Wednesday, July 11, 2007

More Lectures on Journalistic Standards

This time from Dei'ah veDibur, bemoaning the many-headed secular hydra threatening to cut off Haredi institutions from their golden calf cash cow, govt. funding.

For years complaints have been heard repeatedly about Atty. Amnon De Hartoch, who oversees support for institutions within the government and is known for seeking out every opportunity to scheme against Torah-based schools and institutions. Often resorting to totally groundless interpretations of various laws and regulations, he works tirelessly to cut off funding sources for Torah institutions, avreichim, schools, teachers, transportation to Chinuch Atzmai schools, etc. The primary victims of his directives are yaldei Yisroel, who are forced to suffer ongoing, unprecedented and systematic abuse for choosing to attend chareidi schools.

In the course of the cultural war he is trying to wage, De Hartoch has also issued sophisticated, brazen unrestrained remarks reflecting his personal sentiments against the chareidi public, mainly in a personal court case he filed.

"A destructive triumvirate has declared war," said MK Rabbi Moshe Gafni. "This trio has three heads, each one hammering away constantly with its sledgehammer, and all three are coordinating their stances." Rabbi Gafni's remarks are a reference to De Hartoch's new link with his friend Gilad Kariv of the Reform Movement, who has often filed High Court petitions against the chareidi education system and recently even filed a complaint to the Knesset Ethics Committee for insulting a public worker. Meanwhile Ha'aretz has been publishing articles filled with defamatory remarks — without providing support or reactions — solely intended to deprecate the chareidi public.


Hang on, so the supposed "link" here is that the Justice Ministry guy is friends with the head of the Israeli Reform movement, who has dared to file petitions with the Supreme Court? Wow, that's like, almost as good a conspiracy as the Rothschilds. Jews of a feather, I guess.

Representatives from the State Comptroller's department in charge of government ministries began investigating a detailed complaint submitted by Rabbi Gafni regarding De Hartoch's conduct. After several meetings with De Hartoch, another meeting is expected to be held between De Hartoch and the State Comptroller and his staff.
Wait, I thought rabbis filing complaints was a bad thing. Or is this another Rabbi vs. "rabbi" thing? It's hard to keep up.

De Hartoch has been known to take advantage of his vested authority to trample over the chareidi education system at every possible opportunity.

As opposed, of course, to Haredi MKs such as Rabbi Gafni, who have been known to take advantage of their authority to send tons of money to the Haredi sector while screwing over everyone else, as well as continuing to enforce the legal blocks to giving non-Orthodox groups any government recognition or funding. Totally different.

On other occasions he has worked to take away funding from Torah-based cultural activities and rabbonim in outlying settlements. Recently he issued a new directive effectively depriving the Torah Core Group run by the chareidi community in Yeruchom of funding, re-channeling it to a national-religious Torah Core Group in the city.

Hmm, maybe he's not as anti-Torah as you thought. And what are good haredi rabbonim doing in settlements, anyway? Aren't these guys supposed to be following Rabbi Shach?

The last paragraph connects the dots between the Justice Ministry guy and Haaretz:

For years Ha'aretz has been abetting these efforts by running innumerable articles against the chareidi public and chareidi MKs. Public figures have expressed surprise that in most cases the reports failed to include reactions from chareidi spokesmen — a clear departure from journalistic ethics — and said these articles are tendentious and extreme in terms of style. Presumably Ha'aretz, often considered a very professional, highbrow daily, would never write such articles about the Arab sector, for example.

I conducted an exhaustive search of the article but for some reason was unable to find Dei'ah's quotes from the Justice Ministry, Reform Movement, or Ha'aretz. I can only conclude that, masterful geniuses that they are, Dei'ah's editors had their webmaster include the quotes in invisible ink, thereby avoiding any potential halachic issues of people reading lashon hara or encountering apikoros. On behalf of all their readers' souls, I send them my appreciations.

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