what you are looking at is a photograph released by NASA of the moon precisely where the Beresheet lunar module crashed. There is now a small crater, a few tens of meters wide. They have before and after pictures, with a shot from December that has no such marking on it, and this new shot from April that shows the crater.

Beresheet left its mark on the moon!

this is an important kashrut announcement, as Mentos is a very popular candy around here...


basically, the hechsher of Badatz Chatam Sofer Petach Tikva is announcing that Mentos made in Vietna is not under their hashgocho, despite a mistakenly printed label that says it is.

I have no idea if the Mentos sold here are these or not, and dont have any handy to check, but pay attention..

The Haredi parties got slightly stronger with the number of mandates they achieved, so now they want to put shtreimels on all our heads...

  --MK Eli Avidar (Yisrael Beyteynu)

the conflict between Yisrael Beyteynu and the Haredi parties seems to be at an all time high. There were some good zingers in both directions over the past day as the coalition negotiations look to be at a real dead end, but this one was the best...

it came down to the wire!




כי מציון תצא תורה...

other bloggers, like me, also feel safe here...

According to Ynet, the Health Ministry published a table of the countrywide measles outbreak.

It might be a surprise to you, but the leading cities on the list are all haredi cities, or cities with substantial Haredi populations. Only one in the top ten is a secular city with no significant Haredi population.

The city at the top of the board is Jerusalem with 1403 diagnosed cases of measles, followed by Bet Shemesh with 430. This is followed by cities such as Tzfat, Beitar, Bnei Braq and others. The secular city in the list is Tel Aviv, taking 8th place with 109 cases.



These numbers are absolute - the number of cases diagnosed. I would like to see the ratings per capita and see which city places where. Tel Aviv might drop off the list entirely, while Bet Shemesh, Beitar or Tzfat might jump out in front.

With Bet Shemesh normally coming in at the tail end of various statistics, this is not the one we finally want to be leading in.

And, again, I hope the Minister of Health, outgoing and whoever the incoming will be (likely the same but not definitely), is putting together a plan to combat this outbreak. We've heard nary a word about it until now from the Deputy Minister of Health. I think that needs to change.

Don't think of your empty Coca-Cola can or water bottle as a worthless piece of garbage, not worth your time and energy to go collect your 30agorot in recycling fees. Think of it just one step in getting your sefer torah.

A community in Upper Nazareth, Nazareth Ilit, the community of Bnei Hayeshivos Ohel Yaakov, decided to put together a massive collection and recycling program, with everyone collecting every qualifying bottle and can they could, mostly worth 30agorot each.

So this community collected and turned in all these cans, and used the money to buy a mehudar megillas Esther. They are now collecting cans and saving up to buy a scroll of Koheles.

And it does not stop there. According to Ladaat, they already have plan for the next stage - collecting cans to raise money for a sefer Torah!

Every little bit counts. Every little bit adds up.

It used to be that various cities would try to block visitors from other cities, usually from Haredi cities, from visiting and enjoying the local parks, crowding the park and leaving their mess behind. They did this by making rules that local residents can enter for free but non-locals would have to pay an entrance fee.

People would get upset, words would be exchanged, protests with the Ministry of Interior would be filed, MoI would express outrage at such anti-haredi moves, and eventually the decision would be reversed and the park would, usually, remain open and free for all.

It seems from this Mako News report that the Ministry of Interior is now being proactive and changing tactics. Instead of insisting, as they have in the past, that the parks remain free for all, they are now initiating a plan by which the parks will be open to all but will all charge an entrance fee.

The new rule would have any public park larger than 100 dunam can have an entrance fee. The fee will be decided practically by the local municipal government and it will be dependent upon the expense of cleaning and maintaining the park. According to the MoI, the local authorities are in favor of this arrangement.

A citizens rights watchdog does not like this potential arrangement suggesting that it will cause a division among the people with there being parks for rich people and parks for poor people. Being that this plan is in the initial stages, now is the time to protest it in the hopes that it will be canceled and not advanced.

I am not sure if this is going forward or backwards.

I would at least hope and expect that if this goes through and they start charging an entrance fee that will will at least actually clean and maintain the parks properly, including having the water fountains working along with trash pickup.

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