It would appear the cherem placed on the Ramot Yerushalayim Kenyon Ramot Shopping Center by prominent community rabbonim has persuaded management to talk a deal. The rabbonim felt the shopping center was not meeting basic community tznius and after dialogue failed to compel management to comply with the directives of rabbonim, the cherem was announced. The managers of the shopping center are now signaling a willingness to reach a compromise agreement with the rabbonim. Despite an announced secular activist call to assist the shopping center, the managers realized without the chareidi shoppers, the mall has no future.
Prominent rabbonim such as HaGaon HaRav Asher Weiss Shlita (Gavaad Darchei Torah), HaGaon HaRav Yitzchok Aryeh Leib Halprin (Av Beis Din Ramot Gimmel), HaGaon HaRav Shlomo Neiman, HaGaon HaRav Chaim Yehuda Cohen, HaGaon HaRav Oriel Eisental, and HaGaon HaRav Menachem Mendel Fuchs signed their names to the cherem notice.
Maariv reports that with the assistance of senor City Hall mayoral advisors, the managers of the center have been holding talks with representatives of the rabbonim towards ending the cherem. Among the concessions by management is a willingness to refrain from playing female singers on the public address system and to make certain that events hosted in the mall for children will conform with community tznius standards. Employees in the various stores will be permitted to dress as they see fit. A mashgiach will be appointed to ensure compliance.
While mall operators have shown their willingness to back down, it remains to see if the concessions are sufficient for the rabbonim to lift the boycott.
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
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5 Responses
Was in the mall yday – its packed!!
free country – cant tell people what to do…
Wow this is a positive first and do hope that the Rabbonim will agree that these compromises are adequate.
After the cherem is called off and business is started again, new issues can be DISCUSSED & DECIDED upon bderech hashalom.
#1 We could tell people what to do, if they dont listen its a different story. By the way, do you know anything of ‘vehoya machnecha kodosh’ veloyiah becha ervas davor”kol beisha erva’ etc?
The Rabbonim take very seriously their responsibility to protect the neshomos of their constituents from harmful influences, so I don’t see what incentive they have to compromise or how much room they have to compromise. This seems like a good example of what former Kineset speaker Rivlin said in another item today, that the Chareidim by the weight of their numbers and economic power have have a lot of power over what goes on in this country. Hashem ya’azor.
Shimen, I didn’t know we can tell people what to do. Can I tell you to dress as a ninja fighter this shabbos in shul? How about telling people to only wear white shirts everydat to shul? But on a serious note, as we learn from so many beautiful weekly parshios,Moshe and Aharon certainly couldn’t tell the Bnei Yisroel what to do, and we learned the consequences. In conclusion, unless you are a dictator of a country, you can’t tell people what to do.