How the Law Can Stop Those Who Are Keeping Jews from Keeping Shabbat

July 19 2021

As Orthodox Jews are forbidden from using electricity on the Sabbath, many who live in high-rise apartment buildings rely on Gentile doormen to press the elevator buttons for them. The Orthodox residents at a New Jersey apartment building, all of whom are elderly and some infirm, did the same—until they discovered that the co-op board had instructed the doormen not to help them. In response, they have sued in federal court. Michael A. Helfand writes:

In the present case, Kurlansky v. 1530 Owners Corp., the plaintiffs have alleged building policies and comments from co-op board members that, if proven true, can only be described as discriminatory. Some of the plaintiffs have alleged hearing co-op board members say that they did not want “too many of those types of Jews” in the building.

How can the law respond to [such] injustices? First and foremost, courts can vigorously apply state and federal laws—such as the Fair Housing Act—that prohibit religious discrimination when it comes to housing services and facilities. In recent religious-liberty cases, the Supreme Court has repeatedly emphasized that government agents cannot act with bias and exclude religious institutions from government benefits. Federal and state anti-discrimination laws apply that same logic to various private actors with respect to employment, zoning, and housing. Courts must similarly not hesitate when presented with evidence of such animus to call out those who manipulate local power in the name of religious discrimination.

Read more at First Things

More about: American Jewry, American law, Freedom of Religion, Shabbat

Oil Is Iran’s Weak Spot. Israel Should Exploit It

Israel will likely respond directly against Iran after yesterday’s attack, and has made known that it will calibrate its retaliation based not on the extent of the damage, but on the scale of the attack. The specifics are anyone’s guess, but Edward Luttwak has a suggestion, put forth in an article published just hours before the missile barrage: cut off Tehran’s ability to send money and arms to Shiite Arab militias.

In practice, most of this cash comes from a single source: oil. . . . In other words, the flow of dollars that sustains Israel’s enemies, and which has caused so much trouble to Western interests from the Syrian desert to the Red Sea, emanates almost entirely from the oil loaded onto tankers at the export terminal on Khark Island, a speck of land about 25 kilometers off Iran’s southern coast. Benjamin Netanyahu warned in his recent speech to the UN General Assembly that Israel’s “long arm” can reach them too. Indeed, Khark’s location in the Persian Gulf is relatively close. At 1,516 kilometers from Israel’s main airbase, it’s far closer than the Houthis’ main oil import terminal at Hodeida in Yemen—a place that was destroyed by Israeli jets in July, and attacked again [on Sunday].

Read more at UnHerd

More about: Iran, Israeli Security, Oil