Latest news with #Yeshiva
Time of India
08-08-2025
- Politics
- Time of India
'Will Die, But Won't Enlist': Ultra-Orthodox Jews Refuse IDF Services; Fierce Clashes In Jerusalem
Massive protests erupted in Israel as thousands of ultra-Orthodox Haredi men blocked major roads near Tel Aviv and in Jerusalem in defiance of military draft policies. The unrest followed the arrest of two yeshiva students accused of draft evasion, sparking widespread outrage within the Haredi community. Backed by rabbis from leading factions, demonstrators clashed violently with police, who responded with water cannons, skunk spray, and baton charges. Protesters shouted anti-police slogans, including "Nazis," and burned IDF draft orders while chanting 'We will die and not enlist.' At least five arrests were made, and one officer was injured. The protests reflect deepening religious resistance to mandatory military service, with growing tensions between the Haredi public and the Israeli state.#IsraelProtests #Haredi #Jerusalem #IDF #MilitaryDraft #UltraOrthodox #BreakingNews #Yeshiva #Zionism #DraftResistance Read More
Arab News
14-07-2025
- Politics
- Arab News
Israeli ultra-orthodox party leaves Netanyahu's government due to dispute over military conscription bill, statement says
TEL AVIV: Israel's ultra-orthodox party Degel HaTorah said in a statement its Knesset members have resigned from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government due to a dispute over failure to draft a bill to exempt Yeshiva students from military service.
Irish Times
04-06-2025
- Business
- Irish Times
Ultra-Orthodox parties in Netanyahu's coalition threaten to vote for Bill calling for early elections
Ultra-Orthodox parties in prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu's coalition are threatening to vote with the opposition next week in favour of a Bill calling for early elections. Elections must be held by October 2026. According to polls, Mr Netanyahu's right-wing and religious coalition is set to lose its majority. The Bill to be voted on in a preliminary vote next week would likely mean the election would be brought forward to later this year or early next year. The 20-month Gaza war , the longest in Israel's history, has caused a serious rift in Mr Netanyahu's coalition. Many of the voters of the right-wing parties have already served hundreds of days of army reserve duty, causing a huge strain on families and businesses. READ MORE The ultra-Orthodox parties, in contrast, serve a constituency that, with a few exceptions, does not serve in the army. Calls for a more equitable sharing of the burden have been rebuffed by ultra-Orthodox leaders, who fear that military service will be the first step towards the adoption of a more secular lifestyle. The fast-growing ultra-Orthodox community, which already makes up about 14 per cent of Israel's population, is angry that the government has failed to pass legislation enshrining in law an exemption from military service for yeshiva religious seminary students. [ International aid ship en route to Gaza will be stopped, warns Israeli military Opens in new window ] Israel's high court ruled a year ago that the draft exemption for the ultra-Orthodox community is illegal as it discriminates against other Israelis, who serve three years in the army from the age of 18. However, the overwhelming majority of ultra-Orthodox Jews, known in Hebrew as Haredim, or God-fearing, have simply ignored their draft orders – so far with impunity. Mr Netanyahu promised the ultra-Orthodox parties months ago that legislation would be passed enabling the community to continue avoiding military service, but he failed to deliver on that promise, partly due to fierce opposition from his own political base. Legislation being drawn up by Yuli Edelstein, the head of the Knesset parliament's foreign affairs and defence committee, and a member of Mr Netanyahu's Likud party, calls for sweeping economic sanctions against those who avoid the draft and would also prevent offenders from receiving a driving licence or travelling abroad. In an effort to exert pressure on Mr Netanyahu, the ultra-Orthodox parties have, for the last month, refused to support coalition private members' Bills, effectively paralysing the work of the Knesset. The prospect of early elections is highly problematic for Mr Netanyahu. 'It looks like the beginning of the end,' a source involved in one ultra-Orthodox party said. 'The question is just how much time this end will take.' However, ultra-Orthodox parties will have to take into account the fact that early elections could also send them into opposition.
ITV News
01-05-2025
- Entertainment
- ITV News
Hard-hitting new film sheds light on mental health in the Orthodox Jewish Community
A new film based in Manchester's Orthodox Jewish Community aims to highlight the m ental-health issues felt by many young people there as they struggle to deal with the pressure to conform and succeed. "Levi" tells the story of Levi, a Jewish youngster, who arrives home from studying at a Yeshiva, a religious school. Desperately unhappy, Levi is unable to communicate how he feels to his family. He would rather study to become an architect but feels he is letting his family down by wanting to take a different path. Unable to express his feelings, he considers taking his own life. The film is the brainchild of Manchester-based political podcaster Eli Hassell. He says the idea came after he'd spoken to many people in the Orthodox Jewish community who were struggling with their mental health. Eli said: "I want young people in the community who are going through mental problems to be able to watch this film and realise there is a way out. "I've seen a lot of it, a lot of younger people suffering with mental health and sometimes really bad cases, talking about suicide, it's tough seeing this." Eli says while the community is self supporting, somewhere where everyone knows everyone else, that can also mean people can be apprehensive about sharing their problems in case others find out. It means mental health issues can be internalised and get worse. And for young people like Levi in the film, who have a very particular path mapped out for then by their family, expressing how they feel can be very difficult. Rabbi Avrohom Yeshaya Goldman was a consultant on the film. Avrohom runs a 24-hour Jewish mental health helpline, based in Manchester. He says that within the Jewish community, like the world at large, there is a stigma around talking about mental-health. B He said: "It's so close the small Jewish community so whenever anyone struggles, they feel that this might be impact who I'm going to marry, might impact my siblings, my family. So much so that a father or a sibling or a mother might feel that their family might be better off without them." He thinks the film is 'phenomenal' and will hopefully help to reduce the stigma around mental health. It's hoped that the NHS will soon be using the film as a tool to get people talking when they work in the Jewish community.
Forbes
11-04-2025
- Sport
- Forbes
Yeshiva University And Lehman College Broke 141 Games Of Losing Streaks
On a blustery day earlier this week, on a baseball field at Fairleigh Dickinson University in Teaneck, New Jersey, history was made. Truth be told, before a single pitch was thrown, fans and looky-loos alike knew that they were about to witness something monumental. They simply didn't know in which direction. You see, taking the field for that day's double-header was Lehman College, based in the Bronx, living through a 42-game losing streak. On the other side of the diamond was Yeshiva University, based in Washington Heights, which had lost 99 games in a row. Barring some act of G-d, one team was going to break their streak and go home happy; and one team's futility would continue for at least another game. It should be noted that these two New York-based teams played these games in New Jersey, at a neutral site, not because of its historic nature; not because 'everything is legal in Jersey'; and not to avoid a Manhattan / Bronx border skirmish. Rather, it was because neither school's field was in playing condition after storms swept through New York last weekend. Yeshiva was the first to convince Fairleigh Dickinson to host the games at to the Naimoli Family Baseball Complex on its turf field, so they became the home team. In the first game, played under clear skies and at roughly 39 degrees in front of approximately 250 fans, the teams went back and forth. Yeshiva scored two in the bottom of the first, surrendered one in the top of the second, and then scored three more in the bottom of the second. Lehman struck back with three in the top of the third, but then surrendered one more in the bottom of the fifth. Going to the seventh (which would have been the last inning as double headers limit each game to seven innings), Yeshiva held a two-run lead and needed just three outs to break their 99-game streak. Since both of these of these schools are Division-III, they do not offer scholarships. These kids are playing for the love of the game. Most were not heavily recruited. In the case of Yeshiva, an Orthodox Jewish school, most of the students could not have played elsewhere, as college baseball is known for Friday nights and Saturday afternoons – said differently, during Shabbat – when they could not participate. As the game moved to the seventh, the players began to show what the pressure of two massive losing streaks can do to your psyche. The first Lehman batter of the seventh walked, and so did the second (after a pitching change). The third was hit by a pitch, which put the tying runs in scoring position and the lead run on base – all with no outs. After yet another pitching change, a double tied the game. Anyone in attendance at that moment could have sensed this game was over – Yeshiva had given up the lead, Lehman had two runners in scoring position and there were still no outs. But a comebacker to the mound, followed by a strikeout, and then a fly ball kept the game knotted at six. Yeshiva wasted a single in the bottom half of the seventh, and thus the game went to extra innings. In the top of the eighth, the first three Lehman hitters singled, loading the bases with no outs. [But, here too the stress shone through. Lehman's Argenis Sanchez dropped a bunt to move the runners up, but when the Yeshiva players converged to field the ball, no one covered first, allowing the batter to reach. It went down as a hit.] In the bottom half of the eighth, Yeshiva went strikeout, ground out, strikeout, giving Lehman their first win since their current head coach – Chris Delgado – was a player on the team in 2023. The loss pushed Yeshiva's record of futility into triple digits. Winning pitcher Justin Chamorro, a biology major who is going into a PA program after the season, threw a complete game, striking out a career-high thirteen. According to Michael Clair, who was in attendance for both games, Chamorro said the following after the game: And when asked about that winning feeling, Chamorro said it was 'a sense of relief, a sense of joy.' The second game of the double dip started about 20 minutes after the first. Maybe coming so close in time to an extra innings loss took all of Yeshiva's angst away; maybe actually hitting the century mark in consecutive defeats was a release valve; maybe having the sun beginning to set and the crowd thin to a reported 70 onlookers took the pressure off. Whatever it was, Yeshiva came out swinging, scoring thrice in the bottom of the first, and then four more times in the bottom of the third. When the Maccabees scored two insurance runs in the bottom of the fifth, they led 9-3, and looked well on their way to getting off their own schneid. A walk and a double in the top of the sixth made the score 9-4. And a wild pitch in the top of the seventh gave Lehman their final run. When Noah Steinmetz (whose older brother Jacob plays in the Arizona Diamondbacks' system as the only Orthodox Jewish player in the minor leagues, and whose father coaches Yeshiva's basketball team) struck out Sanchez, the streak was finally over. After fielding the errant strike three and tossing it to first to record the final out, catcher Jacob Canner hugged Steinmetz in front of home plate, and the team quietly celebrated their victory – as if it was old hat, and not something that hadn't happened since 2022. In some ways, the outcome on Tuesday afternoon was perfect. Both teams broke their streaks. Yeshiva ran theirs to a cool 100 before changing the tide. The Lightning Bug of Lehman gave their 26-year-old coach a boost of confidence as he continues to build his alma mater program, and the Maccabees of Yeshiva got to ride off into the desert of their Passover break on a winning note. When these two schools ventured to New Jersey on Tuesday afternoon, they were sporting a combined 141 consecutive losses. Dayenu!
