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Injured minor detained in bed, taken for interrogation

By Joel S. Davidi Weisberger | November 19, 2020

By the mid 18th century, separate communities of Ashkenazim and Sephardim developed in various parts of the Land of Israel. While there had been various Jewish communities in the Holy Land since the destruction of the Temple, the Sephardic community of the “Old Yishuv” owed its genesis to descendants of Spanish exiles who arrived in the years following the great expulsion in 1492. The Ashkenazim, on the other hand, arrived in several waves, the most well-known being the aliyah of the chasidic community on the one hand and those of the misnagdim—disciples of the Gaon of Vilna—on the other. The former began arriving in the mid 18th century while the latter came about a half century later.

The chasidim and perushim (as the misnagdim came to be known) formed their separate communities. Because of the very small size of both communities and the common challenges that they faced, it wasn’t long before there was a degree of intermixing (something unheard of back in Eastern Europe where the chasidic-misnagdic battles were still raging). Another interesting phenomenon is the slow and steady rate of intermingling between Sephardim and Ashkenazim. This was perhaps more evident among the chasidim (who as I mentioned in previous articles adopted a modified Sephardic rite based on the writings of the Arizal, who was himself of both Sephardic and Ashkenazic parentage).

The great chasidic leader R’ Menachem Mendel of Vitebsk, who in 1777 led a group of 300 chasidim to Eretz Yisrael, believed in melding the various Jewish communities in the Holy Land together and married off his son Moshe to a respected Sephardic family. The bride’s dowry was 800 Turkish groschen (a large sum for the time). He also married off his daughter to the Abulafia rabbinic family from Tiberias. Perhaps more interestingly, even before that, Rabbi Gershon of Kitov (1701-1761), brother-in-law of the Baal Shem Tov (founder of the chasidic movement), married his daughter to the son of the Sephardic Chacham of Hebron.

Rabbi Gershon of Kitov was an interesting personality. When his more famous brother-in-law began propagating his ideas, Rabbi Gershon became a vociferous opponent. He eventually came over to his side and became a chasid himself. Rabbi Gershon made aliyah in 1742, making him the first immigrant of the chasidic aliyah. He initially settled in Hebron, which had a small community consisting solely of Sephardim. He was treated with great reverence there and spent most of his time studying in the study hall. He grew dissatisfied, as he wrote in a letter: “Although the Sephardim treat me with great respect I have not found anyone here who is like me in nature.” He eventually moved to Jerusalem, where his wife passed away. He was encouraged to remarry by the local Sephardim who offered him a match from one of their own but he demurred, claiming in a letter that he was unused to their ways and temperament. In that same letter, interestingly enough, he mentions that his daughter Esther was engaged to marry the very learned son of Rabbi Mordechai Rubio, the Sephardic Chacham of Hebron.

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From Jewish Link, here.

Trump Pardons Flynn…It’s a Good Start!

And Yaakov awakened from his sleep, and he said, Indeed, Hashem is in this place, and I did not know it. (28:16). Rashi: For had I known, I would not have slept in such a holy place.

Rav Sternbuch heard several times from the Brisker Rov how amazed he was by this possuk. Even though Yaakov attained a giluy Shechinah in his sleep, and with Eisav planning to kill Yaakov, Elifaz having stolen all his money, and being about to encounter Lavan, he received a promise from Hashem in the dream that He would always protect him (“I am with you, and I will guard you wherever you go”), Yaakov nevertheless would have been willing to forego all these spiritual and material benefits rather than transgress the halocho of desecrating a holy place by sleeping there. This teaches us, concluded the Brisker Rov, that we cannot do “business” with Hashem by committing a forbidden act, even if the potential gains are very appealing. If there is any sin involved, no potential gain is worth it — even apparent spiritual gain.

To prove his point, he cited the Tosefta in Terumos that rules that if a non-Jew tells a group of Jews, “Give us one of you and we will kill him, and if you don’t, we will kill all of you,” it is forbidden to surrender even one Jew to be killed. Rather, they must allow themselves to all be killed instead. We see from here that we are not allowed to “do business” with the laws of the Torah. Murder is forbidden, and to transgress for the sake of the “greater good” is prohibited — because in reality, the “greater good” is following Hashem’s Torah in every minute detail.

He also cited the gemoro (Eiruvin 43b) that Eliyohu is not permitted to come on Shabbos to redeem the nation, since his coming would involve the prohibition of techumin derabbonon. Even though a delay in his coming might mean that the resumption will be delayed for a long time, because if the nation sins subsequently for a moment, causing a decline in its spiritual level, they would no longer be entitled to be redeemed, and the redemption would be postponed to an unknown future date. In other words, it is forbidden to transgress even a rabbinic prohibition in order to hasten the redemption.

Similarly, during World War I, when many Jews were being killed, one rabbi told Rav Chaim Brisker that it would all be worth it if it will expedite the coming of Moshiach. Rav Chaim responded that this was not so, and, for example, it is forbidden to deliver Jews to be killed even for the sake of bringing Moshiach, notwithstanding the fact that when he will come we will be privileged to witness Hashem’s honor increasing greatly in the world as well as an immense spiritual reawakening.

We are subject to halocho, and according to halocho it is forbidden to sacrifice Jews in order to save others, no matter the gain! The laws of the Torah were not given to us to bargain with, and we are not allowed to commit sins in order to reap other supposed gains.

In the same vein, the Brisker Rov explained that the passuk that Hashem does not accept bribery (Devorim 10:17) means that He does not accept bribes of good deeds. In other words, He does not forego strict adherence to halocho in return for other merits, because halocho is paramount.

In 2006, a 15-year-old high school student from Albuquerque, New Mexico won third place in the Intel science and engineering fair for her project on slowing the spread of an infectious pathogen during a pandemic emergency. Using a computer simulation that she developed with the help of her father, she argued that in order to slow the spread of the disease, governments should implement school shutdowns, keep kids at home and enforce social distancing.

Incredibly, that third place high school science fair project can be tied directly to the lockdown policies being implemented by governments around the world today. You see, that father that she developed her computer simulation with was no average doting dad, but a senior researcher at Sandia National Laboratories who at that time was working on pandemic emergency response plans for the US Department of Homeland Security. His proposal to implement school shutdowns and, if need be, workplace shutdowns in the event of a pandemic emergency was developed at least in part in response to his daughter’s high school project.

Now those advocating for lockdowns have seen the destruction and death that those policies have wrought this year and we are living through that right now. Not only are people being deprived of their livelihoods and forced into grinding poverty as a direct result of these shutdowns, but now the undeniable truth is that if you are advocating for lockdowns, you are advocating for some portion of the population to be consigned to death.

This is no longer debatable. It is even openly admitted—although months too late by the World Health Organization.

DAVID NABARRO: I want to say it again: we in the World Health Organization do not advocate lockdowns as a primary means of control of this virus. [. . .] We may well have a doubling of world poverty by early next year. We may well have at least a doubling of child malnutrition because children are not getting meals at school and their parents and poor families are not able to afford it.

This is a terrible, ghastly global catastrophe, actually. And so we really do appeal to all world leaders: stop using lockdown as your primary control method. Develop better systems for doing it. Work together and learn from each other. But remember, lockdowns just have one consequence that you must never, ever belittle, and that is making poor people an awful lot poorer.

SOURCE: The Week in 60 Minutes #6

This is the point at which, no doubt, I’ll be expected to produce the data to back up the non-controversial observation that lockdowns kill, even though that data will do precisely nothing to penetrate the consciousness of those who have already decided that they occupy the moral high ground for advocating locking billions of people around the globe as prisoners inside their own homes. But persevere I will.

I’ll point, for example, to the letter signed by hundreds of doctors calling the lockdowns themselves a “mass casualty incident” and exhorting politicians to end the shutdowns.

I’ll point to the research that shows that thousands of people will die because of delays to cancer surgery treatments as a result of the medical shutdowns.

I’ll point to the research of the Well-Being Trust showing that 75,000 Americans are expected to die deaths of despair—including alcohol and drug misuse and suicide—this year alone as a result of the lockdowns.

I will point to the research of The Lancet showing that 265 million people are expected to be thrown into severe food insecurity as a result of these lockdowns.

I will even point to the research showing 125,000 children are expected to die from malnutrition as a result of these lockdowns.

But, as I say, none of these deaths will matter to those who have already decided that they are right and virtuous for advocating locking vast swathes of the human population inside their own homes to starve to death in the name of slowing the spread of a disease that even the epidemiologists who have been wrong about everything this year tell us will kill less than one percent of the infected.

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