I recently wrote what was considered a fairly radical suggestion. In that piece I suggested that the residents of Sderot and the other communities bordering with Gaza should begin shooting their own "homemade" rockets or Kassams into Gaza. I think the government should finance it, but if they don't I am sure it would not be difficult to raise the money privately. Maybe even Gaydamak would be forthcoming...

Anyway, today I have another radical opinion. Over the past few days Hamas has been threatening and warning Israel. They say if we assassinate their leaders Gilad Shalit will be killed. They have said they are going to try to kidnap more Israelis. They said they will restart their suicide bomber program again.

I think it is time Israel fight fire with fire.

If Gilad Shalit is worth 4000 Arabs, as they must think so as that is what they requested in exchange for him, I think we should kidnap 4000 Arabs from Gaza.

I do not care what specifically we do with them, other than stick them in solitary confinement with no access to Red Cross reps. Other than that they can be put anywhere. In jails with horrible conditions, in 5-star hotels (with no telephone or internet access of course) or anything in between. Just kidnap a boatload of them.

In addition, I would cancel any access current prisoners have to the outside world. No red Cross connections. No visitors. No lawyers. Nothing. The other side is not giving any of that to Shalit. They have not even given us basic proof of whether or not he is alive.

Tit for Tat. Give us information as to Shalit's condition and we will give information of the condition of PA prisoners in Israel. Kidnap tens, or hundreds or thousands of PA Arabs and they can be traded for Shalit. Give Shalit contact with the outside world and we give PA prisoners in Israel contact with the outside world.

Nothing we have done has worked and it is time to play on the same court. Until now we have been playing a completely different game than the one being played by Hamas-led PA (not that Fatah with Abbas was any better, but they put a nicer face on it). It is time to play the same game.

Esser Agaroth is hosting this weeks edition of Haveil Havalim... check it out

We had the good fortune of being able to spend Shvuos in Jerusalem by my in-laws. This afforded me the opportunity to daven vasikin Shvuos morning by the Kotel, something I am not always able to do...

After a night of learning and trying to fight off the drowsiness, I started my walk to the Kotel. I was alone because my boys were not successful in staying up. They tried and one of them had said he might want to come with me to the kotel, but because they did not listen to me and take a nap before Shvuos, that did not work out.

When learning the gemara of eiruvin a while back there was an interesting concept we learned about. It was called "bivin". Bivin are wells or pits dug in the middle of the streets. The people of Jerusalem would dig wells and pits of water during the holiday season. They did this for the benefit of the multitudes of people who were travelling to Jerusalem for the holiday and aliyah l'regel. The discussion in the gemara centers around whether the area of these bivin are considered public domain or private domain and whether one would be able to carry within them.

It is a bit hard to imagine wells being dug in the middle of the street just for the holiday season. I mean, what would they do when the holiday was over - fill the well? leave it there? It might be dangerous to have an open well in the middle of a well travelled road all year round...

Well, on the way to the Kotel I think I understood that topic a little better. I have been to the kotel many times in previous years on Shvuos morning, though not much in recent years. I saw something that was completely new, at least to me (meaning, maybe they did it last year as well, but not a few years ago).

On the main road of Shmuel HaNavi st., with the tens of people turning into hundreds and then into thousands, as the side streets spill into the main road, walking towards the Kotel, different organizations put out hospitality tents in the middle of the road. These tents or drinking stations offered cold drinks, hot drinks, cakes, cookies, a place to sit and rest for a bit.

These are the modern day "bivin" displaying the generous hospitality of Jerusalemites.

The kotel was great. Shvuos is probably the one day a year that Jews can walk safely through Shaar Shchem - Damascus Gate (why is it called Damascus Gate and not Nablus Gate - Shchem is translated as Nablus, while Damascus is Damesek in Hebrew? Just somethign I have wondered about).

Shaar Shchem leads directly to the Kotel but through the Arab shuk (marketplace). And of the two main Arab shuks (shaar shchem and shaar yafo) Shaar Shchem is considered fairly dangerous for Jews. So usually Jews will not go there, aside from the few people who do, such as members of Ateret Kohanim and the like.

But on Shvuos morning with thousands and thousands of Jews puring through, we generally walk through Shaar Shchem instead of the longer way through Shaar Yafo. Jacob recently wrote about his memories of walking through Shaar Shchem and how kids and yeshiva guys would pick fights with the Arab locals. I have similar memories. I remember people overturning Arab pushcarts, breaking locks on the Arab stalls, singing loudly Jewish songs of taking over the city and building the Temple, etc.

I was expecting to see that, but it seems that either I missed it, or the kids have gotten tamer than in my day. I did not see any disturbances except for one. One 10 year old kid tried to jam a padlock on a stall. The soldiers stopped him fairly quickly and chased him away. No lous singing in the Arab shuk (there was some singing by a group of people near one of the gates to Temple Mount, but not in the shuk itself).

I davened in Rabbi Lau's minyan. Rabbi Lau is a former Chief Rabbi of Israel and currently Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv. He has a set minyan every year and the last few times I have gone to the kotel Shvuos morning, I have davened in this minyan. Generally the great chazzan and performer Dudu Fisher is the chazzan of this minyan. I was looking forward to hearing him again. Unfortunately Fisher is in America and could not make it back for Shvuos. For the first time in many years he did not lead the services in Rabbi Lau's minyan. They had a different chazzan who was ok. He was no Dudu Fisher, but he was ok.

On the walk back I passed the Mayor of Jerusalem, Uri Lapoliansky who was also walking home from davening at the kotel.

Spring is in the air. There were a number of posts with pictures showing the beauty of spring. I think the largest percentage of posts were on that topic, though I was too lazy to actually count it. I was going to call this the Spring Edition because of those posts. I then decided that the Eretz Yisrael posts win out, as Eretz Yisrael topics are always more important... so I called this the Eretz Yisrael edition.. enjoy the posts - all of them, the eretz yisrael posts, the spring posts and the rest of them....





Eretz Yisrael
Cosmic X's son went to Meron on Lag B'Omer and is making me hungry.


muse went walking instead of swimming.

muse then takes us on tour of Nachla'ot, Jerusalem in honor of Yom Yerushalayim.

ari kinsberg remembers his visit to Kever Yosef, from the time one could go without having to wait for a 2 am bus...

and tnspr569 tells us about his trip with me to the Shomron, trying to get into Kever Yosef.

Ben-Yehudah points out what he sees as the latest Nissan advertisement.

Jacob has 585 pictures (yes, 585. that was not a typo) of the Jerusalem Day Parade and the Jerusalem Flag March.

Cosmic X continues showing us the progress of the new Jerusalem Calatrava Bridge.

Evan took a hike Above Tsfat and then shows us Tsfatas well. He also shows us Yom Yerushalayim.


Misc
Sarah presents Big Signs from her last trip to the US. They are from Universal City Walk, which is always a fun place to go

frumhouse took a walk with her child and presents West Rogers Park in Bloom. Enjoy all the beautiful flowers!

Barbara presents a pictorial essay by her kids...called DID YOU KNOW? .

I don't know what a Dogwood is, but A Simple Jew presents Black & White Picture Of The Week - Dogwood In Bloom.

Irina notices she is Surrounded by Beauty and takes some time off of her routine to show us some of the beautiful images...

David from Temunot presents some cute pictures his daughters drew for Mother's Day.

Sarah gives us an interesting perspective of light in Still Life: Marvellous Marbles.

frumhouse at Little Frumhouse on the Prairie brings us a batch of Chick Pics.

SWFM shows us a whole bunch of loony pics and then a few of the sky.

Jacob DaJew went biking with a fellow blogger and posted some video at Frum Satire and Jacob Da Jew Meet!! Then he took his family on a trip to Drummer's Circle in Prospect Park

Baleboosteh shows us images of Life In A Non-Bustling Town...

Baleboosteh gives us two posts with pix of herchildren.

Cosmic X suggests what to do with A Moldy Pita.

A Simple Jew presents Black & White Picture Of The Week - Gerberra Daisy.

Yossi presents Yeshiva in prison.

PerezTime went to The Beach.

Mordechai presents his Picture of the Week.

Tamara talks aboutGriffith Park.

David from Temunot went Back in Time to Plymouth.

Yechiel (Jonny) Stein presents pictures of the Beitar Yerushalayim championship celebration at Gan Sacher.

This is a sticky reminder and will stay at the top until Shavuot or until I get sick of seeing it... Don't forget to count the Omer! And scroll down for newer posts...

---

15:00

Hamas: Any harm to Haniyeh would mean change in rules of the game (Reuters)

background: Israel has been, in an attempt to scare Hamas leaders to stop or at least lessen the shooting of Kassam rockets into Israel, threatening that even Hamas leaders such as Haniyeh and Meshaal are included in the IDf targets.

I am not sure what game they are referring to. I was not aware we are involved in a game. Is that what they consider this whole thing - a game?

Nor am I quite sure what the existing rules are that any harm to Haniyeh would change those rules. Are they the rules that say that they can harm and kill Israelis but we cannot harm and kill them?
Have they not attempted to harm Israeli leaders? Just last week one Arab from Gaza was arrested and admitted to having been involved in an assassination attempt on Olmert. They can try to kill our leaders but we cannot do so to theirs?

Since I wrote about MBD being in cherem, I now have received letters with the "other side of the story".

I do not know the progression of what happened, but after the first letter was published declaring MBD in contempt of Beis Din and in cherem, he went to Beis Din to clear it up. He declard his willingness to go to Beis Din for judgement. While it is not the same Beis Din as the one that published the original letter, and I do not know the details of who gets to choose which beis din, it seems the story is not so simple...

I received three different letters supporting MBD and will post one of them. They all say pretty much the same thing anyway, so one is enough. It is in Hebrew, but basically says he has fulfilled all his obligations as far as beis din is concerned and therefore the original cherem is null and void.
Looks like you can buy MBD cds again...

I think we have all heard the story of the young disabled boy named Shay, who wanted to join a game of baseball played by a bunch of kids. They let him play. Of course, the story turns out that Shay comes up to bat with the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth and the winning run is on base. They do not replace Shay with a regular player, but let him bat. He hits the ball weakly and, in an amazing display of sportsmanship and sensitivity to Shay, the opposing team throws the ball around intentionally, allowing Shay to knock in the winning run as he completed his "grand slam".

The story is very inspiring...

Last night I was witness to a similar display of good sportsmanship (albeit not quite as emotional).

My softball team was playing the Dawgs last night. Our center fielder was stealing second base and somehow pulled a muscle as he pulled into second. He could hardly move, yet we could not replace him. We only had nine players. Taking him out of the game meant a forfeit (and this game was going to be a fairly easy win - we ended up winning something like 16-7).

He stayed in the game. We just figured he would be an easy out and on defense would move over to first base and I would move over to Center Field (and I had a great game in center with 4 catches).

So, he is on second and the next batter is on first. The next batter comes up to bat. He hits a long double. The crippled guy should easily have been able to score, but he could not move. He was limping around third base as the throw came in to the first baseman from the outfield.

He could have easily thrown the cripple out at home. But he held onto the ball and let him score.

That was a display of great sportsmanship.

The irony was that we had an opportunity to reciprocate.

Later on the game, the opposing first baseman hurt himself legging out a single. He stayed in the game thinking he could play. He got caught off first base on a long fly ball that was caught. We could have easily thrown him out while he hobbled back to first. We held onto the ball and let him hobble back. He then came out of the game and was replaced by somebody else, as they had an extra player.

In the following video you can see the takedown of a Hamasnik in the recent Fatah - Hamas battles in Gaza.

Jack is hosting Haveil Havalim #117 - go check it out..

This weeks Hebrew Mishpacha magazine had articles describing the lives of three great Torah scholars. Rav Elyashiv, the Vizhnitzer Rebbe and Rav Ovadia Yosef.

The articles are very interesting. I would guess the purpose of these articles is to inspire us before Shavuos, the holiday of Matan Torah, in regards to learning Torah.

I want to relate one story I just read in the article on Rav Ovadia Yosef.

The story is that Rav Ovadia Yosef was the wedding of one of the children of Rav BenTzion Abba Shaul. Also attending the wedding was Rav Chaim Kryzeworth from Belgium. While waiting for the chassan and kalla, there was a long delay.

Rav Kryzeworth suggested to Rav Yosef that they should talk in learning while waiting for the chosson to arrive. Rav Ovadia Yosef agreed.

Rav Kryzeworth then suggested that they should review the whole Talmud Bavli (by memory) together (!) while waiting, and as a token to the host of the waiting, they would point out every time the tanna Abba Shaul is mentioned in the gemara.

Rav Ovadia accepted this challenge and suggested that they take turns, Rav Kryzeworth pointing out the first time Abba Shaul was mentioned, and Rav Ovadia pointint out the second time, etc.

They began, each one taking his turn.

When Rav Ovadia Yosef mentioned the fourth time Abba Shaul was mentioned, Rav Kryzeworth interrupted him and said, "You missed one", and mentioned the reference that had been missed.

As he was quoting the missed reference, Rav Ovadia smiled and said, "If you look at the Maharsha on that gemara you will see that that reference to Abba Shaul is not the same Abba Shaul. We are referring top the tanna Abba Shaul, but that one is a different one named Abba Shaul ben Bitnis."

I just thought this was an interesting story that I wanted to share with you. It shows the great mind of Rav Ovadia Yosef, but I found another point. The whole article is about Rav Ovadia Yosef. In this story, I saw how Rav Kryzeworth had a great mastery of the material as well.

Soetimes we look at Rosh Yeshivas and Rabbonim and we think how smart they are but they really might not have control and mastery of everything they have learned at the tip of their tongue. Rav Ovadia Yosef is considered an exception in the sense that his mind is so great and he has so much knowledge at the tip of his tongue. I never heard this of Rav Kryzeworth, albeit he was always considered a great Rosh Yeshiva. But I never heard he had that level of mastery.

It seems that even if we do not know about it, even if we are not aware of it, the great Rabbonim do have that mastery of the sources. Sometimes it is hidden behind their other activities or covered by other things that are at the forefront of any specific Rav's personality, but we should never underestimate the greatness of the Torah leaders. They really do know it all, even if ArtScroll did not put out a book saying so.

I have a list of halachic terms that disturb me by their vagueness and ambiguity, and lack of clear definitions. They are sometimes liberally applied, and sometimes not applied when it looks like they should be.

I added a term to the list last night...I actually never compiled a formal list, but when I stumble across such a term I think about it.

The newest word to make it to my list is "Yohara". This term is used in halacha in the sense that there might be a certain action or opinion that when followed, one would be accused of acting with "yohara" meaning haughtiness.

The context it was used in last night was in regards to tzitzis. The Mishna Berura quotes a Beis Yosef that says that one who makes two holes in the corner of his garment is guilty of yohara. Ostensibly, this would be because he is trying to fulfill even the opinion of a minority view when it is not necessary. But nowadays we do that all the time (try to fulfill all opinions, even thos eof minority viewpoints), so why is that a big deal or why are we not guilty of yohara all the time?

Another time this term is used is when covering the head with a tallis for davening. If I remember correctly, the shulchan aruch says that talmidei chachomim cover their heads with the tallis during tefilla. Others who do so are guilty of yohara. Yet nowadays almost everybody in religious circles (and for sure in chareidi circles) does so. Are they not all guilty of yohara because they consider themselves talmidei chachomim when that is not necessarily the case?

When do we apply this? when do we not? why is this ever an issue?

this can be added to another term: "tircha d'tzibbura"

I know I have more, but off the top of my head I cannot think of any...

What halachic terms do you know of that bother you like this?

I am hosting the upcoming edition of the jpix carnival (#8). It will be posted this coming Sunday.
If you have any posts with pictures that you want to share with others, make sure you submit them. You can either email me at israeli.jew at gmail dot com or submit via the handy carnival submission form.

Get a move on it and submit your links... before time runs out!!

The residents of Sderot have been under continuous attack from Gaza, but the intensity has increased, with 21 rockets falling yesterday in the area, and more today.

Akiva was IM'ing a friend of his yesterday when a barrage of rockets hits. He posted a transcript of the conversation and included some video footage as well..

A lot of people are criticizing the government for their lack of response to the Kassam rockets. Many even blame the recent Winograd Report for "sandaling" (Hebrew slang for tying their hands) the government. They claim that ever since the Winograd Report was released, the government is afraid to make any moves, let alone a move that would include shooting at our enemy and putting soldiers in harms way. They are afraid they will be subject to another investigation and report condemning them.

I reject such claims. The rockets have been falling on Sderot for years and have increase din intensity for the past year and a half. That is well before the Winograd Report came out and well before the Winograd Commission was ever formed or began asking questions of the politicians. The reason Olmert and Peretz are not defending the State of Israel is because they are incapable of doing so. Not because they are afraid of a new commission of inquiry.

And on that note I will add, that while something clearly needs to be done and Israel is obligated to defend itself, and I think we should wipe Gaza off the map, if need be, I think right now the timing is wrong (it would not have been wrong a year ago or even a week ago, but today it is).

Why do I say that? What about the poor residents of Sderot under attack?

I am not saying it is too dangerous and Israel should not do it. The residents of Sderot deserve our full support and we need to defend them. I just think tactically today is a bad time.

Why?

Because right now the Arabs of Gaza are killing each other. Yesterday they killed something like 15 of each other, and so far today another 5. They are, once again, on the brink of civil war. I do not think anyone even knows why they are killing each other. But if we go in now and attack because of the Kassam attacks, we will stop them from killing each other. We will be the source of their unity as they join hands to return to killing Jews. I prefer we give them a few days to kill each other before we send a mass response. A small response (maybe targeted killings or whatnot) might still be in order, but not a large scale response.

Not to worry, as no large scale response is planned anyway.

I also thought of an idea I would like to suggest for the residents fo Sderot (and surrounding areas).

I think it is high time, considering the lack of protection provided by the State, that you took matters into your own hands. It is time for you to get together and acquire some sort of missile or rocket.

Maybe Arkady Gaidamak can be approached to help with the funding. Maybe a fundraising drive among the general Israeli public (I would chip in to it).

You Sderot residents should be buying rockets. Maybe even building your own. I mean, if the third world Arabs in sewage-ridden Gaza City can figure it out, a bunch of smart Jews should be able to, right? It's not exactly rocket science, is it? (actually it is, but that was a joke).

Anyways, once you get a reasonable supply of rockets and missiles, you should start shooting them in the direction of Gaza.

I cannot wait to see the Arabs in shock at your response. I cannot wait to see Terje Larson and Javier Solana in a fit condemning Israel for such rocket attacks on poor PA civilians, after they have ignored the attacks on Israel for so long. And I cannot wait and see the look on the faces of Olmert and Peretz as they have to try to stop you from protecting yourselves.

Heck, I might even come down for a day to help shoot rockets at them.

If the government won't protect you (and us by extension), it is time you did something different.

Voting in the final round of the JIBs has begun. Check it out and go vote for your favorite blogs.

I am a finalist in two categories. Go vote for me in Best Slice of Life in Israel category and
Best Small Blog category




This post will be sticky (under the Omer post). So make sure you continue to scroll down for newer posts. The Omer is still more important than the JIBs, so it keeps the top spot.