Daily Archives: November 10, 2005

Brooklyn Bridge shut down due to a suspicious package

At around 12:00pm today the Brooklyn Bridge was shut down on the Manhattan bound side after the police received a call that there was a suspicious package on the ramp. The police immediately cleared the bridge and shut it down to all traffic.

The Bomb Squad, ESU, EMS, and FDNY responded and identified the package as not being a threat and the bridge should be open by now.

French Jews Worry Violence May Spread

Concern they might become ‘scapegoats’ if rioting takes on anti-Israel tone.

As France was plunged into a state of emergency Wednesday after nearly two weeks of rioting by poor and disenfranchised immigrant youth, some Jewish leaders worried that the uprising could morph into the kind of anti-Semitic and anti-Israel violence that gripped the country during the height of the second intifada.

Many of the rioters are Arab Muslims, and the concern is that Islamic groups could exploit the situation, shifting the focus away from the domestic issues thought to have touched off the riots — racism, urban poverty and the failures in immigrant absorption — and toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Memories of a Tzivos Hashem Soldier – Levi Piamenta

Six years ago, on the 7th of Mar-Cheshvan, the Tzivos Hashem soldier, Levi Piamenta, OBM, passed away. The large number of people who arrived to the Levaya proved above all, to what extent he was loved by Kfar Chabad residents. Levi radiated with warmth and would help everyone. One day he was found to be infected by ‘the illness’, but he recovered from it after several months. However, the symptoms returned and he remained ill until his passing.

Wednesday, Reb Avi Piamenta, his father related some interesting anecdotes involving his son. “Several years ago a Bochur, paralyzed in his entire body, lived in Kfar Chabad. His condition was so severe that the only things he could move were his eyes. When Levi saw the Bochur, he became friends with him and found a way to communicate with him. He would sit near him and play with balls. It was amazing. I personally view this as a manifestation of the warmth Levi would impart to every person, even to such a Bochur who could not communicate ordinarily with others. That Bochur was ‘Niftar’ a few months after Levi”.