this is pretty bad. can you imagine finding out that your mohel was no good so your mila is invalid and you have to do it again? Bad enough at 8 days, can you imagine having to redo it at 20 or 30 or 50 years old???

According to this report, a mohel from Russia, in the Saratov region, was invalidated by the Vaad Harabonim of the area due to it having been discovered that in 1991 he went to a festival in Zitomar in the Ukraine and at the festival ate pork. The rabbonim decided that this mohel was unreliable and unfaithful. He kept his secret hidden for 6 years until it became known, but in the meantime had circumcised 150 Jewish babies.

1997 is more than 20 years ago, so I dont know why they are only deciding this now, but still, can you imagine being told you have to redo your bris at age 25? Hopefully the rabbonim will only require the extraction of a drop of blood rather than some more invasive medical procedure..

very strange, but enchanting

Mayor of Haifa Yona Yahav went to meet with Minister of Interior, and more specifically head of Shas, Aryeh Deri to try to make a deal to have Shas support him in the upcoming mayoral race in Haifa. Yahav is a bit beleaguered, as Degel Hatorah has been very anti Yahav, claiming he discriminates against their community in Haifa. Meanwhile Aguda has already declared support for him.

I don't know what will come out of it, nor do I have an opinion on Yahav's status as mayor of Haifa. The most interesting thing about this meeting is the following picture (posted in Haredim10)


Deri is wearing sunglasses indoors, in his office? Who does he think he is - Rav Ovadya Yosef?

I am completely at peace with myself. I acted as was necessary. I went with my truth. I acted appropriately and everything that happened should not have. I have no regrets. I have no doubt that if you would put me back now to the same moments as the incident in hebron - I would do the exact same thing. Because that was the right thing to do.

  -- Elor Azariah

obviously, kol isha

cute title

I have zero intention of getting involved in any way in the upcoming local elections. I will not be supporting or endorsing any candidate nor will I campaign on behalf of any candidate or party. I also have no intention of commenting on the various campaigns from a political perspective, though I will comment on side issues that are campaign/elections related.

Such as the following:

I dont get this. It makes me scratch my head.

Behadrei is reporting that Moshe Montag, from a different party (Degel Hatorah) than Mayor of Bet Shemesh Moshe Abutbol (Shas) and from a party that has not yet expressed its own support for Abutbol, is running the coalition negotiations for Abutbol. The article is about the Likud pulling its support from Abutbol due to Montag not agreeing to some of the demands made by the Likud

 How is that possible? isnt that a conflict of interests? When Degel sits with Abutbol to negotiate what Abutbol will offer them in exchange for their support, does Montag just make an appointment with himself and sit down in his own living room or at a coffee shop all by himself?

Abutbol has someone from a different party that does not yet support him running the electoral support negotiations. Weird.

Strauss (owned by Unilever) has announced a significant change to the beloved Krembo. They will no longer be wrapping the krembo in the famous iconic aluminum packaging. The krembo will now be sold in packs of 8 in hard plastic packaging with the krembo inserted directly within with no aluminum wrap. Strauss says that they have been testing the formula and are now confident that the krembo will stay fresh like this. The krembos sold in the larger packages will not yet be sold like this but will undergo further testing to ensure freshness as they presumably sit for longer.

Here is a video showing the new production line:

Strauss claims that this change will save more than 13 tons of aluminum per year - this translates to 6000 kilometers of aluminum.

When you buy individual krembo in the makolet, that is presumably just the makolet remoiving the krembo from the large boxes and selling them individually, as Strauss does not market them individually. For now, coming out of the big packages, these individual krembo should still have their aluminum wrapping. When Strauss changes over the larger packages as well, either the makolets will have to stop selling individual krembo or it will be kind of disgusting buying individual krembo that isnt wrapped and likely was touched or even licked by half the kids in the neighborhood.

While Strauss is saving a lot of aluminum from the environment, they are increasing the use of disposable plastic, between the hard plastic container and then the plastic packaging the box will be covered with. I don't know which is worse for the environment - aluminium wrap or plastic (the hard plastic box together with the plastic packaging). Searching online seems to indicate that foil is a bit worse than plastic cling wrap, but I am not sure how it compares to this.

As an aside, Strauss says no employees will be laid off due to this change. Until now employees hand wrapped each krembo in foil. Those employees will be moved to other marketing lines in the company.

Also as an aside, and supposedly nothing to do with the wrapping change, the price of krembo is going up. Strauss says it is due to increases in minimum wage and increases in prices of the various components that go into the krembo.
source: Ynet

from Nissim Black's Twitter account

I am not quite sure what it means, but Rav Chaim Kanievsky told Nissim Black that Being "Black" is your Mayla (Virtue) not a Chesaron (Lacking)

אירוניה זה שח"כים ערבים פעלו יחד עם אש"ף כדי לגנות את ישראל באו"ם, אבל את מפלגתו של כהנא שאמר שהערבים שהם בוגדים שיש לסלקם, הוציאה המדינה מחוץ לחוק.
בקיצור,כהנא צדק, אבל אנחנו נמשיך לממן משכורות בעלות של מיליונים כל שנה, לאוייבים שצריכים להיות עכשיו עם מזוודה ומצנח מעל שמי סוריה

— איילת לאש (@ayeletlash9) August 28, 2018

funny..

המסקנה העגומה היא שלא משנה מי אתה ראש ממשלה או ביל גייטס, כשתצא עם אשתך בסוף היא תלך לקניות ואתה תשב ככה pic.twitter.com/3EgBg5YUyr

— שמעון ברייטקופף (@Shimonyb) August 26, 2018

The Arab MKs should be deemed traitors and tried for treason.

I have no problem with them fighting for their communities. I have no problem with them trying to work so that the Arab communities in Israel will have a better standard of living, will get whatever is coming to them as citizens of the State of Israel, so that their interests can be advanced. They live here, they are citizens, and they have representation in Knesset to do just that.

Fighting for the rights and interests of your citizens is one thing. Fighting for the enemy and for foreign interests is another.

With the Arab MKs petitioning the UN to work against Israel in favor of the Palestinians and to condemn Israel for a law passed by the elected government, that is treasonous and working against the State they are members of. I would have no problem with them working within the Knesset to abolish the law or to make changes in the law or anything as part of the democratic process, but calling in foreign powers to act against your own State is beyond the pale.

a group of Haredim have been protesting outside the military court in Jaffa due to the detention of a young woman who did not declare herself religious and get her automatic exemption, thereby being considered AWOL when she did not respond to her draft notice. Behadrei calls them "extremists", and while one can never tell just from a few pictures, some look like they might be part of the extremists community and others might not be.

One of the signs being held in the pictures struck me. Someone is holding a placard saying that "the sefardi and traditional daughters are nobody's property. We will fight for their honor until the end".

I think that is very honorable of these people to protest on behalf of a sefardi woman as they would for an ashkenazi woman. Though it might just be an excuse to have a protest, but still at least they dont discriminate.

Now, if they would take the same approach regarding the issue of the seminaries refusing to accept sefardi students into their schools, causing a crisis of a different sorts, that would really be something. Being that they are so concerned, I expect to see pictures of them protesting outside the houses of the askanim, rabbonim and school administrators to defend the honor of the sefardi women. Maybe that would do something towards helping resolve the crisis.

interesting..

amazing... and check out the surgeon...

a new building project has been publicized for the City of Jerusalem. The project would be planned for the religious community and would consist of several hundred housing units to be built in the neighborhood of Bet Chanina.

Bet Chanina is an Arab neighborhood in Jerusalem, so the announcement about this project has drawn some ire along the left side of the political spectrum. Avi Gabbay, head of the Labor - Zionist Union party, for example, criticized the plan saying that he is all for building homes in Jerusalem, but to build such homes for Jews, Dati Jews, in the heart of an Arab village, which Bet Chanina is, is just poking the bear and will only bring trouble.

Aryeh King, on the other hand, said that this project will pass the test of the Supreme Court and will be built and it will be for religious Jews only, not even secular Jews will be allowed to buy there. King says that if the Supreme Court allows Arabs to buy homes in Pisgat Zeev they will have to allow Jews to build homes in Bet Chanina. He added that when they bought the land they used subterfuge so that the sellers would not realize it was Jews buying the land.

What I dont get is if the Supreme Court allows anyone to live anywhere (and I dont know that that is th ecase. just because they let Arabs buy in Jewish neighborhoods does not mean they will allow Jews to buy in Arab neighborhoods, though they should.) how can King say that this project would only be for religious Jews and not even secular Jews will be allowed to buy in the project - if it goes to the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court might allow it but using the principle the assumption is based on they would also have to open selling of homes to Arabs and secular Jews, 

fabulous episode. I agree with a lot of what was said, and disagree with a lot.

On the website of Shuvu Banim, the strain of Breslav led by convicted molester and rapist Eliezer Berland, Berland has announced that every person, every boy and girl, must give a 1000nis pidyon (redemption fee) to him directly before Rosh Hashana. In exchange Berland grants his bracha for success and salvation, successful shidduchim, homes in Jerusalem and apartment si Uman with cheap flights for Rosh Hashana, seeing the arrival of Mashiach and the coming doown of the Third Temple in fire from heaven. He gives instructions to send the money so that it will arrive directly in his hands and not end up in anyone else's.

Shuls sell membership and High Holiday seats before the holidays. Country clubs sell memberships. All sorts of social clubs and networks have some sort of buy-in, membership fee or whatnot. It is normally ok. When a criminal does it, it is more of a shakedown then a membership fee, even though the people following him consider him a martyr or wrongly convicted than a criminal. He doesnt say anywhere that the money is going to communal needs or to support struggling families in the community or anything like that - it is just going to his hands. It is possible that Berland plans to do good with this money without publicizing the info, but a criminal like him is probably more likely to just be pocketing at least the bulk of the money if not all of it.

It is not reasonable to shut down the Ayalon Highway during the week

  -- Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, commenting on the bridge crisis after the Minister of Transportation, Yisrael Katz, reversed Iryat Tel Aviv's decision to construct the bridge on a series of Shabbatot. Netanyahu's comment raised eyebrows after things had mostly calmed down.

A Guest Post by Dr Harold Goldmeier

Kikar has a report about someone from Boro Park, a Bobover Chassid, who named his newly born daughter a combination of 9 names.

Her name is Leah Hinda Tzirel Malka Etya Sheina Chana Chava Toiba (and her last name Folger).

This reminds me of the joke about a guy who had a baby and went to the rabbi to ask what name to give the baby. The Rabbi said, I dont know, Yaakov, Shimon, Refael, Yitzchak, Chaim, Dovid... Sure enough, at the bris the fellow named his son Yaakov Shimon Refael Yitzchak Chaim Dovid...

I do feel bad for the rabbis and lawyers and bureaucrats and anyone else that will need to fill out forms in her future - every time she is going to fill out some sort of official document she is going to have sit there writing out all these names, sometimes multiple times on the forms or in triplicate or whatever. And then there might not even be enough space on many of these forms for her full name!

The Opposition is capably incapable and ineffective. I am not sure if that is a compliment or an insult.

They have done basically nothing and caused almost no trouble for the government in the past 4 years, and probably even in the past 9 if not more. Netanyahu's [governmental] problems come almost entirely from within his coalition - nothing from the Opposition.

The latest is an announcement of roadworks to take place on Fridays and Shabbos that will force road closures of the Ayalon Highway in the Tel Aviv area. They will be building a bridge - I guess a pedestrian walkway - over the highway, and presumably a project of that magnitude requires road closures that can't be done during the week.

Sure enough, that brought out protest and threats from Deputy Minister Yaakov Litzman. This is a breach in the status quo and is against Jewish values. If the decision is not reversed, there goes the government.

Minister of Transportation Yisrael Katz almost immediately put a stop on the order and said the work will not be done on Shabbos but will be done during the nights when there is less traffic on the roads and the road closures will be bearable.

An anonymous Haredi politician has responded that if they can close roads for all sorts of reasons like parades and marathons and other events causing tremendous traffic jams, it is hypocritical to say the roads cannot be closed for the building of the bridge and it must be done on Shabbos even with no claim of "pikuach nefesh".

This sent the Opposition into a tizzy. As they complained (in many different variation from different politicians but all saying basically the same thing), a small group of haredim are controlling our lives and Netanyahu has given them full control over the government. To that end, they successfully mustered enough signatures to call for a special session of the Knesset to discuss the issue, even though the Knesset is on vacation now.

Being that they have been able to do this twice now within just a couple of weeks is actually impressive. The fact that nothing comes out of such sessions, and that they have found no other way of promoting their agenda and preventing Netanyahu's government form promoting its agenda and from preventing the Haredi parties from wielding the power they do, shows how ineffective they actually are.

Interestingly, and basically a side point, the name of the bridge is to be "Gesher Yehudit". I am not sure what the name signifies, if they named it after someone, or how they chose that name, but I find it ironic that "the Jewish bridge" is the name given to a bridge that will be built on Shabbos and argued about causing much strife.

sources: Kikar, Kipa, Behadrei, Actualic, and others

And if there's ever going to be peace remember I said with the Palestinians it was a good thing to have done because we took it off the table because every time they were peace talks. They never got past Jerusalem becoming the capital. So I said, let's take it off the table. And you know what in the negotiation Israel will have to pay a higher price because they want a very big thing but I took it off the table

  -- US President Donald Trump, speaking at political rally in West Virginia

I have not yet seen any reactions among the Israeli leadership to this statement. I wonder what the PM and his people thought when Trump said that...

At the beginning of last summer the Ministry of Interior migrated to the biometric passport system. All new passports could only be issued as biometric passports. This created a rush on the Ministry of Interior at the beginning of travel season and lasted throughout the summer. It seemed like the Ministry of Interior was under-prepared and overwhelmed and could not handle all the requests. Many people paid the high price for a temporary passports due to the delays with the regular passports.

Minister of Interior has now announced that the fact that the Ministry could not handle all the requests in such a short period of time is not the fault of the people and the extra expenses the people incurred in paying for temporary passports is the responsibility of the government, and the government will refund that money.

Deri said that in the coming days there will be a form published online (on the Ministry of Interior website) to fill out and whoever paid the high price for a temporary passport and fills out the form will get his money back.
sources: Behadrei, Ladaat

Burger Ranch opened its first branch in the areas of Judea and Samaria (i.e. over the "green line", in occupied territories, in the West Bank) today, in the city of Ariel.

5 years ago McDonalds refused to build a branch in the mall in Ariel, due to its politics. At the time, after that stir, the owners of Burger Ranch said they would proudly open a branch there. Naftali Bennett promised he would eat the first hamburger when they open. Today they finally opened the branch and Naftali Bennett kept his promise.

[In a one-state scenario,] the prime minister of Israel in a few years will be called Mohammed.

  -- President of the United States Donald Trump, talking with King Abdullah of Jordan

Wow PepsiCo just announced they are joining the thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, of people around the world who love to buy SodaStream - PepsiCo is buying Israeli company SodaStream for $3.2billion!

Mazel tov!

I like the visuals in this clip...

MUSIC VIDEO by Brian K. Spector and Y. Shofario This independent, non-associated production was made before the decision to release Jonathan Pollard on parole. Jonathan Pollard still lives a very restricted life to this day.

if only we could go back to the days when highly-placed public officials could appoint their friends and relatives to jobs and positions without everyone else complaining and making trouble... #simplertimes

(for those unaware, this is about the appointment of the Chief Rabbi's brother in law to be the head of the batei din in Jerusalem after which a number of complaints against the appointment were filed with the Justice Ministry)

As we get closer to the holidays, it seems the authorities are aware of the increase in people attempting to smuggle fruits into the country and they therefore step up their level of inspection and enforcement. The fruits commonly being smuggled are esrogim for the upcoming Sukkos holiday.

Some bring an esrog for themselves, or a few for the members of their family, while others bring in tens or hundreds of esrogs to sell.

From the perspective of fruit being smuggled in, it does not matter if you are bringing in 1 or 100 or 1000 - the problem of importing foreign bugs along with the fruit is the same and thus possibly causing new infestations of unknown species, as is the concern of the Ministry of Agriculture.

According to Behadrei, a woman from Ashdod was just caught smuggling 40 esrogim in from Spain, after he suitcase did not arrive with her, and she reported it missing. When they found the suitcase and brought it in, they checked it and found the esrogim.

Anyways, the funny part of this is that Ministry of Agriculture statement on the matter included a note that because it is prohibited to bring in "4 species" from foreign countries, in order to avoid distressing situations, the Ministry of Agriculture will gift a "blue and white" set to any traveler who brings a set in with him or her from abroad.

The Ministry will exchange your foreign set with a local Israeli set.

That is a nice gesture. I wonder if they will do so at the equivalent value of the set confiscated, or at least a similar level of kashrut. Meaning, if someone bought a set of Mehudar aleph aleph mehadrin min hamehadrin chazin ish esrog in New York or London and tries to bring it in with him, will the Ministry give him a kosher lbracha set or a mehudar set?

While the ministry isnt obligated to, and thus I would not expect it of them, it is basically pointless if most people won't use the set given to them by the Ministry and they really should not bother wasting their money. Cute idea, but basically a waste of money

this is funny. the police arrested someone, a yeshiva bochur, for his involvement in the recent violent  protest rallies in Jerusalem, of the Peleg protests against the draft law. The charges brought against this fellow were a slew of charges such as violence, attacking a police officer, preventing a police officer from doing his work, danger on public roads, and more..

It turns out that the police only arrested this guy because he was wearing a white shirt, but they did not actually know that he did anything wrong. They simply grabbed a charedi fellow and arrested him and claimed he did all that stuff - stuff that was done, but not by him.

The courts released this fellow after it being proven that the only basis for the police arresting him was his white shirt - his lawyer, Itamar Ben Gvir, showed that the police had stood far away from the hafgana and there is no way they could have actually identified him as having thrown stones or overturning garbage cans. Someone did it, but not him. Being that there were many people, hundreds or thousands, wearing white shirts and dressed similarly, the arrest was deemed baseless, against the claims of the police that he was easily identifiable as the only one wearing a white shirt - a ridiculous claim at such a hafgana.
source: Haredim10

I would think they would have these hafganot fully documented with photographers and videographers, as they do in many other situations, and would be able to figure out who acted violently and broke the law and arrest the right people. It is very strange, surreal almost, that they arrested someone just because of his white shirt and thought that would be good enough to be considered positive identification in a sea full of white shirts. The police have to do better.

A few days ago I heard a rumor, but it was told to me as fact. As reality.

Someone tells me that Rav Landau, the rav of Bnei Braq who heads a very respected kashrus organization known as the Badatz of Rav Landau, has decided to retire. Rav Landau is affiliated with Chabad, but because his son is a member of the messianic wing of Chabad, this fellow tells me, Rav Landau does not want to turn his kashrus organization over to his son, so he is closing it entirely. Coca Cola, the flagship product under the hechsher of Rav Landau, along with many other products are being moved over to the kashrus of the Badatz Eida Hachareidis, and many products, such as Coca Cola, have already been switched.

That is pretty big news. I was a bit surprised I had not heard about it, but this fellow claimed it as fact. I somewhat trusted him against my better instincts, simply because this is a fellow who is very careful about what he eats and is strict to eat only from the Eida hechsher and checks everything. I figured he would surely know if he is making such a claim. I still thought it strange that it was not in the news and that I did not hear about from some various forums and groups I am a member of, but  I can miss things too, so I guess it could be true.

After a few days, I still have not seen anything about it, and bottles of Coca Cola still bear the hechsher of Rav Landau and not the Eida, I decided to do some online searching about it.

Sure enough, it took a while, but the only thing I could find about it is some rumors on forums being discussed. I found a discussion making this exact claim from back in 2014, and also another one from back in 2010.

Obviously it is not true and is just an old rumor being rehashed. It does not even make sense, as he does not need to pass it down to his son but could sell it or pass it over to a different rav, but reality does not always have to make sense or be logical, but rumors should be.

Anyways, it is just an old rumor being rehashed.

My point here is not to dispel a specific rumor only a few people might have heard. My point is that the kashrus world is always full of rumors, some logical, some strange, some that pan out and actually happen and many that do not. Sadly, the reality seems to be, that a lot of what we do regarding kashrus is based on rumors - rumors of things we heard  about what this or that hechsher does or does not do. We talk as if we know something to be true, even if it isn't and the source was just a rumor that somehow became "reality" after it passed through a few people in the chain.

Check to the best of your ability. Rumors can be damaging to companies, and it hurts the consumer too. Do not just assume something is true, just because you heard it from someone who seems to know what he is talking about. Like all rumors, kashrus rumors are just rumors, not truth.

A Guest Post by Dr Harold Goldmeier

• Israel has a legal right to exist as much as any other country recognized in the family of nations.  There is no daylight in definitions of terms "anti-Zionism," "anti-Israel," and "anti-Semitic."
• Palestinians are treated better and are economically well off more than in any Arab country, and they are happier living in Israel. 
• Most Palestinians will choose to become Israeli citizens and assimilate if given the choice without a threat of harm or death from the Palestinian Authority, Hamas, and other roaming gangs of terrorists.
• Israelis see the secular, Reform, Conservative, domestic, and foreign ultra-Orthodox haredi Jews, and Obama-Clinton liberals, as a claque promoting the Palestinian perspective.  Diaspora Jews are a dying breed because immigrating Muslims are turning their new countries anti-Semitic.  Jewish youths forsake their heritage through surging rates of intermarriage and Jewish education illiteracy.  They are now a non-starter collection of forlorn Jews with no tethers to other Jewish people or Israel despite some keeners.

The latest kashrut brouhaha with the Eida Hachareidis is a report on Channel 11 News (Kan) is regarding a winery that put out a line of wine marketed with the celebratory symbols for Israel's 70th birthday.  The Eida has told Psagot Winery that they must either cover up the Zionist symbols on the labels of the bottles, or must cover up the Eida hechsher.

What a conflict! They want to market to a community that will only rely on the Eida hechsher and not any of the other hechshers available, but they also want to market their wine to people who will buy it as part of a celebration of Israel's 70th birthday! And the Eida will only allow it to be one or the other, not both.

Here is a picture of the bottle of wine causing the friction..



It is also possible that the Eida was simply embarrassed to have its logo on a bottle for a company that could not even spell the worth "birthday" correctly for a major marketing campaign taking advantage of Israel's 70th birthday!

The Eida always claims that the kashrut division is independent of the rest of the activities of the Eida and is "kashrus neto" with no involvement in the anti-State activities of the Eida. An incident like this shows that this is not true - they are giving an ultimatum that it is either a symbol of the State of Israel or it is the logo of the Eida, but the two cannot reside on the same bottle side by side.

Being that this is purely a marketing issue, companies feel that having the Eida hechsher will bring them a lot more business, people need to make it known to the companies that the Eida hechsher will expose them to an entirely new market, but it will close them off from other markets.. If the Eida says it can only be one or the other, who can blame them for choosing Eida if there are no ramifications?

headlines like these bother me so much. If it happened anywhere else, everyone would be screaming anti-semitism and that it evokes memories of the British Mandate period andd of other difficult times in Jewish history.

Kikar has a report about the monthly Rosh Chodesh fighting at the Kotel between the Haredi community and the Women of the Wall members and supporters. Today seems to have been a little bit unique because the WoW people wanted to bring in shofars to blow, as per the custom during the month of Elul at the end of davening.

The event turned violent, as it often does, and someone (on WoW's side) was arrested for acting violently against young protesting the WoW prayer service. Because they were expected to bring in shofars for blowing, the lawyer representing those opposing WoW requested from Avichai Mandelblit, the Attorney General, to ban WoW from bringing and using shofars at the Kotel.

The article does not say if he acceded to the request and banned the shofars or not, but implies that the women were doing something wrong and against the rules.

Even if I think the approach used against WoW is wrong and counter-productive, I can at least understand the opposition to women wearing tefillin in public and reading from torahs when making a minyan. I do not get what is wrong with women blowing shofar. As far as I am aware, the Shulchan Aruch and poskim do not call it yohara or haughtiness, as by teifllin, and there is seemingly nothing halachically inappropriate or disturbing about  a woman blowing the shofar. Women are allowed to blow the shofar, especially for themselves and for other women, and according to many even for men. And, the blowing of the shofar now is custom, not obligation, so it is even much more minor of an issue than, say, on Rosh Hashana itself. So, Israelis trying to ban Jews from blowing shofar at the Kotel reminds me of the stories of the British arresting Jews for blowing shofar at the Kotel on Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, and I do not understand what the opposition to it is about. They should just continue to focus on opposing the torah reading and tallis/tefillin wearing which makes more sense.

The latest Internet craze is something called the Kiki challenge.

The Kiki challenge is based on a song by "Drake". Drake happens to be Jewish. His father is Afruican American and his mother is Jewish, so he is Jewish. His real name is Aubrey Drake Graham. Drake is a singer-rapper and his song "Kiki" became a big hit and this challenge developed around it.

To me the challenge looks stupid and I don't get it. Basically, someone gets out of the car with the song playing and while the car continues to drive slowly the passenger gets out and leaves his door open and dances to the song moving with the car.

Here is a recent video of a Chabadnik doing the Kiki challenge...

I guess this has been such a big hit that the rabbis felt the need to weigh in on it.

Rav Aryeh Stern, Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, said that this is not appropriate and is also dangerous. We need to try to be similar to God, not to the non-Jews.

Chief Rabbi of Israel Rav Dovid Lau said there is no allowance for putting lives in danger, even if it looks like a phenomenon that is not dangerous and even possibly positive. Safety is the most important.

Rav Yaakov Nechimovski, the Chabadnik in the video above, says that he is not ashamed of the openness and style by which he lives his life, as he always has. A rav needs to be connected to the people to the maximum allowed within the framework of possibilities, as long as there is really nothing wrong..
source: Kikar

I still don't get the challenge, and I do not see any serious danger to one's life, as long as one does not do this on a busy road, but if you are going to do it, gei gezunteheit...and I guess ask your LOR first...

A divorce in the beis din of Tiberias dealt with an interesting issue of division of the assets.

When the couple got married, the father of MRS took out a mortgage on his own home to the tune of 1,000,000nis in order to help the young couple buy a home. At the time they made a verbal agreement that the young couple would pay the monthly mortgage payments.

Eventually, sadly, the couple ran into rough times in their relationship and decided to divorce. They agreed to sell the apartment and pay back the debts and then divide the rest of the value of the apartment. Mr then went and claimed in beis din that the million shekels given to them to buy the house was a gift, not a loan. Meaning, the father will have to repay his own debt and the separating couple does not need t pay that debt back from the assets. Mrs counter-claimed saying it was a loan, not a gift and the debt should be paid back from the sale of the apartment.

Upon investigation, the beis din discovered that the process actually was the father sold his house, gave the money to the couple to buy a house and then bought a new place for himself with a mortgage. After going through the halacha and responsa on the issue, the members of the beis din concluded that the money was a loan and not a gift and must be repaid.
source: Kikar

The Friedman family in Belgium has been strange for a long time. Moshe Friedman made a lot of trouble as an extremist with the Neturei Karta. He was not just anti-Zionist, but after the local community in Antwerp suffered from him as well, the community put him in cherem. At some point Friedman wanted to send his sons to the local girls school and sued to be permitted to do so, thus causing the local Haredi all-girls school to become somewhat co-ed (practically it might only have been his sons there among the girls, so I am not sure if it remains co-ed or if other boys went there as well).

At some point, after a lot of fighting and trouble, Friedman left the Neturei Karta. Some claim he became not frum, some say he just dropped his extremism. Pictures of him and his family were seen dressed in a far more modern style, and there were snippets in the news of him becoming involved in other issues of activism and politics not related to Israel.

His daughter, Raizy, is running for city council in Antwerp under the banner of the CD&V party. According to Actualic, Friedman has been quoted as saying that she has no problem shaking hands with men - this issue was contentious as a previous Jewish candidate was dropped from the party for saying he would not shake hands with women. I have no problem with that as there is a variety of piskei halacha on the matter and plenty who can be relied upon say in formal settings with no expression of intimacy shaking hands is fine.

The other issue Raizy Friedman was asked about is the possibility of banning kosher shechita. Friedman responded saying that she would have no problem with that if it were the law. She said specifically that animals need to be treated well and if the law requires slaughtering animals after they are stunned or otherwise unconscious, then that is the way it must be.

Friedman is definitely not representing the local Jewish community in her position as a candidate for this party. She might even be considered a rodef of the Jewish community if she is really going to be a part of a plan to ban kosher shechita. This is very strange. I can only hope she is saying this so as to not hurt her chances, or even to help her chances, of being elected, and then plans to work to help kosher shechita rather than hinder it. Or else I hope there was some other mistake and misunderstanding. This is bizarre.