It was an amazing zchus to be part of the Birchas HaChama! To see so many people from different parts of the community join together for avodas HaShem! Kudos to RBSA Torah and those who helped.

My only comment is in regard to the overdoing of signs by Kupa Shel Tzedaka. Now before I get labled as a Kupa "basher" let me say that I support them and think they do good work. But having banners all over the place was just uncalled for.

This was supposed to be an "unpolitical", uniting the community event. After seeing all of the signs my young son innocently said "wow, you mean Kupa also made the Birchas HaChama?".

After the dancing I would have normally gone to donate at the Kupa duchan. I was so turned off at the over advertising that I walked away.

Kupa has to learn when it is the right time to be "in your face" and when it's not.

at least in the announcement afterwords they announced that there are two amazing tzedaka organizations in the community - LA and Kupa - and they both have duchans for donating and everybody should go over and donate generously....
(it was the head of Kupa who made the announcement)

i thought it was a very moving experience

one question to Ari.

I heard that the Piezner Rebbe was going to say the bracha
what happened?
I noticed that it was Rabbi Perlstein

I personally think that the rebbe would have been a better choice at an achdus event

chag kasher vesameach

just beautiful. we should all be zoche to do more mitzvos together and to renewed achdus

Both of the Achdus events so far (Beis Tefilla 'launch conference' and the Birkat HaChama in the Park) were characterised by:

1. Well publicised, good turn-out, a lot of enthusiasm. "Success!"

2. Rabbi Perlstein, the most extreme/militant of the chareidi camp, in the kovod spotlight. (Others got walk-on support roles).

It does look like, regardless of the great intentions and talents of the organizers, Rabbi Perlstein has hijacked the RBSTorah Achdus initiative.

If the third public event (assuming there will be one) also has Rabbi Perlstein similarly and uniquely positioned for kovod, I for one ain't going.

Kol Hakavod to RBSTorah folks on the very nice Achdus Divrei Torah Booklet put out in the shuls on Yom Tov.

It was particularly striking that none of the contributors were especially highlighted - all were printed in the same (modest) way.

I noted that Rabbi Perlstein was conspiciously absent from this.

Was that because he wasn't offered the opportunity (unlikely) or because he chose to reject it?

Maybe the self-appointed Mora Dasra's printed words, placed alongside those of other (lesser?) rabbonim, was too much of a leveller, so he skipped it...

I think you guys missed an important accomplishment here.
as opposed to the original achdus event in bais tefilah several months ago, this time there was a much larger turn out on the side of the main stream chareydi community. most of the gra and chanichey, and eretz hatzvi kehillos showed up this time. this is something that should be credited to rav perlstein. despite many overtunes inside the cahreydi community against making an event together with the mizrachi and amerikanishe tzibur, (in case anyone didn't notice, there indeed was another birkas hachama event in the neighborhood - presumabely not because it was too far to walk up the hill from kishon and sorek), rav perlstein insisted in pushing through with the achdus event displaying real leadership despite the threat of lowering his status among the ultra- chareidi who aren't interested in achdus. he led the way showing the community the importance of achdus and the advantage of having a joint event involving the cross spectrum of the rbs community.
in my opinion this is a tremendous step in the achdus that people are always talking about- an event where a significant part of every community was in attendance and took part, Rabbi Cooperman was given a major role, the siyum was made by a person with a kipa sruga, the kadish by a sefardi rabbi, and both tzedakah organizations were given equal footing (by the official program). Rabbi perlstein being honored with the official bracha making and not rav shpiro was probably the ingredient that allowed for the full participation.
it was a tremendous step in uniting the community.
focusing on all the little fine details and rav perlstein's status or who put up more advertisements will just prevent any true achdus from being attained.
kudos to rav perlstein and his tremendous showing of fearless leadership showing his constituents the proper way to go.