Manning up at the Kotel by Rabbi Daniel Landes

Originally posted on Times of Israel blogs: http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/manning-up-at-the-kotel/ The latest escalation in the attacks upon women praying as a group at the Kotel on the second day of Rosh Hodesh Adar is as remarkable as it is perverse. Senior rabbinic figures summoned hundreds of dati leumi (religious Zionist) teenage young women from their high schools …

RRFEI Analysis: A new twist in the unfolding Kotel saga

Leading archaeologists insistently weigh in against the Government’s Western Wall agreement This week witnessed a new twist in the unfolding Kotel saga. At the initiative of leading Israeli archaeologists that approached a ready and willing Knesset committee chair, a public hearing was held regarding the Kotel agreement from an archaeological perspective [LINK]. Early on, we …

Updates on the Kotel agreement and the Supreme Court’s ruling on access to Israel’s public mikva’ot

Since last week’s bulletin, there have been a number of developments in the ultra-Orthodox political and rabbinical leadership’s battle against the implementation of the Kotel agreement, as well as their battle against the Supreme Court’s ruling to make Israel’s public mikva’ot available for non-Orthodox conversion ceremonies. These developments reflect, in essence, an escalation in anti-Reform …

RRFEI response to the Western Wall compromise agreement

The agreement is described in Hebrew here: [link], and in English here: [link] RRFEI gives great credit to the Reform movement and Conservative movements, and the Women of the Wall for making the painful sacrifice of giving up their demands of being allowed to hold egalitarian prayer services and women’s minyanim at the traditional Western …