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Rabbi Ovadia: Bochurim Smoking Should be Slapped

By Kobi Nahshoni for Y Net News

ISRAEL — Shas’ spiritual leader, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, called on parents and teachers to act to prevent smoking among youth, a phenomenon which he referred to as “a breach which must be thwarted.”

Speaking during his weekly sermon Saturday evening, the rabbi said that “if a person sees his son smoking a cigarette, he should shout at him and defend him and stop him from doing it… A yeshiva head who has a meeting and sees his student smoking, should slap him in the face. What are you smoking for?”

Stats Say Crime Low Despite Economic Downturn

NEW YORK [CBS] — The economy may be dismal, but the recession doesn’t seem to be driving New Yorkers to commit crime.

The New York Police Department says the crime rate for the first three months of the year is the lowest since comparable record keeping began in the 1960s.

Tonight! Global Webcast – Maintaining Your Inner Identity During Stressful Times


Tonight, Monday, April 27, 2009, at 8:30pm, Rabbi YY Jacobson will deliver a live Parsha webcast: Maintaining Your Inner Identity during Stressful Times — What a Talmudic law on fruits teaches us about psychological serenity & historical endurance. The class will have an accompanying curriculum which you can download.

To watch, please visit www.TheYeshiva.net
To listen via telephone, please call: 1-616-347-8000. Access code: 1007852#

Swine Flu Confirmed in Queens Students

QUEENS [WABC] — New York City was dealing with a growing public health threat Sunday after tests confirmed that eight students at a private Catholic high school had contracted swine flu. Some of the school’s students had visited Mexico on a spring break trip two weeks ago.

Largest Emergency Meeting In Montreal’s History

MONTREAL [CHI] — At least 2000 Montreal-Anash (Men and Women) are expected to attend an emergency meeting tonight, Sunday 8:45pm at the Yeshiva at 6405 Westbury Avenue. After Crown Heights, Montreal is the next largest Chabad shchuna in the world!

The 68-year-old Tomchei Temimim is the only Chabad elementary school in Montreal, Canada.

Cultures Collide Wonderfully for Unusual Seder in Thailand

By Levi Stein for the Home Town Life

Correspondent Levi Stein getting a ride in a tuk tuk.

It isn’t often a person from West Bloomfield shares Passover Seder in Thailand with someone from Sydney, Australia, but that’s exactly what I did this year.

Australian Rebbecca Saidman was married a few days before and looked up the nearest Chabad House during her travels in the city of Chiang Mei.

Mumbai Terrorist Claims he is a Juvenile

NEW DELHI [CNN] — An Indian court — trying the lone surviving suspect in last year’s Mumbai terrorist attacks — Friday ordered an inquiry into his age, prompted by his claim that he is a juvenile.

Mohammed Ajmal Kasab will undergo dental and bone tests, defense attorney Abbas Kazmi told CNN.

Mazal Tov! – it’s A Girl!

We would like to wish Mazal Tov to Mendel and Chanie Chaikin (Shluchim to downtown Toronto) on the birth of their daughter, Rochel.

May the newborn be a source of Nachas to her parents, grandparents and Klal Yisroel.

Parents and Alumni Organize Salute of Campus Center’s Fifth Year Celebration

By Tami Kamin-Meyer for Chabad.edu

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign chancellor Richard Herman, left, and Rabbi Dovid Tiechtel of the Chabad-Lubavitch Center for Jewish Student Life speak at a Chanukah menorah lighting at the university’s student union building in 2007. Herman will address the Chabad House’s fifth-anniversary dinner this Sunday night.

When Steven Cohn’s son Ari and the rest of his freshman class embarked on their collegiate studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2003, they weren’t the only newcomers to campus. Meeting them were Rabbi Dovid and Goldie Tiechtel, who had just arrived to open the Chabad-Lubavitch Center for Jewish Student Life.

Mazal Tov! – It’s A Boy!

We would like to wish Mazal Tov to Shmuel Sholom and Faige Rivka (nee Borenstein) Serebryanski (Crown Heights) on the birth of their firstborn son.

May the newborn be a source of Nachas to his parents, grandparents and Klal Yisroel.

Op-Ed: Stroller Controller – on Inconsiderate Stroller Operators

Easy Access?

Even when William Congreve coined the phrase “hell hath no fury like a woman scorned”, he could not have envisioned the utter lack of courtesy and decency with which I and many other residents of this community are confronted on a daily basis.

I am referring to what I like to call the “Baby on Board Syndrome”, where many mothers feel as though they are the queens of their domain, and that the rest of the world must either make their motherly lives easier or get out of their way.

The most common example of such lack of courtesy takes place when a person sees a woman with a stroller who needs to enter a store. Naturally, most bystanders quickly react by opening the door and holding it open for the mother with the stroller.