Focus on the Benefit of Doing Mitzvahs Whether you subjectively find something easy or difficult, depends to a great degree on the perceived benefit. If there is no gain, then even a minor action might seem difficult. But when you gain an immense fortune by taking some action, even a difficult one is now considered easy. When you focus on the eternal benefits gained from performing mitzvahs, you will be far less bothered by any difficulties or hardships involved. Love Yehuda Lave | | Bennett suspends Israeli cooperation with UNESCO after Temple Mount vote Education Minister Nafatali Bennett decided last Friday morning to immediately freeze all Israeli cooperation with UNESCO, because of its decision to declare top Jewish holy sites Muslim. Due to Bennett's decision there will be no meetings with UNESCO officials, cooperation in international conference or professional cooperation with the organization.
Bennett said he made the decision because UNESCO has given a boost to terror.
"Your decision denies history and encourages terror," Bennett wrote the countries of UNESCO. "Those who give prizes to the supporters of Jihad in Jerusalem the same week that two Jews are murdered in the city could god forbid encourage more victims." "The western world stands before UNESCO and against terror, just as they oppose terror in Aleppo they must unite against diplomatic terror in Jerusalem. " Bennett will hold a meeting next week in order to decide on further steps. Last Thursday, in a 24-6 vote, UNESCO gave preliminary approval to a resolution that denies Jewish ties to its most holy religious sites: the Temple Mount and the Western Wall. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu slammed the vote stating: "The theater of the absurd continues at the UN." "Today UNESCO adopted its second decision this year denying the Jewish people's connection to the Temple Mount, our holiest site for more than 3,000 years," he said. "What's next? A UNESCO decision denying the connection between peanut butter and jelly? Batman and Robin? Rock 'n' roll?" Twenty-six nations abstained from the vote and two were absent. The six countries that voted in support of Israel were the United States, Great Britain, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Germany and Estonia. Those who supported the motion included Algeria, Bangladesh, Brazil, Chad, China, Dominican Republic, Egypt, Iran, Lebanon, Malaysia, Mauritania, Mexico, Morocco, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Russia, Senegal, South Africa, Sudan and Vietnam. Nations that abstained from the vote were: Albania, Argentina, Cameroon, Cote de'Ivoire, El Salvador, Spain, France, Ghana, Greece, Guinea, Haiti, India, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Nepal, Uganda, Paraguay, South Korea, St. Kits and Nevis, Slovenia, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Togo, Trinidad and Ukraine. Absent countries included Serbia and Turkmenistan. TOVAH LAZAROFF, HERB KEINON, MICHAEL WILNER and ADAM RASGON contributed to this report. | | Israeli Scientists Find Algae Yields The World's Cleanest Energy Source Researchers at Tel Aviv University have discovered that algae can yield mass quantities of hydrogen, "the world's cleanest energy source." The scientists revealed in the findings of back-to-back studies published in Plant Physiology and Biotechnology for Biofuels, that microalgae produce hydrogen, a clean fuel of the future. The researchers also suggested in their studies a possible mechanism to jump-start mass production of this environmentally-friendly energy source. The research was led by Dr. Iftach Yacoby, head of TAU's renewable energy laboratory, and Rinat Semyatich, Haviva Eisenberg, Iddo Weiner and Oded Liran, his students at the School of Plant Sciences and Food Security at TAU's Faculty of Life Sciences. Researchers in the past believed that algae only produce hydrogen in the course of a single micro burst at dawn, lasting just a few minutes. But Yacoby and his team used highly sensitive technology to discover that algae produce hydrogen from photosynthesis all day long. Armed with this discovery, the team harnessed genetic engineering to increase algae's production of this clean energy source by 400 percent. Laboratory tests revealed that algae create hydrogen with the assistance of the enzyme hydrogenase, which breaks down when oxygen is present. The researchers discovered effective mechanisms to remove oxygen so hydrogenase can keep producing hydrogen. "The discovery of the mechanisms makes it clear that algae have a huge underutilized potential for the production of hydrogen fuel," Yacoby said. "The next question is how to beef up production for industrial purposes — to get the algae to overproduce the enzyme." Some 99 percent of the hydrogen produced in the United States comes from natural gas. But the methods used to draw hydrogen from natural gas are toxic — and wasteful — he said. "I grew up on a farm, dreaming of hydrogen," said Yacoby. "Since the beginning of time, we have been using agriculture to make our own food. But when it comes to energy, we are still hunter-gatherers. Cultivating energy from agriculture is really the next revolution. There may be other ways to produce hydrogen, but this is the greenest and the only agricultural one. "The world burns in just one year energy it took the earth over a million years to produce," Yacoby continued. "We must stop being hunters and gatherers of energy. We must start producing clean energy — for our children and for our children's children." Yacoby is now researching synthetic enzymes capable of increasing hydrogen production from microalgae to industrial levels. | | Shimon Peres And Zehut Moshe Feiglin Shimon Peres symbolized something. He created a language and mentality that have determined the mindset and behavior of Israel and, in great measure, the entire Western world for the last 25 years. MK Moshe-Feiglin Two events, which on the surface are completely unrelated, have wondrously come together. The first looked like a watershed event, all the world's leaders honored it with their presence. The second seemed unimportant, out of the limelight, almost unknown. The first event was the funeral of Shimon Peres. Nobody missed it. Our entire country came to a standstill. The second event was the distribution of the Zehut platform to our party members, which took place last week in Tel Aviv. This event didn't make any headlines and only those who attended even knew about it. With my morning coffee, I watched, as usual, the first rays of sun rising over the mountains of the Shomron. I was trying to explain to myself why the funeral of Shimon Peres had turned into such a mega event. And then I realized. The two events – Peres's funeral and the distribution of Zehut's platform – were connected. Death and birth, literally in the same time frame. With all due respect to the deceased, the steady stream of heads of state who arrived in Israel to attend Peres's funeral was not commensurate with the man himself. An entire country does not close down for no good reason and the leaders of the world do not trouble themselves to fly to Israel just to attend the funeral of a public figure – as respected and famous as he may be. Shimon Peres symbolized something. The man created a language and mentality that have determined the mindset and behavior of the State of Israel and, in great measure, the entire Western world for the last 25 years. Peres accomplished much in his life. But without the Oslo Accords, there would have been no difference between the honor given him upon his passing and the honor merited by any other deceased Israeli public figure of similar stature. Nothing of what we witnessed would have taken place without the Oslo Accords. Oslo is the heritage of Shimon Peres. Peres's words from the Knesset podium prior to the ratification of the Oslo Accords still echo in my ears. He turned to opposition head Binyamin Netanyahu and asked him: "And what is your alternative?" Netanyahu (and the entire Right) did not have an answer. This lack of an alternative enshrined Oslo as the only language and mentality in Israel. Even when Oslo exploded in our faces again and again and again, bombarding us with shocking images and news that we could have never dreamt up – buses blowing up, restaurants collapsing upon their customers, thousands of fatalities, tens of thousands of wounded, a deterioration of Israel's international standing and right to exist as a Jewish state, an insufferable economic price and internal despair of any hope for change; even when our streets became filled with security guards, fences, and cement blocks; even after all the dead-end "rounds" of fighting and the scores of fatalities in every "round," the inner goal of which were to prevent Israel's victory and perpetuate Oslo; even after missiles rained down on Israel's cities after Oslo's architects promised that they never would – after all of this, Oslo has remained the only language that we speak. Simply because the Right has never proposed a different language. Upon Shimon Peres's passing, the heart of an entire world that does not know any other language – a world that lives and breathes Oslo-ese – skipped a beat. And exactly at the same time, on a narrow street in Tel Aviv, the new language – offered by Zehut – was revealed. Rest in peace, Shimon. There is now an answer to your question. The Nation of Israel has an alternative. Moshe Feiglin About the Author: Moshe Feiglin is the former Deputy Speaker of the Knesset. He heads the Zehut Party. He is the founder of Manhigut Yehudit and Zo Artzeinu and the author of two books: "Where There Are No Men" and "War of Dreams." Feiglin served in the IDF as an officer in Combat Engineering and is a veteran of the Lebanon War. He lives in Ginot Shomron with his family. | | | It's the Thought That Counts By Rabbi Joshua Hoffman
God tells Moshe that after he dies, the people will rise up and stray after gods that are foreign to the land, and forsake God and annul the covenant that He sealed with them. In His anger over this, He continues, He will forsake them and conceal His face from them. As a result many evils and distresses will encounter them. The people will then say, "Is it not because my God is not in my midst that these evils have encountered me? God then says, "I will surely conceal My face on that day because of all the evil that it did for it had turned to the gods of others" (Devarim 31:16-18). Rabbeinu Bachya notes that God says twice that He will conceal His face from the people. He explains that the first time refers to the exile in Bavel, and the second time refers to our present exile. He points out that the second concealment is expressed with a double expression "hasteןr astir," to allude to the fact, that unlike the first concealment, which lasted a relatively short amount of time, our present exile is much longer. He then cites a verse in parshas Bechukosai (Vayikra, 21:24) which teaches, that, ultimately the nation will be redeemed from that exile. The Ramban, however, offers a different explanation of the verse which speaks of a second concealment of God's presence. He points out that this concealment comes after the people have recognized their sin and said that they are suffering because God is not in their midst, so that they now rejected the idols they had serveג. The second concealment, says the Ramban, comes from God's mercy, and is really a form of redemption, albeit in a hidden, limited way. The recognition of sin, however, is only the beginning of the process of repentance, a "hirhur teshuvah," an awakening of teshuvah. Ultimately, this feeling of regret for their sin, and God's show of mercy, will lead them to complete repentance, expressed in vidui – confession – and a full redemption. We noted in last week's message that, while Rosh HaShanah is the beginning of the ten days of repentance, there is scarcely any mention of repentance in that day's liturgy. Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik zt"l explained (see Machzor Mesoras HaRav to Rosh HaShanah, introductory essays, pps. xvi-xvii) that Rosh HaShanah is devoted to hirhurei teshuva, by which once is aroused from his spiritual slumber, as the Rambam describes the purpose of the shofar, and sets him on the path of repentance. This seems to be the stage that the Ramban describes in our verse. Following the Ramban's explanation, we can better understand the verse that follows. God says, "Now write this song for yourselves and teach it to the bnei Yisroel, place it in their mouth" (Devarim 31:19). The commentators explain, that the song referred to here is the Torah, and the verse is a command to write a sefer Torah. This Torah should then be taught to the people, as the verse reads, "and teach it to the bnei Yisroel, place is in their mouths." In fact, the Rosh and others say that one can fulfill this mitzvah by writing other books of the Torah, not only in the form of a sefer Torah, since the purpose of the mitzvah is to teach Torah. The study of Torah, in fact, is an important element in repentance. In the daily shemonah esreih, we say "return us to Your Torah.... and return us with complete repentance," indicating that complete repentance requires immersion in Torah On a practical level, this is simply because we must study Torah in order to recognize the extent of our misdeeds, so that we can fully repent of them. On another level, Torah is our primary means of attuning ourselves to God, and in this, it is essential to the teshuvah process. The Torah, then, is here telling us that through Torah study, we can expand on our awakening of teshuvah, and complete the process, and ultimately merit full redemption. | | |
In a small town, the Rabbi died. His widow, the Rebbetzin, was so disconsolate that the people of the town decided that she ought to get married again. But the town was so small that the only eligible bachelor was the town butcher.The poor Rebbetzin was somewhat dismayed because she had been wed to a scholar, and the butcher had no great formal education.
However, she did not want to stay lonely for the rest of her life, so she agreed, and they were married.
After the marriage she went to the mikvah. Then she went home to prepare to light candles. The butcher leaned over to her and said, "My mother told me that after the mikvah
and before lighting the candles, it's good to have relations." So they did.
Then she lit the candles. He leaned over again and said, "My father told me
that after lighting the candles it's good to have relations." So they did.
They went to bed after saying their prayers. When they awoke he said to her,
"My grandmother said that before you go to the synagogue it's good to have relations." So they did.
After praying all morning, they came home to rest, and again he whispers in her ear, "My grandfather says after praying it's good to have relations." So they did.On Sunday she went out to shop for food and met a friend who asked, "So how is the new husband?"
She replied, "Well, he is no scholar, but he comes from a wonderful family."
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