The new Bet Shemesh Haredi anti-Bloch website Aspaklaria is reporting about an allocation of land granted to Yeshivat Hakotel for the formation of a Mechina Kdam Tzvait - an IDF prep school.

The allocation is in the area of Rashi St, near Yeshivat Reishit.

I would note that the allocation is temporary, for one year with an option to extend for up to another two, as can be seen in the Iryah notice. 

According to Aspaklaria, the allocation has been approved. They also say that the Haredi residents of nearby Bar Ilan St are upset that an allocation is being granted to an institution from outside the city while they continue to fight for approval for allocations to open nursery schools for their children - the children of local residents.

the Haredi news media on Twitter, Haskupim, also announced this issue on Friday. They described the location of the allocation as being "near a mitchared neighborhood".

So, the complainers feel not only do they deserve first rights to allocations in the Haredi neighborhoods, which is surely a good argument, and also in mitchared neighborhoods, which might be a good argument but is at least debatable, but now also they have first dibs on anything near mitchared neighborhoods! Nobody else gets anything. Anything near where a Haredi person might one day live has to go to them first!

Without discussing the merits, or lack thereof, of this specific allocation and institution, as I do not know why it was decided they deserve the allocation more than any other institution requesting it, nor do I know if any other institution was requesting this plot of land, nor do I know anything about this specific situation, I would say this this land is not in a Haredi neighborhood. It is not far from a neighborhood that some Haredi families have moved into in recent years and has become known as a "mitchared"neighborhood, a neighborhood in the process of becoming haredi, but this plot is not in that mitchared neighborhood, and I would say they deserve it no more than any other institution. Maybe if the plot under debate was actually in their neighborhood then I would have mroe sympathy for their complaint, but this is a plot in a different neighborhood that is nearby and actually seems to fit very well with the overall character of that neighborhood.

Should a plot be allocated to an institution from outside the city while their are already internal needs waiting to be dealt with? That question is above my pay-grade, but I would note that the local Haredi press never complained before when allocations were granted around Bet Shemesh to Haredi yeshivas from outside the city as an enticement to move to the city.

Also, they are only external/foreign institutions until the day they move in. Once they move in to Bet Shemesh, they are now a local institution, so I am less sympathetic to this complaint. Plus, in this instance, it is not a foreign institution, but a new institution being built and formed, albeit by a parent institution from outside the city. Should nobody be able to move to Bet Shemesh, open businesses and open schools and institutions until this or that person or community gets all his needs met?

Overall I have no general problem with this allocation or institution, and while the residents of Bar Ilan St might have a complaint about their needs not being met, those concerns and fights, justified as they might be, have nothing to do with this allocation.