The balcony in Avigdor Rabinowitz's apartment is just like him, a few meters from Shabbat Square - but hidden. You don't see the square from it, but a pile of buildings stacked on top of each other; you feel the demonstrations from it, hear the sirens, smell the fires, but you're not there.
Avigdor is like that too. He is quiet in front of his eyes, doesn't see his opponents - even if he smells them. He is a stone's throw from the heart of Haredi society - the son of Benny Rabinowitz, a senior reporter at the "Hashkafa" newspaper, Yated Ne'eman, but doesn't see it too much. He acts "blind", as if there were a vehicle with some military insignia standing at the Bank Hapoalim traffic light, when a tin can is burning in front of him, he dodges quickly and nimbly, and continues on to the next destination.
I'm conducting the interview while four floors below me, a "Makhtazeit" is raging.
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The 'zealots' just remembered that they haven't protested against the 'conscription decree' for a long time, the hug campaign is raging at the entrance to the city, and the Geula neighborhood is blocked to vehicle traffic.
Boaz, the photographer, was forced to wander on foot from his remote parking spot.
In short, I arrived on time.
Zola on the roof of a WhatsApp group
It's hard to call Avigdor a regular Haredi. He grew up in Ofakim, "went through the motions" until the age of 20, and even today his dream is to become a rabbi; but his entire appearance works differently.
Avigdor is the late prototype of the working Haredi, he is hated by his neighbors on the other side of the square, a missionary of work ("I will never expel a yeshiva student from his studies, whoever has already left and is looking for work - I am there for him"), and his face could easily turn into the pig-face that is the hallmark of the unknown cartoonist from Mea Shearim.
""My childhood is not interesting," he says when I dig into his past. Although he is still young, only 24 years old, it is clear to me that the roots of this phenomenon lie deep in his childhood.
I'll make it short: Three hours of digging led me to the conclusion that we might see Avigdor on many morning shows trying to crack the CBS data on the working Haredi, but it's not certain that we'll ever understand why he's doing it.
""Four years ago I left the yeshiva, and together with others I founded 'Zola on the Roof', a Haredi meeting place that is completely equivalent to any Pitzoziya you know. Over 100 Haredi teenagers spent time there every evening. With Torah lessons, 'tishim' by Carlebach, guest appearances by Haredi artists and joint 'zits'.".
""At a certain point, when more and more guys in Zola told me they were looking for work, I set up a WhatsApp group called 'Jobs for the Haredim,' a group that quickly became a powerhouse. Suffice it to say that today the groups, 60 in number, with 4,000 members, are managed by a computer system.".
""Then more and more Haredim and employers contacted me, and we set up a Facebook page, and eventually a website.
""About 1,300 Haredim found work in the past year through 'Jobs for Haredim'. We have over 11,000 followers on our Facebook page. The number of people searching for jobs and employees on our website has tripled since its inception.".
To my most important question, why he succeeded and not others - like, for example, non-profits and organizations that draw budgets from government ministries or philanthropic organizations abroad - he has no answer.
""There were those before me, projects and websites set up by smarter people than me, more connected than me, government offices, professional job search companies, none of them managed to replicate the success. I don't know - and I'm not sure we'll ever know what the secret is.".
""I think it was the timing, the 'ultra-Orthodox', the unofficial sahbakism, a lot of ingredients that are not a recipe, they were simply the right thing, in the right place and at the right time. I saw a need and I answered it.".
Thank you, Nati Grossman
Avigdor is not ashamed to say what is on the table clearly.
""It's clear to me that I work on the fine line between Haredi and what Grossman and Motkah Blei call Haredikism. Naturally, you're constantly looking down to see that you're walking the line - and not stepping outside the boundaries of Haredi public legitimacy.".
""On the other hand, in the 'Ten Influencers' article that we posted on the Haredi Jobs website, I dedicated a place of honor to extremists who need complete isolation like air to breathe. "Those people may not understand and maybe they do, but they are, they are, the people who give a tremendous boost to continuing the activity and overcoming the existing challenges.
""I definitely use the blows I get from them here and there to push forward.".
He smiles mysteriously when I ask who he voted for in the election.
I remember his war with the 'Degel' MKs who didn't jump to help integrate the Haredim, even if I see the reconciliation meeting along with it. It's hard for me not to guess that he preferred to spend Election Day anywhere other than the polling place. In his place, I wouldn't choose 'United Torah and Sabbath Judaism' - when the latter, whose assistants know how to be available 24 hours a day, don't really come to help him in the war on hiring Haredim. Pierre, that's how most working Haredim feel.
He dismisses the rest of his relationship with politics with a half-smile - half-curve of the mouth. At 24.5 years old, he himself doesn't know if he will ever run ("You can't know, everything is open"), but he is sure that an ultra-Orthodox MK outside the sectoral parties is a matter of time. "All kinds of ultra-Orthodox who are involved in the political system in parties in all shades of Israeli politics, one of them will eventually make it to the Knesset. And that will be the beginning of a flood that could leave the ultra-Orthodox party with the same number of seats for many years to come.
""There is no doubt that expectations from the Haredi MKs have dropped, after promising much before the elections, and keeping very little. There was a move that almost succeeded in putting 'Haredi Oved' on the party's list for the Knesset; on the representation level, nothing happened, and it seems we will not get more of that in the future. But on the other hand, a branch of the 'Horev' Labor Party was recently inaugurated in Bnei Brak, MK Moshe Gafni put forward a proposal for affirmative action for the Haredi, there are attempts from time to time - which are not always successful.".
""In the same breath of intentions for changes in the 'commander's spirit' in the Haredi lists, there is no doubt that the Haredi MKs cannot - or do not want to - support solutions such as integration into academia; I understand the fact that they cannot, from where they are, support such solutions. This is an issue that will be left to those invisible figures who will reach the Knesset not through the Haredi parties.".
A man of projects
Today, 'Jobs for the Haredi' has an office with three employees. It already operates as an official non-profit organization, called 'Shacharit'; Avigdor's cell phone is almost dead, he is free to take care of advertising on the website, to initiate collaborations with colleges, projects, and huge companies interested in recruiting Haredi workers - and he doesn't hesitate before admitting that part of the reason they prefer Haredi is the fact that a Haredi will receive less money at the end of the month.
He said goodbye to the 'Cheap Rooftop' a long time ago, it is now run by the original owner. Now he is preparing to move on, to take on the next thing, to expand 'Works for the Haredim' or to open a new project, no one knows where it will come from, not even he himself.
""I'm a project person," he explains to me. "I take on a project, start it, finish it, pass it on.".
I immediately asked when he was leaving the Haredi jobs and who was a candidate to replace him, and I got a smirking smile. "Do you think I've exhausted everything I can do there? Wait and see.".
""Immediately after the holidays, a number of projects that I've been working on recently will be launched. I wouldn't call them revolutionary - but they will undoubtedly meet several needs of the working Haredi public.".
• And money from Lena?
""Donations and advertisements mainly, collaborations with large companies that are looking for many Haredi employees cost companies money.".
• Did Dad help with recruitment? With the establishment?
""Helped like any father would help, I manage just fine on my own, with a little help when needed.".
Entrepreneurship course
One of the projects that will open after the holidays is an 'entrepreneurship course', of the type that is so familiar in the general world and so lacking in the Haredi world.
""Urdu entrepreneurs will receive tools from us to deal with entrepreneurship at all levels. We will give them some of the experience we have gained and that of others, we will teach them to deal with initiative and the street.".
""Each of the projects established by the course graduates will receive a start-up budget, money that we already have in our possession today in order to encourage that entrepreneurship; but beyond that, we will connect it with associations and organizations that will extend their patronage to it in order to finance the continuation of the activity.".
The organization that will actually establish the entrepreneurship course is Aguda Achat, where Avigdor is a member of the management team, but several more initiatives of this kind will be established over the coming year, some of which are completely formed and just waiting to be implemented, and some of which are in various planning processes.
In any case, it won't be boring for him this year, nor for us.
Young and influential
A year ago, Rabinovich was included in the list of "The Marker Magazine's 40 Most Promising Young People." The barge gossiped that his brother-in-law, Nati Toker, the Marker's media correspondent, was responsible for his inclusion on the list ("He didn't even agree to put my name up. There's no connection"), but my first impression is generally from the fact that he's the youngest person on the list.
How young? The only one whose age prefix is 20.
And he is not only active within Haredi society. He is receiving more and more inquiries from program producers and website editors who wish to 'understand the Haredi', his columns have been published and are being published on all the leading news sites, and as such an ambassador, it can be said that not many represent the world of values of the working Haredi with his uncompromising clarity.
But there's also Avigdor himself. I sat with him for three hours, we walked from here to there, climbed stairs and passed through crowded stairwells together, we even went down together to see the demonstration (and get a photo from Boaz in the middle of Shabbat Square).
It's hard for me to say that I appreciate the man as much as I appreciate his work; you know, after all, Avigdor is sitting on his balcony looking down on you.
