If You Tickle Us...

Just when you’ve given up hope in our entire leadership along comes someone to restore your faith in humanity. Step forward the real “Angel Gabriel” Ost. Arrested on suspicion of perverting the course of justice, he had the good sense and decency to step down in the interim from his position as CEO of Shomrim North West while he fights to clear his name. You may think that is not particularly remarkable and is exactly what any sensible person in his position would do. Alas, you would not have been living in Jewish London for the last half year if you harboured such thoughts. If only the main protagonist would have mustered the same dignity and courage and acted in a likewise manner, he would have saved the broader community, the UOHC, his own shul and followers, his family including his elderly father and, above all, himself the shame and disgrace that has justifiably been heaped upon them all. He could then have tried to clear his name away from the limelight and without draggin...

We are where we are and a chap, who until recently was a senior member of the most senior rabbinical body of our community, has been arrested on suspicion of sexual assault. So what does the body do? Forget about the rabbis. They're not trained in crises handling and the best one can expect from them is to stroke their beards and call on their flock to repent. After all, our leaders are only under suspicion while we're a bunch of hoary sinners at the best of times, or at least so we're told. You would also not expect our Chief to do anything but keep his counsel this time round given what happened when he was last consulted on such delicate issues. Silence after all doesn't make particularly good TV viewing. But what of our lay leaders? What do they do at a time like this? You know like the robin-round Rosh Hakohol . Or the chairman of the external affairs committee who week in week out pontificates on neither here nor there. Or the spokesman and occasional 'QC...

Due to this morning's arrests the position with comments has become further complicated due to sub-judice (pronounced, sub JEW dc) rules. For some helpful guidance please see the following links: http://www.channel4.com/producers-handbook/media-law/contempt-and-reporting-legal-proceedings/contempt-or-sub-judice-rules http://www.out-law.com/page-9742 Please read carefully before you comment. Editing comments is horribly time consuming and if there is any doubt the comment will not be published. If there is a media lawyer reading this and is able to assist please can you make yourself known by email. There is however no reason why there cannot be a sensible discussion on how we got to where we are and the many repercussions to the community of the current situation. So please do not give in to those who would like to silence us and do contribute to this very important debate. Be heard not herded.

As you all know this site has been the subject of legal action. We have no intention of boring you with the details but a few things must be said. There is a court order for Google Inc to disclose the IP address of the owner of this blog as well as of certain 'named' commenters which are based in the EU. The pseudonyms of the affected comments are listed below and those concerned should urgently seek legal advice. "The official FISHEL" "non-apikores" "Betrayed Former Supporter" "Hersh" "M055AD" "Playing with fire" "Shia" "Ger - (woman with brain)" "Be a Mentch!" "DSM IV 302.89" "Kazuhide Uekusa" "Antwerpian" "Stamford Hill'er" "Ben Tzion" "Laurence Davis" "Velvel" "The Curtain Falls" "Simche" "r''l" "r"l strikes again" "Avi" ...

[1 February 2013] Clarification I wish to make it clear that the Haloche requires that cases involving criminal activity must be reported to the authorities (social services or police) without delay. Victims of crime who do so, will of course be given all appropriate support. Where criminal activity is only suspected, the above also applies, however care must then be taken to ascertain that these concerns do indeed have a reasonable basis. May God grant all of us the protection necessary to ensure that the situation never occurs in practice. Good Shabbos Rabbi Cohn So it appears we have a serious machloikes haposkim (dispute of the authorities). Rav Padwa is of the view that reporting abuse to the police is mesira and anyway “the police is not the solution,” while Rabbi Cohn thinks it is actually haloche that requires one to report all criminal activity to the authorities which includes the police. Rabbi Cohn as we know is also an ‘honest broker’ in the UOHC convened B...

Original Scarfe Cartoon… …and Hamodia’s take on it For goodness sake, they’re wearing a tichel Methinks that the JAA (Jewish Acronym Alliance) ought to demand an immediate retraction of this notorious distortion of this notorious ad, Rupert Murdoch’s counterpart at Hamodia Newspaper Ltd must issue an unreserved apology and the Hamodia’s editor should be seriously considering his position. And as for Gerald Scarfe’s chareidi counterpart, if only we had one…