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Despite PM Netanyahu's opposition to this, the government is looking to pass a law that would require all behavior to comply with the orders of the Chief Rabbinate at the Holy Places in Israel, including the Kotel... this would disallow women from using Torah scrolls or laying tefilling and donning tallit at the Kotel, appropriate attire, among other behaviors we have seen and some have fought over. Netanyahu is pushing for them to drop the vote on this law proposal, but so far many of the ministers are saying they are going to push it forward despite Netanyahu's opposition to it.

MK Avi Maoz (Noam) has propsoed a law that will require compliance with the Chief Rabbinate's decrees or directives at the Holy Sites, including the Kotel. Maoz would have this be punishable by up to 7 years of prison for non-compliance.

One potential side effect of passage of this law would be Jews going to Har Habayit. The Chief Rabbinate has always been opposed to Jews going to Har Habayit and has issued directives against Jewish ascent. If the law passes and Jews go up anyway, we could see frum Jews being arrested for going to Har Habayit, and that is regardless of how they act up there or what they do (until now Jews could be and were detained on Har Habayit for visibly praying or doing other "provocative" things, though this has been lessened since Minister Ben Gvir took office as Minister of National Security).

I am not sure what the official legal status of Har Habayit is in Israeli law - I think it only has status as a holy site for Muslims, not as a Jewish holy site, so that might actually be its saving grace for Jews. If it is not a holy site it might not fall under the authrity of the Chief Rabbinate. Strange that it is not considered a holy site, but that is what I understand its status is...

As far as the Kotel, where does it begin and where does it end? Will the same rules apply to the Kotel Hakattan (it should)? What about the plaza leading to the Kotel? Can the women make their minyan in the plaza without threat of arrest? if people are dressed inappropriately in the plaza can they be arrested?

At the end of the day, I cant see it being a good thing to see people arrested for praying, for not wearing stockings (if the Rabbanut decides that is appropriate attire for a holy site) or for other such behaviors. Once the genie is out of the box, not sure it will be so easy to put back in, and while the goal is against the Reform from doing their things, it will quickly affect others as well... will this take away the right for Israel to express outrage when other countries ban prayer in certain places or ban circumcision unless done in certain ways?

Rav Aharon Butbol was asked by a yeshiva bochur about the need to don a black hat and jacket for the purpose of bentching.. how necessary is it really?

Rav Butbol responded paskening that technically there is no need to wear a hat and jacket for davening. The problem is, which the hat and jacket resolves, that a head covering has to cover the majority of the head for it to be considered a valid head covering The modern bochurim wear such small kipas it has become necessary to wear a hat for davening to fulfill the halacha of having the head covered. Yeshiva bochurim, a ben torah, should wear larger kippas, specifically a size 6 or 7.

Rav Butbol said that for bentching there is a halachic preference to be "wrapped" - Ituf as we do for davening with a tallis. The jacket accomplishes the need for ituf, but it is not absolutely necessary rather only a midat chassidut.

Also, if someone accepted on himself to don his hat and jacket for bentching, after 3 times it does take the status of a neder and if one wanted to stop doing that he would need to do hatarat nedarim, unless he includes that in the hatarat nedarim done on erev Rosh Hashana. 

source: Kol B'Rama

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The Amish Menonites cover Waterbury!

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  -- Former Chief Rabbi Rav Shlomo Amar, regarding the idea of opening the Rabbanut tests to women

There are many people out there who think this would be a great idea and improvement....

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A municipal swimming pool just recently opened in Efrat. The designers worked hard to figure out a way to balance the desire for family swimming while also allowing for religious sensitivities against mixed swimming to be adhered to...

While most pools in such mixed communities will designate hours for mixed swimming and hours for separate swimming, in Efrat they decided to innovate and they came up with the creation of a built in mechitza that has be raised from the bottom of the pool and lowered back down when no longer needed. With the pool being 8 swimming lanes wide, the mechitza down the middle will leave four lanes for men and four for women when the wall is up.

It seems to me to be a lot of innovation for one benefit - lowering the wall for the hours of family swim makes it like any other pool with no mechitza that has hours for family swim. Raising the wall means women and men can swim at the same time but separately rather than having to schedule men at a certain time of day and women at a different time of day. I guess the same could have been accomplished by building two pools. I wonder which would have been cheaper, though the idea of a wall in the pool that goes up and down is cool.

JPost has a picture of it, though the picture just looks like a swimming pool with a wall. they should have taken a picture where you can see both sides of the pool with the wall in the middle...

  -- Rav Yitzchak Yosef, former Chief Rabbi of Israel

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Rav Tachan began discussing reckless drivers saying there is a mitzva to report such drivers as they have the status of rodef on the roads. It is not allowed to report reckless drivers, it is an obligation to report reckless drivers. Also, if you capture reckless driving ona  dashcam it is a mitzva to report it to the authorities.

What about reporting the presence of police in Waze so other drivers know police are in the area to slow down in advance or drive safer (eg put away the phone they are using, etc) - on the one hand when you report police presence it causes drivers to slowdown, which is a good thing. On the other hand, reckless drivers will use it to avoid punishment and will continue driving recklessly with nothing to deter them.

Rav Tachan paskened that the purpose of the police presence on the roads is to ensure safe driving. Helping people avoid the police is problematic. It is prohibited to help a reckless driver avoid the police and to avoid the law. Better that he should be arrested, pay his fine and learn his lesson than continuing to drive recklessly..

When someone is putting the public in danger, the concept of "moser" does not apply. A person driving recklessly can be reported without any concern of being considered a moser as he is putting the public at risk.

I would further ask, is it ok to report police as being present on a road even when they are not so as to cause reckless drivers to drive safer?

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  -- Yair Golan, Chairman of the Democrats Party

you can disagree on priroties of spending, you can be against funding settlements...but are "settlers" not working people? for the most part they are. The vast majority of them work and serve in the army

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