- The valid question of why it took Scopus so long to write their letter warrants a response
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The point that incidents of pedophilia or failing to act on them are not a CHABAD phenomenon by any stretch is never made, except in a letter
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Jeremy Loebenstein and Sue Susskind were planning to resign well before the Royal Commission and at least one of them was procrastinating for other reasons.
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Shira Chadasha is not Orthodox despite Mark Baker’s claims, and their level of observance is not a flea on the real Shira Chadasha in Israel. It is conservadox if we need to assign nomenclature. Males who lead services there can be counted in a minyan but should not be awarded any kibud, according to the most authoritative modern orthodox poskim (let alone Charedi ones)
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The Jewish News failed to consider why TRUSTEES of Yeshivah should resign. I know from my old Shule Elwood, the trustees were not in the know about most things and were just bureaucratic signatures.
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Let’s hear from Henry ‘the lefty’ Herzog whether Mark Dreyfus is halachicaly Jewish. Doesn’t matter to me, but he is called that everywhere. Maybe he is.
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I’m sick of this social justice mantra from Mark Baker and his ‘all singing’ temple. What are the rest of us? Followers of unsocial injustice because we maintain fidelity with recognised Halacha?
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Cyprys hired the Hall from Betar to conduct his own private martial arts classes. God only knows what happened in there or thereafter. Thankfully one brave character told him to leave forever or he’d have him evicted. [This is a correction, it wasn’t a Betar sponsored function]
9. CSG who used Cyprys were strangely missing in the royal commission. What of their governance over many years?
I can go on but this paper tries so hard to fill its pages to the extent that we are meant to be impressed by the prognostications of Danny Lamm, Ron Weiser and others have on the Israeli elections? I’d rather listen to Isi Leibler on Shalom TV; he is far more informed.
- Avi Yemini (née Waks) is given no air time despite 3 important videos he published
pitputim 
actually this post is from Dovid Segal!
Here is your answer
An Open Letter from the yeshiva to the Community
בס’ד
Dear [ ]
The role of the Yeshivah Centre Committee of Management is to ensure the Centre has continued success in the future. Like the whole community, we are totally committed to the unique ethos of the school.
We regret, therefore, that we find ourselves in a position where the good name of the Centre is under threat and confidence has been diminished. We wish it were otherwise. We want to reassure everyone that we are committed to making the Centre and our school better, stronger, and more transparent.
To do so, we are undertaking a number of substantive initiatives that we believe will create the right frameworks to take the Centre and our school forward.
We are weeks away from launching a scheme to respond to the needs of victims of child abuse. An independent and preeminent committee is being established to develop and implement a scheme based on the principles of existing models operating in other organisations.
We will commence a consultation with parents and others in the community in the coming weeks on the operations and performance of the school. The feedback will be gathered through one-on-one interviews, email and small group sessions.
We will shortly commence an independent review of the governance arrangements of the Centre including the transparency of the Committee. The review will assess existing best practice models of education governance that underpin great schools. It will make recommendations on how these might operate and apply in our context.
We will undertake a process to renew the Committee’s composition in the light of this review. This process comes as Mr Chaim New, Mr Yirmi Loebenstein, Mrs Sue Susskind and Mr Don Wolf, the current chair, have chosen to step down from the Committee. We would like to thank them for their many years of voluntary service.
We are approaching the review with an open mind. We want to take from best practice, and seek the best people for a renewed Committee. Mr Merv Adler, Mr Michael Goldhirsch, Mr Chaim Raitman, Mr Shlomo Werdiger and Rabbi Shimshon Yurkowitz are remaining on the Committee during the review and process of renewal to oversee the running of the Centre. Rabbi Yurkowitz will transition off the Committee in the near future. Leah Balter, a parent of the school and vice president of Jewish Care Victoria who has been involved in community consultation around Jewish education funding, is currently assisting the Committee. Reflecting the renewal, we are not appointing a chair at this stage and will do so based on the outcomes of the review.
As we focus on the ongoing operational performance of the school, we are committed to the initiatives above and will communicate regularly on progress. Together these actions provide the basis for continued success.
The Committee of Management
Mr Merv Adler, Mr Michael Goldhirsch, Mr Chaim Raitman, Mr Shlomo Werdiger and Rabbi Shimshon Yurkowitz
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It was plain to anyone that the old model of one shaliach (who I believe was well intentioned) together with underlings and various committees only answerable to him was not a mode of governance that is acceptable or sustainable in this day and age. As it turned out, it was a number of cases of pedophilia here and Sydney which made that abundantly clear. It might not have been that: there could have been some financial scandal which tipped over the bucket. One can only hope that experienced minds put their heads together engage consultants as need be and put up a new model. There ought to be no triumphalism. The overarching concern is that the schools and shules and other associated arms are all answerable in auditable form to some arm(s) of governance and every effort is made to assists the various AV* victims in both states to get the very best recuperative help (I don’t know if one can ever get over such incidents but perhaps they can learn not to allow it to take over every minute of their thought processes so they can function as normal human beings with their families and friends) We need to give Yeshivah a chance to reorganise and during that time I think that other when input is sought hopefully through a process which allows submissions of ideas as well) that the only others we should hear from are those who feel they have wronged and not genuinely done Teshuva. The Issur is clear: לפני עוור לא תתן מכשול and more. The others are any who are victims and still haven’t come forth. They should go straight to the police and suffer no ignominy for such action.
I can reveal now that when I had a series Of stand up shouting matches with Cyprys he threatened to sue me for defamation when I was at Elwood. All other board members were in a state of shock. I offered to drive him to my house with his defamation papers so he could deliver them personally. When he was out on parole I sought halachic advice on whether we had to abide by the parole conditions and allow him to daven at Elwood in the interim. I was told that he must be watched like a hawk, sit in a corner leave immediately after davening and never be allowed near a child. I remember one day on Shabbos there was a big kiddish and I stayed in Shule waiting for him to leave. Instead he went to a back area where kids were playing and I stormed over there and yelled at him to go home immediately or I would call the police. He ran after me into the Shule and I stood eye to eye, with witnesses, and didn’t take a step back. My reward? The next day when I was driving home he has applied for an intervention order against ME!! and claimed his kids who were not there were afraid of me. Anyway I had to resort to lovely pro bono good souled lawyers who had it withdrawn. There were plenty more incidents and my conscious is clear. But I’m digressing. None of this has to do with the AJN who sees fit not to publish all manner of article as I pointed out above. And yes, yet another Henry Herzog letter this week. I think Beis Aharon Shule has the highest % of letter writers per membership.
Why haven’t the AJN revealed the name of their staff member? Is it against the law?
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Fact – subscriptions and circulation of the Australian Jewish News (AJN) has fallen dramatically. It is now subsidised by the insertion of the weekly advetorial property guide. The AJN is increasingly irrelevant and hasn’t been a Melbourne community paper since the Rubinstein era. In an attempt to resurrect its success the AJN is giving out free copies of its anniversay book, which is an interesting nostalgic read of different communal times.
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Fact – subscriptions and circulation of the Australian Jewish News (AJN) has fallen dramatically. It is now subsidised by the insertion of the weekly advetorial property guide, a business model that was adopted to save an ailing rag. The AJN is increasingly irrelevant and hasn’t been a Melbourne community paper since the Rubinstein era. Though Lipsky breathed a few extra years in to its communal relevance. In an attempt to resurrect its success the AJN is giving out free copies of its anniversay book, which is an interesting nostalgic read of long forgotten communal trials and tribulations. Maggid the secularist is out of touch with the kinematics of the modern 2015 Melbourne Kehilla, he is still trying to run the paper on a 1970’s model of bland articles that is now laregley obsolete and not representative of most segments of the community.
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