by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008
Seems there’s no level too low to which certain groups can sink. Ynet reports that certain rabbis Hadana and Tsadok are scamming Ethiopian couples by finding their conversions problematic, at the last minute so that they can’t get married, offering to do a “fake” wedding for them since they can’t cancel at the last minute… of course, not forgetting to charge them an arm and a leg for the favor… and then after the “fake” wedding and the “proper” conversion are over, Hadana will then do a “real” wedding for them in his office… for another fee, of course.
A Yedioth Ahronoth reporter approached Rabbi Shalom Tsadok with a “similar case,” in a bid to verify the couples’ complaints.
“Rabbi Shilo is introduced when it’s necessary and conducts the wedding; he is popular but must be paid what he asks for,” Rabbi Shalom Tsadok told him, adding he was “not involved with setting the price.”
When asked by the reporter whether he could ask Rabbi Hadana about Rabbi Shilo, or tell him that the wedding was not a real one, Rabbi Tsadok said: “You can, but no one should know it was make-believe… Rabbi Hadana probably knows everything…it’s for your own good.”
The Rabbinate, added Rabbi Tsadok, will not recognize the marriage. “It’s not binding. It’s just a little ceremony.”
The reporter than asked the rabbi whether NIS 3,000 ($900) would be enough. “He will only want cash,” said Rabbi Tsadok. “When you get to the wedding hall, you meet him before you go in, give it to him personally and then enter the hall with him.”
The wedding, explained the rabbi, is invalid: “It doesn’t count, just a make-believe… It’s artistry. There will be a wedding and everything, a ring too.”
Unsurprisingly, the couples mentioned in the article decided not to continue the conversion process, and did not get legally married. SO: in sum: chillul hashem, in making these people - who opted to go jump through every hareidi hoop so that they could be married, had someone deliberately screw them over for money (I wonder whether in fact there really was a problem with their conversion, given that halachically, it doesn’t actually take much to convert someone and have it stick) offer to fix it for more money, and then try to get - what, yes more money out of them… and they don’t want to consider continuing their journey towards joining the Jewish people? Astonishing.
FOlks, just go to the Masorti movement, already. They’ll do a proper conversion, they’ll marry you, and they won’t try to con you because you’re brown.
by Kitra Cahana · Wednesday, June 14th, 2006
Shabbat is coming, and this week I’ll miss the whispers of my father–the blessing that keeps my time moving holy. Not unlike the only child whose father clutched him the night before, clung to his mother before saying goodbye as they departed into the darkness towards Israel. They are making aliyah to be reunited with family, and yet in the same moment aliyah is tearing their loved ones apart. The mother tells Micah Feldman through tears that she has already lost two children. Out of the darkness they came only to move further into it.
Of course I am looking in from the outside–there is undoubtedly a reason and I’m told the decision to accept only 2/3rds of the family will soon be verified. Perhaps it is a brother and not a father. Other than this wailing family, little emotion is expressed. I spent the day with these 65 individuals as they were given final warnings from Brahane, their teacher about life in Israel. This is a diaper, this is deodorant, this is Saranwrap–don’t let your children eat it. There was shouting and laughing as the whole anticipated the strange new world that they would soon master. But now, only slight nods indicated that they recognized me or even each other. There was no one body, no one whole people that was leaving. Only singles and silence as they departed.
by Kitra Cahana · Monday, June 12th, 2006
How do you translate Israel into meaningful words? I was a liaison between the people and a hidden future today, but a very limited one. “If you are voluntary will you tell about the cities of Israel?†Dange Telahu asked on behalf of his family who will join their grandparents in Israel in July. “Will they take my baby away, will he be safe when I go on the plane?†his mother tenderly clutched her child as he drank from her drained breast. “Is there nature in Israel like in Ethiopia where I can run on a mountain or near a river, not on an asphalt road?†his brother Adesso hopes to train to be a professional runner. “What does sand feel like?†“ How will I know which bus goes where when I get to Israel?†“Will I be able to keep my sherouba, my braids in, or will they make me take them out?â€, “Will a terrorist try to kill me?â€
I was caught on having answers that would numb their doubts and place their nerves behind them. Would a terrorist discriminate against their skin color? Would life in an absorption center differ greatly from normal Israeli living?
I tried to explain what I did know – the imprinted history I had lived only a year before. A lot of us claim to know the back of our hands, but how would we describe them to a blind man? I took his palm in mine and traced lightly, attempting to mimic the emotion of sand - this is like that feeling I said. I pointed to the side of my face yawning, trying to describe what a ‘pop’ in the ear might feel like during take off and landing - they would need to yawn to make it disappear but that that would come naturally from within. What I really wanted to say was that adaptation to change comes from within. Humanity moves through the world like liquid. But unlike liquid that is overpowered by its environment we guide our own moldings through it, we each chisel our own Davids and should not fear that process.
by Kitra Cahana · Saturday, June 3rd, 2006
Poverty swells in the slums of Addis Ababa. Yet none of the tin and mud homes that I have visited lacked in either grace or generosity. The beauty of having time to work on this project allows me to not only spend my moments seeking out the aesthetic, but also using my time tending to a growing trust and sensitivity, ultimately finding the poetic balance that weaves the photojournalist with the humanist. Today I enjoyed listening and not looking as intently.
And as I listened I began to feel the growing strings of sympathy pull me. I came to know the deep crisis that is endured by the Falash Mura, as they wait between three to nine years with the unrelenting expectancy that they will be brought to Israel. Those that have been rejected hardly flinch when they say: Maybe next week I too will join my brethren in the holy land. Listening to each speak his own impoverished share, I began to realize that while all dreams dreamt were about climbing out of poverty and joining immediate loved ones in Beer Sheva, Tzfat and Jerusalem, I was one of the only ones aware that tonight the Jewish holiday of Shavuot begins. All barriers to Jerusalem are crushed as Jerusalem’s gates are unhinged and she embraces all those yearning to congregate within her. How appropriate it felt to be with these people on the eve of this holiday, and how alone I feel in its celebration.
by Kitra Cahana · Thursday, June 1st, 2006
Flying over Ethiopia at night feels like flying over a tucked away fold of the ocean. Black pockets stare at the foreign bird-like creature, a faranji machine as she makes her way, casting no shadow over Ethiopian soil. Pale constellations reveal the skeletal structure of Addis Ababa as the plane humbly descends towards the four million Ethiopians living in the country’s capitol. Doubt looms in my stomach as I look towards Baruch Tegene’s words, the blessing he gave me before departing on this three-month trip for strength.
He spoke of a season of a stork that would sail over Ethiopia and the Beta Israel communities when he was young. Upon being spotted the Jewish people would call out yearningly: “Carry me to Yerushalayim with you. To the holy sites of Abraham and Solomon, our forefathers.†When I first heard, I longed to long so lovingly for a home. His words have always penetrated wholly, for I feel so open to someone I hold to the same respect as my Saba Moshe — heroes of our people. Yet now, flying over the same trees and sand as the winged ones, I do not hear the same plight of Baruch and the Beta Israel as the stork did long ago. But as the birds of Moses and Solomon rerouted their migration to include and respond to the prayers of the Beta Israel in recent decades, I’m eager to learn more about the stork of promise and try to understand whether she will or she should listen to the yearnings of the Falash Mura, the liminal people caught between their Jewish roots, their Christian conversions and their hope to resettle with family in Israel.
Regardless, my photographic vision must hear the plight of humanity.
