A Sefer Torah fell to the floor on Shabbos morning before Kriyas HaTorah in Yeshivas Ponevezh in Bnei Brak. According to a report by B’Chadrei Chareidim, the unfortunate incident occurred in the yeshivah’s Ohel Kedoshim hall. The Sefer Torah was apparently tied to another Sefer Torah in the Aron Kodesh, which caused it to fall down when the first one was lifted up. Hundreds of bochurim witnessed the sight and now they are awaiting a decision on whether to fast [other than on Asara B’Teivis]. A group of bochurim asked the posek HGaon HaRav Menachem Mendel Lubin, who said that only those who saw Sefer Torah fall need to fast.

The first order signed by the newly sworn-in Religious Services Minister following Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s return to power on Thursday was the freezing of former minister Matan Kahana’s kashrus reforms. The first and foremost goal of Shas MK Michael Malchieli, who was chosen by Shas chairman Aryeh Deri to serve as the new Religious Services Minister, is to eliminate all of Kahana’s “reforms” to Israel’s religious status quo, which Kahana carried out despite the opposition of all of Israel’s leading Rabbanim, including Israel’s most senior Dati Leumi Rav, HaRav Druckman, z’tl, who was niftar last week.

A man attacked NYPD officers during New Years celebrations outside a Times Square security screening zone on Saturday night, in what is being investigated as the country’s first terror attack of 2023. Trevor Bickford, a 19-year-old resident of Maine, approached officers at W. 52nd Street and 8th Avenue and began swinging at them with a machete, NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell said in a press conference. The attack left two officers injured – an 8-year veteran suffered a head laceration, and a recent police academy graduate had his skull fractured. Both NYPD officers were taken to Bellevue Hospital for treatment; they are expected to recover from their injuries. Bickford was struck in the shoulder by officers who opened fire on him before taking the attacker into custody.

Yep, he was lying. When during the 2020 presidential debate moderator Chris Wallace asked Donald Trump about his having paid only $750 in taxes, Trump responded saying that he had paid “millions.” “I know that you pay a lot of other taxes, but I’m asking you the specific question. Is it true that you paid $750 in federal income taxes each of those two years?” Wallace asked Trump. “I paid millions of dollars in taxes, millions of dollars of income tax. And let me just tell you, there was a story in one of the papers that I paid $38 million one year. I paid $27 million one year,” Trump replied. “Show us your tax returns,” Joe Biden said. “You’ll see it as soon as it’s finished. You’ll see it. You know, if you want to do, go to the Board of Elections.

Israel will officially declare the Covid-19 pandemic over next month and downgrade the country’s handling of the virus to that of the flu as of January 18th, according to reports. Israel’s Home Front Command had been shouldering the responsibility for all Covid-related treatment and testing since the virus first became a major health concern in the country, but those responsibilities will now be shifted to the civilian health system. On the last day of January, Covid will officially be downgraded to flu status, the pandemic control center will be shuttered, and Covid patients will no longer be required to isolate themselves.

Democrats in Congress released six years of former President Donald Trump’s tax returns on Friday, the culmination of a yearslong effort to learn more about the finances of a onetime business mogul who broke decades of political precedent when he refused to voluntarily release the information as he sought the White House. The returns, which include redactions of some personal sensitive information such as Social Security and bank account numbers, are from 2015 to 2020. They span nearly 6,000 pages, including more than 2,700 pages of individual returns from Trump and his wife, Melania, and more than 3,000 pages in returns for Trump’s business entities. Their release follows a party-line vote in the House Ways and Means Committee last week to make the returns public.

As part of a far broader campaign aimed at providing the unfamiliar an authentic glimpse of Jewish life and culture, Agudath Israel of America has purchased billboard slots in Times Square and outside the Lincoln Tunnel that call out the New York Times’ unfettered hatred of Orthodox Jews and tie it to the troubling increase in antisemitic hate crimes committed in New York City. With the New York Times incessantly attacking the Orthodox Jewish community with slanted, one-sided articles that fail to provide its readership with unbiased alternative perspectives or objective context, the billboards are a single component of a multi-pronged push by the Agudah to correct the record. “Attacks on Orthodox Jews have more than doubled recently,” one of the billboards state.

As part of a far broader campaign aimed at providing the unfamiliar an authentic glimpse of Jewish life and culture, Agudath Israel of America has purchased billboard slots in Times Square and outside the Lincoln Tunnel that call out the New York Times’ unfettered hatred of Orthodox Jews and tie it to the troubling increase in antisemitic hate crimes committed in New York City. With the New York Times incessantly attacking the Orthodox Jewish community with slanted, one-sided articles that fail to provide its readership with unbiased alternative perspectives or objective context, the billboards are a single component of a multi-pronged push by the Agudah to correct the record. “Attacks on Orthodox Jews have more than doubled recently,” one of the billboards state.

Democrats in Congress released six years’ worth of former President Donald Trump’s tax returns on Friday, the culmination of a yearslong effort to learn about the finances of a onetime business mogul who broke decades of political norms when he refused to voluntarily release the information as he sought the White House. The returns, which include redactions of some personal sensitive information such as Social Security and bank account numbers, are from 2015 to 2020. Their release follows a party-line vote in the House Ways and Means Committee last week to make the returns public. Committee Democrats argued that transparency and the rule of law were at stake, while Republicans countered that the release would set a dangerous precedent with regard to the loss of privacy protections.

An Israeli Arab was thanked Thursday after returning hundreds of thousands of shekels erroneously left in his taxi cab by a well known Meah Shearim money changer. The story began to unfold when the money changer, Reuven Kroizer, discovered that he had mistakenly left a bag stuffed with about 300,000 shekel in a cab when he was traveling from the bank to his money changing shop. Kroizer and his assistant quickly contacted the police, who used the information given to them to identify the taxi driver. Police then contacted the man, an Israeli Arab from east Yerushalayim, and explained the situation to him. To his credit, the taxi driver drove immediately to the police station to return the money to its rightful owner.