Make no mistake, what is about to happen in the ultra-Orthodox communities in Brooklyn will be catastrophic. School closures, business closures, synagogue closures and fines to everyone will rock the community and pain them - WITHOUT FIXING THE PROBLEM.
I am all for punitive responses and mandates and fines, but only after an effective, community-centered approach towards education and participation. This has not happened. This hasn’t even pretended to happen.
Instead, clueless methods to improve mask wearing and social distancing were implemented - 2 days ago - and now there are threads to attack the community from all sides by early next week. 3/
If the mayors office wants to find the Orthodox providers who care deeply about their communities, they know where to find us. This isn’t our first rodeo; many of us dealt with skepticism + ignorance during the measles outbreak in 2019.
Instead of practical steps, City Hall is talking big and doing nothing - and all but ensuring that this community will feel hated on, picked on, and will never trust guidance from them again.
Nice work 👌🏽
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This arrived last night and I already finished it.
A must read for halachic people whose loved ones have a cancer diagnosis.
This covers so many topics in concise and readable language:
1. Cancer screenings: allowed, or actually mandatory? 2. Genetic cancer screening: allowed or mandatory? 3. Common cancer statistics and treatment modalities 4. Preventative surgeries or treatment: allowed or mandatory? 5. Halacha on medicine in general
6. Clinical trials: allowed or forbidden? When? What if you’re healthy and want to contribute to science? 7. Pain medicine: allowed, forbidden, or mandatory? 8. Palliative/hospice care 9. Goseis and end of life 10. DNR and DNI 11. Artificial nutrition 12. Healthcare proxies
If you condemn Israel for Palestinian suffering but you omit Hamas, you might just hate Jews.
If you fault Israel for Palestinian suffering but you omit Qatar’s role, you might just hate Jews.
If you condemn Palestinian suffering but you didn’t condemn the Hamas massacre, you might just hate Jews.
If you condemned Israel for blowing up a hospital and didn’t post a retraction and correction, you might just hate Jews.
If you didn’t condemn Islamic Jihad for their hospital bombing, you might just hate Jews.
If you provide armchair analysis on the most conflicted and contested region in the world without educating yourself on millennia of Jewish sufferings you might just hate Jews.
Many people are arguing that “context” is needed to understand the slaughter by Hamas.
As a student of Jewish history, I agree, and I offer context.
We start with the first expulsion of Jews in Israel, in 586 BCE by the Babylonians.
1/
Under the Persian ruler King Cyrus, Jews rebuilt their Temple and returned to Jerusalem for several hundred years.
The Romans captured the city and dispersed the Jews in 70 CE.
The Jewish people migrated west and south, living in Europe and North Africa for centuries.
2/
For 1,000 years they wander between the Middle East and Europe, building communities and scholarly works. Note that official Christian policy is to convert all Jews, expel them, or worse.