FailedMessiah.com

Hasidic Actor Flees Natalie Portman Film After Rabbis Threaten Expulsion

A hasidic actor who was acting opposite Natalie Portman in a film being shot on location in Brooklyn was forced to walk off the movie set and drop out of the film because rabbis…

Kolko Victims' Attorneys Seek New Victims

Details after the jump in the extended post… 

Is The RCA Lying About The New Conversion Agreement?

An interesting quote published today from a leading RCA figure lends some credence to the idea that the RCA is not telling the whole truth about its conversion deal with Israel's chief rabbinate.

Rabbi…

The Aussie Haredi Lesbian Abuse Scandal, part 3

A correspondent tells me that Malka Leifer, the principal of the Adass Yisroel girls high school in Melbourne, Australia, is…

Peter Himmelman Interview

It's in the Forward, and it's one of the better interviews with Peter I've seen.

(I did a crappy one a long time ago that, thankfully, is now lost.)

He talks about opportunities lost because of Shabbos, about Matisyahu, and more.

I thought this would be a nice break from all the bad news we've had of late.

Check it out.

Lesbian Haredi Abuse Scandal Deepens

More sordid details have come to light about the lesbian abuse scandal at a haredi school in Melbourne, Australia.

Included in these sordid…

Lesbian Abuse Scandal Rocks Aussie Haredi School

What happened at the Adass Yisroel school in Melbourne, Australia?

Parents would like to know, but rabbis…

More On Rabbis Who Backed Call For Vigilante Violence Against Arabs

The Jerusalem Post has printed some of the names of the rabbis who called for vigilante violence against Arabs and Jewish terrorism against Arabs. Of course, the rabbis say…

Aish Rabbi Thinks 5 Million Adult Jewish Males Live In US

David Kelsey catches Aish HaTorah's Rabbi Ya'akov Salomon in a whopper.

Rabbi Salomon thinks there are 5 million adult Jewish males living in America.

This would make the Jewish population of America about 18 million, at least three times greater than it is.

Why does Salomon think this? Does he have…

Rabbi Hershel Schachter Runs Away?

It seems so.

The New York Jewish Week has done some followup on the Rabbi Hershel Schachter "shoot the prime minister" controversy.

What's new? This…

Terrorist Who Planned Mercaz HaRav Attack Killed By Israel

Ynet is reporting that four terrorists, including the man thought to have planned the attack on the Mercaz HaRav yeshiva, have been killed by Israeli forces in Bethlehem. Another wanted terrorist was seriously wounded in the targeted attack.

Now isn't this a lot better than rabbis' wall posters and whispered plots?

UPDATED: Rabbis Call For Jewish Terrorism, Vigalante Violence

And they signed their names:

Police Officers Criticize Jerusalem Police Chief Over Handling of Mercaz HaRav Terror Attack

The officers claim Jerusalem District Chief Ahron Franco was unprepared to give a briefing about the attack to senior police officials yesterday and could only answer a few of the many questions asked him. They also claim…

Mercaz HaRav Rabbi Approves Revenge Terror Attack Against Mufti By Yeshiva Students, Channel One Reports

That's right. If the unnamed security sources quoted by Channel One are …

Rabbi Yisroel Shapiro Pleads Guilty; Baltimore Rabbis Coverup Mentioned In Press

The Baltimore bar mitzvah teacher pleaded guilty to…

Mark Your Calendars

Professor Saul Lieberman's 25th yartzeit is coming up. UTJ has a memorial program scheduled featuring Dr. Elijah Schochet, "“The Prioritization of Human Life in Halakhah and Aggadah.”

Details after the jump in the extended post…

Feiglin Barred from Entering Britain

The Likud party's resident fascist, Moshe Feiglin, has been barred from entry into Britain.

Why?

Yeshiva Students Kick, Harass Female MK

They have not learned.

Mea Shearim's Secret Rooms

It has secret entrances. Inside, extreme secrecy is maintained. Two relatives or friends may be in adjoining rooms but never know the other is inside. It is a place of forbidden pleasure, and inside are women only – haredi women.

What goes on inside these sheltered, cloistered walls?

Amar Breaks Promise – 8 of 10 New Conversion Judges Appointed Are Haredi

Here's how it was supposed to work. The government was to appoint 10 new conversion judges. These new judges were supposed to be from the moderate wing of the Religious Zionist movement – in other words, Modern Orthodox. The aim was to make the conversion process (i.e., horrid bureaucracy that so injures potential converts) a bit kinder and eaiser to navigate.

But something went terribly wrong.

What?…

Chabad in the New York Times

The Times has a report that features Chabad but is not soley about Chabad. Most interesting is…

Gutnick, Chabad, Aish, Alleged Stock Market Affinity Schemes

It allegedly worked this way:

The FailedMessiah Store Is Open For Business

Lots of new products, many different designs. Check it out.

(Make sure to scroll all the way down to see the various designs, and click the links to see which products are available for each one. Thanks!)

Pictured at right: The Williamsburg Very Good Night Thong from the Lipa Ban collection. (Please click to enlarge.)

UPDATED: Senior Member of RCA Committee on Conversions "Abhors" Agreement, Fears For Converts

That's right. Despite the spin from Rabbi Basil Herring and others at the Rabbinical Council of America (RCA), the dissent within the organization over its capitulation to Israel's chief rabbis is deeper and wider than claimed.

Rabbi…

Yeshiva Torah Temimah Needs Your Help

It seems the Yeshiva Torah Temimah Wikipedia entry is a mere stub. It needs some serious fleshing out.

Guess Who Was Spotted in Brooklyn Yesterday?

Who?

You know who. Sure you do. A reliable source tells me it was…

YU's Rabbi Hershel Schachter Calls For Murder Of Prime Minister – Retracts Statement Made "Off The Cuff"

Yeshiva University's rosh yeshiva and one of the two American rabbis who will decide which rabbis can and which rabbis cannot do conversions called for the assassination of Israel's prime minister and blanket refusal to serve in the IDF.

Rabbi Schachter later retraced those statements after…

The New Conversion Agreement – Will Past Conversions Be Deemed Invalid?

Has the new conversion agreement between the Israeli chief rabbinate and the Rabbinical Council of America (RCA) created a situation where past conversions done by Orthodox rabbis who are not currently 'approved' by the RCA will be deemed invalid?

A former president of the RCA says the answer to that question is…

8 Killed In Terror Attack On Mercaz Harav Yeshiva In Jerusalem

It's the one in Kirayt Moshe, which may also hold Mercaz Harav's BT yeshiva. There are many reported injured, at least three seriously.

Medic Yaron Tzuker said he arrived as the gunfire was still going on. "They were still shooting when we got here, he told Channel 10 TV. We took cover and the ambulance was hit. It's horrible inside - dead bodies and wounded - it's horrific."

 Details after the jump in the extended post below…

Food Fight In Poneviz Yeshiva

It all began when a yoghurt cup was hurled at Rabbi Gershon Edelstein, a supporter of…

Baruch Dayan HaEmet

Stephen Feinstein was a man few of you knew. An internationally known academic whose field of study…

Agudah Mouthpiece Rabbi Avi Shafran Gets It Wrong – The New Music Ban, part 16

How wrong is Avi Shafran this time?

Very, as…

Marvin Schick Gets It Right – The New Music Ban, part 15

As longtime readers of FailedMessiah probably know, Marvin Schick and I do not see eye to eye on most things.

However, when it comes to the Lipa Schmeltzer-concerts ban, we're…

Haredi Spin: Why the 'Gedolim' Made the Ban – The New Jewish Music Ban, part 14

Binyamin Jolkovsky, publisher of JewishWorldReview.com and a close observer of the haredi community, said he believes the rabbis intend…

Rabbi Avrohom Schorr: Bully, Coward – The New Jewish Music Ban, part 13

Hella Winston has a Page 1 story in tomorrow's New York Jewish Week on the Lipa Schmeltzer-concerts ban.

Here's the (cowardly) money quote, in context:

Chabad Leader Owes NY State $3.4 Million Dollars in Back Taxes

According to the New York Daily News, Schenjer Zalman (A.K.A., "Jimmy") Gurary, a Chabad rabbi and "garment center executive" who was at one time one of the leaders of Agudas Chasidei Chabad (Aguch), owes…

The Ungrateful Oligarch

"The moment you ask a child in Israel what Yom Kippur means to him, and he answers the Yom Kippur War… then I don't know if that is Zionism or whatever you call it, but it has certainly become bankrupt,"

The answer and more in the extended post below…

Lipa – The T Shirt!

Buy it here.

Williamsburg Hasidim Refuse to Count Elderly Modern Orthodox Jew for Minyan

Yochanan Lavie writes:

Not only would they not eat at your table, but they might not count you in a minyan. I know an elderly MO gentleman who lives in W'burg. He has been frum all his life, and has been living there before it became a shtetl. He is MO, as I've said, and has no beard. The Chassidim won't count him in a minyan. Sometimes, he walks across the Willy B. bridge to the Lower East Side to daven on Shabbat!

Will there…

UPDATED: Jewish Slaughter "Under Attack," Chief Rabbi Says

According to statements made last night by Israel's Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger, animals should be treated humanely during the kosher slaughter process because:

1. Jewish law mandates it
2. If we don't, the goyyim and/or PETA will see us and stop kosher slaughter.
3. Shechita, kosher slaughter, is under attack from the goyyim so we have to behave.
4. Common sense and human decency tells us that we should do everything in our power to reduce suffering associated with the food we eat.
5. None of the above

The correct answer(s) after the jump in the extended post below…

Ha'aretz Hearts Lazar

Ha'aretz has a fawning profile of Chabad's 'chief rabbi' of Russia, Berel Lazar. The profile fails to mentions Lazar's disgusting medal episode in Auschwitz, the recent lessening of his power, or dozens of other questionable actions (like this, yesterday) Lazar has taken over the years, including the deals that led to his rise to power.

True, the profile does…

Who Said This? A Failed Messiah Pop News Quiz

Who said this about Vladimir Putin's hand-picked successor?

"You won in the first round with a huge lead. It shows that people trust you, that your campaign promises to continue development, to protect human rights and freedoms, to assist in developing a civil society have won the hearts of many Russians."

The answer after the jump in the extended post below…

Nechomas Yisroel, The Organization Behind The Ban – New Music Ban, part 13

Nechomas Yisroel, the haredi charity run by Asher Friedman, one of the two men behind the Lipa Schmeltzer-concerts ban, is a tax exempt organization. It pays for yeshiva tuition for students that would otherwise go to public schools. As such, it should have public records available for anyone to see, 990 forms and details of its income and spending.

But it does not.

Why? Because…

Baltimore Rabbis and Ohel Make the Wrong Choice on Rabbi-on-Boy Child Sexual Abuse – Again, part 2

So what kind of gathering was the Baltimore Vaad HaRabbonim's “How To Protect Our Children,” held a couple of weeks ago in response to a myriad of child sexual abuse  allegations in the Baltimore Orthodox community?

This kind:

It's Official – The 'Gedolim' Want YOU to Pay for Their Mistake; The New Music Ban, part 12

It's official. The so-called gedolim will issue a ruling tonight that will urge ticket holders for the now-canceled Madison Square Garden "Big Event" Lipa Schmeltzer concert to donate their "refund" to the concert promoter and the charity it would have benefited, Simchat Tzion.

(You can hear this appeal being made at the beginning of Zev Brenner's radio show last night.)

So, what's wrong with this?

Rabbi Yaakov Horowitz Wimps Out – The New Music Ban, part 11

Rabbi Yaakov Horowitz, 'rebbe' to many J-bloggers, was interviewed on the Zev Brenner Show last night. Rabbi Horowitz refused to comment on the Lipa Schmeltzer-concerts ban, even though that was the show's topic.

(I have posted the entire show as an mp3 file after the jump in the extended post below.)

Rabbi Horowitz pleaded with listeners to not criticize 'gedolim.' He claimed he's never heard Lipa sing (like he couldn't take 10 minutes before the show and listen), so he couldn't comment on any potential reasons for the ban.

Please.

Worse than that, Rabbi Horowitz has made a clear, open and deliberate choice. He has decided to…

Who Is A Jew? Who Is A Convert? Who Is A Rabbi? The New York Times on Israel's Conversion Crisis

The New York Times Magazine has feature on the conversion crisis in Israel and the Rabbinical Council of America's participation in that crisis. How did the RCA participate? By caving in to Israeli haredi demands, as we noted last week.

Here are few money quotes:

New Ban On All Concerts – The New Music Ban, part 10

This new ban was published in Hamodia in Hebrew and signed by 8 (or 9) haredi 'gedolim' who were part of the 33 'gedolim' who signed the original against Lipa Schmeltzer and the "Big Event" concert.

It is translated into English after the jump in the extended post below:

Background of the Ban – New Jewish Music Ban, part 9

Kiryas Joel's "Vaad HaChinuch" banned Lipa Schmeltzer's music in late 2005 during Hanukka. The ban and an English-language translation is posted after the jump in the extended post below:

The Rabbi Behind The Ban – The New Music Ban, part 8

Rabbi Avrohom Schorr, son of Rabbi Gedaliah Schorr and the rabbi behind the Lipa Schmeltzer-Jewish music concerts ban.