The rabbonim of Bnei Braq, including Rabbis Chaim Meir Wosner, Yiyzchal Zilbershtein, and Shimon Baadani, have decided to issue a psak jointly calling on the public to not cross the street against a red light.

The impetus for this historic psak is an increase in the number of traffic accidents in the city. To combat the increase in accidents, the city has installed new traffic lights around town at intersections that previously did not have any. Despite that, there are still many people who cross against the light and put themselves and other people in danger - and the children learn from seeing the adults behavior that it is ok to cross on a red.

Ergo, the psak says, based on the commandment of guarding your safety, every person is obligated to wait at the light and crosswalk patiently and only cross when the crossing light indicates green. And people must realize the tremendous responsibility they bear in being an example for the youth.
source: Kikar

Another bad accident in Bet Shemesh had a car hitting a 4 year old child last night and sending him to the hospital in moderate condition.

There have been a number of tragedies recently in Bet Shemesh, some of them fatal, many involving children.

Some are calling it a curse, or an ayyin hara, on the city. Some are saying the city is being punished for "bad behavior" on whatever issue is close to the person saying so. Anytime anything bad happens to anyone or any place should be a cause for people to look inwards and see where they can improve, and the families and communities should surely be doing so.

I don't know from mystical stuff, so I am going to leave the issue of curses and blame aside for the mystics and kabbalists to deal with. What I can look at is the roads, the driving, the walking...

Bet Shemesh is a city that has had a tremendous population growth. The roads are not particularly safe - many have potholes, are poorly designed or placed traffic circles, crosswalks that are faded or lacking (we just learned that the city recently "cancelled" all the crosswalks in the shopping center of RBS), faded lines, curbs that jut out too far into the street, poor visibility in many places with views blocked by overgrown brush and weeds, and more. Drivers, as in many places, are distracted by their phones or other distractions, drivers are driving too fast, not giving the right of way, not letting pedestrians cross. Buses are speeding through the streets, while bus drivers are distracted with passengers, with passengers paying and with other distractions. Pedestrians jump into the street whenever they feel like it. Pedestrians are often not paying attention to traffic, cross before ensuring a nearby driver saw them, crossing nowhere near the crosswalks,are distracted by their phones and other things.

Just the other day, on Friday, I was driving down a main road and a family went into the street to cross in the middle of the block, nowhere near a crosswalk. The parents were towing a couple of little kids by the hand, while pushing a stroller and each parent holding a number of bags and cases. They were crossing in the middle because it was opposite a bus stop they were rushing to as they wanted to make the bus in time to go for Shabbos wherever they were going. One of the kids got loose and ran into the middle of the street. I was driving patiently and saw the scene and stopped my car with them in front of me. The father eventually collected the kid, barely even saying a word about it. Had I been distracted or driving too fast, I would have run over that kid, and maybe the father too. Fault isn't the issue. Fault doesn't bring the smashed kid back. The parents should be crossing carefully by the crosswalk, the city should repair the fencing in the road that was dismantled by pedestrians who want to cross in the middle, drivers should be paying attention and driving carefully, the kids should be taught road safety and not jump into the streets, parents should be careful that they have control of their kids in the streets.

Bet Shemesh is a big city with over 100,000 residents. Accidents happen everywhere, and in big cities they happen more just by the nature of there being more people and more drivers, and often the infrastructure has been neglected, if it was even up to par in the first place.

Be careful out there. The city will or will not do it's part in improving the roads and improving road safety. We can only do our part. Pay attention on the roads, whether you are a pedestrian or a driver.

this even beats Coffix!

Tzippi Hotovely has put together a program working in coordination with all the gas stations... if you are driving during the night, between midnight and 6am, you can stop in any gas station an dget a cup of coffee for just 1 shekel! The goal is to minimize road accidents.

Kol hakavod.

This story is related by Kikar, and is described as "the story that is driving the yeshiva world wild"..

here it is:
At the beginning of the week, 5 yeshiva bochurim from Yeshivas Ateret Yisrael were injured in a car accident. They were on the way for some R&R down south by the Dead Sea. Driving along the Highway 90, the car flipped over. The driver was critically injured, and the four passengers were injured as well, albeit only light injuries. The driver was whisked away to Hadassah Ein Kerem where he went straight into surgery, and is still fighting for his life (Chizkiyahu Aryeh Leib ben Tova, if you wish to daven for him)..

The story, as related by one of the other passengers, is that as they were driving down the curvy road toward Ein Bokek, they were all talking about a former fellow student in the yeshiva. They were making fun of him and talking about him - only the finest lashon ha'ra.

The driver had just put an end to the conversation, saying that it is not appropriate to talk about the fellow like that, and when they get back they would have to ask his forgiveness.

Moments later, everything flipped - on one of the sharp curves the driver lost control of the car, ended up being trapped in the flipped car and was in critical condition.

As soon as the passengers were released from the hospital after being treated for their light injuries they went to the victim of their lashon ha'ra, concerned there might be a "kpeida" on them and the driver, and asked his forgiveness.

The fellow gave his forgiveness immediately, saying in front of them 3 times that all is forgiven, and then he gathered a minyan of 10 people and said it before them as well and davened for his recovery..

Now that is immediate justice, if I have ever heard of any... except for the fact that he is the one who stopped the lashon ha'ra, so why is he the one that was punished?

lots of lessons here:
 - don't leave yeshiva for some vacation mid-zman
 - don't talk lashon ha'ra
 - drive safely
 - pay attention to the road, especially on a windy, curvy road
 - drive safely, no, that cannot be repeated enough

either way, refuah shleima

There was a horrible head-on collision yesterday on Highway 38 that resulted in two tragic deaths. It once again raised the issue of why Highway 38 has not yet been upgraded and improved, considering it was originally designed to service a city of 15,000 residents that now actually contains 85,000+ residents, with thousands more on their way...

Besides for the fact that the upgrade project is almost underway - tenders have been issued and I think things should start to move within 4 months, even had the 38 already been upgraded to a beautiful road years ago, the accident would probably not have been prevented. This specific accident happened near Givat Yeshayahu. The upgrade of 38 is only supposed to be from Shaar Ha'Gay until Bet Shemesh and will not include the section of the highway past 38 - where the accident was.

While the 38 is really an inadequate and dangerous road, not all accidents happen because of the road. One can be a great driver, but if the driver across from you, beside you, behind you, or  in front of you, is not, you can still get into an accident. if someone falls asleep at the wheel and heads at you straight on, even if you are a very careful driver, there might be almost nothing you can do about it. If someone else is texting while driving, you can be a great driver.. There are endless types of scenarios in which anything can happen and there are no guarantees, even on the best of roads.

Drive safely, and be alert. Not every accident should be blamed on the road, as lousy as it is.

People consider Moshe Feiglin to be a super-extremist, and many probably expected him to enter the Knesset with plans to right away introduce legislation in all sorts of "Eretz Yisrael" or Jewish related realms, such as change the police policies for Har HaBayit, or legislate annexing Judea and Samaria, or maybe try to legislate more Jewish education in the school systems, or Shabbos observance, etc. (even though Feiglin s opposed to religious legislation, he is misunderstood often and is thought to be desiring to legislate much more observance). If people did expect that, they were wrong.

Feiglin, who will be soon be entering the Knesset, has already announced what he plans to tackle first. ANd his plans do not, yet, include any "Jewish" issues, but social issues.

The first is a plan to lessen the regulations on medical marijuana, along with legalizing marijuana to the general public, albeit with restrictions. The second is to legislate harsher punishments for serious traffic violations.

A few months ago Moshe Feiglin surprised everyone when he said, during an interview, that he was in favor of legalizing marijuana. It had not been a part of his platform, it was not an issue that was naturally his, and nobody had ever heard him speak about it before. Since then he has mentioned it a few more times, and has discussed it in length publicly a number of times and has clarified his position.

pranking the giant hand of The Voice in Ramat HaChayal by sticking a giant "joint" between the fingers

Feiglin told NRG that he is planning to legislate on two issues that are close to his heart - marijuana and traffic violations. He wants to make the regulations easier for those who need medical marijuana, and at the same time also legalize it for the general public - for people over 21 and limited to certain amounts. Feiglin believes, and I agree with him, that marijuana is far less dangerous than alcohol and cigarettes, and it should not be lumped into the light or heavy drug category. Prohibiting its use, Feiglin says, is a violation of a person's freedom, it strengthens the trade in the underworld, and it causes a lot of pain to sick people who need better access to it.

The second item, serious traffic violations, is also close to his heart, especially since his son was badly hurt when hit by a car a few years ago. Feiglin would legislate stricter punishments for serious violations, such as  drivers who cross the bold line, driving through a red light, etc. If Feiglin has his way, these drivers would immediately lose their insurance coverage. If they were, God forbid, to be in an accident, the Bituach Leumi would continue to pay the victims medical coverage, but not the coverage of the violator that caused the accident.

Aleh Yarok has never been able to get its party into the Knesset, despite many years of trying, but it seems their main issue will be taken care of anyway. I hope the law passes. I think marijuana should be legal.

watching the video of various accidents or near-accidents, you can see that more often than not it is because the driver is not paying attention to the road. We can only guess what he or she is doing rather than keeping eyes on the road

Picture of The Day

I cannot even imagine how this car got into that position. When I drove by it, cars were repeatedly driving around the traffic circle in order to get a better picture of it...
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A female soldier was recently killed in a hit-and-run accident outside of Yokneam. A group of rabbonim from the Tzohar organization decided to hold a modern-version of the "egla arufa" ceremony in it's wake.

What is the modern-day version of egla arufa?

It's actually a bit disappointing. They went to the gas station next to where the soldier was killed and held a prayer session and made a public call to be more careful on the road, along with a public protest against the moral injustice of hitting and running.

The rabbonim involved in the ceremony made do with the prayer and protest, and did not break the neck of a calf beside the river. They explained that it is incomprehensible that blood can be spilled like this and the public should not have to answer for it.... "We have responsibility for blood spilled in traffic accidents. We have responsibility for the blood of the youth that is spilled in stupid fights. [we have responsibility for blood spilled] of women killed by their husbands. We have responsibility for blood spilled in the murders that fill the pages of our newspapers. When talking about people's lives, we cannot shirk our responsibility....". "We cannot get used to it, and we cannot say it is part of life. We must take responsibility for the blood spilled."
(source: Srugim, among others)

Interesting.

Chabad Yeshiva Boys dance while stuck backed up in traffic due to an accident, instead of complaining and grumbling like most of us would, and draw the interest of the news helicopter..Reminds me of the Breslavers

Yesterday evening a 3 yr old kid got into his parents van, and somehow knocked the gear shift into neutral. The parking lot had a strong slope, and the car rolled backwards gathering speed and somehow maneuvered and smashed right into the side of my parked car.

Somehow, perhaps it was a miracle, nobody was injured. The "driver" managed to not run over any of the dozens of kids playing in the lot. The "driver" himself was not injured or hurt despite the force of the crash - the crash was so hard that it blew out the whole back window from the drivers car, it shoved my car over and lifted it up partly onto the sidewalk, and it caused my car to smash into the car parked next to it. The damage to my car was minimal - just some denting, but nothing serious.

Today I just spoke to my friend and found out he was in an accident yesterday. he was driving with his family, local city driving, and someone ran a red light and smashed into his car. The car was totaled but everybody was ok (after being checked in the hospital), thank God.
He told me that if not for the seatbelts, they would have had some very serious injuries. His wife would have been seriously injured, but her seatbelt saved her.

So, please everyone. There are lots of cars on the road. Even if you are a cautious and safe driver, other people might not be. Somebody might be tired but driving. Someone might be in a rush and not careful.

Drive safely, but especially be careful to make sure everyone is wearing seatbelts.

And after all the stories I have heard over the past day of people who's kids knocked the gear shift into neutral and caused some sort of accident, I would recommend the car manufactures install some sort of safety catch on the gear shift so it would not be so easy to knock it into neutral.

The police have been studying the cause of the traffic accidents in Israel, and have not been able to come to a conclusion.

I think I have figured out the cause of the great number of traffic accidents in Israel.

I received a delivery today of something I ordered from a company. The delivery was sent by a taxi driver.

I get stuff from him fairly frequently, so when I saw him last week sitting in the passenger seat of his taxi and someone else driving, I was curious what was going on. I asked him if he is training someone, maybe his son, to get into the business. He told me that he is not, rather his license had been suspended three months for something (which he would not specify) and he had to have a driver drive him around.

So, today I get another delivery from him. As we are dealing with the paperwork, a driver drives by with his hand holding down the horn. We looked up and did not see what they guy had been honking at. The taxi driver muttered, "These crazy drivers. They are the problem."

Here is a guy with a suspended license kvetching that someone honked at some sort of obstruction. He is the type of driver that is the source of the traffic accident problem in Israel

Ynet has a video of a shocking traffic accident that happened yesterday. A driver on a motorcycle attempted to squeeze between two trucks.
What happened to him is what happens, or almost happens, in all the movies that include car chases and drag races. That is, he did not make it out from between the trucks and got smashed.

Moshe Yisraeli ended up laying in the street for a couple of minutes and bled to death.

The shocking part of it is not the dangerous way the victim was driving, trying to squeeze between two trucks. I have seen much worse driving on any given day. Just this past Sunday night on my way back from Bnei Brak I saw two crazy drivers in two separate incidents. One of them switched lanes at high speed squeezing between two cars in alternate lanes to get in and zip by. The second was a similar situation.

It seems like everybody is in a rush, which is the reason traffic kills more people than terrorism and war in Israel. Considering Israel is technically, and even literally, a war zone, and considering Israel is home to non-stop terrorism, that means the traffic situation is pretty bad.

So, Yisraeli's driving is not shocking. Nor is it shocking that the accident resulted in his death. When you play with fire, you might just get burned. When you try to squeeze in between two moving trucks in traffic, you might just get crushed.

What is shocking though is the lack of response and assistance by Joe Q. Israeli (no relation to Joe Settler).

In the video you can see (not really well, but you can see it) cars continuing on their way. Drivers avoid the guy laying in the street and drive around him and his moped.

While society in Israel is changing, and people are minding their own business more than they used to, it still is a very caring and sharing society. If you walk outside in the sun with a baby, Israelis will come out of the woodwork to tell you that you should cover your baby's head from the sun. If you fall down in the street, 5 or 6 Israelis will immediately run over to see if you need help. If you are at the window in the bank, the Israeli behind you will offer advice how to pay less bank fees, or where you can get a better rate on your mortgage.

It is surprising that nobody stopped within the first minute or so and jumped out to help the guy.

As Israel becomes more and more like a Western country (i.e. United States) (for example, in terms of full capitalism and privatization, etc) we find more and more that people are concerned with themselves. People are less concerned with what is going on around them than they used to be. I've got to get to work. I don't have time to stop and help. Don't inconvenience me. I am in a rush.

The sad result of copying the West is the deterioration of the concern we always had for others around us. Now we just don't want to be inconvenienced. (not that this happens in the US, just it is a result of our copying the US in other things)