Takanos of RBS Hei

Everybody has their preferences for the type of community they want to live in. Some people want a more diverse community, some want a more tolerant community, some want a more religious community, some a less religious community, some a Haredi community, some a Dati Leumi community, some a secular community, some want more yeshivas, some want more parks, come want more community centers and basketball courts or soccer pitches, some want more shuls and schools, some want more Hassidic, some want mroe Litvishe, some more Sefardic, some more Ashkenazic, some want a more "anglo" community, some a less anglo and more Israeli community, etc. 

I do not begrudge anyone their personal preferences of what type of community they want to live in.

That being said, if I want to live in a specific type of community I will seek out such a community and try my best to move there and settle in. I do not think it is legitimate to move into a community that is not as preferred and then try to use discriminatory practices and bullying methods to keep others out so it will hopefully become the community I want.

While we saw the other day a call to residents in RBS D to continue building the community there as a heimishe community and not rent or sell to "others" that was a personal call made by an anonymous person. Someone like that can be marginalized or ignored. What is one person going to do? He might garner up support for his plan but at this point he is just one person. Reject him but he can basically be ignored.

RBS E/H/5/Hei - aka RBS Hei - was built as a more diverse community. The plans, prepared by then-Mayor Moshe Abutbol, was to plan and market Hei to 3 different sectors, 1/3 Haredi, 1/3 Dati and 1/3 Secular. Anyone buying or renting and moving to RBS Hei knows in advance that this neighborhood was designed to be a more diverse neighborhood. Over time market forces might lock that down in some way with some moving out and others moving in and it turning to develop some more specific character, but in the early stages it is meant to be a diverse community.

There is now a call by a group of Haredi rabbonim and activists to push out the non-Haredi sector and only allow Haredim to rent or buy apartments in Hei. They have put together a set of "takanos" for RBS Hei....

That is different than the guy in RBS D - that was an individual, a nobody. This is a call out, with a published letter signed, by a slew of local rabbonim. This is not a private individual stating his opinion, but it is community leadership, it is the "system", it is official.

They can do what they want, no matter how wrong it is. but if and when calls anywhere in the country get put out to not sell in a certain area to Haredim, they are the first to scream discrimination and call people anti-Haredi. And it used to happen in the earlier days of Bet Shemesh when the newer neighborhoods just started being built and Haredi communities started being developed here and some even started spreading out and buying in older areas that had a secular or dati atmosphere. There were calls to not let them buy in those areas, and they were rejected but they were also condemned, and the Haredi communities and leadership, even at the national level, screamed bloody murder at such calls. I would like to see a reporter take such a poster to Moshe Gafni or Yaakov Litzman or Aryeh Deri and ask them what they think about it. I would like to see them reject such behavior and use the Degel or Aguda or Shas resources to put an end to it. 

------------------------------------------------------
Reach thousands of readers with your ad by advertising on Life in Israel

------------------------------------------------------