Atara Perlysky

HALB Student

See Page 27

$1.00 WWW.5TJT.COM VOL. 10 NO. 11 24 KISLEV 5770 cahu ,arp DECEMBER 11, 2009

INSIDE FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK Oh! Nuts Goes Crazy

!vfubj igfhkhhrp t BY LARRY GORDON
Essence Of Chanukah
Rabbi Chaim Gross

Please, Not Him

18
Bibi’s Bubble
Hannah Reich Berman 28 It’s said that lightning doesn’t
strike twice in the same place.
Sound Of Silence But that doesn’t mean that the
Rabbi Avi Shafran 34 same people cannot be dragged
out and barred from their own
MindBiz
Esther Mann, LMSW 37 homes more than once, espe-
cially from two homes, in dif-
The Bostoner Rebbe, zt’l ferent locations, at different
Noach Gordon 42 times. Now, just a week or so
after the Israeli government’s
not-too-well-thought-out freeze
on construction (on land that
Palestinians are demanding one
day be the capital of their new
country), that is exactly what is
taking place.
An otherwise weak and inef-
fective government in Israel
cannot stop Hamas in Gaza
from stockpiling state-of-the-art
weaponry or Hezbollah in
Lebanon from arming itself
with tens of thousands of mis-
siles. But it seems the Israeli gov-
ernment knows how to deal
with women wearing colorful
headscarves and wheeling dou-
ble strollers. It was sweet pandemonium as hundreds of children and adults packed
Mr. Netanyahu is in such a into the grand opening of Oh! Nuts at their new larger location on
Central Avenue in Cedarhurst. Featured performers at the special event
rush to checkmate the bum- were the very popular Uncle Moishy (above center) along with
the Ballooner Rebbe. There was lots of good stuff to eat and a
Continued on Page 8 great time was had by all.

THE HISTORY OF A GOOD COVER HEARD IN THE BAGEL STORE

BY RABBI YAIR
HOFFMAN
Bar Mitzvah of A very talented fabric design-
Shalom Gelbtuch. er who worked at a top-name
See Page 48 fabric company would receive a
certain type of phone call rather
regularly. The caller would ask,
“You have velvet scraps,
maybe?” As a perceptive person,
she knew right away that the
caller would invariably be a
chassidishe man who wished to
manufacture yarmulkes (kippot)
to be worn by Jewish men in
accordance with the tradition of
keeping one’s head covered.
What is the history of the yar-
mulke? What are its halachos?
And when, if ever, is one permit-
ted to remove it?
Simply Extraordinary
The Gemara in Kiddushin (31b) BY LARRY GORDON The essence of the story was
tells us that Rav Huna, the son of not just about this one unsung
Rav Yehoshua, would not walk Sometimes a column that hero of Israel, but a myriad of
four cubits (six feet) with a bare contains a few ideas serves as a such personalities who are now
head. He would say in response catalyst for a number of addi- involved in any number of mun-
to any inquiry, “The Divine tional ideas and suggestions dane pursuits that are so much a
Presence is above my head!” from readers. Such was the case part of everyday life. And they
The implication of this last week with an article that are not limited only to the visi-
Gemara is that Rav Huna was appeared in this space about the tors who frequent our office in
unique in this regard, and that director of a yeshiva in the Cedarhurst to collect funds for
others in his time would not Golan Heights who had served themselves or the institutions
necessarily conduct themselves in an IDF special-forces unit that they represent.
in such a fashion. This does not captured terrorist leader After last week’s article
Marwan Barghouti in Shechem
Continued on Page 22 (Nablus) about seven years ago. Continued on Page 12

Sh’or Yoshuv’s big night.

See Page 67 It’s A Small World . . . Outside
Stimulation
Another Mother’s Musings
BY PHYLLIS J.
LUBIN
It’s not as if I don’t read. I do
read, but not much and not
often. Of course, I read certain
things on a daily basis (Yussie’s
and Lea’s homework assign-
ments, the front page of the
Mr. Alan Veingrad at MAY. newspaper), but in terms of
Photo By Judah S. Harris
ARAB-ISRAELI
CONFLICT 2.0
BY SAMUEL SOKOL
The website of the Five Towns
Jewish Times was defaced on
Saturday. The hacker, identifying
himself as a Turkish Muslim
going by the name “Sehul-islam,”
posted a video attacking former
Israeli prime minister Ariel
Sharon as well as a picture of

See Page 70 reading full novels, not so American and Israeli flags burn-
much. I just don’t have the time ing side by side.
or the patience to read a whole The hack was discovered
CANDLE LIGHTING book “just for the fun of it.” Saturday night as readers
At the Sunday-night reception for the Bonei Olam organization at the
Dec. 11 – 4:09 PM home of Andrew and Bassie Lowinger, the director, Rabbi Shlomo So when my mom reminds attempted to visit the website.
Dec. 18 – 4:11 PM Bachner (far right) presents an award of appreciation to
Mr. and Mrs. Lowinger and members of the event committee. Continued on Page 21 Continued on Page 16

Arab-Israeli Conflict 2.0
Continued from Front Cover
There was a lengthy Turkish text
posted to the site’s homepage. Portions
of the text that were in English seemed
to indicate a religious motivation for
the defacement. A pop-up window stat-
ed “Muslim turkish hacker” and “The
dirt Israil and America,” while the home-
page contained the phrases “Islam Was
Were],” and “ALLAHU AKBARRR!” The
Turkish text itself was formatted in a
way that indicated a quotation from a
religious work.
The Internet has increasingly become
a battleground in both the Arab-Israeli
conflict and the war against terror.
In 2008, a Muslim hacker posted an
anti-Semitic message on the website of
the Bank of Israel. The message read,
“Listen to me Jews—you are a nation
whose fate has been decreed . . . we
will kick you out.” It continued,
“Millions of young Muslims are ready to
16 December 11, 2009 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES
die for the sake of Al-Quds [Jerusalem].”
This came on the heels of a self-identi-
fied Iraqi hacking into the website of
Israel’s Army Radio.
In 2006, a group calling itself “Team
Evil” hacked over 750 Israeli websites
over a period of several hours in response
to IDF operations in the Gaza Strip fol-
lowing the kidnapping of IDF Corp. Gilad
Shalit. The group explained their actions
by stating, “You’re killing Palestinians,
we’re killing servers.” Among the sites
hacked were those belonging to Bank
Otzar HaChayal, Rambam Hospital, and
Bank HaPoalim.
Terror groups have also become
increasingly Web-savvy in recent years.
Groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah, and
even the Taliban have a presence online.
In October, Evan Kohlman of the
NEFA Foundation discovered and publi-
cized the Taliban’s official YouTube
channel, dubbed “Istiqlal Media.”
Hamas’s information section maintains
a website at Qassam.ps. For a time,
Hezbollah was offering free e-mail defense told Wired magazine. world collaborated against Iran in media relations also dog its Internet
addresses at Hezbullah.org, until the site According to Wired, Aaviksoo stated launching distributed denial of service campaign. Different ministries and
was shut down. that “all major commercial banks, tel- (DDoS) attacks on the propaganda arms departments each formulate material
The State of Israel uses the Internet for cos, media outlets, and name servers— of Iran’s government. for public consumption separately,
its public relations as well. The office of the phone books of the Internet—felt According to Der Spiegel, Israeli agents and there are frequently contradic-
the IDF spokesman maintains a blog and the impact, and this affected the planted a Trojan Horse on the computer tions between statements by different
a YouTube channel. In October, the IDF majority of the Estonian population. of a Syrian official visiting London in bureaus.
announced that it is now on the popular David Appletree, founder of the
micro-blogging service Twitter Jewish Internet Defense Force, believes
(twitter.com/IDFSpokesperson). that “the mainstream Jewish community
Twitter allows users to post short Terror groups have also become increasingly is behind the times when it comes to
messages, each of which can be no dealing with these threats or using social
longer than 140 characters. Twitter is an media effectively.”
increasingly popular service, and many
Web-savvy in recent years. Groups such as When asked for comment on how
high-profile political organizations, such Jewish organizations have responded to
as Americans for Peace Now, Human
Hamas, Hezbollah, and even the Taliban have a increasing levels of hate online,
Rights Watch, and Israel’s Ministry of Appletree told the Five Towns Jewish
Foreign Affairs, use Twitter as part of presence online. Times that mainstream organizations
their PR efforts. In a statement, the IDF “claim to be doing things and they
explained that it “is utilizing the oppor- throw it in their many requests for more
tunities afforded by ‘new media’ plat- donations, but I don’t see them active
forms in order to improve accessibility This was the first time that a botnet 2006, which gave Israel intelligence nec- on this front . . . We have consistently
to our information.” threatened the national security of an essary for its 2007 bombing of an alleged offered to help and consult various
In addition to its presence on Twitter, entire nation.” nuclear site. organizations with their social media
the IDF will soon establish a profile on Such attacks do not necessarily origi- It is hard to evaluate how well presences and have asked them to join
Facebook and also will create a photo nate from military sources. During the Israel’s intelligence community uses us in our fight, but it seems they don’t
stream on the photo-sharing website unrest following the 2009 contested elec- the Internet. However, the same prob- wish to get involved with things that are
Flickr. The IDF is also looking for soldiers tions in Iran, hackers from around the lems that plague Israel’s traditional outside their scope.” ❖
throughout the armed services who are
interested in becoming contributors to
the IDF blog, writing about their day-to-
day experiences in the army. The IDF has
also begun reaching out to bloggers, with
a mailing list and press releases for new-
media personalities in Israel.
On Tuesday, President Shimon Peres
announced the opening of his own
YouTube channel at a press conference in
Jerusalem held jointly with Chad Hurley,
the co-founder and current CEO of
YouTube. Hurley came to Israel especially
for this event.
Peres explained that the primary goal
of his YouTube channel was to connect to
citizens of Israel and the world. “I think
communication is one of the greatest
things we have in our life. Let’s talk, let’s
dream, let’s laugh in order to make our
world better and our lives more meaning-
ful. Let’s take advantage of my channel to
be informal, talk person-to-person, and
communicate like old acquaintances,”
Peres stated.
At the end of the event, Hurley present-
ed the president with a dedicatory plaque
of the original website source code.
Hurley expressed his pleasure with the
way in which YouTube is “considered a
vehicle for peace.”
However, in 2008, U.S. Senator Joseph
Lieberman of Connecticut sent a letter to
Google CEO Eric Schmidt in which the
senator lambasted Google for breaking its
own content guidelines in allowing ter-
rorist videos to be posted to YouTube.
According to Lieberman, videos on
YouTube “provide weapons training,
speeches by al-Qaeda leadership, and gen-
eral material intended to radicalize
potential recruits.”
In a related statement made at that
time, Lieberman said that Google con-
tinues to allow the posting of videos by
organizations the State Department
has designated as foreign terrorist
organizations.
Cyberwar is an emerging discipline in
military circles. As with terrorism, cyber-
war blurs the distinction between sol-
diers and noncombatants.
In 2007, hackers took down a large
part of “the essential electronic infra-
structure of the Republic of Estonia” as
Jaak Aaviksoo, Estonian minister of
5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES December 11, 2009 17