In a letter to Rabbinical Council of Victoria (RCV) President Rabbi Yaakov Glasman, Council of Orthodox Synagogues of Victoria (COSV) President Paul Korbl has called on the Rabbis of the RCV to issue a statement endorsing free market competition.  He has also advised that such a statement “should make no reference to or cast any aspersions on any particular Rabbi.”

Korbl also stated that he believes that:

“The general consensus is that multi Hashgochos may be beneficial as competition is potentially a good thing and would lead to a reduction of prices. It is a fact that different Kashrut standards exist and are frequently based on the perceived piety and the level of stringency of the particular rabbi. For this reason it seems to me that any adverse comments on any particular rabbi would in no way be beneficial. It is impractical for one level of Kashrut to be imposed because a minimum level for one person may be too stringent for another.”

However, Korbl’s message to the RCV has fallen on deaf ears, with the RCV releasing a statement by email that could be the described as the very opposite of the statement Korbl called for.  COSV has since removed the RCV statement from their website on advice that it is potentially defamatory. At the time of writing, the statement was similarly absent from the RCV website.

The RCV’s chosen course of action has prompted a follow up email from Korbl scolding the RCV for failing to heed his advice that Korbl says has caused the RCV to lose public credibility.

The great thing about Facebook is that you learn that you are only two degrees of separation from people for whom The Protocols of the Elders of Zion are not a fabrication, but a textbook.

On the very first day of Julia Gillard’s Prime Ministership, I happened to catch a rather intriguing thread on my Facebook feed. It included a conversation between two Palestinians, one of whom is a Facebook friend of a Facebook friend.  Part of the conversation was in Romanised Arabic, and the essence of it was that Julia Gillard was not to be trusted, and that her displacement of Rudd as PM was the work of the Jews.

That’s right.  The Elders of Zion were not happy with Kevin Rudd, so they simply had him replaced with Julia Gillard, who would now do their bidding.

I must admit that I found this conspiracy theory more amusing than alarming.  It is well known that in the Arab Middle East, conspiracies about Jews are rampant, and The Protocols are essentially considered a history book by a significant minority.  In some ways it was reassuring to know that Facebook’s algorithm doesn’t always throw material at the user that is consistent with their worldview.

However, there was nothing amusing about the front page of The Age today.  The headline blared out Gillard accused of soft line on Tel Aviv.  You’d think that the editors of The Age would be aware that the Israeli government is based in Jerusalem, and not Tel Aviv – that alone is an appalling error in a front-page headline.

It seems Gillard’s partner, Tim Mathieson, is “employed as a real estate salesman by the founder of the Australia Israel Forum, Melbourne property developer Albert Dadon.”  Just to be clear, he’s not employed by the Australia Israel Forum, he’s employed by the founder of that entity, to sell real estate as part of a completely different entity.

The Age trots out former career diplomat Ross Burns, who has long since been sharing his antipathy for Israel with anyone who will listen (essentially Fairfax and the public broadcasters).  Burns’ central thesis is that Gillard’s partner’s boss will be influencing (or perhaps controlling) Australia’s foreign policy.

So let me get this right: Gillard’s partner is employed to sell real estate. Nothing against being a real estate salesman (my own day job as a consumer researcher is no more important), but it’s a long way from being Prime Minister.  Nevertheless, in order to have her partner ‘get in good with the boss’ down at the real estate agency, Gillard will allow her partner’s boss to determine Australia’s foreign policy?  Hmmm.

As implausible as this sounds, we better check if any other federal parliamentarians have partners employed by, well I don’t know, Century 21 or L.J.Hooker.  Who knows what conspiracies might be uncovered!



Source: frontpagemag.com

By Anthony Frosh

Recently, we have seen the launch of two important leftist Jewish political initiatives.  In the USA there is J Street, and now in Europe there is J Call.  Already I have heard calls for the launching of an Australian version.  These organizations have very slick marketing, using the latest in online campaign techniques; and J Street seems to also have the ear of the Whitehouse.  They brand themselves as “pro Israel, pro peace.”  But to what extent are they really “pro Israel?”  And are they even “pro peace” or are they more “pro appeasement”?

At their core, these organizations are about Jewish citizens of Diaspora states lobbying their governments to pressure Israel into making decisions that Israeli democracy has not yet been willing to make.  I believe many of the Jews who join these organizations are acting more out of concern for their own leftist credentials amongst their non-Jewish leftist peers, than they are out of concern for the welfare of the State of Israel.

While I look forward to receiving counter-arguments in the comments section, I urge all readers to first read the following F.A.Q. I have created.

Isn’t everyone entitled to voice their opinioneven if they don’t live in Israel?

Yes, they are.  Kibbitzing from the sidelines is fine.  However, this is quite different to lobbying other governments to pressure Israel into making decisions that are not supported by the majority of Israeli people.

What is a Jew who disagrees with Israeli policy to do?

The most obvious answer is to make Aliyah and directly participate in Israeli democracy.  Once you or your children are serving in the army, I’m sure Israelis will be more open to listening your ideas on how to achieve peace and security. “Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier” wrote Samuel Johnson with much truth.  However, in Israel, this  quote is understandably even more apt to the third person than the first, especially when those third persons are wanting to make major decisons concerning national security.

If moving to Israel isn’t for you, you could nevertheless still directly support other organizations that do participate in Israeli democracy, such as Israeli political parties and Israeli NGOs

How is donating to Israeli Political parties or Israeli NGOs different to supporting J Street and J Call?

When you donate money to Israeli organizations, you are enabling them to better participate in their own democracy.  This is very different to lobbying other governments to undermine the will of the Israeli electorate.  Thus leftist Jews who do not wish to undermine Israeli democracy should consider donating money to political parties such as Meretz, or NGOs such as B’Tselem, rather than supporting J Street or J Call.

Aren’t J Street just doing what AIPAC (or in Australia, AIJAC) does, but with opposing politics?

No, they’re not.  Regardless of whether or not you appreciate AIPAC or AIJAC’s politics – and I have my reservations – their process clearly does not undermine Israeli democracy.  Yes, they are Diasporite Jews lobbying their own governments concerning Israel, but they lobby those governments to put less foreign pressure on the Israeli government, not more.  For example, although these groups might support the settler movement and Israeli militarism, they do not lobby their governments to pressure Israel to build more settlements, or to carry out grander military operations in the Levant. Rather they support Israeli government policy regardless of which party heads the Israeli government of the day.

Furthermore, one does not need to agree with all of AIPAC’s politics to recognise that they are an important counterweight to the many nefarious forces that lobby the American government to be more hostile to Israel.

Don’t we need a counterweight to AIPAC/AIJAC?

There already exist several.  For example, in the USA, the State Department is very hostile to Israel, and they constantly attempt to pressure the Whitehouse to take a more anti-Israel line.  One of the major reasons for this is that the State Department is lobbied heavily by the numerous Arab governments.  The same model plays out in almost all other western democracies.  In addition (and in overlap) to the Arab governments, there is considerable lobbying from some of the major oil companies that are operating in the Arab world.

Furthermore, and this is especially the case in Europe, there are huge numbers of citizens who just have pure hatred for Israel and the Jews.  Many of these citizens have roots in Islamic countries, but many of them are just old fashioned Anglo-Euro anti-Semites.  With all of these forces, do we really need more organizations lobbying western governments to be tougher on Israel?

What is so wrong with undermining Israeli democracy, so long as it is done through another democracy?

If you attempt to deny the Israeli people the fundamental right to determine policy for themselves, then you have no right to call yourself “pro Israel.”  Furthermore, the idea that foreign governments can be better trusted than the Israeli government to assure the welfare of the Jewish people goes against the grain of history.  This is true for Australians, Americans, and especially Europeans.  As the Jerusalem Post editorialised:

“One cannot escape the sad irony inherent in the initiative: Here they are, the remnant of European Jewry, expressing their lacking faith in the political reason of their own brethren – the Jewish leaders of Israel – while choosing to placing their own destinies in the hands of Germany, France, Austria and other countries that failed miserably to protect their Jewish citizens during the Holocaust.”

The Stern Hu trial - making less sense than the "Chewbacca Defense"

By Anthony Frosh

The Stern Hu situation provides a lot of food for thought, both in the media coverage and also the reaction of the Australian Government, or lack thereof.

The Rio Tinto executive has apparently admitted to taking bribes, although under how much duress this admission was made is a question that is rarely asked in the press.  Further questions that seem largely ignored are:

• Who is Hu accused of taking bribes from?
• Why aren’t these bribe-givers also on trial?
• And don’t executives from billion-dollar corporations normally give bribes (to government officials), rather than take them.  It does not require the “Chewbacca Defense” to say “this does not make sense!”

To add insult to injury, in some media coverage, such as in the Fairfax papers, Hu is described as an “Australian passport holder” rather than simply as an “Australian.”  I cannot recall Schapelle Corby, or even David Hicks, suffer such a demotion.  One must question why some Australian citizens are deemed to be true blue Aussies, while others are merely “passport holders.”

Speaking of passports, there’s no sign of the tough talk that we heard from Prime Minister Rudd and Foreign Minister Smith regarding alleged use of Australian passports. And then there was what Greg Sheridan superbly described as “needlessly energetic comments by Foreign Minister Smith condemning Israel over the recent announcement of 1600 new housing units to be built in East Jerusalem.”

However, despite the Chinese government not even allowing Australian diplomats to attend the trial of Hu, Rudd and Smith are expediently staying shtum. 

Labor backbencher Michael Danby (Federal Member for Melbourne Ports) has spoken out about China’s dubious judicial procedure. Given Danby’s constant differences with government foreign policy (UN votes on Israel, the Dalai Lama, and now the Stern Hu trial), it might be time for him to consider leaving the Labor party and running as an independent.  But that’s a subject for another article.

Richard Dawkins - High Priest of the Atheists, and one of only two people to ever appear on the ABC's "Q & A" who were more smug than host Tony Jones

By Anthony Frosh

With the Global Atheist Convention currently taking place in Melbourne, I, like many people, have observed how it is rather unusual to have a conference defined by what you are not.  I don’t much care for beer, and this clearly puts me in the minority in this country.  However, it would never occur to me to organise a convention for people who don’t like beer. Be that as it may, I must admit that if anybody out there wishes to organise one, I promise to make myself available as a guest speaker.

‘Evangelical atheists’ claim that most wars have been fought in the name of religion.  When people point out Nazis, Soviets, etc, then people like Richard Dawkins say that those atheists didn’t commit their atrocities in the name of atheism.

There are two main problems with Dawkins’ argument.  Firstly, Dawkins is plain wrong when he asserts that no atrocities were ever committed in the name of atheism.

Obvious examples are the regimes of Mao and Stalin, who destroyed cultures they perceived to have had a religious basis. Thus their atrocities and human rights violations were committed in the name of atheism.

Secondly, by putting up the defence that those atheistic regimes didn’t commit their atrocities in the name of atheism, this assumes that religious entities that have waged war and committed atrocities have done so in the name of theism.   This has rarely been the case.  Most wars described as religious wars are actually about tribalism and ideology, and not at their core about theology.

The unfortunate thing is that evangelical atheists seem to be spending most of their time denigrating religion.  It might be more interesting if they actually tried to acknowledge some of the great philosophical challenges that atheism presents.

A genuine atheist ought to agree that there is neither anything sacred about a human being, nor any other living thing.  Thus, a living thing is simply a complex arrangement of a bunch of atoms or chemicals, as is a tennis ball, a tin of paint, or a laptop computer.  While I have no reason to believe that atheists in general are devoid of morality and purpose, the question that remains unanswered is “what is their justification for having a morality and a purpose?”  Why does a bunch of atoms (regardless of complexity) require a code of ethics and morality?  Furthermore, why would a bunch of chemicals be so concerned if another bunch of chemicals happens to feel that there is some form of metaphysical force that makes certain arrangements of chemicals (living things) sacred?

The answer is that self-described atheists have not fully comprehended the philosophical implication of the complete absence of the metaphysical.  If they had, they’d realise that a bunch of atoms has no need to attend a global convention.

Finally, I suspect that so-called atheists deep down aren’t really atheists at all.  Like most of us, I suspect they are agnostics.  They just lie at the atheistic end of the agnostic spectrum.  Likewise, deep down most God believers lie at the theistic end of that same spectrum.

John Turturro as Herbert Stempel in Quiz Show (1994) - just one of several Jewish characters to have been played by this famous Italian-American actor

by Anthony Frosh

I grew up in very Italian neighbourhood.  As a consequence, we had several Italian family friends.  And technically speaking, one of my grandfathers immigrated to Australia from Italy (well, he was there for about 6 weeks until his boat departed from Naples bound for the land down under). However, I have never known a great deal about the Italian Jewish community.

Up until now, my exposure to the mere existence of an Italian Jewish community has been limited to the following:

1)      I saw the film Life is Beautiful (but who didn’t?)

2)      For a while, a young man from Milan (who was studying at the yeshiva around the corner from my flat in East St Kilda) used to visit me periodically to drop off a Lamplighter and to encourage me to lay tefillin.

3)      A Jewish character once briefly appeared in a particularly multicultural episode of Il commissario Montalbano (a detective TV drama set in Sicily).  It wasn’t clear whether he was a moneylender, a banker, or just an accountant.  Either way, it was a stereotypical Jewish profession. On the plus side, the moneylender/banker/accountant was shown to have integrity, as he insisted on providing Inspector Montalbano with a receipt, even though Montalbano (who has excellent judgement of character) tries to insist that it isn’t necessary, having complete trust in this Jewish financial worker.

Recently, I have come across a most interesting article (forwarded to me by RachSD, who I must say is a prolific forwarder or high quality articles). The Italian Jewish community is launching a new Jewish newspaper.  Nothing unusual about that, you might think – only this newspaper, Pagine Ebraiche, is aimed at non-Jews, and is not intended to compete with the existing ‘internal’ Jewish publications in Italy.

It seems there are two primary reasons for launching this newspaper.  One reason is that the Italian Jewish community wish to be more active in influencing the way the rest of the Italian population perceives them.  Instead of merely being the “object of news”, Jews will now “make their own voices heard.”

The more interesting reason for launching this newspaper is the perceived demand from the wider Italian community.  According to those interviewed in the article, Italians are highly interested in Jews, and Jews have an important symbolic value in modern Italian society.

“There is a huge interest in Jews and Jewish culture here,” said Emanuele Ascarelli, who directs “Sorgente di Vita” (“Source of Life”), a biweekly Jewish television program co-produced by the Union of Italian Jewish Communities and state-run RAI television that draws 200,000 to 400,000 viewers. Ascarelli estimates that 90 to 95 percent of [the audience] are not Jewish …

“Everything that Jews do has a symbolism,” Ascarelli said. “What Jews say counts on issues such as immigration, minority rights, the Shoah, the culture of memory.”

I guess the obvious question for Galus Australis readers is: should the Australian Jewish community launch such a publication?   While I think it is an interesting idea, I’m not convinced that there is enough demand for such a publication in the sunburnt country.  Forgetting the hasbarah aspect, it does not seem like the wider Australian community is overly interested in what Jews are saying and doing, and I certainly doubt whether Jews in Australia have the same symbolic value as the article portrays Jews in Italy to have.

But let’s hear what you have to say.

It was Wednesday night in Palolem, the sixth night of Chanukah. My new roommate Daniel and I went to the Beyt Yehudi for the candle lighting. After staying for a little while to enjoy the singing and jam session, Daniel prompted us to leave.
“Leave? Why? I think they’re about to serve a meal.”
“But we want to go to this restaurant where you can order steak.”
There are not that many places in India where you can get beef, given the Hindu reverence for the cow. However, the state of Goa, being an ex-Portuguese colony, is largely Christian, and thus beef is often available at restaurants.
“I don’t eat steak– I’m a pescetarian, remember?”
“Come on, we will have steak, and you can order fish.”
I didn’t know who “we” was at this stage. To my surprise, and in what seemed like another recurring coincidence, Daniel had somehow become friends with the couple who Marios and I had seen on the train on the way to Goa, and then had also sat at a table with in the pub the night before.

Just before leaving for the restaurant, Daniel said quietly to me that he had forgotten their names, and wanted me to ask them. I in turn told him that I had also met them before, and having also forgotten their names, I didn’t feel comfortable asking them. When we got to the restaurant, I suggested, without providing much of a reason, that we all exchange email addresses. That allowed us to rediscover their names. Shauli and Shoham. They had been in India at least six months already, mostly in the North. Shoham spoke English with a slight London accent, rather than a regular Israeli accent. I asked her about this, and she explained that she had spent a few years there as a child. Shauli was moderately tall, and was quite thin, a typical characteristic of a guy who has been travelling in India for a while. He also had a thick (but not long) beard, another characteristic fitting that profile. Later on, Shauli would show us a picture of himself not long before he left Israel. He was unrecognisable. His pre-India appearance was clean-shaven, reasonably solid build, and a buzz cut on top. In Israel he had been a combat pilot in the air force, flying F-16s. Now, far removed from that, he looked like a total hippy, carrying around his flute, which he played intermittently.

Daniel, Shauli, and Shoham all had good spoken English, and when in my company, they more often than not conversed in English for my benefit, although I never requested them too. In fact, I didn’t mind when they spoke in Hebrew, as it was good practice for me, and when possible, I would make an effort to use Hebrew too. Otherwise, I was quite good at speaking English with people who speak it as a second language.

At one stage, Shauli and Shoham were discussing in Hebrew something about the beauty of the Chanukah Menorah lighting ceremony as done by the Breslover shaliach at the Beyt Yehudi. I made some unmemorable comment, and then Shauli said something surprising to me, in English..

“But you know, in a way, I don’t like Chanukah that much” he opined.
“You don’t like Chanukah? What’s not too like? There’s no fasting, the food is delicious, mmmm latkes, sufganiot, and there’s no prohibitions against anything…”
“Yes, but it is about the Maccabees…I don’t like the Maccabees.”
“Oh, I think I know where you are going with this. I’ve thought about this before, although I don’t think I’ve ever discussed it with anyone. I can see how, from a certain point of view, not mine by the way, but some people who are some kind of post-modern revisionists might twist it this way…they might frame the Maccabees as the Al Qaeda of their time. You see the Greeks, they were occupiers, but they weren’t occupiers like the Romans were. The Romans occupied through brute force – they weren’t interested in the cultures of the lands they occupied. However, the Greeks were very interested in Judaism, from an academic point of view, not a religious one. But at the same time, they were trying to get the Jewish people to fuse their own culture with Greek culture. Thus the Greek occupation was as much intellectual and cultural as it was physical. And this was not always forced, but many Jews at the time embraced the Greek culture, which they saw as more modern and liberated – Greek culture and thinking was the most ‘modern’ of its time. The Maccabees took a stand against this cultural fusion or assimilation, “Ah, they were sort of anti-globalisation?”
Shauli commented
“Yes, in a way, they could have been seen as an early version of it” I continued, “And they didn’t just fight the Greeks, but also other Jews they saw as cultural collaborators….And while I don’t believe they were terrorists, I can imagine some revisionist moral relativists framing it that way.”
“That’s very interesting, but this isn’t why I don’t like the Maccabees” Shauli stated.
“Then what is it you don’t like?”
“In Israel, I support Hapoel. I hate Maccabi. They are our rivals” he laughed. In Israel, the most dominant sporting association is Maccabi, which is named after the Maccabees. Hapoel (which translates as ‘the worker’) is the next most dominanat. Both organization have professional teams in various sports in a number of cities throughout Israel.
“Do you support Hapoel in football or basketball?”
“Both…. You name it, if they are playing it, I support it. In any sport, I support Hapoel, and hate Maccabi”
“Ok, that’s the strangest reason I’ve ever heard for not liking something.”
“Yes, I know,” conceded Shauli, who was smiling broadly.

Fascism has long been associated with far right-wing political movements.  Today, when it comes to suppressing the expression of ideas, it is getting increasingly difficult to distinguish between the so-called intellectual left and the far right.

Last month, The International Centre B5 left-wing German activists violently prevented the showing of a documentary film by a Claude Lanzmann, a prominent French Jewish filmmaker. The 1973 documentary film was Lanzmann’s first film, Why Israel, about the role of the Jewish state as a homeland for refugees. This is just one of many similar instances in Europe of late, and while this phenomenon has been most intense in Europe, it has by no means been limited to the old continent. 

At the University of California, Berkeley, where one might presume that freedom of speech is paramount, there have been significant attempts to violate the right of free expression.  For example, when Nonie Darwish, an Egyptian-American author and feminist who has become a Muslim apostate and strident critic of Jihadist Islam was scheduled to speak, she faced a well-organised tirade of constant heckling throughout her lecture in order to prevent her from expressing her ideas to the audience. Now you might think that a human rights activist and feminist of Arabic origin might appeal to the left-wing students at Berkeley, but it appears that if you have anything to say that might not be fully congruent with these students’ worldview, then your rights to free expression (and the rights of others who might like to hear you) are to be quashed.

Australian universities have similarly not been immune from this denial of freedom of expression. Anecdotally, at a university public lecture that one of us attended recently, the professor delivering the lecture could only cite her own intuition in defence of her argument, but nonetheless spoke in angry tones at audience members who dared to challenge her hypothesis. In our experience similarly dogmatic attitudes are regrettably all too common in Australian universities, and especially humanities departments.

In the Australian Jewish community, we can also see that the far-left have at times shown a disconcerting lack of pluralism.  One self styled radical left Jewish blog has in its mission statement

“We’re hoping people will disagree with us, pushing us to consider other ideas and ways of thinking.” 

However, this is immediately qualified with  

“…we’re not liberals – we’re not guided by arguments of ‘freedom of speech’. This is a blog… that we’re carving out for critical, progressive thinking.”

Got that? If you’re not what is deemed by the editors to be progressive, then your ideas are not worthy of being published, not even in the comments section.

As editors of a Jewish magazine, you might expect that we’ve received many requests to censor people’s comments because they were perceived as anti-Semitic or anti-Israel etc.  However, the fact is that up to this point (kineynahora), we have not received a single such request.  On the other hand, we have received several requests (and even the odd demand) from ‘progressive’ correspondents requesting that we remove comments that the correspondent deemed not to be ‘progressive’ enough.

As always, we remind the correspondent that we are not so wise as to be the arbiters of which ideas are valid or invalid.  After all, whole societies have accepted ideas that the majority of people now consider to be morally repugnant (and vice versa). It’s time these so-called progressives look in the mirror and ask themselves the question: what makes them so insightful that they feel they can arbitrate in this way?

Amir Khan and Dmitry Salita in an old-fashioned stare down. They will fight on Dec 5.

By Anthony Frosh

Last week, a rabbinical student named Yuri Foreman became a world boxing champion.

Jewish boxing champions are nothing new.  Daniel Mendoza, often known as the father of scientific boxing, and English champion in the late 18^th century, was a Sephardic Jew.

In fact, in the first half of the 20^th century, the American boxing scene was littered with fighters of Jewish heritage. Max Baer and Barney Ross were arguably the most famous of these. Baer was a bona fide world heavy weight champion in 1930s, who wore trunks with an embroidered Magen David.  Ross (born Dov-Ber Rasofsky) was also a bona fide world champion in the 1930s in the lightweight welter-weight divisions.  Ross was born into a religious family, apparently grew up with the ambition of becoming a Talmudic scholar and teacher.  However, the murder of his father in an armed robbery saw him turn his back on Orthodox religious life, and instead he became a man of the streets, rather than a man of the books.

Even in Australia, there have been some Jewish boxers of some note, such as David Oved and Henry Nissen.

However, until relatively recently, there have not been any professional boxers to my knowledge who could be described as frum, or devoted to their religion, at least not during their boxing careers.

Born in Belarus, raised in Israel, and currently residing in the USA, Yuri Foreman has become only the second Israeli ever to win a world boxing title.  The only previous Israeli world boxing champion, Johar Abu Lashin, won his title in a lesser rated boxing association. While Abu Lashin’s achievement should not be minimized, it is fair to say that Foreman’s title is a greater achievement, having been won through the top-flight World Boxing Association (WBA).

Dmitry Salita is another Baal Teshuva fighter born in a former USSR country.  From Odessa in the Ukraine, Salita became frum after moving to Brooklyn.  Entering the ring with Yiddish rap song playing, he apparently attracts a large following of Chabadniks who come along to watch his fights, chanting “Dima, Dima…”  In what will inevitably be described as a promoter’s dream, the undefeated junior-welterweight will next fight Amir Khan (British Muslim) for the world title.  At the press conference to announce this fight, Salita wore standard Charedi garb of black suit, white shirt and a black yarmulke.

Uriel Ben-Hamo has been Charedi his whole life, which in some ways makes his story more remarkable than either Foreman’s or Salita’s, even though his achievements as a fighter have not been as notable on a world stage.  Ben-Hamo, a reigning Israeli kick boxing champion, was born into a Charedi family in Israel, and still attends Jerusalem’s Magid Mesharim Yeshiva on a daily basis.  Ben-Hamo is studying to be a sofer stam (scribe),  but at the same time has aspirations toward winning a world-title.

I would conclude the article here, but possibly someone is out there thinking: “How can you write a story about religious Jews who are professional fighters without mentioning the great Zab Judah?”  Judah (as is  was once described as “the greatest Jewish boxer of all time.”   Judah is from a Black Hebrew Israelite family.  However, Judah (at least as of 2006) has apparently moved away from the faith of his father, and instead moved closer to Yehoshua.  Yes, while our Zabdiel could duck and weave with best of them, it appears he perhaps could not stand up to the quiet onslaught from the Jews for Jesus crowd.