Bnei Brak (Hebrew: בני ברק (audio)ⓘ) or Bene Beraq, is a city located on the central Mediterranean coastal plain in Israel, just east of Tel Aviv.

A center of Haredi Judaism, Bnei Brak covers an area of 709 hectares (1,752 acres, or 2.74 square miles), and had a population of 218,357 in 2022[1].

Bnei Brak takes its name from the ancient Biblical city of Beneberak, mentioned in the Tanakh (Joshua 19:45) in a long list of towns within the allotment of the tribe of Dan.

The town was set up as a religious settlement from the outset, as is evident from this description of the pioneers: "Their souls were revived by the fact that they merited what their predecessors had not.

What particularly revived their weary souls in the mornings and toward evening, when they would gather in the beth midrash (Jewish study hall) situated in a special shack that was built immediately upon the arrival of the very first settlers, for tefilla betzibbur (communal prayer) three times a day, for the Daf Yomi shiur (Torah lesson) and a Gemara shiur and an additional one in Mishnayos and the Shulchan Aruch.

"[3] In 1928, the Great Synagogue was completed, and the village committee celebrated its inauguration by presenting statistics noting its development over the past four years.

[citation needed] After 1948 new Bnei Brak neighborhoods including Neve Ahiezer were built on the Palestinian depopulated village of Al-Khayriyya.

[7] Avrohom Yeshaya Karelitz (the Chazon Ish) emigrated from Belarus to Bnei Brak in its early days, and attracted a large following there.

[citation needed] Leading rabbis who have lived in Bnei Brak include Yaakov Landau, Eliyahu Eliezer Dessler, Yaakov Yisrael Kanievsky ("the Steipler"), Yosef Shlomo Kahaneman (Ponevezher Rov), Elazar Menachem Mann Shach, Michel Yehuda Lefkowitz, Aharon Yehuda Leib Shteinman,[citation needed] Nissim Karelitz, Shmuel Wosner and Chaim Kanievsky.

[citation needed] Beginning in the 1960s, the rebbes of the Ukrainian Ruzhin dynasty (Sadigura, Husiatyn and Bohush) who had formerly lived in Tel Aviv, moved to Bnei Brak.

The rebbes of Alexander, Biala-Bnei-Brak, Koidenov, Machnovke, Nadvorne, Premishlan, Radzin, Shomer Emunim, Slonim-Schwarze, Strykov, Tchernobil, Trisk-Bnei-Brak and Zutshke also reside in Bnei Brak.

[17] It has been managed by three distinct groups: A board of directors, an association of rabbis and public servants, and most influential of all, the "Halakhic Supervision Committee", a rabbinical committee consisting of Shmuel Wosner, Nissim Karelitz and Yitzchok Zilberstein, with Yisrael Rand, a confidant of Aharon Yehuda Leib Shteinman, serving as its secretary.

As the Haredi population grew, the demand for public religious observance increased and more residents requested the closure of their neighbourhoods to vehicular traffic on Shabbat.

[22] Bnei Brak is home to Israel's first women-only department store,[23] only one example of gender segregation in what is viewed as an ultra-orthodox city.

[24] Additionally, tzniut (modest dress) was often required for women, playing a radio or secular music on the bus was avoided, and advertisements were censored.

Bnei Brak won national attention when it lost a battle to remove the photos of women candidates from Likud election ads.

Orly Erez-Likhovski, legal advisor of the Israel Religious Action Center declared it a victory for gender equality: I am very happy that the officials from the Likud didn't give up, fought the municipality and the police who first arrived on the scene.

The municipality also blamed the construction of Tel Aviv Light Rail disturbed the underground rats and forced them to move to the city.