Mar 10, 2014
I love RBS but the schools make me not want to vote for the politicians
if you are a parent who wants your child to get an education that includes both limudei kodesh and limudei chol, you have no business voting for Moshe Abutbol for mayor.
Moshe Abutbol's city government does everything it can to avoid helping schools that are not the mainstream haredi schools. If a school is more "open" than the average 'cheider', it will likely be generally brushed off and its needs ignored.
I have it on good authority, including having a document on Iryah stationery, that a local school is being refused a plot or building in a local area, forcing parents to pay extra money for transportation, making the kids leave earlier than what should be necessary because they have to travel to school instead of being able to go to school locally, all because some unnamed rabbonim have opposition to the school. When it was pointed out that many local rabbonim are involved in the school in various ways and come to speak at the school, the school was told that other rabbonim don't approve. And I am talking about a haredi school and haredi rabbonim.
While it may not be completely Moshe Abutbol's fault, and it would be more directly the fault of one of his supporting parties, the fact that the Iryah can reject such basic assistance for such a reason is a black mark on Moshe Abutbol's entire administration. They may not like the school, but it is a local school servicing local families and they should have to provide the required services. This is an example of Abutbol being controlled by the more extreme elements of the city.
As a matter of fact, the Agudah party, Gimmel, has gone on a campaign to try to pick up some of those disenfranchised parents. The hassidishe parties have always been mroe open to these types of schools. While I do not know how much they helped in the past,, they are starting to post letters around the neighborhood stating their commitment to helping these types of svchools. There was a letter recently of Gimmel committing to help Magen Avos, and now there is a letter from Gimmel committing to support the Mesivta. If you plan to vote for a haredi party, you might even want to consider voting for gimmel because they are the haredi party that is willing to publicly help these schools out. Will they or will they not - I have no idea, but we know the other party under whose blanket these schools should fall (both for the clientele and for the fact that it has held the haredi education portfolio) and the mayor is already not doing what they should do.
As I said, you don't have to send your child to either of these schools, or any other similar-styled school, if that's not the way you want to educate your children. but it is unconscionable that the Iryah will refuse to help a school because the more "extreme" rabbonim of the neighborhood don't want him to.
Nobody is saying these schools need to be given buildings in the heart of the haredi areas. RBS A is not monolithic, and a building or plot can be situated in a more diverse section of the neighborhood. But they continue to refuse the most basic assistance to these schools, and probably to others as well that I am not aware of. And their needs aren't always in the form of buildings - they have other needs that the Iryah provides to other schools but ignores these, and probably other, schools just because they are not mainstream haredi schools.
Vote Eli Cohen for mayor of Bet Shemesh. Bet Shemesh needs to be more moderate and less extreme.
Moshe Abutbol's city government does everything it can to avoid helping schools that are not the mainstream haredi schools. If a school is more "open" than the average 'cheider', it will likely be generally brushed off and its needs ignored.
I have it on good authority, including having a document on Iryah stationery, that a local school is being refused a plot or building in a local area, forcing parents to pay extra money for transportation, making the kids leave earlier than what should be necessary because they have to travel to school instead of being able to go to school locally, all because some unnamed rabbonim have opposition to the school. When it was pointed out that many local rabbonim are involved in the school in various ways and come to speak at the school, the school was told that other rabbonim don't approve. And I am talking about a haredi school and haredi rabbonim.
While it may not be completely Moshe Abutbol's fault, and it would be more directly the fault of one of his supporting parties, the fact that the Iryah can reject such basic assistance for such a reason is a black mark on Moshe Abutbol's entire administration. They may not like the school, but it is a local school servicing local families and they should have to provide the required services. This is an example of Abutbol being controlled by the more extreme elements of the city.
As a matter of fact, the Agudah party, Gimmel, has gone on a campaign to try to pick up some of those disenfranchised parents. The hassidishe parties have always been mroe open to these types of schools. While I do not know how much they helped in the past,, they are starting to post letters around the neighborhood stating their commitment to helping these types of svchools. There was a letter recently of Gimmel committing to help Magen Avos, and now there is a letter from Gimmel committing to support the Mesivta. If you plan to vote for a haredi party, you might even want to consider voting for gimmel because they are the haredi party that is willing to publicly help these schools out. Will they or will they not - I have no idea, but we know the other party under whose blanket these schools should fall (both for the clientele and for the fact that it has held the haredi education portfolio) and the mayor is already not doing what they should do.
As I said, you don't have to send your child to either of these schools, or any other similar-styled school, if that's not the way you want to educate your children. but it is unconscionable that the Iryah will refuse to help a school because the more "extreme" rabbonim of the neighborhood don't want him to.
Nobody is saying these schools need to be given buildings in the heart of the haredi areas. RBS A is not monolithic, and a building or plot can be situated in a more diverse section of the neighborhood. But they continue to refuse the most basic assistance to these schools, and probably to others as well that I am not aware of. And their needs aren't always in the form of buildings - they have other needs that the Iryah provides to other schools but ignores these, and probably other, schools just because they are not mainstream haredi schools.
Vote Eli Cohen for mayor of Bet Shemesh. Bet Shemesh needs to be more moderate and less extreme.
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The school u r referring to is a high school. They are in BS, 4 km away. They are fairly new to the scene. Not everybody gets a penthouse on park ave south and central park.Not all land is available to every one who decides to open a school. Also, if the school has different values in certain ways then the average population then maybe its best for them not to be in the heart but to be in BS.
ReplyDeletebad answer. the response hasnt been - you arent big enough yet, come back when you have 30% more students. and it was not - you havent been around long enough, come back in 2 years.
Deletethe response was we'd love to help but some rabbis say that they wont allow a school that offers bagrut to open its doors in RBS.
nothing to do with penthouse or central park or new or old. and it doesnt have differing values to the local population. a large number of parents send kids to schools like magen avot and darchei noam, among others, and for high schools to all sorts such as maarava, nehora, among others. There is room in rbs for yeshiva ketanas and the mesivta as well.
Vote for Moshe Abutbul if you want the city to be filled with Shomrei Shabbos instead of Mechalelei Shabbos.
ReplyDeleteI don't understand how a person who calls himself frum can so proudly go against the wishes of ALL Rabbonim.
The Rabbi in your shul included.
When Rabbis Malinowitz, Feldman, Kaminetzky etc. who aren't your typical Israeli ultra ultra come out swinging against voting for a kofer, you oughta listen.
You think that you understand better than all the Rabbis. Ok, just don't call yourself frum.
Um, have you not seen the letter of about 20 local rabbanim recommending Eli Cohen?
DeleteI'm not referring to rabbanim sug dalet.
DeleteUNKNOWN, please do not think of ever relocating to the tri-state area in USA? You will be lost since our Rabbis & RY allow us to think, make decisions and vote our daas.
DeleteI am from there. Haha.
DeleteThe issues there aren't as life and death, torah and kfira, frum and hiloni-lite mizrachi over there.
This is leider the "Jewish" state.
Hi anonymous, just a question: which charedi Rabbi gave you a heter to be on internet putting comments on blog, because i assume rhat it's not your parnassa.
DeleteHaha.
DeleteI don't proclaim that I'm proudly defiant of all rabbanim.
And wouldn't dream of voting for anyone planning on hurting charedim and refusing to let them expand over here.
NO ONE, and i repeat, NO ONE hurt the Chareidim, and Torah, as much as the extremists of Beit Shemesh (e.g. the spitting and the election fraud) and the "leaders" that didn't deal properly with the situation.
DeleteYea, Unknown. What are you doing here? You're the kofer--you clearly don't listen to the Gedolim about the Internet. Duh.
DeleteI live in RBS A. My Rav lives here too and he is Charedi. He told his congregation to vote their Da'as. He hasn't once intimated in public who anyone should vote for, despite having one of the party leaders as his Rosh Kehilla. He hasn't endorsed any candidates or parties.
DeleteOnly the Rabannim who are scared of independent thought feel a need to rail for or against any one candidate.
As an aside, it's extremely unlikely that Eli Cohen is a Kofer. You throw around such terms so lightly without giving the slightest thought to what they mean.
Only people who are being hypocritical in claiming to favor independent thought are bothered by people who are freely interested in knowing what their Rabbonim think is the best choice so they can make a free choice to agree.
DeleteThank you Rafi- I was planning on voting for Chen (maybe the cute posters were affecting me!) but after reading your post, I will definitely vote for Gimmel if only to send a message that I won't support a party that doesn't support the Mesivta. My son is only in fourth grade but iyH I hope to send him there in 5 years!
ReplyDeleteAnonymous, you didn't answer the question. Tell me if I'm wrong but the big majority of charedim rabbi oppose the use of internet, except for parnassa. In the US, the charedi school, except few, won't accept your children if you have internet home. So if you belong to this majority, you are defiant of your rabbanim in public. By the way, why are you so angry?
ReplyDeleteI'm so tired of the Litvish parties completely ignoring the Anglo community - except during election season, where they put up some snazzy signs, tell us how we're also "good chareidim", and then ignore us for another 5 years until they need us again. A strong showing for Gimmel will send them a message that we can't be taken for granted and that they'll need to earn our votes. If you're an Anglo whose going to vote for a Chareidi party for City council anyway, don't throw your vote out on Montag and his gang- vote Gimmel!
ReplyDeletePolitics is all about quid pro quo. If you want to get support for Magen Avos, the Mesivta, etc., vote Gimmel. I don't agree with their view on every issue, but this is about giving votes to those who promise to do something for us. I'd vote for Abutbol too if I thought he would do something about all the robberies in town (he won't bother with security cameras or anything, he said at a meeting, I am not a sherrif, I don't control the police, so I can't do anything), or if he would finish Resido center (something he promised to do before the LAST election 5 years ago).
ReplyDeleteAnyone sitting and reading the internet blogs is quite a hypocrite for telling anyone to vote for anyone because "the rabbis said to." By being here and commenting, you prove that you don't believe you have to listen to rabbis, so quit telling other people to. Also, I don't think any rabbi who refused to meet with Eli Cohen can actually judge him.
ReplyDeleteRafi - you put me in a quandary. Do you know if gimmel has an agreement with another party for the extra vote?
ReplyDeletethey did have an agreement. I dont remember for sure, but i think their agreement was with koach. i'll have to look for the information
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteI remembered incorrectly. degel and koach have an agreement. gimmel and shas have an agreement.
Deletehere is the list: http://betshemesh.muni.il/uploads/n/1381950534-0.pdf
Thanks Rafi. Just to clarify, this means that if i vote TOV, and they dont get a seat, then it is zero...but if they get one seat only, the extra goes to balaish? Is that right?
Deletecorrect.
Deleteto further add to the intrigue, this only happens if balayish also passes the threshhold. that is not so clear that he will. much of chabad has abandoned him. also many of his voters are supposedly upset at him. montag and abutbol have been trying to help him and are trying to send voters to him because they want him in the city council.. he just barely made it in last time, and he is looking like very likely to not make it in this time.
The locating of schools with a specific hashkafa is a very delicate issue. Listen, if the community rabbanim, the community leaders, think the school shouldn't be located there, maybe it's a good idea to listen to them. After all, remember what happened last time when a dati leumi school was located too close to a charedi neighborhood? Bedlam ensued, with terrible events that won't be soon forgotten.
ReplyDeletethere are plenty of people for whom this school is not inappropriate. I would be fine not giving them a plot on kishon, or on revivim or next door to masaas mordechai, but much of the neighborhood is fairly mixed and there would be nothing inappropriate about putting a school like this in most places around rbs
DeleteOK, great plan, any time a school opens somewhere and someone doesn't like it, they can burn it down and blame the school for opening in the wrong neighborhood. The Orot Banot story was NOT the fault of the Orot Banot school, but the fault of the bad people. What kind of neighborhood is this, where a school for regular children can't open anywhere? What is it, an x-rated movie theater? A homeless shelter? Shame on you!
ReplyDeleteHopefully soon all this fighting will end. Whoever 'wins' it hopefully will enable all to get back to living their lives in beautiful Beit Shamesh peacefully.
ReplyDeleteEven though we can't know for sure what Gimmel will end up doing for Anglo-Chareidi schools, to me the fact that they were willing to put these signs up in the RBS shuls proves to me me that at the very least they're not intimidated by the kannoim in town, who are almost all affiliated with Degel (Chen Charedi). That is a good starting point. The chasisim (Gimmel is Agudas Yisrael which is Chasssidish), aren't threatened by American tsyle Chinuch because their boys go the schools of their own Chassidus with the whole levush and all. It's the Litvish yeshivos (affiliated with Chen) that are nervous that "their" talmidim might jump ship and go to a place like the Mesivta. If there are a lot more Gimmel votes in town it will send a message to Chen that they can't just put up cute signs in English- they have to represent ALL the Chareidi Anglos- not just the ones who want to be just like the Israeli Chareidim.
ReplyDeleteWho really represents the "moderate Chareidim"? Not the Chiloni parties, not the DL- they look out for their specific mosdot, not Shas- they try to take care of Sephardim, not Chen- they are 100% beholden to the Chareidi party line, so I think that if Gimmel is offering to represent us, we should vote for Gimmel- it's not as if any other party has given us a reason to vote for them.
ReplyDeleteIf the extra Gimmel votes were going to Koach or Chen then I probably wouldn't vote for Gimmel, but now that I heard it's Shas I guess it's the least problematic of the choices. I heard that besides the Abutbol-Gimmel voters, supposedly lots of people in RBS are voting for Eli Cohen and Gimmel- it's pretty funny but I guess it makes sense. Supposedly the last poll shows that Eli Cohen is going to win.
ReplyDelete