Reciprocal Respect

WHO LOSES MOST FROM VIOLENT PROTESTS?

While in Kiryat Sanz in Netanya last week long enough to daven Minchah prior to an
afternoon at Netanya’s separate beach I noticed a few women walking through
the chassidic enclave in decidedly non-chassidic dress. What struck me was that
no one from the Sanz community seemed to notice.

Later I called friends who live in the community to ensure myself that my powers of
observation had not deserted me. They told me the story of a rav
vacationing in Sanz who complained to the late Klausenberger Rebbe ztz”l
that he had seen immodestly dressed women. The Rebbe responded “That’s
amazing. I’ve been living here over ten years and I’ve never seen anything
like that.”

Another time the Rebbe learned that some of his chassidim had shouted “Shabbes” at
seaside bathers. He ordered them to cease and desist. “No one ever became frum
from being shouted at” he said. “Instead open up your windows and sing zmiros
at the top of your lungs. That might have some positive effect.”

Sadly the peaceful relations between Klausenberger chassidim and their neighbors in
Netanya Stoliner chassidim and secular neighbors in Jerusalem’s Givat Ze’ev
neighborhood Gerrer chassidim and their fellow residents of Arad and dozens
of other places around the country where chareidim and non-chareidim live side
by side will never be reported. The media always prefers stories of extremist
refugees from Meah Shearim ordering their national religious neighbors in Ramat
Beit Shemesh to remove the TVs from their homes or threatening violence against
the opening of a national religious girls’ school on a plot of land adjacent to
both communities. Such incidents allow the media to make its favorite equation
of chareidi Jews with the Taliban.