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  -- Mayor of Elad Yisrael Porush

the problem with Haredi municipal politics described in just one sentence...

Rav Lau was asked if it is allowed to conduct the selichot services accompanied by musical instruments.

According to Kikar, Rav Lau referred to the historical basis for banning musical selichot. Rav Lau said it is a fairly new phenomenon nd preferably people should continue the tradition of the nusach that was accepted for many generations, but if someone feels the musical accompaniment adds to their inspiration and meaningful prayer, then it should not be prevented.

The original reason why musical accompaniment was banned was to reject the Reform who brought musical instruments into the services having copied the style form the Churches. There were some places and some circumstances where it was allowed, such as during the week rather than on Shabbos and holidays, or at Kabbalat Shabbat, if davened early enough.

Rav Lau says that because today it is already common to have selichot services with guitars and violins, it cant be said that it is taken from the goyim. An organ would still be prohibited because of chukas hagoyim, but guitars and other such instruments would be ok.

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I am sure that by now you have heard about the incident on the United Airlines flight in which a female reporter was asked to move by a religious male and she threw a fit and everything went public. She She publicized her side of the story and then an independent reporter interviewed him and published his side of the story.

The story has basically become a "he said, she said" story and nobody really has any way to determine which side is more correct (of course taking into account the old adage of their being three sides to every story - my side, your side and the truth). Despite not being able to determine the accuracy of either side's story, some have jumped n her story to bash the Haredim and others have jumped on his side to bash the journalist who hates Haredim.

I get that if she fabricated the story she put him in a bad light, that is a personal issue and she should apologize to him. And if he fabricated his description of the incident, he has made her look bad so he should apologize to her.

The fascination with finding out the truth of this story doesn't seem to be to defend him or her but to defend or attack the entire scenario. Whether it happened this way or that is not really all that important (except to the two of them specifically).

This actually happens all the time. Who has flown a flight between Israel and USA in recent years and didn't experience some men on the flight refusing to sit next to a woman and causing delays? Sometimes these incidents get resolved fairly quickly and quietly, with people politely asking others to switch and some agree (I have agreed in the past even though I dont care who I am sitting next to), and sometimes it becomes more of an issue with people running up and down the aisles looking for someone to arrange a switch of some sort and not enough people are willing, and a ruckus sometimes might ensue.

Whether it happened with these two people on this specific flight does not make the general phenomenon any better. Suddenly the entire scenario is a fabrication? Besides for defending him or her  personally, the story is bigger than that and it happens on multiple flights every single day. Saying it did or didnt happen on this one flight does not change the fact that it happens all the time and we can all do our part to try to be more gracious, more accommodating, more accepting, of others.

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According to Kikar and Behadrei, Rav Fried paskened that traveling via the light rail is allowed, and one does not even need to wait any specific amount of time after Shabbos (ie bkdei sheyaasu), but the light rail should not be used immediately as a form of protest over the chilul shabbos.

While Kikar has more details with a variety of reasons why the rabbi allows it, Behadrei just brings briefly the main reason being that people cannot cause a prohibition on something that is not theirs, and because the workers do not own it or the public lands they worked on, they cannot cause it to be prohibited. Additionally, most of the work was done by non-Jews and did the work for a salary...

Regarding how much time to wait, Rav Fried quoted from Rav Sternbuch that people should wait a year before using it (I think Rav Sternbuch said this regarding the Jerusalem light rail when it opened), but in this case the opening was already delayed a year as it waited for the permits and approvals, so there is no need to wait any longer, but there should be some form of protest against the chilul shabbos, so it shouldnt be used immediately.

Rav Sholom Ber Sorotzkin has now acquired the old building of Telshe Yeshiva in Telshe, Lithuania. According to reports he is going to use the building for a yeshiva he will be opening there

Honestly, from a nostalgia perspective this is nice. Beyond that I dont see any reason for this. Who is going to learn there and why? It seems like a big waste of money and resources. Rav Sorotzkin is a descendant of Roshei Yeshiva from Telshe. In the past he has taken rocks and bricks, along with the original doors, from this old building and brought them to Israel to be placed in his yeshivas here in Israel (he mentions it in this publicity video he made several years back, which I have posted here in the past). I wonder if he will ship the original doors back and install the, back on the original building for his new yeshiva. 

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  -- MK Almog Cohen (Otzma Yehudit) defending the exemption being worked on for the Haredi community just after attacking the volunteer Reserve duty Air Force pilots who are saying they might not continue their volunteer service.

If there was not a mandatory draft, MK Cohen would be 100% right. As long as there is a mandatory draft, you cant just say anyone who doesnt want to be drafted, shouldnt be. I mean, the word "mandatory" has a definition. If you think people who do not want to be drafted shouldn't be, change the law and dissolve the mandatory draft and turn the IDF into a volunteer or professional army