I'll stick my hands up and admit my mistake to a point. I've done my share of hiring and firing in the past and the truth is qualifications may get you an interview but you take the person you think fits the job best and is most flexible. You may call it discrimination and I'll agree but I also call it running a business.

To #6 Jew1; I would ask where you got your facts, but you just listed a sweeping general statement with no data. Then you say, "Equality for all..." Eqaulity has nothing to do with the issue. That phrase should only be said by the minority who want the same rights as the majority. Haredim don't want anything from the majority except to keep the status quo. If you want to be equal you should go fight for your right to learn full time in a yeshiva.

choosing to send your child to a partially funded or privately funded school does not detract from the fact that you are entitled to free education. Higher education may be heavily subsidized but ask a student what happens if they dont meet there grades.

financially support their families and NOT place themselves in a position where they need to take welfare AS A LIFE STYLE CHOICE. In order financially support their families they need an education in core subjects - math, science, English, etc. They also need to have developed the interpersonal skills to be successful in the workplace, or no one will hire them. These are the facts of life.

neither do I.... and so what? Does that make me a stupid person? Is that so important in everyday life in Israel to know about havdala? Don't be so pious cause it won't lead you anywhere...

right not to study English (and by implication math, science, etc). Quite frankly, I think this is child abuse, because as parents you are condemning your children to a life of poverty and dependence. THESE ARE NOT JEWISH VAlUES! Stop listening to your rabbis who are only interested in power and influence, and couldn't care less about religiosity. Use you own comment sense and critical judgment, and the free will that you were born with, before it was erased by your culture. See the light! Don't live in darkness.

If you want to change haredi attitudes toward schooling,employment and the army etc don't look to start a revolution better to take baby steps. Get 1 thing and then slowly build on it from there that will make it much easier for them to adapt and accept change. Act like your trying to overnight throw them into a secular society and your going to have uprisings.

Uprisings if they do occur can be "put down" very quickly and efficiently using strong methods that can be used within the law. No more pointless molly coddling. It shall be done ,one way or the other.

The author says Charedim study "Jewish sciences". What may these be? Jewish physics? Mathematics? No... then Jewish chemistry? biology? Perhaps this astute author could enlighten his non-charedi audience with another crack opinion piece, no, essay, on "Jewish sciences" for the sake of the non-Charedi population not trained in these (esoteric?) studies. And where, and how, could I sign up. if interested, in Jewish Sciences 101?

I support the haredi right not to study English, but also point out the secular right of not having to pay for a haredi educational system that breeds ignorance in the 21st, century.

You cannot study any subject in humanities, including Judaism, without knowing English. The essence of studying is not repeating Rashi, but discussing a question from all possible angles and putting it into context with the surrounding world. The least you can do is also know English, preferrably also Arabic (Rambam), Spanish, German etc.

I have never read such a one-sided report like this!! Haredin demand to be left alone, do NOT recognize the State of Israel, but DO recognize the treasury when they demand money from the State to stay in coalitions. These people receive more money than your bias article show. Haredi women as a matter of principle do not follow higher education, because their husband 'prefer' them not to. And as for so many Haredim in the workforce, well that truly comes from lala-land

but not for Gemara study.

Ignorance of scholarship in the sciences is most certainly essential, and it is primarily in English (or has been translated into English).

what ever happened to rak am hacham venavon .

Haredi women don't follow higher education because of what their husbands want but because traditionally haredi marry sooner than seculars and they start having children. Your assuming that women want to adopt a secular lifestyle and ignoring the fact they both share the same culture and its a culture they like. The career woman idea thats really only something that started until after WW2. Before then the womans place was in the home taking care of the children and she didn't go onto higher education etc because its not something she needed. Haredi culture is the traditional pre warr culture.

the time has come for direct action against the hareidim

whats ur problem? they want to live in the stone era let them live in the stone era!! ur free to become without any moral and heretics... oh and please dont answer me they should join the army cause most of u lives abroad ur just being ridiculous

of course no one needs English for lerning Gmara by heart. But I wouldn't call that studying. And lo and behold, even people from the US thought about subjects discussed in the Gmara and wrote about it. In English!

basics of Judaism in a Jewish country not? I was shocked that an Israeli neighbor of mine (when I still lived in the States) who was an elderly woman who spent most of her life in Tel Aviv, did not know BASIC Judaism. "You are supposed to have a mezuzah on EVERY door of the home?" She was delighted to find this out and asked many questions and wondered how, growing up in a Jewish country, she never learned so many things so fundamental to her history and cultural heritage. Did this make her stupid? Of course not. She was a brilliant and worldly woman. She was, however, culturally illiterate in relation to her own cultural traditions. Even if one doesn't practice, one ought to know the traditions that one's forebears carried for thousands of years.

SO much discrimination in the job-market here. Half the time he can't even apply for the jobs because the unwritten and unspoken law of discrimination here is: If you don't want Haredim, make sure you post "occasional 'weekends' and holidays required" even if they aren't. It's understood. If someone unwittingly left that code for "no Haredim need apply" out of their advertisement, the phone interview usually goes very well (my husband is very personable, gets along great with everyone). HowEver, the in-person interview is always the deal-breaker. Kippa and beard? Ohhhh. Nononononononono. Qualified? Very. Social problems? No. ...but it has been decided as soon as he walks through that door. They try to reconcile the great guy they spoke with on the phone with this, this, Haredi persona they have glued into their minds. Anyway....YEAH, the Haredim aren't working. Right. Sure we're not. For lots of us it sure ain't for lack of trying! We came here to be part of a Jewish country and to live among our fellow Jews, regardless of level of observance. We've continuously fought-down our thoughts about going back to the US because there we're LESS DISCRIMINATED against by non-Jews (!!!!!!). Un-be-lievable.

subjects, as they were mandatory where we came from. We'd LIKE our children to be educated and employable with the basic skills necessary to get along in any world they're in. Many other parents feel the same way, and many who have been through the system and struggle to catch up their education to become employable find themselves aggravated at having being denied some of the basics. There is an unfortunate history of many world governments attempting to force yeshivas to teach socialist/nationalist dogma and the like as required subjects. The Epic Saga of the Jewish will to fight against the Helenization, the Romanization, the Socialist Haskala invasion, etc stands as heroic lore, "The Great Jewish Fight for Survival". So the suspiciousness is understood, but myopic. This guy had me going until the "Today it is English, tomorrow it will be heresy studies" business. I read it and said aloud, "Whaaaaat???" If anything looks "heretical", kol hakavod, fight the good fight, but in the meantime, we must stop trying to deny our children some essential keys to their futures. If that means government intervention, I have one thing to say to that: PLEASE.

"...one ought to ..." Really? Why? Religious ritual, no different from superstitious customs, people in fancy costumes that gives them special powers, anything to fool the hoi polloi to do as they are told!

down their throats ...give credit where credit is due, you were allowed the freedom to explore..but you know it's not given to everyone..far from it!.It's getting so complicated it's no longer necessary to stuff it down..that's what Orthodoxy etc, is all about now... Times are changing and the outside world is very tempting, exciting and filled with new adventures...all that must be negated if the object is to remain a Jewish State...Seems it will all have to rest on the Orthodoxy if things get any worse......and that doesn't look like a pretty sight either, would you want to go back? TATA ...

i will give you $10 for every hiloni-Israeli who is truly ignorant of the basics of Jewish culture. Then you will give me $10 for every hareidi who is truly ignorant of the basics of supporting one's own family. Deal or no deal?

in ALL Jewish schools,secular or religious, private or public. It should include English, Math, Civics, History or Social Studies....AND basic Torah studies: Tanach, Mishnah, the Jewish calendar (holy days, rituals, history, sages of the past, etc.). THIS approach is a WIN-WIN APPROACH, for it will bridge the gap between the sectors, provide common denominators and advance Am Yisrael. The seculars will learn basic Torah, Jewish tradition and YIddishkeit, and will come to appreciate the Jewish past and the return to Zion; the religious will learn basic science, English, etc., and come to appreciate there's a big world out there, and it's now the 21st century.