Wake-up Calls Help People Rise and Pray
Jewish tradition teaches that the current Hebrew month, Elul, is a wake-up call to repent and prepare for the High Holy Days that follow. Well Israel’s largest telecommunications company, Bezeq, is taking this idea rather literally.
As if weekday synagogue services don’t already start early enough in Israel — often between 5am and 6am — many congregations recite selichot or penitential prayers around the High Holy Days, and start even earlier. The most pious of congregants can have difficulty getting up in time.
And so Bezeq has told customers that it is offering free wake-up calls to anybody who wants. It’s another sign of the importance of the religious market to telecommunications companies. Bezeq and cellular providers have special deals for students at the same yeshivah, seminary or kollel to call each other cheap or free. And if you are religious and don’t call on Shabbat, you can have a discount and a special Bezeq number (starts with 80) to identify you to other religious people.
But back to the wake up calls. Personally, I think if Bezeq really wants to ingratiate itself to the religious market, it should go one step further, and offer to conference people in to their local synagogue service. Penitence in the comfort of your pajamas — ideal!
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
