In August, Ynet News reported that “Rabbi Aharon Leib Shteinman, a prominent leader in the haredi world, says that [Yair] Lapid [Israel’s Finance Minister and head of the Yesh Atid party] is Amalek, the archetypical enemy of Israel from biblical times. This Saturday, when the parasha of Amalek is read, Shteinman instructed his disciples to have Lapid on their minds as they utter the words telling of the great enemy of the Israelites…. Sources close to Shteinman also said that he tells pupils to think of Lapid and of Education Minister Shai Piron when saying Birkat haMinim, which is said three times every day other than Shabbat, and that is read with the purpose of destroying the enemies of Israel: ‘And let the arrogant government be speedily uprooted in our days. Let the noẓerim [idol worshippers] and the minim [Jewish separatists] be destroyed in a moment. And let them be blotted out of the Book of Life and not be inscribed together with the righteous.’" ynetnews/articles/0,7340,L-4417647,00.html A leading Haredi rabbi, “inspired” by the Torah, instructs his followers that Jews who serve the land of Israel and want Haredim to become educated participants in Israeli life, with the civil obligations of all Israeli citizens, are the greatest enemy of the Jewish people. The followers of this rabbi are praying three times per day, every weekday, that Jews should be “destroyed in a moment” for supporting an Israel where all of its citizens live together in shared responsibility and unity. Where does that leave us? The ramifications of preaching this hatred are not just theological. This vilification causes reverberations felt around the world. This message brings Jews and other supporters of Israel – 90% of whom are not Haredim – to despair if there is a place for them among the Jewish people or in Israel. The consequences when they seek a place -- at the most revered site of Jewish unity – the Kotel are also profound. For months, Shteinman and others have been instrumental in supporting the initiatives of Israeli politicians and through them, the police, to subvert the April 2013 appellate court order of Judge Bavli, which held that Women of the Wall have the legal right to pray according to their customs at the Kotel – including out-loud prayer, wearing Tallit and Tefillin and reading from a Sefer Torah. But “spiritual leader of the haredi world Rabbi Aharon Leib Shteinman gave his blessing to the proposal” of “MKs from the United Torah Judaism party” to send “[l]arge numbers of haredi school girls … to the Western Wall …, in protest against the Women of the Wall activist group.” (Jerusalem Post, 5/10/13) After spending years arresting women for wearing Tallitot at the Kotel, terming it a “public disturbance”, but now prohibited from making these arrests due to Bavli’s order, Shteinman and the police have adopted a new tactic. In recent months, they have crowded the tiny women’s section of the Kotel (1/4 of the size of the men’s section, due to the order of Haredi Kotel administrator R. Rabinowitz) – 30 minutes before the 24 year long 7 AM davening time of Women of the Wall, so that when the Women of the Wall arrive there, “R. Shteinman’s police” tell Women of the Wall – you can’t enter – there is no room for you. On Rosh Hodesh Av, they forced WOW to stand next to the public bathrooms, in the parking lot, not even in sight of the Kotel, while last month, Rosh Hodesh Elul, they were slightly closer, but still prohibited from the women’s section of the Kotel. And now, unsatisfied with his prior vilification of Yair Lapid, “Haredi leader Rabbi Aaron Leib Shteinman reportedly attended a simchas beis ha-shoeva celebration in Bnei Brak Thursday night. Shteinman spoke to the crowd and again called for Finance Minister Yair Lapid and other government leaders to be wiped out, using the rabbinic curse “yemach shemo” (and its plural, “yemach shemom”), which is traditionally reserved only for the most evil non-Jews who conspire to kill Jews and for Jews who have converted to another religion and then persecute Jews or try to convert them. The curse means that the person’s name and very existence should be completely wiped out so there is no memory or trace left of him. Although not a direct command to kill, being labeled by a senior haredi rabbinic leader with the same rabbinic curse used against Hitler and the Nazis is essentially equivalent to removing the normal protection a Jew would have under jewish law from retaliatory violence or murder.” failedmessiah.typepad/failed_messiahcom/2013/09/haredi-leader-cursed-finance-minister-yair-lapid-marked-him-for-violence-again-123.html This contempt for Israeli law and the subversive actions to nullify the decisions of the Israeli courts, as well as this most recent suggestion that an Israeli government leader should be eliminated, clearly demonstrate that these tactics do not preserve the sanctity of religious tradition or seek the unity of the Jewish people. To the contrary, they demonstrate that Jewish values are no part of Haredi organized opposition to Women of the Wall and that this Haredi leader will stop at nothing in advancing his agenda. The Haredi effort to eliminate and marginalize the majority of Jews by R. Shteinman, and by the Ashkenaz Chief Rabbi Lau (as reported this morning) in seeking to banish the prayers of non-Haredi Jews from the existing Kotel, to the subterranean Robinson’s Arch area, is a profound and unprecedented statement of values which are repugnant to the Jewish tradition. As Women of the Wall plan for tefila/prayer at the Kotel on Rosh Hodesh Heshvan, and the Haredi efforts to prevent them once again are generated, what will each of us do to stand up for Jewish values, inclusion and pluralism?
Posted on: Sun, 22 Sep 2013 21:46:07 +0000
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