There is still an ongoing infestation of rats in Bnei Braq and it seems this may very will affect Sukkos obligations.

The City of Tel Aviv published on its municipal website instructions, guidelines and relevant information for the upcoming holiday season in Tel Aviv. Some of it is informative, some generous, and some cute and quirky and not necessarily traditional.

Minister of Health Yuli Edelstein called this evening for increased fines for those breaking the Corona rules. he also spoke about the lockdown and how they are dealing with it and where they are outing their efforts along with the plan to come out of it carefully and not give in to various sectors demands to ease up quicker...

I think it is kind of funny to discuss what the regulations and restrictions will look like in two months - they get changed every few days and are frequently confounding. Still, Israel Hayom is reporting, and many other media are now re-reporting it, that it seems the Ministry of Health will order full closures for the upcoming holidays of Rosh Hashana and Sukkot, similar to the full closure on Pesach and Yom Haatzmaut a couple of months ago. That will include orders to only celebrate with he nuclear family - only with people living in the same house - no guests, no grandparents, no cousins, married children, grandchildren, no nephews and nieces, etc.

This is not just an assumption, but is something being said by officials within the Ministry of Health. Obviously this has not been officially decided yet and an official decision will come later and be based on the trends and numbers leading up to that time period, but the working assumption is that this is what is going to happen.

The idea of such restrictions is, again, that holiday meals brings a lot of family and friends together from various places causing a significant cross-pollination and risk of exposure and infection. The thought is that shortly after such a holiday we would see spikes in the numbers of infections and deaths. Such a closure would prevent that.

Right? Wrong? Fair? not Fair? I don't know. Minister Yuval Steinitz is calling for a full closure right now, immediately, for ten days. Zebang VeGamarnu, as they say. Beat Corona right now with an extreme 10 day closure. Would it work? Maybe, maybe not. A holiday closure would not even do that, but it might prevent, or avoid, a situation that could become really bad.

Either way, forewarned is forearmed.

Like the other holidays, my guess is that we will see the elected officials making the restrictions for the general populace ignoring them themselves. Or they will "move in to live together" a day or two before the holiday, or before the lockdown, to circumvent the rules.

According to the website Chabad Online, for the first time ever a sukka was built on the White House complex, provided by American Friends of Lubavitch.

To paraphrase Donald Trump, President of the USA, he built a sukka at the White House and the Jews paid for it!

The schedule and program for the annual Sukkos Bet Shemesh festival is out!
Enjoy!

The ministers of the new government each held a ceremony a couple of days ago, each in his or her respective office. the ceremony was a transfer of the baton from the previous minister to the new minister.

Right before the transfer of authority, Gilad Erdan, formerly the Minister of Interior, signed a directive that would ease the construction of the sukka, without requiring a permit.

Some recent directives require the request for an exemption from requesting a permit for building certain temporary structures. Sukka is not in the list, but it is in the descriptive imagery of the directive. A sukka that is larger than 50 square meters or higher than 3 meters, would need official exemptions, while smaller or lower would not.

Erdan decided that with most sukkot placed on porches and rooftops, with them only being used for a week, he decided to ease the burden from those who keep mitzvot and all this is not necessary - they will not need to request exemptions - since it is not included in the law, but only in the explanation of the law, he felt he has that leeway..
source: Kikar

It reminds me of the joke of the policeman who received a complaint about someone's sukka. He went down to see it, and asked to see the permits for building a structure like that. The owner tried to explain that he has no permits, but it is only temporary.. The police did not want to hear any of it, once he heard the fellow has no permit. He slapped on a warning with an edict that the sukka must be dismantled and removed within 14 days.

Erdan is a good guy who works hard. It is a shame he has not yet been brought into the new government with a satisfactory level of responsibility..

This has got to be the best deal available for buying the 4 minim, the lulav and esrog (and others) for sukkos... it is a great price, depending on the quality of the merchandise of course, but it even comes with a one year warranty!

on Walla Shops

and, not only that, but you can split the 39nis price into 5 interest-free payments, or 36 maximum payments with interest! That is either 7.8nis per month for 5 months, or a little over a shekel a month (plus interest) for 3 years!

The deal is limited and will expire soon, so don't waste time.. decide quickly.. at this price, what could possibly be a reason not to buy?

I hope that by now you have already built your sukka.. but if not, this might be for you!

Do you prefer to buy an esrog with a pittem? (I don't even know the proper spelling for pittem, if there is one..). Back in the USA, way back when, I remember, esrog with pittem was the standard. Here in Israel, esrog without pittem is the standard, and some people look for the esrog with the pittem, which is usually a bit more expensive and also a bit harder to find.

By the way,, another thing different today than back in the good old days is the horsehair wrapping. It used to be when you buy an esrog it would be wrapped in this amazing bed of horsehair. In shul you would unwrap it, and after shaking and doing what you need to do, you would lovingly rewrap it. Nowadays they almsot all come with foam wraps that just are not the same.

It used to be thought that people who bought the esrog with a pittem either did not have little children at home, or they were just big risk-takers. If the pittem breaks off, the esrog becomes invalid. After spending a lot of money on an esrog with a pittem, that could be a big loss for the pittem to break off...

If you are one of those pittem risk-takers, you now have a solution to your hedge against your risk. We used to joke about pittem-insurance, but now it is a reality, at least in New York.

The way it works is that the buyer of the pittemed esrog will pay an additional $10 to the merchant above the price of the esrog. That $10 is his insurance payment, in case the pittem breaks off. If it does break during the holiday, he will be given a brand new beautiful pittemed esrog.

I wonder how easy or difficult it will be to find the esrog merchant to cash in on the insurance, should it be necessary, once the holiday has begun..

The next stage is selling all sorts of complimentary insurance packages. Against black dots, against dry spots, against aravot drying out, against the tip of the lulav splitting, etc. all sorts of possibilities exist! And then investigators will be hired to look into fraud and insurance scams - did he break the pittem himself because he wanted a new fresh esrog? was he negligent? did his wife bite off the pittem too early? did his kid use it as a baseball?

This could lead to so many new industries!

and sports is not the only realm in which people are making kiddush hashem (kiddushei hashem?).

Kikar reports on a beautiful story that happened in the Gush Dan area that is a tremendous kiddush hashem.

A couple weeks prior to Yom Kippur, a group of yeshiva students were sitting in a restaurant near their yeshiva eating cholent (can a story start off with a better stereotype than this?). While eating, a secular fellow approached them and asked if they could help him build a sukka. He said t was going to be the first time in his life ever having a sukka.

When pressed he explained that in his building, some haredim have recently moved in. They were building their sukkot outside of the building, and he asked them why they are doing this, without permission from the other residents, and ruining the beauty of the building. He continued saying that they explained how important it is, and it amazed him and he decided to build his own sukka.

The yeshiva boys offered their help.

A few days later, a few of those yeshiva boys showed up at this fellow's house with tools and equipment, ready to build his sukka. This happened in the Pardes Katz neighborhood of Bnei Braq.

(illustration photo)

The yeshiva boys later said that they had come to help with the sukka, and arrived only to discover that the sukka  to be built was very small, really only large enough for one person. They built the sukka, the family was amazed, the father and son put on kippot (brought by the yeshiva boys) and helped put on the schach. (the report says they made a bracha together, but I have no idea what bracha it is referring to). The yeshiva boys described how emotional it was.

They ended up turning the concept into a project. This fellow had a couple of friends who also decided to build sukkot for the holiday, and the yeshiva boys decided they would start a project building sukkot for secular people who want a sukka but dont know what or how to go about it. They received the blessing and the ok from a rosh yeshiva to go ahead with the project, despite it meaning they would be taking away time from yeshiva - they considered waiting until after yom kippur, but the rosh yeshiva told them to not wait - people might change their minds and decide not to put up a sukka at all, better to strike while the iron is hot.

This project is completely voluntary. They do not take money for the building of these sukkot.

I wonder how many people are just taking advantage of a free service to get their sukka built, but would have built one anyway. There are plenty of secular people who celebrate sukkot in some way, including some with a sukka. But that is besides the point. From the side of the builders, this is a tremendous kiddush hashem. and from the side of the secular sukka-wanters, it is wonderful to see the growing interest in the mitzva of sukka.

It is a tremendous kiddush hashem. Kol Hakavod to them.

Tour Har HaBayit With Me, From My Visit on Hoshanna Rabba 5772

I went up to Har HaBayit on Hoshanna Rabba afternoon. I video'ed most of the walk around, in addition to the Kotel before going up. You can now take a virtual tour of Har HaBayit, joining me on my Hoshanna Rabba aliyah!

Highlights of the video, besides for Har HaBayit itself, are a lulav that is about 3 meters tall (I wonder how he got that in the bus or car!), and the fellow at the end who got arrested for waving an arava. It's not on video, but I got to do hishtachavaya twice, near the end of the eastern path, despite being closely guarded most of the time by the police and Waqf official.

If you are only viting Har HaBayit virtually, maybe you can offer a virtual prayer. But be careful - if you get caught openly praying you might get virtually arrested!

Exhibit Features Simchat Torah Flags

Shakin' the Lulav

Sorry for sharing again, but I get a kick out of this video each time I see it...