The Coalition is spending a lot of time and energy trying to pressure the Judiciary to push off PM Netanyahu's testimony (in his own trials) again. And that is understandable.

Benjamin Netanyahu's court case is one that is drawn out and is expected to take years to complete. It is going on all the time with different sessions and hearings, and we do not always hear about details or even that sessions are happening, unless you are an avid follower of the trial and look for all the information.

In what seems to be a legal precedent, a court ruled considering an injured avreich based on normal average wages for compensation rather than based on what his kollel earnigns are and how they were affected.

Last night at 3am Israeli forces evicted a family from their home in the Shimon Hatzaddik, aka Sheikh Jarrah, neighborhood of Jerusalem. 

Today people are protesting on both sides, against both sides.

Bini Ashkenazy, a financial reporter, reported on Twitter this morning a landmark decision on driving handsfree.

 Somebody got a ticket for touching his phone to turn off Waze while driving. He chose to challenge the ticket. In court he claimed that according to the law one is allowed to remove one hand form the steering wheel for the purpose of ensuring proper functioning and operation of the vehicle. The navigation system is today one of the essential functions of the car and is one of the activities performed for proper functioning of the car (similar to the way changing the radio station might be considered?). Sending messages and reading messages would not be considered proper functioning of the car but navigation is. He was not holding his phone but only touched it while it remained in the dash mount.

The court accepted the argument and decided in his favor.

This is an important ruling and can possibly invalidate a lot of tickets that are given out to drivers...

 

Netanyahu's Court Case: The Session in Netanyahu's Case has been postponed to February 8

Fighting about what to name a child is not uncommon. In the Haredi community there is generally a policy to go by, if the couple is part of that community and willing to go by it - as to which parent gets naming rights for which child. But even then there are exceptions, such as in a situation where a close relative recently passed away. 

A strange court decision just determined that Friday night is not Shabbos - only Saturday day is.

Traffic Court in Jerusalem heard a petition from someone who had received a ticket for driving on Friday night in an area in which it is prohibited to drive on Shabbos - in Batei Machse in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem.

The driver drove onto the street despite a sign warning the public that driving there on Shabbat and Chagim is prohibited. The driver petitioned the court to have his fine canceled claiming that the description "shabbat and chag" is not clear enough and he thought that it is only prohibited form driving there during the daytime hours of these days, not at night. The obligation to adhere to road signage must require the signs to be clear and understandable.

The court actually accepted the argument and canceled the fine. The judge explained that it is not unreasonable to misunderstand the sign, especially when needing to make a split-second decision while driving and seeing the sign.
source: Kipa

I guess in the secular parlance, "Shabbat" is a day of the week - Saturday - not a halachic time from sundown on Friday afternoon/evening. That being the case, it is not unreasonable, as the judge said, that someone would misunderstand the sign in that split second and assume Shabbat means Saturday and not Friday night.

That being said, this fellow would not be allowed to drive there on Saturday night, after sundown, because in his mind the entire Saturday is prohibited from driving on that road. He found a great argument, but using it means he expects to be allowed to drive there Friday night and Saturday night, which goes against his argument.

Anyways, the result is that the court decision tells us that Friday night is understandably not part of Shabbat.

And, based on this court decision, will the police be rewording any such relevant signs? If they do not, make sure to appeal any tickets when relevant. If they do, I wonder how they will reword it to make it clearer and not just more complicated for drivers with too many words to see in the moment of driving by - no driving on Friday night from sundown until Saturday night 35 minutes after sundown.....

About two and a half years ago, on Yom Haatzmaut of 2017, a 13 year old boy (man?) threw things at cars that had Israeli flags flying. He was involved in the usual rally/protest by the extremists, in Bet Shemesh, and was arrested when the police came in. he was charge dwith throwing things at a bus and at another car with a flag on it.

The wheels of justice turn slowly, but turn they do. Behadrei is reporting that the juvenile court finally handed down its sentence. 

The State wanted to have him punished with a harsh sentence, claiming that the infraction is so serious due to the danger involved that it could get up to 2 years in prison.The State wanted him punished with 200 hours of community service, along with a commitment to not do such crimes again.

It should be noted that the accused admitted to his actions, but skipped out on a number of hearings, failing to appear in court.

The defense attorney claimed that he comes form a closed community and has no cellphone, which made it difficult at times to locate him and inform him of upcoming hearings.

The interesting part is the following. An askan of the Eida Hachareidis, Rav Shimon Shisha, testified on his behalf saying that since the arrest, the young man has strengthened in his torah learning, studies mussar, all in addition to his regular learning schedule in yeshiva. He pleaded with the judge to take this into consideration, along with the fact that this young man hardly ever leaves the yeshiva now, and pleaded for a lighter sentence.

The judge accepted that the young man had accepted upon himself additional learning commitments to atone for his actions, but that he also must pay something back to the community for it was the community he harmed. He sentenced the young man to 100 additional hours of learning Torah, separate form the regular learning schedule. These 100 hours will have to be spent learning with students n the yeshiva who need help.

Interesting court decision. I hope that at least the experience he has gone through the past couple of years will have been enough to impress upon him the severity of his actions, as the punishment alone probably won't.

The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in The Hague announced that it will be opening an investigation into possible war crimes committed by Israel in the Occupied Territories. (It will also be investigating possible war crimes by Hamas.) The result of such an investigation, if guilt is found, would likely find Israelis (government official both past and present along with past or present IDF personnel) arrested and charged when traveling internationally.

Obviously this has upset the Israeli government and the Israeli government is denying war crimes and also denying the ICC's jurisdiction to even deal with the matter.

Interestingly, Foreign Minister Yisrael Katz is now saying that the reason the government has not dismantled and evacuated the village of Khan Al-Ahmar despite the go-ahead given by the Israeli courts is because they were afraid that doing so would be the last straw for the ICC and would lead to trouble.

Looks like they got it anyway.

This used to be called the Sam Malone Method of Problem Solving, being that if you ignore a problem long enough it will go away.

They thought that just ignoring the issue and not doing anything newly provocative would cause the ICC to leave them alone. It turns out that the ICC wants to pick on Israel regardless of Khan Al-Ahmar, and Israel just avoiding the issue did not accomplish anything.

So, will this push Israel to now dismantle the village, since not dismantling it did not help anyway? Or perhaps now it is already too late and it will just make matters worse? Did Netanyahu get this completely wrong, adding this as another misstep and miscalculation of his to a growing list in the past year or two...or was there no way to avoid it anyway?





 

There was an interesting court case regarding a yeshiva and a shul in Elad in which it ended up that it was up to the courts to set the official time for starting davening.

According to Behadrei, City Hall of Elad allocated a plot to a shul in April 2000. 17 years later, in December 2017, the same City Hall (though under different leadership) allocated the same property for a yeshiva, Yeshivas Ateres Shlomo under the ownership and leadership of Rav Shalom Ber Sorotzkin.

Shul leadership tried to get the second allocation canceled after initial attempts at coming to a peaceful agreement of how to share usage of the building failed, as representatives of the yeshiva never cooperated and did not even go to the set meetings.

After spending nearly a year in court fighting over this, they came to agreements regarding most issues on the table with both institutions continuing to use the building. For example, they agreed that on Shabbos the shul membership would get use of 70 seats and the yeshiva would get 100 seats. During yeshiva vacation periods, the shul can use as much of the resources as they see fit.

Other issues as well were relatively easy to find solutions for. Such as, the shul would daven mincha 20 minutes before sunset while the yeshiva would daven mincha gedola at 12:30pm (and I guess 1:15 during the summer months). The shul and yeshiva would daven kabalas shabbos and maariv together, as well as davening mincha on Shabbbos afternoon 40 minutes before sunset together. On Motzei Shabbos the shul would daven first at their regular time and the yeshiva would daven after them. Expenses would be shared with shul membership paying a set monthly fee to the yeshiva to cover expenses.

Aliyot to the torah would divided equally among the yeshiva and the shul membership, as well as dividing up leading the various services. They also agreed upon an arrangement for sharing the gabbaus.

The one thing they could not agree on that required a court decision was what time to start davening on Shabbos morning. The shul wanted to start later, saying they always start at 8:30 with minor adjustments depending on the time of year and the time for shema. The yeshiva says that is too late, as yeshivas always start at 7:15. They also claimed that the shul historically did not really start at 8:30 but at 8:15 and is only claiming 8:30 for the purpose of negotiations. The shul said they would agree to make it earlier up to 8am, but as everyone gets up early to daven during the week before going to work, on Shabbos they want to start later.

Regarding that one issue they could not come to any agreement, so the courts decided that davening on Shabbos morning in the shul/yeshiva would be at 7:45am.

According to the courts in Tel Aviv the city is not allowed to give out parking tickets using street cameras. According to the courts, the City of Tel Aviv was not authorized to use the street cams in this fashion, and the right to privacy outweighs the need to enforce parking laws.

According to the courts, using the street cams that video the road and those who are coming and going is a breach of privacy - the city was only authorized by the Knesset to use the cameras for traffic violations on the public roads but not to deal with parking violations. According to the court, the original authorization given to the city limits what they can use the cameras for.

According to the courts, using the cameras gathers a lot of information that has nothing to do with enforcing parking laws - many people not violating any law walk in and out of the video and they get documented with whatever they are doing, what they are wearing, what businesses on the road they walk in and out of, if it is Shabbos or weekday, people who park legally, etc. This is a breach of privacy that would require authorization from the Knesset to be allowed.
source: Globes

I would expect that now that this has been determined, the local authorities will just go to the Knesset and get them to expand the authorization to include parking lots. I do not see this breach of privacy is any worse than the initial breach of privacy on the roads that the Knesset already allowed. If they allowed one, chances are good that they'll allow the other, especially as it will help the local authorities bring in a lot of money...

On the one hand, there is no privacy today anyway. Almost all those people picked up in the video are carrying cellphones with location tracking enabled (and even if disabled, it has already been exposed that Google still tracks you anyway) and pretty much everything you do and everywhere you go is exposed and available to the public. This does not seem like a big deal. And, if they can get people to park better, such as taking up only one parking space instead of two or three or not parking in driving lanes, it is probably worth it.

On the other hand, perhaps the government has too much power anyway, and it is good to limit them a little bit. Even though here they'll just be helping themselves to authorize it, in the meantime - until they do, don't just give them that power and access.

this is funny. the police arrested someone, a yeshiva bochur, for his involvement in the recent violent  protest rallies in Jerusalem, of the Peleg protests against the draft law. The charges brought against this fellow were a slew of charges such as violence, attacking a police officer, preventing a police officer from doing his work, danger on public roads, and more..

It turns out that the police only arrested this guy because he was wearing a white shirt, but they did not actually know that he did anything wrong. They simply grabbed a charedi fellow and arrested him and claimed he did all that stuff - stuff that was done, but not by him.

The courts released this fellow after it being proven that the only basis for the police arresting him was his white shirt - his lawyer, Itamar Ben Gvir, showed that the police had stood far away from the hafgana and there is no way they could have actually identified him as having thrown stones or overturning garbage cans. Someone did it, but not him. Being that there were many people, hundreds or thousands, wearing white shirts and dressed similarly, the arrest was deemed baseless, against the claims of the police that he was easily identifiable as the only one wearing a white shirt - a ridiculous claim at such a hafgana.
source: Haredim10

I would think they would have these hafganot fully documented with photographers and videographers, as they do in many other situations, and would be able to figure out who acted violently and broke the law and arrest the right people. It is very strange, surreal almost, that they arrested someone just because of his white shirt and thought that would be good enough to be considered positive identification in a sea full of white shirts. The police have to do better.

The City of Rishon LeTzion has been running a pilot for a while to open libraries for the religious community. At the request of the community's representatives, the city agreed to run this pilot in which they open 4 libraries once a week after hours - meaning, after the library has already closed its regular operating hours for the public. As well, the library removes from the shelves books deemed inappropriate for the religious public for the duration of the opening hours for the religious community.

The pilot has come to an end, due to a lawsuit for discrimination.

Lee Weizman sued the city of Rishon claiming she was discriminated against when she noticed the branch of the library open and decided to return books she had borrowed. She was told she could not do so at that time, though after arguing they accepted the books from her. Another time as well she went to exchange books and was refused service, but after arguing the manager got involved and let her get new books in exchange for the books she was returning.

Weizman complained to the city but her complaint was ignored, so she decided to sue instead. She sued the city for 75,000nis. The counter claim by the city is that in both incidents in which she tried to avail herself of the library's services, she was provided the service, so she was not discriminated against.

The court decided in favor of Weizman, though for far less than what she claimed. The court awarded her 10,000nis. The judge explained that making separate hours for the religious "torani" community in the municipal library is discriminatory and against the law, as it discriminates against the secular community during those hours. Being that this is not a religious service, and nothing in the service provided by the library requires making a distinction between the religious and secular communities. The fact that a religious community might choose to not avail themselves of the service during regular hours for their ideological reasons does not make it discriminatory against them.

The City's response was that the city tried this pilot to allow the religious public to use the library. The library continued to function as normal for the secular and general public during the same hours as always and nothing was changed for them. The pilot has now been canceled.
source: Ynet

Personally I dont know why people feel they cannot go to a library when secular people are there. Nor do I know why some people might feel insulted or upset because of certain books on the shelves that they won't even borrow to read. However, I do think it is a shame that there seemingly cannot be a legal way to provide services to such communities in a way they find acceptable. Different strokes for different folks. The question is where it will lead to. At what point will the court say that this separation of groups is ok and we will not intervene - will shuls and yeshivas and seminaries eventually become a target as well?

Regarding this case, it is interesting that the Dati community in Rishon wanted to separate themselves for the general public in this way. The Dati community generally prides itself on being involved with the general community and not being isolationists.

Also, how is a librarian supposed to determine if someone is part of the Dati community and provide the service, or not? Even if a person comes in dressed not classicly religious, there is a wide range of people within every community, and people have kids who don't conform exactly to the way the parents want. I dont know how the librarian determined Weizman should not be provided the service, most likely by whatever way she was dressed, but it seems this entire exercise was flawed in that anybody not dressed overtly secular (whatever that might mean) should have been able to get away with getting into the library without too much effort, thus rendering the entire exercise pointless to begin with.

The Supreme Court has upheld the police position, and the law as defined until now, by rejecting the appeal of a Jerusalem driver who had been ticketed with a 1500nis fine, and revocation of his drivers license, for holding his cellphone while driving.

The driver first appealed in the lower courts and lost his appeal twice, so he continued to appeal further to the Supreme Court. he must have money to burn, considering he had already lost on appeal twice.

Mr Driver felt he had a good case, admitting he had been holding his phone but claiming he had not been using it. Further, he claims to have been stopped at a red light at the time, and not actually in motion.

The courts decided to accept the claims of the police that he was actually in motion, though they also stated that being stopped at a red light is still considered being in a traveling vehicle and is the same as being in motion. The court therefore upheld the punishment levied on Mr Driver.

I would add that it has been stated before by the courts that just being stopped is not enough and one would actually have to have put the car in park - though I do not know if you put the car in park at a red light if that would be good enough or if you have to first pull over to the side of the road and park properly.

Back to the case, the Supreme Court stated that a driver of a car must hold the steering wheel (or handlebars) with both hands whenever the car is in motion. The driver can remove one hand from the steering wheel only if he needs to perform an action necessary for the integrity of the car or for fulfilling the rules of driving. As well, the court stated, his use, or lack thereof, of the phone while driving is irrelevant, as simply holding the phone while driving is prohibited and punishable.
source: Maariv

I would guess that this means to set the blinkers to warn drivers of your impending right or left turn, to hit the hazard button, to adjust the windshield wipers, and the like. As I have asked before, I do not know why it is ok to fiddle with the radio, considering the severity of the laws of holding cellphones and recently even holding or drinking coffee (and other drinks) or checking waze while driving. Adjusting the radio has nothing to do with rules of the road or integrity and safety of the car, so I dont get why adjusting the radio is not a ticketable offense. Or maybe it is and now it is time to figure out those newfangled buttons on the steering wheel that control the radio.

Regardless, drive safely. Forewarned is forearmed. Get a dash mount, keep your phone in your pocket, put it in the glove compartment, leave it at home - whatever, just don't hold it while you are driving.

This issue has been on my mind, and since it was published in the news yesterday I waited to write anything as I thought about the issue. I am just going to write my thoughts, somewhat conflicting thoughts, but I have no conclusion and I am not sure what the right approach is.

A course had been developed to train members of the Haredi community in public service. When the course was originally designed, it was designed for men only. Efforts were put forth and they added a separate track for women and while initially they wanted the course to have 20% women (again, actual course work would be gender separate, but the overall course had to be 80% men and 20% women), and then the final agreement was on 50-50 - equal tracks for men and for women.

A women's lobby went to court against this program because of the gender segregation. Yesterday morning the courts accepted the argument of the lobby and decided that the course is damaging to women and the ideal of equality in society. The court said that when weighing the damage caused by canceling or freezing such a training program against the constitutional right of equality, the right of equality is more important. The court has given the State 30 days to add at least 10 women to the men's course to allow it to continue, or it would be canceled indefinitely.
source: Kikar

On the one hand, if the State wants to bring Haredi society out of the shtetl and into society, at least a certain amount of it has to be on Haredi terms. Even if just for practical reasons, as if certain red lines are crossed, in the name of equality or any other ideal, that goes against Haredi ideology, the Haredi community simply won't participate. If the State wants Haredim in the workforce, if the State wants to train Haredim, one of the Haredi red lines is no co-ed schooling. Forcing co-ed education at the expense of training Haredim is throwing the baby out with the bath water.

On the other hand, the Haredim want opportunities as well. The Haredi community is largely less educated and trained for the workforce, and programs like this are a big boon to the community as it gives them opportunity for many jobs that are so valuable to them. The Haredi community cannot just expect everyone else to always compromise in favor of the Haredi community and they sometimes must make concessions as well.

Is co-ed education a concession? To whom would they be conceding on this? This would be a concession in the face of an ideal held by the larger society of providing equal opportunities to people of both genders.

Should the Haredi community concede on this? I do not know, but this is not the basic ideal of not having any co-ed education. Keeping that red line makes sense for children in school, but for adults who will soon anyway be working in mixed-gender environments? Is it really such a strong ideal to keep them separate in the classroom when in just a few months they will be working together, shoulder to shoulder (but not touching) in some government office, providing services to both men and women?

I don't know what is right and what is wrong. I do not know which is more important. The Haredi community desperately needs, and seems to want, the State to pull it out of the shtetl, because they won't do it themselves - at least not on a communal level. The State desperately wants to promote increased Haredi involvement in society, and especially in the workforce. The State wants to uphold the ideal of gender equality. Which is more important? I don't know. The court says gender equality and equal opportunity is more important, but it bothers me that such an important opportunity will be lost because of it.

What's good for the USA is often good for Israel, though usually Israel adopts USA behaviors a few years later...

If the USA could appoint a Haredi woman, Ruchi Freier, as a judge, Israel can appoint a Haredi woman as well. And Israel just did.

After some speculation that it might happen, it finally has. Chavi Tucker, a graduate of the Bais Yaakov school system and daughter in law of the Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivas Chevron, has become the first female Haredi judge in the Israeli court system. Tucker's childrne are all in Haredi school systems and a son served in a Haredi unit in the IDF, so her bonafides all check out..

Good luck on the new position. Being the first means she is a trailblazer.May it lead to more and more integration, acceptance, and understanding.