Bat Ayin
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Bat Ayin is an Israeli settlement in Gush Etzion, Judea inhabited primarily by baal teshuvah religious-zionist Jews who adhere to Chassidic philosophy that combines spiritual religious life with organic agriculture. Bat Ayin was established in 1989 and its population as of 2005 has topped 1000. Bat Ayin is home to the Bat Ayin Yeshiva, an institution of advanced Jewish learning for men, and Midreshet B'erot Bat Ayin, a women's learning program. The two institutions are independent. The men's Yeshiva is associated with the modern-orthodox Religious Zionist movement as well as with the teachings of the Breslov and Chabad Hasidic dynasties. The women's Program is more traditional and not limited to one particular form of Chassidisim. Students are encouraged to develop their textual skills and express their creativity in biblio-drama, dance, creative writing, art and music. Picking wild herbs, working the land and preparing wholesome meals are integral to the learning process.
The particular brand of Bat Ayin Orthodoxy has been called Chavakuk (in Hebrew, חבקו"ק), an acronym that stands for Chabad, Breslov, Carlebach, and Kuk, the four main influences on the Neo-Chassidic culture of the village. Proscriptions on dress, hair covering, and lifestyle (according to Orthodox halacha) are conditions for joining and staying on the settlement. (For example, married women must cover their hair.) Although residents adhere to these communal dictates of religious piety, they are also known for their counter-cultural practices such as organic farming and holistic medicine.
[edit] Bat Ayin Cell
The community has drawn some critical media attention surrounding the publicity of the so-called "Bat Ayin Cell", or underground - a small group of residents accused of planning and perpetrating attacks on various Palestinian and Arab targets. In 2003, three members of the cell were convicted of plotting to detonate a bomb outside a Palestinian Girls' school in East Jerusalem in retaliation for Palestinian attacks against Jews. [1]. Longtime Kahanist activist Noam Federman was charged with having supplied the explosives for the bomb. Federman was placed under administrative detention for seven and a half months and eventually acquitted in May 2004. [2] Two other men were also charged and acquitted of involvement. In late 2004, one of the convicted men's brothers was also convicted and imprisoned, after leading investigators to the cell's weapons cache, which contained weapons that ballistic tests later proved had been used in various unsolved killings of almost a dozen Palestinians. [3], [4] Though most of the men suspected of involvement with the cell were not actually from Bat Ayin, the name remained associated with the case throughout the trial.
[edit] External links
- Yeshivat Bat Ayin
- Berot Bat Ayin
- Frontline: Israel's Next War? (PBS documentary on the Israeli radical right, including interviews with members of the Bat Ayin cell)
[edit] Further reading
- [5] Push to commute Jewish terror sentences
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