatever they want and whatever makes them feel good and fulfilled - but it does not mean you have to follow suit.

Yisrael Hayom is reporting on a statement supposedly made by some unnamed person highly connected to the Mideast peace negotiations from the side of the USA saying that if Abu Mazen's upcoming speech at the United Nations will be laden with direct attacks on the US Administration and its peace efforts, the USA will respond by moving the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

First of all, I'll take what we can get. If that is what is needed to get the USA to move the Embassy, and if Abu Mazen attacks the USA at his United Nations podium, and the USA carries out its threat, so be it.

Second, this may be an impetus for Abu Mazen to speak harshly about the USA instead of a deterrent. Then he can blame the USA and show them as unfair brokers and nobody will remember that Abu mazen did what he did but will simply blame the USA.

Third, I really prefer that the Embassy be moved as a result of a decision that it is the right thing to do - and not by being used as a threat, neither as a stick or as a carrot. If the USA thinks the time is right and it should be moved, move it. If not, not. 

Fourth, this might actually be a bigger threat to the Israelis who seemingly have not wanted the ruckus that could be caused by such a move and seemingly had persuaded Trump's people to put the plan on the backburners.