if you thought the situation with the Ethiopian Jews working at the winery was resolved..it seems to not be so



as a result of this, MK Yaakov Margi (Shas) has tweeted out a call to boycott the Eida, saying nowadays there are enough other Badatzes that we can survive just fine with them...

לאור הגזענות הטהורה של בדצ העדה החרדי ביקבי ברקן אין מנוס מלהחרים אותם.
יש היום די בדצים מהדרין שאפשר לחיות בלעדיהם וחוץ מזה שזה מזמן עסק כמו כל עסק.

— חכ יעקב מרגי (@yakmargi) July 30, 2018

A Haredi MK calling for a boycott of the Eida is far different than a radical secular extremist, or someone who can be brushed away and branded as such, calling for a boycott of the Eida...

As a follow-up to yesterday's brouhaha with the Barkan Winery transferring three Jewish religious employees of Ethiopian origin after the Eida hechsher demanded they do so, Tempo - the parent company of Barkan Winery - has announced last night that it will not accept any form of discrimination and the  transferred Ethiopian employees will be put back, on Wednesday, on the line in their original positions.

Tempo qualified the statement by adding a note that if any employee would be moved from his position, his livelihood would not be harmed.
source: Ynet, Kikar

So, does the qualification means that they wont transfer anybody, but if they do it wont affect the salary - meaning, the transfer may very well stay in effect?

Also, as of this morning, the news reported that the affected employees had not been put back in their previous positions. I have not heard or seen any update since, so I do not know if they were returned to their original positions later in the day, or not.

My biggest question is how Tempo can make such a statement. The transfer happened because of a demand made by the Eida, their newly taken on hechsher organization. Does this mean they have persuaded Eida to accept the Ethiopians in these positions and the Eida agreed? Does it mean they are dropping the Eida as their certifying agency? If the statement made by Tempo is truthful, it has major ramifications, and I would be curious to know how this is working.

On another aspect of this, the Eida, with this demand, is really just doing to the Rabbanut almost exactly what the Rabbanut does to so many other Jews and Jewish converts. The Eida is calling into question the status of converts of the Rabbanut, and the Jewish status of people declared Jewish by the Rabbanut. How many times have we seen the Rabbanut call into question the status of converts who converted by orthodox batei din around the world? They don't seem to like it now.

I argue the same point now, even though it now defends the Rabbanut - as soon as an Orthodox beis din converts someone, that person is Jewish. That is the halacha, in Shulchan Aruch. Even if the beis din did it with ulterior motives, and even if the beis din did it despite the convert converting for marriage or money or other ulterior motives that would have invalidated them - once it is done, the convert is fully Jewish. Whatever the Eida might say, these people are Jewish. If there is a specific problem with a specific person whose background is questionable and did not undergo the conversion lchumra, that might be another story, but in general they are Jewish. When the Rabbanut rejects a convert from an orthodox beis din somewhere in the Diaspora, that convert is still Jewish, even if unrecognized by the Rabbanut. Perhaps the Rabbanut might be spurred to work on formulating a new policy on this issue, now that it sees how its own converts can be treated by such a policy.

According to INN, MK Shuli Muallem Refaeli (Habayit Hayehudi) is proposing a law, in light of yesterday's incident with the Barkan Winery transferring some religious Jewish employees of Ethiopian descent off the wine line as per the requirements of their new kashrut organization, the Badatz Eida Hachareidis. The Eida questions the Jewishness of Ethiopian immigrants, even though the State recognizes them as Jewish as per the decision of Rav Ovadya Yosef, some with conversions lchumra and some without. Being that the Eida questions their Jewish status, the Euida says they cannot work on the wine line, as they would turn the wine into yayin nesech in the case that they might not be Jewish.

So MK Refaeli is proposing a new law. Her proposal would make it illegal for a private kashrus organization to demand the removal of workers from the production of food and wine simply for being of Ethiopian origin and descent.

According to Refaeli, "Edah Haharedit kashrut cannot boast that food under its supervision meets the Jewish standards of kashrut, if it tramples the rulings of the great rabbis of Israel, headed by Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, who determined that Ethiopian immigrants are Jews".

I like what she is trying to do, but I think the proposal as a law is stupid. Make a law that they cannot remove Ethiopians from the line? Very nice, but what happens next week when someone does it to Russian Jews - make another law? And then when they do it to Bnei Menashe immigrants from India - make another law? and on and on. Make a general law that people accepted by the State as Jewish cannot be discriminated against by treating them as non-Jews, or questionable Jews. Then the Eida gets out of the wine business, or changes their policies on this matter.

the following is a shocking report in the news that was just exposed. Briefly, the Barkan Winery decided to change kashrut supervision organizations and take on the supervision of the Eida Hachareidis. Among the requirements of the Eida to grant the certification was to get the Ethiopian workers off the line producing the wine - they could be moved to other parts of the business. Barkan decided to comply, as business is business and that's what is required - they are desperate to break into the market of people who will only accept Eida hechsher..

People, including politicians, are comparing this to the Nazi selections. I don't like any comparisons to Nazis, unless it includes mass murder and concentration camps it seems uncalled for, as horrible as this behavior might be.

So, who is to blame - the Eida or Barkan management? The Eida demanded it as a requirement, but Barkan went along with it without even putting up a fight and just sacrificed them on the altar of entering a new market.

Most interestingly, Chief Rabbi Rav Yitzchak Yosef criticized the Eida harshly for this and claimed it is pure racism and there is no halachic reason for such a demand. More specifically, Rav Yosef suggested that it could be problematic relying on them for strict kashrut supervision when they are involved in being lenient regarding the character assassination of people who's only fault is the color of their skin. (source: Kikar)

I think a boycott of the Eida hechsher, as many are calling for right now, is nearly impossible. Especially if you live in a largely Haredi area where the Eida has the lions share of the market. However you can give preference to other hechshers that you rely on, when you have the choice. If you see two products one with the Eida and the other with Rubin or Mahfoud or Belz or whatever it might be, if you accept the second hechsher, prefer to take that one instead of the one with the Eida. The individual consumer cannot do much to these giant manufacturers and hechshers, but what little we can do we should. And Barkan as well - buy a different wine, when you can. A Barkan boycott is more feasible, and some are calling for it, though any winery using the Eida hechsher presumably has the same issue - though maybe they aren't employing Ethiopians to start with, so maybe it just never came up.

I feel it is important to include the full statement in response issued by the Eida. There are also a couple of interesting points in it.

Mazel Tov to Rav Reuven Vabeshet (sp?) on being appointed to the position of Chief Rabbi of the Ethiopian community in Israel.
source: Kipa

I just don't get why he is dressed like a Litvishe Ashkenazi Jew, but I guess to each his own.

 If they aspire to be a part of the Litvishe Ashkenazi community, why do they need their own Chief Rabbi?

The Rabbanut courts have become experts at reversing important decisions that affect lives.

Various rabbonim and courts have reversed, and attempted to reverse, conversions. The conversion reversals are already old news. Recently the rabbanut courts have been trying to reverse the granting of a divorce in Tzfat - the Supreme Court might not allow them to for procedural reasons, but the Rabbanut court has already ordered it reversed.

And now, a rav is saying that immersions in the mikva by women in his city might have to be reversed and the women would need to re-toivel.

Chief Rabbi of Kiryat Motzkin, Rav Dovid Meir Druckman, has decided to fire an Ethiopian woman who was recently working for the city's religious council in the position of a mikva attendant. It seems Rav Druckman raised doubts as to this woman's Jewishness and if she went through a proper conversion (as Ethiopians from Ethiopia were required to undergo conversion lchumra). Because her Jewishness is in doubt, it renders all immersions performed under her watchful eye as invalid - or at least in question..

The Rabbanut requires women to toivel in the presence of a balanit -a mikva attendant.

Rav Druckman denies that his relieving her of her duties had anything to do with her being Ethiopian, but says she had been hired without first getting his approval while many other women have applied for these jobs and had been tested by him, yet she "jumped the line". He also denies having made an issue of her Jewishness, but explains that because he does not know her that was one of the questions he asked.
source: Walla

Whatever his problem with the balanit, reversing tevila already performed seems crazy and against halacha. Either the woman toiveled or she did not toivel. The need for a balanit is important, but if a woman toiveled without one she is considered immersed and tehora, unless there was a known problem (such as hair not going under the water, among other possibilities). The Rabbanut stance is that a balanit is required, but the city councils have decided to not require it if a woman doesn't want one present.. which means whatever the Rabbanut stance, it is clear that it is not an absolute requirement for the kashrus of the tevila.

So even if this woman was not a Jew, which is a ridiculous assumption with no basis, the immersions would all have been kosher. I do not know -can a non-Jew be an attendant at an immersion? The job is completely functionary, and not an issue of testimony, so I don't see why not, but I don't know if it is ok or not. If yes, then what is the issue here, even if she isn't Jewish (again, a ridiculous assumption to make)?

And if the issue was not her Jewishness but just that she was hired through improper channels, why would that render all the immersions invalid retroactively (even if that were possible)? Because she had employment issues her supervision of immersions did not count?

in light of yesterday's operation to conclude the bringing of Ethiopian Jews to Israel, this video is worth watching..

Suspected: Two Ethiopian Runners from the Jerusalem Marathon have Infiltrated into Israel

  -- Walla News

the suspicion is that these two female runners abandoned the race in the middle and disappeared, going into hiding in order to avoid having to return to Ethiopia after the race....

A newly immigrated Ethiopian Jewish boy attends a welcoming ceremony at Ben Gurion Airport, Israel, Monday, Oct. 29, 2012. Some 240 Ethiopian Jews arrived Monday, as part of Operation “Dove’s Wings” to bring to Israel the remainder of the Falash Mura, a group of Ethiopians whose Jewish ancestors were forcefully converted into Christianity.
(NOTE: I saw the photo published by AIPAC, but I don't know who took it)


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Chadash newspaper is reporting that Mayor of Bet Shemesh Moshe Abutbol just returned from a top secret trip to Ethiopia. The report does not include the reason why Abutbol went to Ethiopia, and Abutbol refused to comment on the matter.

In honor of Purim, I was able to think of two possible reasons why Mayor Moshe Abutbol might have gone to Ethiopia, and I invite you to submit your suggestions as well:

1. To recruit more Ethiopian children for his private kindergarten.
2. To spy out the city competing with Bet Shemesh for the twinning deal with Montgomery County

What say you, fair reader?

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A couple of weeks ago I pointed out a letter to the editor in a newspaper in the United States concerning a resident who was opposed to the possible twinning of Montgomery County with Bet Shemesh. It seemed like the project was already in the final stages and was going to move ahead.

Turns out that Montgomery changed direction and decided to cancel the twinning plan with Bet Shemesh. Instead, they are moving down their list of possibilities and choosing Gondar in Ethiopia over us in Bet Shemesh.

From the Washington Post:

This is not what Montgomery County officials expected when they started signing sister-city agreements.


After arranging the first one last year, county officials have been busy finalizing another pact, this one with Beit Shemesh in Israel.


The efforts of Salvadoran immigrants in Montgomery County to reach out to their home country have inspired a sister city agreement with a region in the northeastern part of El Salvador that borders with Honduras.


But recent controversies in the city, which is west of Jerusalem, have put the agreement with the county on hold.­­


In recent months, news reports of the city’s ultra-Orthodox population skirmishing with Israeli police and assaulting some Israeli women have made their way around the world and into living rooms around Washington.

The confrontations followed the posting of a sign outside a row of Beit Shemesh synagogues directing women to walk on the other side of the street. In one ensuing incident, an 8-year-old girl was spit on and called a prostitute, according to Israeli news reports. In another, a woman was surrounded and pelted with stones, according to the reports.
[...]


But now Montgomery Sister Cities, the nonprofit group that was set up by Leggett after his 2007 visit to coordinate the partnerships, is turning its attention elsewhere and looking to the historic Ethio­pian city of Gondar as the county’s next prospective sister city.


The sister-city program, which in this case is more of a sister-county program, encourages cooperation between municipalities through educational, cultural, social, economic, humanitarian and charitable exchanges. Montgomery’s first partnership, with Morazan, El Salvador, was signed in July.


Beit Shemesh, and the surrounding county of Mateh Yahuda, was expected to be second in line.


Instead, it has become a hot-button issue in Montgomery. Susan Kerin, a Derwood resident and a human rights activist, said the county has “dodged a bullet” by delaying the process.


Kerin said the city has had a “systemic” issue with segregation and hate violence. She said that since 2009, she has been telling the county of her concerns. In October, however, she was told by members of the Montgomery Sister Cities board that the agreement with Beit Shemesh was a “done deal.”


Bruce Adams, one of the board members contacted by Kerin, said she is “misrepresenting basically everything” about the meeting. He said he told her that the board was intending to finalize the agreement, but “it was not over till it’s over.” Adams said Kerin told board members that human rights violations were occurring in the city but she could not provide any specifics.


“And then in December,” Adams said, “some things happened that, you know, raised concerns, and so we were able to get a better understanding of what she was talking about.”


Kerin said that she and fellow activists met with Leggett on Jan. 10 and that he told the group the decision was “not a done deal.”


Leggett said that he makes the final decision and that the nonprofit board has not yet issued a recommendation to him concerning Beit Shemesh.


Adams, a political ally of Leggett’s, said the nonprofit board has proposed a public meeting on Beit Shemesh in late March. The board is also inviting the Middle Eastern American Advisory Group, a county committee that was contacted by Kerin’s group and expressed concerns in December about the sister-city agreement.


Meanwhile, the county’s Commission for Women and the Commission on Human Rights are meeting in upcoming weeks to discuss the sister-city agreement. On Wednesday, the county’s Committee on Hate/Violence, of which Kerin is a member, held a conference call on the issue.


The Rockville-based Jewish Federation of Greater Washington has pushed the county to forge the sister-city agreement.


In an interview, Ron Halber, a spokesman for the organization and the executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington, said Leggett and the nonprofit board are right in taking more time to hear public opinion as a result of the recent attention.


County Council member George L. Leventhal (D-At Large) said “good judgment is prevailing.”


“I really support efforts to build bridges, but we have to be practical . . . ,” said Leventhal, who is Jewish and visited Beit Shemesh in 2001. “The deeper you get into issues like this, the greater risk you run of getting your own constituents really mad.”


Council President Roger Berliner (D-Potomac-Bethesda), who is also Jewish, said people would never imagine something like this happening with a prospective sister city — “or else you wouldn’t enter into these discussions.”

Thoughts:

1. Amazing that we have sunk so low that even Ethiopia is more attractive than Bet Shemesh!
2. Their decision is actually very appropriate, considering the special relationship Mayor Moshe Abutbol has with the Ethiopian community...

To his credit, Mayor Moshe Abutbol responded to inquiries on the municipal Facebook page as to his response to this issue.

Here is the original in Hebrew, translation will follow below:

בניגוד לשמועות, לא בוטלה כריתת ברית עיר תאומה עם מחוז מונטגומרי. לעיר בית שמש יש שיתופי פעולה עם הקהילה היהודית במחוז אשר פעלה למסד את הקשר באמצעות העירייה המקומית. פעילות זו נתקלה בהתנגדויות של גורמים פרו-פליסטינאיים אשר מנהלים מאבק כללי נגד מדינת ישראל ופועלים לחרם על תוצרת ישראל, להימנע מהשקעות בכלכלה הישראלית ולהטיל סנקציות על מדינת ישראל. חבל מאוד שגורמים אינטרסנטיים מקוממים מבית שמש חוברים במעשיהם לאותם גורמים פרו פליסטנאיים בהפצת דיבתה של העיר בית שמש, אשר רובם המוחלט של תושביה חיים יחדיו בהרמוניה מלאה.

My translation: Contrary to rumors, the twinning arrangement with Montgomery County was not cancelled. The City of Bet Shemesh has active cooperation with the jewish community of the county that tried to institutionalize the connection via the local municipality. This was met with opposition by pro Palestinian elements that are waging general struggle against the State of Israel, attempt to create boycotts of Israeli products, effect divestment from Israeli companies and place sanctions on Israel. It is a shame that local people with agendas in Bet Shemesh join together with those pro-Palestinian elements in spreading slander against the city of Bet Shemesh, whose decisive majority of residents live together in complete harmony.

My thoughts on the mayor's response:

• His story is completely different than that of the Montgomery County council-people. Strange. 
• He blames local people, yet nowhere have I seen that local people were involved in influencing Montgomery County's decision. If he is going to accuse people, he should at least show what he is talking about.
• Mayor Abutbol himself has joined groups, both locally and abroad, to meet with Palestinians to discuss working together and peace. He is now accusing others of working with pro-Palestinian elements. Interesting.

The big news of the day today has so far been the discovery of an amutah, a non-governmental organization (aka NGO), that operates a number of ganim, nursery schools and kindergartens, in which 62 out of the 68 children registered are Ethiopian children.

The ganim are located in Bet Shemesh, and the amutah is one that was founded by Moshe Abutbol, now the mayor of Bet Shemesh. When Abutbol became mayor, he transferred ownership to his wife. As well, his daughter works in these ganim as a teacher.

The "story" is that these ganim offer their services for free - they charge no tuition. They receive their money from donations and government subsidies (even though they are not under the auspices of the Ministry of Education). They bus kids in from a variety of neighborhoods, and seem to target the Ethiopian community. Yediot Acharonot discovered this and broke the news on the front page of the newspaper today, calling it discrimination (and it has since been argued about on the radio stations).

After the story broke, people from within the Ethiopian community expressed anger that they have been taken advantage of, they've been discriminated against, they have been sent to an "Ethiopian ghetto", all under the guise of an educational initiative.

Abutbol responded rejecting the claims of discrimination and racism. Abutbol explained that just like in an aquarium there are big fish and small fish, and one must remove the small fish from the aquarium so the bigger fish wont eat them. You then raise those small fish elsewhere, and then re-integrate them back into the aquarium. This is the same, Abutbol says, as by doing this the children of these ganim come to first grade ready and prepared properly, after we help them and deal with them with a personal and holistic approach.
.
While Abutbol's response seems stupid and racist in its own right, I don't see why this is much of a story. Abutbol's ganim, or I should says Mrs. Abutbol's ganim, offer free gan, no tuition. They don't as far as I know, limit that offer to only Ethiopian kids. They also don't say these gans are only for Ethiopian kids.

The Ethiopian parents that choose to send their kids to these gans, chose to do so of their own free will. They chose to take advantage of the free tuition, rather than pay for a different private gan, or to send to a regular gan run by the state/city. Other people had the same choice, and most chose not to send their kids to these ganim.

As well, the ganim, as far as I know, did not limit registration only to Ethiopian kids. At least, I have not seen that claim made. So the registration was open to the general public, and free tuition was offered to all.

The possibility that remains open, I think, is that the amutah only advertised in places where only the Ethiopians would likely see it and not others. That is possible, though, again, I have not heard that claim being made.

What do you think? Is this discrimination in a way I did not consider?

I don't see any discrimination here, just because it was Ethiopians that chose to take advantage of the free tuition offer.

A few days ago it was reported that an Ethiopian Patriarch was considering revealing the secret of the Lost Ark, and the Ark itself, and how his church has been holding it for thousands of years, and would likely do so on Friday in Italy.

Turns out he preferred keeping the secret (or had nothing to show) and said nothing on Friday. He had not even scheduled a press conference.

World Net Daily has the whole story. Nobody knows what is true and what is not, but it is definitely a fascinating story....

The agency had reported an announcement would be made at the Hotel Aldrovandi in Rome, and a hotel spokeswoman told WND Pauolos had been in residence there, but no news conference or event was scheduled.

"The Ark of the Covenant is in Ethiopia for many centuries," said Pauolos in the report. "As a patriarch I have seen it with my own eyes and only few highly qualified persons could do the same, until now."

Bob Cornuke, biblical investigator, international explorer and best-selling author, has participated in more than 27 expeditions around the world searching for lost locations described in the Bible. A man some consider a real-life Indiana Jones, he has written a book titled "Relic Quest" about the Ark of the Covenant and participated in History Channel production called "Digging for Truth."

Next week, Cornuke will travel to Ethiopia for the 13th time since he began his search for the Ark. He told WND he believes it is possible Ethiopia could have the real artifact.

"They either have the Ark of the Covenant or they have a replica that they have believed to be the Ark of the Covenant for 2,000 years," he said.

Cornuke said, if it is genuine, there's a plausible explanation of how the Ark may have come to the Church of Our Lady Mary of Zion in Ethiopia.

"The Ark could have been taken out of the temple during the time of the atrocities of Manasseh," he said. "We have kind of a bread crumb trail that appears to go to Egypt, and it stayed on an island there for a couple hundred years called Elephantine Island. The Ark then was transferred over to Lake Tana in Ethiopia where it stayed on Tana Qirqos Island for 800 years. Then it was taken to Axum, where it is enshrined in a temple today where they don't let anybody see it." Cornuke said he traveled to Tana Qirqos Island and lived with monks who remain there even today.

"They unlocked this big, four-inch thick wood door," he said. "It opened up to a treasure room, and they showed me meat forks and bowls and things that they say are from Solomon's temple. When the History Channel did this show, they said it was one of the largest viewed shows. People were fascinated."

He said Ethiopians consider the Ark to be the ultimate holy object, and the church guards the suspected artifact from the "eyes and pollution of man."

"In Ethiopia, their whole culture is centered around worshipping this object," Cornuke said. "Could they have the actual Ark? I think I could make a case that they actually could."
[...]
Cornuke explained that a special guardian lives inside the church which reportedly holds the Ark and never leaves. Once a guardian is appointed, he stays until he dies and another man replaces him.

"We know for a fact that there have been 30 guardians in history who have never left that enclosure," Cornuke said. "I know the guardian. When CNN and BBC went over there, he wouldn't see anybody but me. So I went and talked to him, and he's getting very aged. He told me they have the real Ark and he worships 13 hours a day in front of it. When he gets through, he is covered in sweat and he's exhausted."

He said he met a 105-year-old man who claimed to have seen the Ark 50 years ago when he was training a replacement guardian.

"It frightened him to death when he got a glimpse of it."

Cornuke said he also met with the president of Ethiopia nearly nine years ago and had a one-on-one conversation with him in his palace. He asked if Ethiopia had the Ark of the Covenant.

According to Cornuke, the president responded: "Yes, we do. I am the president, and I know. It's not a copy. It's the real thing."