COLIN POWELL'S 'JEWISH CONNECTIONS' Posted by Dafna Yee, April 30, 2004.

Yesterday, a member of the Crisis in Israel yahoo group posted an excerpt from Colin Powell's speech at the Israeli National Day Reception in Washington, April 27, 2004 ("Transcript: Powell Says Israeli Withdrawal Offers New Opportunity for Peace", http://www.usembassy.egnet.net.news4.html) My own association with Israel is a personal one as well as a professional one, and it goes back many years. As you heard, I was born in Manhattan and raised in the Bronx, and I grew up in a neighborhood which now would be called multicultural. (Laughter.) Multicultural is not a word we knew in the Bronx. (Laughter.) It was my neighborhood. (Laughter.) And people would ask me over the years, "Well, what was it like growing up as a minority?" I said, "Who knew? We all were minorities back in the Bronx." (Laughter.) I was privileged to grow up in a neighborhood with blacks, Puerto Ricans, people from all around the world, and a very large segment of the population was Jewish. Kaiserman's Bakery was on one corner, Teitelbaum's Drug Store was on another corner, the chicken market was just around the corner. Jay Sickser was the name of a man who became a very close friend of mine, a Russian Jew who came to this country to avoid disaster, and he made a home here and he gave me my first job as a young man at age 14 when I walked past his store one afternoon. And he said, "Mmm, Knabe, come here." And I worked with him for the next eight years, and over those years I picked up quite a bit of Yiddish. (Laughter.) And I have dined out on those few words over the last 50 years. (Laughter and applause.) My next door neighbor, the Klein family, they had the first television in our apartment building in New York, and I still remember the whole apartment building gathering in their home in the evenings to watch Milton Berle or Molly Goldberg, for those of you old enough to remember those shows. It was wonderful, but I got to know and appreciate Jewish life, Jewish culture. And I was about 11 years old in 1948, in May of that year, an impressionable young 11-year-old man, when the State of Israel was brought into existence. And I knew not only by listening to it on the radio, the news as it came over, and seeing it in the newspapers, I could see it in the eyes of my Jewish neighbors and my Jewish friends and my Jewish classmates what the State of Israel meant to them and to their families and what they thought it meant to the world. I, for one, am NOT favorably impressed upon reading the stories of Powell's "Jewish connections" (which are continually being thrown up at Powell's detractors). It is clear that he deliberately uses them as anecdotes to convince people that he is a friend of Israel while, at the same time, working determinedly with Israel's enemies to bring about Israel's destruction. Have Powell's Jewish supporters forgotten that Adolf Eichmann was selected to head the "Jewish Desk" precisely because he had spent considerable time in Palestine, spoke fluent Hebrew, and was considered an expert on Zionism? Here is an excerpt with the source to remind people of the dangers of being gulled by someone's "Jewish connections". "Eichmann was considered a kind of specialist. Before the war, he had visited Palestine and studied Jewish religion and the Hebrew language. His report to the leaders of the SS concerning his travels in the Holy Land convinced them that Eichmann was an expert on the subject of Zionism. Heydrich and Himmler chose Eichmann to become the head of the "Jewish desk" in Berlin, and gave him extraordinary power--nearly absolute power--over the fate of the Jewish people in Germany and in all the conquered lands. From his small office in Berlin, Adolf Eichmann pulled the strings and made the decisions that cost nearly six million Jewish lives." http://www.rossel.net/Holocaust08.htm Powell is no more a friend to Israel than Eichmann was a friend to the Jews! And telling stories about his Jewish friends, even if he tells them in Yiddish, won't change that fact! Dafna Yee is director of Jewish Watch Dog (JWD). Its website address is http://jwd-jewishwatchdog.home.comcast.net To Go To Top

THE REAL MIDEAST 'POISON' Posted by CAMERA, April 30, 2004.

In an outstanding April 30 column, "The Real Mideast 'Poison'," Charles Krauthammer included factual information and context about key issues, such as refugees, settlements, borders, Arab/Muslim anti-Semitism, and UN double standards, so often lacking in news articles. Anti-Semitism, once just a European disease, has gone global. The outgoing prime minister of Malaysia gets a standing ovation from leaders of 57 Islamic countries when he calls upon them to rise up against the Jewish conspiracy to control the world. The French ambassador to London tells dinner party guests that Israel is a "[expletive] little country . . . why should the world be in danger of World War III because of those people?" Ah, those people. Kofi Annan's personal representative in Iraq now singles out the policies of the world's one Jewish state -- and only democratic state in the Middle East -- as "the great poison in the region." The Egyptian government daily Al-Gumhuriya is less diplomatic, explaining in an article by its deputy editor that, "It is the Jews, with their hidden, filthy hands, who . . . are behind all troubles, disasters and catastrophes in the world," including, of course, the attacks of Sept. 11 and the Madrid bombings. It is in this kind of atmosphere that Israel offers unilateral withdrawal from Gaza -- uprooting 7,000 Jews, turning over to the Palestinians 21 settlements with their extensive infrastructure intact and creating the first independent Palestinian territory in history -- and is almost universally attacked. Moreover, and much overlooked, Israel will also evacuate four small West Bank settlements, which creates extensive Palestinian territorial contiguity throughout the northern half of the West Bank. The Arabs have variously denounced this as Israeli unilateralism, a departure from the "road map" and a ruse and a plot. The craven Europeans have duly followed suit. And when Tony Blair defied the mob by expressing support for the plan, he was rewarded with a letter from 52 Arabist ex-diplomats denouncing him. This Nuremberg atmosphere has reached the point where, if Israel were to announce today that it intends to live for at least another year, the U.N. Security Council would convene to discuss a resolution denouncing Israeli arrogance and unilateralism, and the United States would have to veto it. Only Britain would have the decency to abstain. It gets worse. The Bush administration has been attacked not just for supporting the Gaza plan but for bolstering Israel in this risky endeavor with two assurances: first, that the Palestinian refugees are to be repatriated not to Israel but to Palestine; and second, Israel should not be required to return to its 1967 borders. Enlightened editorial opinion has denounced this as Bush's upsetting 30 years of American diplomacy. Utter rubbish. Rejecting the so-called right of return is nothing more than opposing any final settlement that results in flooding Israel with hostile Palestinians and thus eradicating the only Jewish state on the planet. This is radical? This is something that Washington should refuse to say? What is new here? Four years ago, at Camp David, this was a central element of the Clinton plan. As was the notion of Israel's retaining a small percentage of West Bank land on which tens of thousands of Jews live. Moreover, the notion that Israel will not be forced to return to the 1967 armistice lines goes back 37 years -- to 1967 itself. The Johnson administration was instrumental in making sure that the governing document for a Middle East settlement -- Security Council Resolution 242 -- called for Israeli withdrawal to "secure and recognized boundaries," not "previous boundaries." And it called for Israel to withdraw "from territories occupied" in the 1967 war -- not "from the territories occupied," as had been demanded by the Arab states, and not from "all territories occupied" as had been demanded by the Soviet Union. Arthur Goldberg (U.S. ambassador to the United Nations), Lord Caradon (British ambassador to the U.N.) and Eugene Rostow (U.S. undersecretary of state) had negotiated this language with extreme care. They spent the subsequent decades explaining over and over again that the central U.N. resolution on the conflict did not require Israel to withdraw to the 1967 lines. Confronted with these facts, the critics say: Well, maybe this is right, but Bush should not have said this in the absence of negotiations. Good grief. This was offered to the Palestinians in negotiations -- in July 2000 at Camp David -- with even more generous Israeli concessions. Yasser Arafat said no and then launched a bloody terrorist war that has killed almost a thousand Jews and maimed thousands of others. The fact is that there are no negotiations because under the road map -- adopted even by the United Nations -- there can be no negotiations until the Palestinians end the terror and dismantle the terror apparatus. To argue that neither Israel nor the United States can act in the absence of negotiations is to give the Palestinians, by continuing the terror, a veto over any constructive actions by the United States or Israel -- whether disengaging from Gaza, uprooting settlements or establishing conditions for a final peace settlement that would ensure the survival of a Jewish state. This is an argument of singular absurdity. And a prescription for perpetual violence and perpetual stalemate. letters@charleskrauthammer.com CAMERA - Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America - monitors the news and TV media for how fair they are in reporting on Israel. Their website address is www.camera.org To Go To Top

ISRAEL'S STRATEGIC FUTURE: THE FINAL REPORT OF PROJECT DANIEL Posted by Fishbein Associates, April 30, 2004.

Dear Friends and Colleagues: We would like to bring to your attention a newly published study entitled: Israel's Strategic Future: The Final Report of Project Daniel now available in the April on-line edition of NATIV, the journal of the Ariel Center for Policy Research (ACPR). The report can be viewed at the following URL: http://www.acpr.org.il/ENGLISH-NATIV/. A print version of Israel's Strategic Future will soon be published by the Ariel Center as ACPR policy Paper No. 155. Authors of the Report: Louis Rene Beres, Ph.D., Professor; Project Daniel Chairman, U.S.A. Naaman Belkind, Fmr. Assistant to the Deputy Minister of Defense for Special Means, Israel. Isaac Ben-Israel, Maj. Gen. (Res.), Israel Air Force; Professor, Israel. Rand H. Fishbein, Ph.D., Fmr. Professional Staff Member, U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee, U.S.A. Adir Pridor, Ph.D., Lt. COL. (Ret.) Israel Air Force; Fmr. Head of Military Analyses, RAFAEL, Israel. Yoash Tsiddon-Chatto, Fmr. MK/COL (Res.) Israel Air Force, Israel. Please direct all enquiries concerning Project Daniel to: Project Daniel Chairman, Professor Louis Rene Beres, Telephone: (765) 494-4189, Facsimile (765) 494-0833, E-mail: Beres@polsci.purdue.edu. This is the Executive Summary. The full report is available at Nativ Online (http://www.acpr.org.il/ENGLISH-NATIV/). In the Spring of 2002 a non-partisan panel comprised of six distinguished citizens of Israel and the United States came together to form Project Daniel. Four are retired military officers as well as retired senior officials in the Israeli Government and Knesset, one is a renowned scholar of International Law and one is an expert on the U.S. Congress and American defense policy. All are recognized authorities in the fields of national security and political science. The charge given to the Daniel panel by its Chairman was to examine the changing strategic environment for Israel in the Middle East, a region increasingly threatened by the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). For indeed, one of the dominant realities facing Israel today is that a surprise WMD first strike by a determined and capable adversary could imperil the national life of the Jewish State. For Israel, a national security policy that relies either on diplomacy or a balance of power to discourage potential attackers is neither a real nor sufficient guarantor of survival in the WMD age. In addressing this challenge, the Daniel team chose to assess the risks and opportunities of Israel formally adopting the "Doctrine of Preemption" as its operational and fully lawful response to one or more hostile states acquiring WMD. If for any reason the Doctrine of Preemption should fail to prevent a hostile Arab state or Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, the Daniel Team advises that Israel cease immediately its current policy of nuclear ambiguity and proceed at once to a position of overt nuclear deterrence. Further to this change in policy, we also recommend that Israel make it perfectly clear to the hostile nuclear state that it would suffer prompt and maximum-yield nuclear countervalue reprisals for any level of nuclear aggression undertaken against Israel. Under certain circumstances, our Team continues, similar forms of Israeli nuclear deterrence should be directed against hostile states that threaten existential harms with biological weapons. The group's deliberations have garnered the attention of Israel's Prime Minister and his senior military staff who have conducted their own review of the report's conclusions. The landmark study, Israel's Strategic Future, argues that due to its small size, demographic density and concentrated military forces, Israel has no option but to deny would-be regional aggressors the opportunity to develop and deploy WMD weapons that pose a clear existential danger to the Jewish state. Nuclear, and certain biological weapons, in the hands of terrorist sponsoring countries such as Iran and certain Arab states constitute the greatest danger to regional stability and consequently, to the future of Israel. It is for this reason that preemption, with all of its attendant political and operational risks, may stand as the only alternative left to a small state when its adversaries clearly fail to abide by the reasonable expectations of diplomacy and self-restraint and are also determined to acquire certain Weapons of Mass Destruction. The situation is made worse by the possible emergence of Islamic "suicide states" -- those who would willingly bring about their own destruction in order to eliminate Israel's national existence. Faced with this seemingly irrational behavior, Israel has no alternative but to act first under certain circumstances, secure in the belief that International law is not a suicide pact. The Daniel authors base their thesis on the fact that preemption, or anticipatory self-defense, is an authoritative doctrine firmly grounded in customary international law. In the aftermath of the 9/11 tragedy, the U.S. formally adopted preemption as a fundamental tenet of its own national security strategy in an effort to address the growing potential of future surprise attacks. Israel, Daniel's authors argue, must do the same. On a public level, the country also must continue to rely on its longstanding policy of nuclear ambiguity to discourage hostile action by seemingly rational states. The Daniel study also breaks new ground in its discussion of the place of nuclear weapons as an adjunct to conventional weapons in the composition of Israel's military arsenal. The authors draw attention to the risks brought on by a critically low Israeli defense budget and how this might contribute to a failure of deterrence. Recent years have seen Israel's qualitative and quantitative military edge eroding. This can be attributed to several factors, not the least of which are: 1.) the ongoing war with the Palestinians, 2.) the quickening pace at which the Arab/Islamic confrontation states are modernizing their arsenals, 3.) the belief that disarmament is possible now that Saddam Hussein has been toppled and Iraq, at least for the time being, does not constitute an immediate threat to Israel, and 4.) a possible overconfidence on the part of many military and political leaders that continue to believe that Israel's superior warfighting abilities will always triumph over what they see as the historic ineptitude of their Arab adversaries on the battlefield. The Daniel report provides a timely assessment of Israel's current strategic position and the growing convergence of its needs and those of the United States in a world increasingly threatened by weapons of mass destruction. It is a sobering analysis, one that already has been recognized by senior Israeli leaders for its seminal contribution to the debate over how their country should address the emergence of new and potentially catastrophic threats to its national survival. To Go To Top

HORROR AND HUMILIATION IN FALLUJAH Posted by IsrAlert, April 30, 2004.

This is a useful and interesting analysis of the psych-war potential. It was authored by "Spengler" and appeared in "Asia Times" (http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FD27Ak01.html), April 27, 2004. Those who have crossed With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom Remember us - if at all - not as lost Violent souls, but only As the hollow men The stuffed men. - T S Eliot, The Hollow Men Allah is the Greatest. I bear witness that nothing deserves to be worshipped except Allah. Come to prayer. Come to success. - The Muslim call to prayer, translated by Maulana Muhammad Ali As the American military weighs the reduction of Fallujah, there come into focus the grand vulnerabilities both of the Americans and the Sunni resistance. The West cannot endure without faith that a loving Father dwells beyond the clouds that obscure His throne. Horror - the perception that cruelty has no purpose and no end - is lethal to the West. Europe is dying slowly from the horror of the 20th century's world wars, ending the way T S Eliot foresaw in the poem cited above, "not with a bang but a whimper". Despite its intrinsic optimism, America is vulnerable as well. The Islamic world cannot endure without confidence in victory, that to "come to prayer" is the same thing as to "come to success". Humiliation - the perception that the Ummah cannot reward those who submit to it - is beyond its capacity to endure. Radical Islam has risen against the West in response to its humiliation - intentional or not - at Western hands. The West can break the revolt by inflicting even worse humiliation upon the Islamists, poisoning the confidence of their supporters in the Muslim world. But radical Islam yet may horrify the West into submission, not only by large-scale acts of terrorism against Western countries, but also by provoking the West into mass destruction of life in the Islamic world. By operating in the midst of civilian populations, Islamist radicals put Western counter-insurgency in a delicate position. The Western response must be harsh enough to humble its adversaries, without turning the stomach of the Western population itself. To do this requires intelligence precise enough to target enemy resources without killing too many civilians. I am grateful to Dr Amar Manzoor for the following summary of the issues (as well as praise). He writes from the UK (my excerpts): Having read some of your articles on how radical Islam might win, I am amazed at your bravery in declaring the obvious in the cultural and deep-seated religious exclusivity which we face on a daily basis. The Islamists seems to be carrying a victory. This victory seems to be to prove that radicals are right in the perception of America. Simple fact: they are losing to win (also called the rope-a-dope strategy by [world champion boxer] Muhammed Ali). Each time the United States starts to kill and maim large numbers of civilians, and gory images are blasted to living rooms all around the world, the Islamists are appealing to the conscience of every person on the planet. Once the US does the killing, rape, pillage, murder, and looting, they [Islamists] will have won the hearts and minds of the people. Guess what, Spengler: it looks like it is working and working very well. Dr Mansoor is right, at least in large measure. Just after the fall of the Twin Towers, I wrote: The grand vulnerability of the Western mind is horror. The Nazis understood this and pursued a policy of "des Schreckens" (to cause horror) and "Entsetzens" (terror; literally, dislodgement). Horror was not merely an instrument of war in the traditional sense, but a form of Wagnerian theater, or psychological warfare on the grand scale. Hitler's tactical advantage lay in his capacity to be more horrible than his opponents could imagine. The most horrible thing of all is that he well might have succeeded if not for his own megalomaniac propensity to overreach. America, as Osama bin Laden taunted this week, lost in Vietnam. But it was not military setbacks, but the horrific images of Vietnamese civilians burned by napalm, that lost the war. America's experience in the war is enshrined in popular culture in the film Apocalypse Now, modeled after Joseph Conrad's story, The Heart of Darkness. The Belgian trading company official, Paul Kurtz, sinks into bestiality and dies with these words: 'The horror! The horror!' It was a dreadful film, but a clever reference. At the close of World War I, T S Eliot subtitled his epitaph for Western civilization, The Hollow Men, with a quote from the Conrad story: "Mr Kurtz, he dead." (Sir John Keegan is wrong: Radical Islam can win, Oct 12, 2001). There is of course more to the story, for radical Islam just as well might lose. Were the United States and its allies to carpet-bomb Fallujah in order to destroy Sunni armed resistance, the horrifying result would appall the population of the West and advance the Islamist cause. Crushing the resistance with limited civilian damage would humiliate the Islamists and weaken them. The nicety of this problem no doubt explains why the American command has taken its good time to decide upon a course of action. On the other hand, surgical strikes against resistance leaders, such as Israel's targeted killings of Hamas leaders Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and Abdel Aziz Rantisi, enervate rather than energize the Islamist side. When the long arm of Israeli vengeance can reach into the heart of the enemy camp, the Islamists are humiliated and thus weakened. Intelligence is the decisive variable in the equation, and the poor state of America's spy agencies, acknowledged by the CIA's George Tenet, has been the Achilles Heel of the coalition, as I argued in Why America is losing the intelligence war (Nov 11, 2003). But I also predicted that America's deficient capacity for human intelligence would make Washington depend more upon Israel. Precisely that appears to be happening. Nations have interests, not friends, observed Otto von Bismarck, and it is commonality of interest that brings Washington and Jerusalem together. A host of Western commentators attacked President George W Bush for taking the Israeli side over settlements and the Palestinian right of return, on the grounds that it humiliated the Arab world, and a plethora of Muslim voices bemoan their humiliation at the hands of the United States. Much, much more is to come. The "rope-a-dope" tactic Dr Mansoor cites can work both ways. Israel offers many things to Washington, including Arab-language translators, intelligence operatives, and tactical expertise in urban search-and-destroy missions. But its transcendent value to American strategy lies not in what it does, but what it is, namely an ever-present source of humiliation to the Muslim sense of self-worth. The price of recalcitrance, Bush has told the Palestinians and indirectly the Arab world at large, is that some part of the Dar al-Islam has fallen to Jewish hands for the indefinite future. Analysts unfriendly to the Muslim world speak of a "pride-and-honor culture", in which the prickliness of the Arab street regarding the Palestine issue and so-called honor killings are supposed manifestations of the same social traits. There is another way to look at the matter. Among the world's religions Christianity and Islam alone have the capacity for mass absorption of converts from different races and ethnic groups. It is hard to tell which of the two is growing faster. One of them will be the world's dominant religion in the 21st century. There is a radical difference between Islamic and Christian conversion. Both seek to supercede Judaism, but in different ways. Christianity offers a New Israel, called out from among the nations by the sacrifice of Jesus. Because God's love for mankind is the premise of the New Israel, there is a limit to Christian tolerance for bloodshed. To propose open genocide, the Nazis had to repudiate Christianity and embrace paganism only. The Christian's participation in the vicarious sacrifice of the Cross offers salvation at the end of the soul's journey. Christian practice puts enormous effort into sustaining the conviction of the promise of the Kingdom of Heaven: prayers, hymns, cathedrals, paintings, and so forth. No such concept of individual spiritual transformation exists in mainstream Islam. The individual submits wholly to Allah, who controls all things without qualification. That is Islam's enormous strength; the individual believer can leave behind the carping self-doubt of the Christians. For the same reason, however, setbacks to the Ummah are a challenge to the faith of every believer, for all events are in the hands of Allah, not those who have submitted to His will. Success therefore is a theological necessity for Islam. Humiliation for Jews and Christians is a chastisement from God; did not Jesus accept his humiliation on the cross? For Islam, humiliation is a refutation of the faith itself. For a generation, Western policy towards the Muslim world has emphasized deference towards Muslim sensibilities, the Bush White House emphatically included. It does not occur to Muslim radicals that their enhanced status in the Islamic world might prompt the West to undertake the opposite, namely to humiliate some aspects and some leaders of Islam, if not the religion itself. The Islamists' vision of the future is audacious, as Dr Mansoor recounts: Irrespective of their color, religion, or culture, we can see that their foothold and leadership methods are taking hold. This has been transferred across the world to China, South America, the Middle East, the Far East, South Asia, as well as the Central Asian republics. The general dismay coupled with the dividing lines of rich and poor in the world and the complexities of culture and capitalism are allowing their message to gain ground steadily. This means more recruits, more audacious plans in the pipeline, and even more difficulty in using third generation forces to counter fourth generation asymmetric threats which appear and disappear like ghosts. The question for me is not the method of implementation, widely regarded as terrorism, throughout the world. This has always been in existence. The question for me is the message and why it is so blindingly powerful. The message provides the impetus to the heart, and perception drives the mind into the court of the Islamist. Again, the opposite may be the case. Muslims of different ethnicity and sect are more likely to fall out when the credibility of the Islamists suffers a reverse. During the past week, the United States has for the first time humiliated the Islamic world openly and without compunction, in the small matter of the West Bank settlements. If it continues in this direction, Dr Mansoor's scenario may not work out as he expects. To Go To Top

UNILATERAL WITHDRAWAL PLAN IS GOOD FOR THE ENEMY'S MORALE Posted by Yocheved Golani, April 30, 2004.

"History will not forgive us if we dismantle Gush Katif... Eighty percent of the Palestinian population interprets the proposed evacuation of Azza as a victory against Jews and Israel," Rabbi Shlomo Riskin stressed to an attentive crowd in Bet Shemesh. The April 28 gathering was part of a series of national efforts at the local level for convincing fence-sitting LIKUD members to vote against Prime Minister Sharon's Unilateral Withdrawal plan. Rabbi Riskin established his community in Efrat and Yeshivat Ohr Torah Stone after Peres and Rabin invited Jews to fill YESHA with Jewish life. With the lives of all the Jews who accepted that invitation now at stake, and the four generations of his own family situated in Efrat, Riskin explained the personal anguish he would suffer in the event of a Unilateral Withdrawal. "If a Jewish government forces me to leave Efrat, this will be a private churban bait hamikdash [devastation] for me, let alone a wider tragedy for the Jewish people." The rabbi described the sacrifices that one must halachically make in the event that peace is a viable result of that forfeiture. "That was the situation with Yamit twenty years ago, but the 'Land for Peace' proposal then resulted in the quiet situation we've had with Egypt as a result. Despite the terrible losses of the Jews who lived in Yamit, there was something to be gained by yielding territory. The Unilateral Withdrawal Plan of 2004, however, proposes no advantages to Israel. None. Hamas will take over the area and it would be disastrous for us." He sighed, "Members of the LIKUD have a chance to guide history with their votes in a few days. I wish I were a LIKUD member so I could vote against this ill-advised withdrawal plan." Particulars of the withdrawal plan demand that all Jewish properties remain intact and standing for immediate use by the enemy. "This means that we have to leave the yeshivot, synagogues and sifrei Torah, everything, to be destroyed, " Riskin cried out. He mourned the potential loss of holy objects in the event that the Gush is handed over to those who wish to obliterate Israel and the Jews. Then he described his conversation in a Russian synagogue some years ago. "The rabbi asked me a question. 'Why does the Gemara, in Moed Qatan 26A rule that if a sefer Torah is burned, we are required to tear kria [an intentionally mournful rip of clothing] twice once for the destruction of the parchment and once for the loss of the letters? A passage in the Talmud (Avoda Zara 18a) teaches otherwise. When the Romans murdered Rabbi Hananya Ben Tradyon, the father of Brurya and father in-law of Rabbi Meir, by burning him alive wrapped up in a sefer Torah scroll, he told his students that although the parchment of the Torah was burning, the holy letters were flying heavenwards. - If the letters themselves withstand the burning, why are we required to perform a second kria due to the fact that they were burned with the parchment?' I didn't know, and the Russian rabbi told me the following answer. 'The law requiring one to tear kria twice upon witnessing the burning of a sefer Torah applies only if the sefer Torah is burned by Jews. In such a case, the holy letters do not rise heavenward. We mourn for them separately. Goyim cannot destroy the truth within the letters of our G-D-given Torah. When goyim burn a sefer Torah, the letters rise to heaven. But Jews who desecrate the ideals of that Torah trap those letters. They don't rise. Therefore only one kria is required on account of the destruction of the parchment. '" Riskin underscored the story with the observation, "The holy alef-bet does not rise with the parchment because the action of the Jews themselves caused this manifold chillul HaShem [disgrace before G-D]". If the government of Israel decrees that such a loss will happen, it will be a great, great chillul HaShem! We'll have done this to ourselves." Trying to reassure questioners in the audience who wondered aloud if Sharon would ignore a vote against his evacuation plan Riskin passionately said, "Sharon is not in a position to defy his party. The people of the LIKUD have the power to defeat the proposed exile of our people. This [proposed withdrawal] is a wrong move." Fielding remarks in favor of ceding the Gush from audience member David Eisen, Riskin asked him to explain the potential advantages of withdrawal to the crowd. Eisen instead noted that while serving in the regular IDF as well as in reserve duty, his unit of 500 soldiers was stationed in Southern Gush Katif in 2002. And, inter alia, placed in charge of the defense of three settlements near the Palestinian city of Rafiah, he and the majority of his united were dismayed to learn that of what they considered to be a small number of homes in the area. Those soldiers felt that since the IDF is not blessed with unlimited resources, they were failing their duties to apprehend terrorists and destroy tunnels smuggling weapons and ammunition from Egypt due to the need to concentrate precious resources to the protection of these families. "I think that as in Yamit, the government should raze all the homes and buildings, including the synagogues, as [influential] rabbis decided in 1982, and for Sharon to surrender territorythat other Jews consider to be critical for Israel's defense." Noting that this matter is disputed by the IDF, Eisen stated that "... it is incumbent upon the Israeli government to explain that this action is being made for the nation's security needs... the current borders in Gaza are not defensible..." In response to Eisen's objection that the Torah-land analogy was inappropriate, Rabbi Riskin retracted his analogy equating the dismantling of settlements in the Gush by a democratically elected Jewish government with Jews burning Torah scrolls themselves. Riskin stressed that the situation is much larger than those families and that the deployment of 500 soldiers in that location protected such mainstream Israeli cities as Ashkelon and Tel Aviv, which would need far more soldiers for protection without the Gush as an impediment to terrorism. He maintained that opening the Gush Katif gateway to the rest of Israel would be disastrous. Eisen, however, remained in favor of the unilateral withdrawal. Incredulous at his lack of logic, audience members spoke among themselves that "The purpose of the Yishuvim is to prevail over future terrorism." Riskin summed up the wisdom of Israel keeping the upper hand over terrorism by keeping the land deeded to the Jews by G-D. Citing Biblical verses he concluded, "It's His to give and He gave it to the Jews? Hanan Ashrawi, whose voice is not heard much in public these days, recently said that '[Palestinian] violence has been a failure,' meaning that we almost had them on their knees. Experience shows us that every time Israel withdraws, terrorism only increases. " Riskin ended his presentation saying, "One of the most important things you fight in a war is the enemy's morale. A withdrawal would be a prize for terrorism." The author can be reached at www.yochevedgolani.com To Go To Top

ISRAEL BUS NUMBER 19 RALLY Posted by Kitty Carr, April 30, 2004.

I am a devout Christian, a self-proclaimed conservative, a long-time Republican and former Bush supporter. This is what I wrote to Christians For Israel, who are bringing Bus #19, a Jerusalem bus that was bombed by Arab terrorists to Washington on May 6th. Dear Christians for Israel, I'm not exactly sure what your point is in bringing the bombed Israeli bus to Washington. It could be filled with corpses, and Bush would still speak of "two states living side by side in peace, harmony and luv." (He has a Vision, you know). Dr. James Hutchens, the editor of "Christians for Israel" who is sponsoring this event, has already assured President Bush in his article "Is Bush Boxing With God?" that no matter what Bush does, he can count on Dr. Hutchens' vote: "I voted for you before and fully expect to do so again. I say this as a fellow-follower of Jesus Christ." Dr. Hutchens was certainly right in pointing out that Israel and Jerusalem are not up for negotiation or division, although at Bush's age and as a 'fellow-follower' of Jesus Christ, one might wonder why Bush doesn't already know these things. However, this is the point with which I vehemently disagree: I would never vote a second time for someone whose intention is to betray Israel! It is remarkable that while Bush is promising the Palestinians a state, he seems oblivious to their insanity and never questions their legitimacy. (See for example "Arab-Israel Conflict Facts" by Steven Shamrak on http://tzemach.org/fyi/articles/forgotten_facts.htm.) If the Palestinians are anything but generic Arabs from all over the Arab world, if they really have a genuine ethnic identity that gives them the right of self-determination, then why did they never try to become independent until the Arabs suffered their devastating defeat in the Six Day War? It can no longer be ignored or denied that President Bush is not only protecting the terrorist Arafat, he is financially supporting the PA, courtesy of US taxpayers. Despite Bush's speech on June 24, 2002, in which he said "Today Palestinian authorities are encouraging, not opposing, terrorism," just one year and twenty-six successful suicide attacks later, on July 25, 2003, Bush met with Mahmoud Abbas, aka Abu Mazen, Arafat's hand-picked replacement, (which is BushSpeak for "elected") and established a joint U.S., Palestine Economic Development Group to promote jobs, growth and investment in the Palestinian economy. Bush praised Abbas for his commitment to fighting terrorism. Said Bush, "It is necessary for this good man (Abbas) to fight off the terrorist activity that creates the conditions of insecurity for not only Israel, but for the peaceful Palestinian people." (The good man Abbas, a terrorist, Holocaust revisionist, conspiracy theorist, founding member of Fatah, a member of the Palestine National Council [since 1968] and the PLO Executive Committee, had no such intentions. Terrorist attacks on Aug. 12, 2003 killed 2 and wounded three. Another attack on Aug. 19, 2003 killed twenty-three and wounded over 130 Israelis.) Bush further said, "To meet the goal we have set, we must improve the daily lives of ordinary Palestinians. For just this purpose, I recently approved a grant of $20 million directly to the Palestinian Authority." According to USAID/WBG, (U.S. Agency for International Development/West Bank and Gaza) "U.S. law specifically prohibits cash assistance to the PA.", which is why this "first time ever" cash transfer required a Presidential waiver. (Documents released June 5, 2002 (http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/MFAArchive/2000_2009/2002/6/ International%20Financial%20Aid%20to%20the%20Palestinian%20Aut), proved that International financial aid to the PA is redirected to terrorist elements. What changed between June, 2002, when the PA was "encouraging terrorism" and July, 2003, when the PA became the recipient of such American largesse and our joint partner in a "Palestine Economic Development Group"?) But $20 million is pocket change. According to the State Department, $120 million was given to the PA through the USAID/WBG in 2003 for "in-kind assistance" and another $129 million went to the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. (Palestinian terror activists in the PA areas, who were arrested and interrogated by Israeli security forces during 2002, admitted that UNRWA facilities, equipment and vehicles were used for assisting in carrying out terror attacks. Can you say "Oil-For-Food"?) When Israel tried to protect itself from American-funded Palestinian terrorism by building a fence around its borders, Powell's offices announced that the Administration is going to deduct from its aid package to Israel any money spent on "settlements." Moreover, as part of the U.S. sanctions, Powell and his people have announced that this "settlement activity" includes the construction of Israel's "security fence." (The State Department has never threatened to withhold money from the PA). As Israel was being "threatened" by Powell, the Palestinian Authority [PA] NGOs refused to sign a declaration that they will not use USAID grant money for terrorist purposes, because they don't believe killing innocent Jews is terrorism. USAID is panicked! They won't take our money! Nothing, absolutely nothing, has changed since January 3, 2002, when Israel seized the Karine-A, a ship laden with 50 tons of arms bound for the Palestinian Authority (PA). The United States held out hope that Arafat could still be induced to halt the terrorist attacks against Israel and to fulfill the other obligations he had committed to in the Oslo agreements. The seizure of the Karine-A appeared to be a clear indication that Arafat not only was unwilling to end the violence, he was importing arms to escalate the war against Israel. When Bush learned of the ship's seizure, he called Arafat and asked him to explain the shipment. Arafat acted as though he knew nothing about it. U.S. intelligence verified the Israeli account that Arafat's "money man" had paid for and arranged the arms shipment, so Bush knew that Arafat was lying to him. From that point on, the United States deemed Arafat "compromised by terror," and the administration began to push for his removal as leader of the PA. Incredibly on April 1, 2002, a reporter asked Bush a question - Mr. President, under your doctrine, a terrorist or someone who aids a terrorist is the equivalent of a terrorist. So what's keeping Chairman Arafat -- what's keeping you from labeling Chairman Arafat a terrorist? THE PRESIDENT: Chairman Arafat has agreed to a peace process. He's agreed to the Tenet plan. He's agreed to the Mitchell plan. He has negotiated with parties as to how to achieve peace. And, of course, our hope is that he accepts the Tenet plan. That's what General Zinni is in the Middle East doing, working to get this Tenet agreement in place, which is a series of concrete steps to reduce the violence in the Middle East. (Violence caused by whom? Wasn't the fact that Bush had caught "Chairman" Arafat lying about the importation of arms to be used against Israel enough proof that the "Chairman" is a liar?) In March-April 2002, Israel was engaged in what it called "Operation Defensive Shield" to "root out terrorists from the West Bank. Israeli troops moved into various towns in the West Bank and took measures to arrest or kill terrorists and to dismantle their infrastructure. The United States did not criticize the operation for the first week. It was not until April 8 that Bush publicly demanded that Israel withdraw without delay from the towns the military had entered. Israel did not comply and, for several days, virtually every news report began with a statement to the effect that Israel was defying the president. Israel ultimately withdrew its troops and declared the operation over on April 25." The documents seized during Operation Defensive proved several things: * Yasser Arafat was personally involved in the planning and execution of terror attacks. He encouraged them ideologically, authorized them financially and personally headed the Fatah Al Aqsa Brigades organization; * The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades and Fatah are One and the Same, and Yasser Arafat is their Leader and Commander; * The Palestinian Authority established close links with the "forces of evil" - Iran and Iraq. These countries supplied funds and terrorist warfare equipment to the Authority; * Syria supplied the Hamas and Islamic Jihad with the funds, enabling them to found and operate the terrorist infrastructure in Jenin; * Saudi Arabia financially supported the families of terrorists, including families of suicide bombers who carried out mass murder attacks in Israel. Documents were captured that indicate direct and systematic Saudi financial support of the families of Palestinian terrorists, including the families of suicide terrorists who carried out lethal attacks inside Israel. In addition, documents were found that show direct Saudi aid to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and Hamas, two organizations that have been declared terror organizations by the US. It seems as if the president is almost willing to commit political suicide to protect the terrorist Arafat. How can there be victory in the War on Terror when the most notorious terrorist and exporter of terrorism is declared off-limits? Bush is aware of the connection between the PA, Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia. Yet he refuses to acknowledge these connections because doing so would expose Arafat as the Main Monster Terrorist. And this he refuses to do. In fact he goes out of his way to show sympathy for the "Palestinians". On April 30, 2002, he said "there are a lot of Palestinians who wonder whether life is worth living." Let's see. They celebrate death. They blow themselves up. They encourage their children to seek heroic death (Shahada) for Allah. (Go to http://www.pmw.org.il/new/ to see clips of the PA indoctrination of children - including one of Arafat telling a teen-aged interviewer that children should seek Shahada), plus there were twenty suicide bombings in 2002 before this speech, and yet, Bush wonders. "Clearly," he said, "There are people in the Middle East who would use terror as a weapon to derail any peace process." People? What people? Surely not the Contemplative Palestinians! The Freedonians maybe? Bush specifically identifies the Palestinians as wondering "whether life is worth living", yet it is unnamed faceless 'people' who use terror. Who writes his speeches? James Baker? This is clearly a War on Islamic Terror, yet Bush refers to Islam as a "religion of peace", and a "great religion hijacked by terrorists". He seems blissfully ignorant of Islam's intention to turn America into an Islamic State. Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman of CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations), said, "I wouldn't want to create the impression that I wouldn't like the government of the United States to be Islamic sometime in the future...But I'm not going to do anything violent to promote that. I'm going to do it through education." According to AntiCAIR, an organization dedicated to exposing CAIR's ties to terrorism, Omar Ahmed, co-founder of CAIR, said, "Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faiths, but to become dominant. The Koran, the Muslim book of scripture, should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth." Unfortunately for America, Anti-CAIR reports that "Since September 11th, prominent Wahhabi-backed leaders have been granted meetings with President Bush, Secretary of State Colin Powell, and FBI Director Robert Mueller. These meetings are then used to further the notion that Wahhabi-funded organizations like CAIR are fit to represent America's estimated 6 million Muslims. "This strategy has permitted the Wahhabi Lobby, as the collection of pressure groups are called, to become the de facto pool of consultants for government agencies willing to compromise vigilance for ethno-sensitivity in the War on Terror. The true agendas of groups like CAIR are obscured or forgotten in the process, and Wahhabis are given a blank check to oppose anti-terror policies that threaten to expose their connection to the terrorist support network in the U.S." If America forsakes Israel for Bush's Israel-For-Votes plan, Israel will survive, but America will not. In past times, Republicrats could count on Republicans' votes, because "where else are we going to go?" But those days are over. I, for one, am not voting for Bush again. This seems to be a dilemma for Christians who profess love for Israel. Voting for Bush would be good for America, but bad for Israel. Voting for Kerry is unthinkable. What to do? Vote for Bush, whose betrayal of Israel can no longer be ignored? Dr Hutchens and other Christian and Jewish leaders should encourage their readers, groups, whatever, to let Bush know that if he continues on his maniacal betrayal of Israel, they will not vote for him! But I've never heard, not once, anybody say this, and who knows? Maybe one voice is all it would take.Then maybe hundreds or thousands of voices telling Bush "no vote" unless he changes his course - abandon the 'Roadmap', and include Israel as our ally in the war on terror! Our government is determined to establish a Palestinian Terrorist Democracy, and supports Palestinian terrorism with taxpayers' money, which makes me complicit, so my first vote for Bush was my last vote for Bush. I'll sit this presidential election out. To Go To Top

DON'T REPEAT THESE MISTAKES, MR. SHARON Posted by Gush Katif, April 25, 2004.

MY MISTAKE In an exclusive interview with Maariv Ariel Sharon admits (January 11, 1994): "I made a mistake supporting Begin's decision to uproot settlements." A MISTAKE Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in a special interview with Maariv said: "The Oslo Agreements were a total failure. A terrible, historic mistake. A huge error." MR. SHARON, DON'T REPEAT THESE MISTAKES. To Go To Top

THE RETURN OF THE LOST TRIBES Posted by David Ben-Ariel, April 30, 2004.

Nachmanides (Moshe ben Nachman, 1194-1270) was one of the greatest Biblical scholars of all times. He attached importance to the subject of the Lost Ten Tribes and spoke of them in several places. In the following articles, Nachmanides gives us some important insights. There were actually thirteen tribes of Israel. The people of Israel include two sections, which are the Ten Tribes of "Israel" and the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin known collectively as Judah. Several Exiles occurred to the people of Israel. The Bible prophesied each one separately. Nachmanides discusses these prophecies and distinguishes between them. Just as part of Judah was exiled with the northern tribes so too did some people from the ten tribes remain with Judah. Their descendants are now to be found amongst the present-day Jews. The overwhelming majority of the Ten Tribes however were exiled by the Assyrians and NEVER returned though they are destined to do so. The Ten Tribes (said Nachmanides in ca. 1260 CE) are still in Tserefath (Gaul and its region) and "at the ends of the north." THE TWO STICKS OF EZEKIEL 37 In Ezekiel [chapter thirty-seven] it speaks of future re-union: [Ezek 37:16] Moreover, thou son of man, take thee one stick, and write upon it, For Judah, and for the children of Israel his companions: then take another stick, and write upon it, For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim and for all the house of Israel his companions: Here it speaks of a FUTURE Redemption for both Judah and Israel. Where it says, "For Judah, and for the children of Israel his companions" by "the children of Israel his companions" it means Benjamin who was attached to Judah. Similarly it says, "For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim and for all the house of Israel his companions." The section is quite plain. The two kingdoms will unite into one kingdom under the House of David. The Israelites went into Exile and ever since then Ephraim and all [the ten tribes of northern] Israel have NEVER been in the Land of Israel. Concerning the FUTURE it says, "And the heathen shall know that I the LORD do sanctify Israel, when my sanctuary shall be in the midst of them for evermore" Behold I will recall a matter that is expressly mentioned many times in Scripture. It is known that with the Return of the Exiles under Ezra only the Tribes of Judah and Benjamin returned. These had been exiled to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar. This is what it says concerning the beginning of that Redemption, [Ezra 1:5] Then rose up the chief of the fathers of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests, and the Levites, with all them whose spirit God had raised, to go up to build the house of the LORD which is in Jerusalem". And on their return it says, [Ezra 2:1] Now these are the children of the province that went up out of the captivity, of those which had been carried away, whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried away unto Babylon, and came again unto Jerusalem and Judah, every one unto his city; When they laid the foundations of the Temple it says, [Ezra 4:1] Now when the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the children of the captivity builded the temple unto the LORD God of Israel; This is the highest level. The establishment of the status of Ezra is expressly mentioned here, [Ezra 8:1] These are now the chief of their fathers, and this is the genealogy of them that went up with me from Babylon, in the reign of Artaxerxes the king. After this, [Ezra 10:7] And they made proclamation throughout Judah and Jerusalem unto all the children of the captivity, that they should gather themselves together unto Jerusalem; concerning the deportation of foreign women. It says, [Ezra 10:9] Then all the men of Judah and Benjamin gathered themselves together unto Jerusalem Whilst they had settled in the land it says, [Neh 11:1]"And the rulers of the people dwelt at Jerusalem: the rest of the people also cast lots, to bring one of ten to dwell in Jerusalem the holy city, and nine parts to dwell in other cities." And it says there, [Neh 11:4] "And at Jerusalem dwelt certain of the children of Judah, and of the children of Benjamin. Of the children of Judah; Neh 11:7] And these are the sons of Benjamin;... The cities of their settlement are related," [Neh 11:25] And for the villages, with their fields, some of the children of Judah dwelt at Kiryat Arba, and in...These same cities are also recalled as being in the inheritances of Judah and Benjamin in the Book of Joshua [when they first entered the land]. Together with all this we acknowledge the view of our sages may their memories be blessed and Heaven Forbid that we should not agree with them. They said in the Midrash Seder Olam, Let me clarify the matter for you. You have already noticed that in the Second Redemption [i.e. the redemption of Ezra, the First Redemption was the coming out of Egypt]. Only those returned who had been exiled to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar. Over these people had the decree of a seventy-year Exile been made. These are Judah and Benjamin as well as the Cohanim [priests] who dwelt in Jerusalem and who pertained to the Kingdom of Judah. This was as it was written concerning the initial split of the Kingdom between the northern ten tribes and the Kingdom of Judah, "having Judah and Benjamin on his side" (2-Chronicles 11;12), "And the priests and the Levites that were in all Israel resorted to him out of all their coasts" (2-Chronicles 11;13): [The southern Kingdom of Judah encompassed the tribes of Judah, Benjamin, and Levi]. The Kingdom of Israel included the ten northern Tribes. These were exiled by Sancheribc as it says, "For he rent Israel from the house of David; and they made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king: and Jeroboam drave Israel from following the LORD, and made them sin a great sin" (2-Kings 17;11). "Until the LORD removed Israel out of his sight...so was Israel exiled out of their own land to Assyria unto this day" (2-Kings 17;12). This is a proof that all the Kingdom of Israel was exiled to Assyria but the Kingdom of David remained as it was until Nebucahdnessar exiled them to Babylon. The Kingdom of David included Judah and Benjamin. It says, "There was none left but the tribe of Judah only" (2-Kings 17;18). This indicates the Kingdom of the Tribe of Judah that included the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin. It also appears from the simple meaning of the text, that before the exile of the northern country by Senacherib there were gathered into the cities of Judah people from the neighboring tribes of Menasseh, Ephraim, and Simeon and these then dwelt in the heritage of Judah. Or . This explains what was said concerning King Josiah, "They delivered the money that was brought into the house of God which the Levites that kept the doors had gathered of the hand of Manasseh and Ephraim, and of all the remnant of Israel, and of all Judah and Benjamin" (2-Chronicles 34; 9). Prior to that time in the period King Asa it was written, "And he gathered all Judah and Benjamin, and the strangers with them out of Ephraim and Menasseh, and out of Simeon: for they fell to him out of Israel in abundance when they saw the LORD his God was with him" (2-Chronicles 15; 9). Those from the Tribes of Ephraim and Shimeon from Israel that were present (2-Chronicles 35;18) with Judah were they who dwelt in the Land of Judah or perhaps to some degree also those who had dwelt in their own territories adjoining Judah and had fled to Judah. They are referred (in 2-Chronicles 35;18) to in a general sense as "from Israel" and not by their specific tribes since they represented only a small portion of their tribe. These are they who returned under Ezra with the Jews from Babylon. They were not expressly mentioned by their tribes since they were attached to Judah. They all settled in the cities of Judah. There was no Redemption for the Ten Tribes who remained in exile. I will now explain somewhat a clearly expressed section that still requires clarification. It says concerning the genealogy of Benjamin in the Book of Chronicles. It is written about the genealogy of all Israel in this work (1-Chronicles 9;1-3). Judah was exiled to Babylon due to their infidelity. Out of the first to return from this exile were priests ("Cohans") and Levites and the Natins who settled in the cities of Israel. In Jerusalem there settled descendants of Judah and Benjamin along with descendants of Ephraim, and Menasseh: [1Chr 9:1] So all Israel were reckoned by genealogies; and, behold, they were written in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah, who were carried away to Babylon for their transgression. [1Chr 9:2] Now the first inhabitants that dwelt in their possessions in their cities were, the Israelites, the priests, Levites, and the Nethinims. [1Chr 9:3] And in Jerusalem dwelt of the children of Judah, and of the children of Benjamin, and of the children of Ephraim, and Manasseh; Our sages (Talmud, Baba Batra 15;a) recalled that Ezra was the one who wrote the Book of Chronicles. His aim was to let us knew the genealogies of those who returned with him from Babylon. Ezra in Chronicles begins his account with Adam at the head and from whom all the genealogies begin. He keeps going in summary manner until he comes to our own tribes of Israel. He then first gives the genealogy of Judah at length. After that he does not give the genealogies of all the other tribes but only some of them and these he goes through in summarized form until he gets to Benjamin. He then becomes apologetic and says, "So all Israel were reckoned by genealogies; and, behold, they were written in the book of the kings of Israel" [1Chr 9:1]. This is as if to say that he does not need to recount their genealogies at length for they are still in exile. He goes on to say, "And Judah, who were carried away to Babylon for their transgression" [1Chr 9:1]. It is as if he is saying that, he really has only to relate the genealogy of one other tribe apart from Judah. The tribe spoken of is the tribe of Benjamin whose genealogy together with that of Judah he has already given. They are the ones who were exiled to babylon and they are the ones returning in the time of Ezra. The other tribes have their genealogies given, "In the book of the kings of Israel" This book [-that has since been lost] is perhaps in their hands in their place of exile. Ezra then goes on to tell of the settlement of those who returned with him: "Now the first inhabitants that dwelt in their possessions" [1Chr 9:2]. That is to say, those who were the first to return from Babylon settled in their citie. These included Israelites, Cohans (i.e. priests), Levites, and Nathinim as stated xpressly in the Book of Ezra, "in the cities of Judah dwelt every one in his possession in their cities, to wit, Israel, the priests, and the Levites, and the Nethinims, and the children of Solomon's servants" (Nehemiah 11;3). [The Books of Ezra and Nehemiah are now separate books but Nachmanides refers to both of both together as "The Book of Ezra."]. He goes on to say, "And at Jerusalem dwelt certain of the children of Judah, and of the children of Benjamin. [Neh 11:4]. He also said, "And in Jerusalem dwelt of the children of Judah, and of the children of Benjamin, and of the children of Ephraim, and Manasseh" [1Chr 9:3]. He only recalls in detail however the genealogies of Judah and Benjamin whose names and family-trees he elaborates upon. Even here he does not give all the genealogies but only a section of them as is the practice in Scripture. He also speaks of the Priestly families and the Levites, whom he says "hitherto waited in the king's gate eastward: they were porters in the companies of the children of Levi"[1Chr 9:18]. That is to so, that with their return from exile they were appointed on the gates of the Second Temple just as they had been so appointed in the First: "All these which were chosen to be porters in the gates were two hundred and twelve. These were reckoned by their genealogy in their villages, whom David and Samuel the seer did ordain in their set office" [1Chr 9:22]. We have explained this section in accordance with the opinion of our sages of blessed memory. These said that in the time of the Second Temple a few refugees from the other tribes also came up. They did not come from all of the other tribes but only from Ephraim and Menasseh. [Another authority however, Tosefot in Arakin 32;a, says that, "from each and every tribe a few returned"]. These few were not enough to be termed a tribe in their own right or even part of a tribe> due to their minority position they were included amongst the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin and dwelt in their cities. This Second Redemption was not meant for the other tribes. Look at the genealogy of the Tribe of Rueben in this Book of Chronicles and you will find that Ezra gives their familial connections until he reaches Beera who was exiled by Tiglathpileser the King of Assyria (1-Chronicles 5). He then stops. All of those other tribes whose family trees he mentions he also does not continue with after the Assyrian Exile. Rueben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Menasseh: "And the God of Israel stirred up the spirit of Pul king of Assyria, and the spirit of Tilgathpilneser king of Assyria, and he carried them away, even the Reubenites, and the Gadites, and the half tribe of Manasseh, and brought them unto Halah, and Habor, and Hara, and to the river Gozan, unto this day" [1-Chr 5:26]. When re recalls the genealogy of Judah he speaks firstly of the King and of Zerubabel and his sons who were amongst those coming into the Land with Ezra himself. "And them that had escaped from the sword carried he away to Babylon; where they were servants to him and his sons until the reign of the kingdom of Persia". [2-Chr 36; 20}. The Book of Chronicles speaks of the exile to Babylon and of the first year of Cyrus,"Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia" [2-Chr 36:22]. The Book of Ezra also speaks of these events in the same way that is additional proof that Ezra wrote Chronicles. Where Chronicles finishes the Book of Ezra begins. They are in effect like unto book concerning genealogies and the Second redemption that took place at that time. We have not revealed very new in the above discussion but by bringing a few scattered verses together we ha clarified an issue. It has been made quite clear from our study that the only ones who returned from the Babylonian Exile were they who belonged to the Kingdom of Judah. Those however who are termed the House of Ephraim, or The House of Israel, meaning the Ten Tribes are still in Exile in Assyria. These Tribes did not have any participants in the Second redemption, as I have noted. The Second Redemption took place with permission of Cyrus, King of Persia. Before then it is known from the Book of Esther the great dispersion and enormous division that existed amongst our people in all the countries of King Ahaserus from India Cush. After this only a few came up with Ezra from Babylon, about 1,500 men. In my opinion it seems probably that the license of Cyrus applied only to those who had belonged to the Kingdom of Judah meaning the people of Jerusalem. Cyrus commanded these wherever they may then have been in his entire kingdom to return to their land. The commandment was directed to these to go forth and to re-build the Temple. "Who is there among you of all his people? his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah..." [Ezra 1:3]. If you wish to claim that permission was given to all of Israel as it says, "Cyrus king of Persia...made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom" [Ezra 1:1], meaning that the proclamation also must have reached the Ten Tribes then it may be answered that the other tribes did not wish to go up at that stage since they knew their time had not come. The vision of Obadiah deals with events that were to occur after the exile of Jerusalem to Babylon. [Obad 1:11] In the day that thou stoodest on the other side, in the day that the strangers carried away captive his forces, and foreigners entered into his gates, and cast lots upon Jerusalem, even thou wast as one of them. [Obad 1:18] And the house of Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble, and they shall kindle in them, and devour them; and there shall not be any remaining of the house of Esau; for the LORD hath spoken it. There are those who say that this prophecy is referring to King Hezekiah in the Second Temple period but those who think this are in error. It is obvious from scripture that this term, i.e. house of Joseph, applies to the Kingdom of Israel who are the Ten Tribes. They should be ashamed not to recognize this fact! The above verse proves it! When was the House of Joseph like a flame devouring the stubble of Esau? Not on Biblical times! The Ten Tribes had already been exiled and they are still in Exile, in the area of the Canaanites, even unto Zarephath: "And this first exile of the children of Israel who are [now] from Canaan unto Zarephath" [Obad 1:20]. These places are at the extremes of the north. The verse continues, "and the captivity of Jerusalem, which is in Sepharad, shall possess the cities of the south" [Obad 1:20]. Those who were exiled to "Sepharad" [meaning Spain] were the Jews of Jerusalem who were taken away by Titus and Vespasian when the Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans and not before then. The others were The Ten Tribes who were exiled in the First Exile. These have not returned as has been claimed. It says, [Obad 1:19] And they of the south shall possess the mount of Esau; and they of the plain the Philistines: and they shall possess the fields of Ephraim, and the fields of Samaria: and Benjamin shall possess Gilead. [Obad 1:20] And the captivity of this host of the children of Israel shall possess that of the Canaanites, even unto Zarephath; and the captivity of Jerusalem, which is in Sepharad, shall possess the cities of the south. [Obad 1:21] And saviours shall come up on mount Zion to judge the mount of Esau; and the kingdom shall be the LORD's. "Zarephath" according to Rabbinical Commentators (Rashi, Iben Ezra, Radak, and all Medieval authorities) refers to France or more specifically northern France and probably included present-day Belgium and Holland. The words translated in the KJ as "the captivity of this host" in Hebrew ["Galut HaChail"] can also mean "the first exile" and so was the understanding of Rabbinical Commentators. When did they come back and when were these enormous exiled groups ingathered to inherit the cities of Ephraim and Samaria? When did saviours go up on Mount Zion to judge the mount of Esau? In the time of Ezra only a few returned as pigeons to their dovecotes. It says, "the kingdom shall be the LORD's" [Obad 1:21]. At that time everyone will openly acknowledge the Kingdom of God. "And the LORD shall be King over all the earth" (Zechariah 14;9). This too will happen in the future. The general principle concerning these and all similar verses concerning the Redemption of Israel and the fall of Edom and the like is that it is all for the future. "The punishment of your iniquity is finished daughter of Zion; he will no more carry you away into captivity. He will visit your iniquity, daughter of Edom; he will discover your sins" (Lamentations 4;22). This is all for the future. "He will no more carry you away into captivity," is instructing us about the future redemption. If it was otherwise what would be the point of saying to those in exile that they would no longer be exiled unless it meant that they really are destined to be redeemed from the exile they are in? Also, "he will visit your iniquity, daughter of Edom; he will discover your sins", must be for the future. It could not be speaking of the past for it was they who were beaten by Herod the Edomite in the time of the Second Temple. It all must pertain to the future. It is impossible that this was all conditional, that they did not desrve it, and that the prophecies were spoken for nothing. It is pertinent that at the time of their exile Israel were sinning and transgressing. Even so, it was prophesied, "The punishment of your iniquity is finished daughter of Zion; he will no more carry you away into captivity" (Lamentations 4;22). This was not conditional, meaning to say that on condition that they repented then they would have been redeemed. This is not the way of Prophecies to make such limited conditions. Rather it is all pertyaining to the future. Zechariah lived in the Second Temple period. Zechariah said, "Behold, the day of the LORD is coming," and so on in great detail that without any doubt can only be referring to some future day. So too, were these passages explained by the Commentators and by our holy sages of blessed memory. David Ben-Ariel is author of "Beyond Babylon: Europe's Rise and Fall", His website address ishttp://www.benariel.com To Go To Top

<>bPRAYER TO SAVE GUSH KATIF Posted by Gush Katif, April 30, 2004.

We request that all teachers in all the schools and yeshivot spend time praying with their students, to strengthen the hearts of the voters, that they should vote with faith in G-d and with security in His Holy Name, with love. We pray also to strengthen the hearts of all those working with great dedication over the past few weeks, encouraging those who may be weak and hold up failing knees. May it be His will that G-d should help us succeed. The order of prayer: Those in schools and at home. Say the enclosed prayer anywhere and at any time. Also Psalms and selichot. And in particular, Psalm 119, according to the alef-bet. Reciting the verses of Eretz (alef, resh, tzadi) Eretz Yisrael (alef, resh tzadi - yod, shin, resh, alef, lamed) and Gush Katif (gimel, vov, shin, kuf, tet, yod, pe) And may it be G-d's will to see our failings, will have mercy, and overcome our failings, and redeem us a complete redemption quickly in our days. To Go To Top

DON'T BOMB; ARABS WOULDN'T LIKE US Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 30, 2004.

It is difficult for the West to defend itself, nowadays. Half the Westerners are "progressives." But how progressive is it to support the socially backward Arabs who wish to drag Western social progress centuries backward?. These "humanitarian" "progressives" decry the deaths of Arabs in combat, especially if civilians killed accidentally, but not the deaths of Westerners, even if civilians. The only inconsistency they recognize is Pres. Bush's, not their own. When terrorists murder Iraqis, Arabs blame the coalition forces. The Arabs have a national neurosis over the matter of blame and shame. They fail to blame the perpetrators. The Arabs argue that it is the Coalition's fault for not properly protecting the people. How many Iraqis inform on the terrorists? Those who don't are accomplices. The Iraqi Arabs and some of the "progressives" recently advised the US armed forces not to bombard Iraqi cities in which terrorists and guerrillas are holed up. The reason given is that otherwise Arabs not part of the insurgency would join it. If we bomb the terrorists, the people would come to hate the US. And if we don't, they blame us for not protecting them. Shall we deceive ourselves and imagine that the West is not already hated by the Arab Muslims? We have the right to defend ourselves, but sometimes lack the will. The "progressives" sap it. Their concept of Western bombardment, kept alive by sensationalist newspapers parading US might and technical prowess, is obsolete. In modern warfare, neither the US nor Israel flatten cities. We use precision bombing. Only the immediate area of terrorist fortification is bombed. More humane than that, warfare cannot get. True progressives would praise the US and Israel for such restraint and damn the Arabs for starting wars and their terrorists for waging it in criminal ways as by investing civilian areas. Blame the perpetrators! "COMPENSATE THE P.A. FOR YESHA LAND ISRAEL TAKES" There is a theory that if Israel annexes parts of Yesha, then it should turn over to the P.A. equal parts of Israel. This theory would be unfair if Israel were a large country not threatened by its neighbors, including the very entity it is asked to turn the territory over to. It is ridiculous for a tiny country threatened by its neighbors, including that entity, now making war on it. The notion assumes that Yesha belongs to the Arabs. It does not. As the unallocated part of the Palestine Mandate, it is reserved for Jewish national development. Israel has the best legal claim to Yesha, all of it. That legal claim derives from the Jewish people's historical and religious claim, recognized by the League of Nations and endorsed by the UN Charter. To those claims add: (1) Necessity for national security, which is fundamental to international law and invoked by the aggressive behavior of the Arabs; and (2) Arab forfeiture of their claim due to massive war crimes and crimes against humanity. Many of our contemporaries, ignorant of history, international law, and religious validation except when claimed by Muslims, and perverse about who commits war crimes, have gotten it into their heads that any resolution of the Arab-Israel conflict should be one of "land for peace," as if peace were something the Jews should pay for, rather than are entitled to. Peres, Sharon, and the State Dept. think that Israel should give up land and merely hope the Arabs would make peace. I'm not sure the State Dept. hopes the Arabs would make peace. The other advocates of land-for-peace think Israel should give up land if the Arabs dismantle the terrorist infrastructure. The State Dept. and the Arabs try to get the others to imagine that the Arabs already have abandoned terrorism. They all deem the Arabs are entitled to the Territories. They never figured out that the arbitrary armistice lines forming Yesha have no significance. Neither do they realize how poor a claim to the area the Arabs have. Mr. Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at ricshulman@aol.com. To Go To Top

FIRST SIGNS OF LIKUD ELECTION TAMPERING Posted by Aryeh Zelasko, April 30, 2004.

(IsraelNN.com) Some veteran members of the Likud Party, Yesha residents, were less than pleased to learn their names have mysteriously vanished from the party roster, making it impossible for them to vote in the party's referendum on Sunday. Proponents of the prime minister's unilateral Gaza withdrawal plan, the subject of the referendum, are well aware that Yesha residents will be voting against the plan. Included among those unable to vote are attorney Motti Mintzer and his wife Tzvia, residents of the Shomron community of Elkana. The Mintzers have been Likud members and paid their dues for some thirty years. Mintzer inquired as to his polling station and was shocked to learn he and his wife do not appear among those eligible to vote. Mintzer plans to take his case to the Likud Court today. He is requesting that members whom have paid their annual party membership fees be permitted to vote even if they do not appear on the voting rosters. According to correspondent Haggai Huberman, the names of Moshe and Hana Kleinman has been wiped from the party roster. They too live in Elkana. The names of other Elkana residents, Likud members, have also been wiped from the list. A similar situation has been detected in Gush Katif. Residents of Kfar Darom, paid Likud members, do not appear among those eligible to take part in the referendum. Similar situations have been discovered among party members residing in Atzmona and Tel-Katifa, also Gush Katif area communities. To Go To Top

COMMENTS ON THINK-ISRAEL Posted by Dr. Babu Suseelan, April 30, 2004.

Think-Israel is an excellent, constructive and comprehensive and instructive website. You provide the readers tools and information to make critical judgment on complex issues affecting the middle East, Israel and the world. You present a bold and rational analysis on the dangers posed by Muslim terrorists and its disastrous consequences for democratic societies around the world. Leftist media have been distorting the real menace of Jihadi Terrorism and undermining Israel's effort to bring peace, prosperity and security in the Middle East. Congratulations for your systemic analysis on current events. [Editor note: Dr. Suseelan expresses so well what we are endeavoring to accomplish, we couldn't resist sharing.] To Go To Top

THE IMMINENT VICTORY OF THOSE FEIGLINS Posted by Steve Plaut, April 30, 2004.

The question is no longer whether or not Ariel Sharon's "Disengagement Plan" will pass the referendum on it to be held this coming Monday, but rather by which gap the "plan" will be shot down by the Likud voters. The polls in Israel are showing the opponents to the plan within the Likud outnumbering the supporters by between 2% and 7%, and I have a month's salary on a bet saying the gap will actually be in the double digits. All this, in spite of the fact that almost the entire leadership of the Likud has come out to back and support Sharon on the "plan", some albeit half-heartedly. In trying to stampede Likud voters into backing approval for his "plan", Sharon is moving from desperation into Orwellism. Yesterday, in Sharon's first major adventure into the netherworld of Orwellistic Newspeak, he declared that a defeat in the referendum for his proposal would be a "victory for Arafat". By inference, a defeat over Arafat would consist, I guess, of expelling Jewish settlers from their homes and handing over a judenrein Gaza Strip to the PLO in which it will organize rocket factories, training facilities, and from which it will send out countless suicide bombers. And someone forgot to tell the Palestinians that passage of the Sharon "Disengagement Plan" would be a defeat for Arafat. Palestinian Media Watch, a watchdog group that documents the contents of the PLO's controlled "Palestinian" media, issued a report that these media unanimously view a passage of the Sharon "plan" as an enormous victory for their "armed struggle" over the Jewish subhumans and a tremendous achievement, a precedent for the dismantling of all of Israel (Haaretz, April 30). More importantly, this is actually the very first test in Israel of direct democracy, and the very first time a ballot proposition has been brought before even a PART of the electorate (only Likud voters are participating in the referendum, which makes it easier for the lemming politicians to dismiss it as a meaningless gesture). That fact may be even more significant than the actual results of the vote. This could open up incredible new possibilities, if it were to become the precedent for future ballot propositions, in which Israelis actually get to say what they want. Heaven knows where THAT could lead - maybe even to accountability of court judges! The fact of the matter is that every single time, without exception, Israeli voters were offered an opportunity to vote for or against "Oslo", they voted against it. And every single time that they voted AGAINST "Oslo", the politicians then ignored the public will and carried out "Oslo" appeasements and capitulations anyway. It all started when Israelis elected Yitzhak Rabin, who ran on a platform declaring unambiguously, "No Deals with the PLO," and then months later spat on the voters and struck the Oslo "deal." By 1996, Rabin had been assassinated by Yigal Amir, and Shimon Peres was beaten in the next vote handsomely by Netanyahu. Netanyahu then ran for re-election and lost, but that was because voting for him was no longer voting against Oslo. Netanyahu as Prime Minister had out-Oslo-ed even Shimon Peres. In any case, Ehud Barak won largely thanks to the Arab voters supporting him at the polls. When Ehud Barak later ran for re-election, he was defeated in a landslide by voters opposed to Oslo. Sharon was elected simply because the public opposed "Oslo". When Sharon ran again, this time against Amram Mitzna, Sharon trounced him by an even larger landslide. But, like all those before him, Sharon then declared war on the Israeli voters who had elected him to stop Oslo, and he re-dedicated himself to carrying out large parts of the political agenda of the Israeli Left. For twelve years, Israeli voters have been disenfranchised over and over and over again. But they were not cowed by the cynicism of the politicians, as the vote this coming week on the referendum will show. Whenever they are given a chance, they show how thoroughly they reject the "Oslo" program of "land for sound bytes". The intellectual underpinnings for the "disengagement plan" are little more than an insult to the intelligence. Supposedly the "disengagement" will allow the PLO to "prove itself" and its intentions, to impose its will and control over the Gaza Strip and begin "nation building", with US and Euro support. But even if "testing" the PLO's intentions is still regarded as something positive, even if we pretend we do not know what those intentions are precisely, even if we think that allowing the PLO to impose its will over the Gaza Strip is something constructive, there is no reason whatsoever why such a "test" requires the expulsion of Jews who live in the Gaza Strip. The Jews live in two small areas within the Strip. Why can't the PLO impose its will on the rest of the Gaza Strip where Jews do NOT live and THERE prove its intentions? Why can't removal of settlements be withheld as a reward or bargaining chip for AFTER the PLO is put to the test? Why can't advocates of removing settlements propose that this be done as a reward for the PLO AFTER it has complied and shown its peaceful intentions? In other words, even if one believes in the thinking behind the Sharon-Bush initiative for unilateral disengagement by Israel and the supposed forcing of the PLO to demonstrate its commitment to nation building, none of that logically requires immediate Israeli expulsion of Jewish settlers, especially when the expulsion would be long BEFORE the PLO complies with anything at all and after it has violated every single punctuation mark in every one of its past commitments. And that logical fallacy is why Sharon is about to get creamed by his own party constituents. The Left will no doubt denounce Sharon for having planned to lose the referendum all along to avoid making concessions to the PLO, and wouldn't it be heavenly if they were correct. A much more realistic explanation is that Sharon's referendum was a strategic attempt to take the prosecutorial heat off himself and his family by appeasing the Israeli Left, which happens to control the Attorney General's office, the Israeli media and the courts. A victory over the "disengagement plan" will be an enormous victory for Moshe Feiglin and his militant wing within the Likud (militant in the very best sense of the term). Feiglin is already being demonized by the Likud demagogic establishment, who are denouncing "those Feiglins" as fanatics endangering the party. Moshe was the initiator of the anti-Oslo Zo Artseinu movement in the 90s. He was railroaded before a court under Netanyahu's reign and convicted of "sedition" because he and his people blocked a traffic intersection. After doing community service, Feiglin decided to take his fight to the innards of the Likud, challenging the Likud leadership from within. He and his camp won a respectable minority position within the party's central committee. While I have some quibbles with Feiglin over some of his choices of tactics and positions, he is the only truly consistent anti-Oslo activist-leader at this point inside the Likud, although may well represent the rank and file far better than Sharon and Ehud Olmert. Feiglin's people have led the battle AGAINST Sharon's proposal in the referendum, and the defeat of Sharon's plan will make Feiglin a much more significant player in the Israeli political scene. May we be blessed with many many more of "those Feiglins". Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist, a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author of "The Scout." He frequently comments - both seriously and satirically - on Israeli politics and the left wing academic community. His website address is http://www.stevenplaut.blogspot.com. To Go To Top

THEY WERE 'IMPRINTED' Posted by Gail Winston, April 30, 2004.

Dear Friends, Remember the inspiring film: "Close Encounters of the Third Kind"? The people who went to the mountain with the flat top (where the extraterrestials had landed) were "imprinted" with the vision and the need to go there. On Israel Independence Day Yom Hatzmaut, 120,000 people spontaneously drove, walked, bussed, bicycled to Gush Katif in Gaza. They were imprinted with the vision that the 8000 men, women and children who live there for 3 generations and who work there to make our salads green. This is the vision that they are imbued with. True Zionism. True patriotism. True pioneers. They live their lives in a beautiful place - a place given to them by G-d - a place where Abraham and Isaac lived in our Biblical history - a place that was barren sand dunes - a place that they made beautiful. As an avid reader of all the Internet and Email incoming traffic (sometimes 350 to 400 messages a day) I didn't see any notices or flyers about the Gush Katif rally. Yes, there were some speakers planned. But, no one expected 120,000 Israelis of all kinds, religious and not, young babies and older savtas, rightists and probably some Leftists who haven't forgotten what Zionism really is or why the Kibbutzim and Moshavim were built. It was truly a traffic jam that may have saved Eretz Yisrael as David Wilder said, because it proves that all Israelis love all of Israel - from the biggest cities to the least grains of sand that protect the biggest cities. The people voted with their feet. The news media claimed 'only' 70,000 went BUT, they didn't include those who sat in the traffic jam - happily - for 7 hours, just to be a part of it. Or those who left their cars & buses & hiked to the rally point. If you will it, the legend became reality. We dreamed it and became a proud, sovereign nation. We will vote for it and it will come true. VOTE ON SUNDAY TO KEEP ISRAEL WHOLE. GUSH KATIF DEFENDS TEL AVIV, BEER-SHEVA, JERUSALEM & HAIFA. IF JEWS AREN'T SAFE THERE, WHERE WILL THEY EVER BE SAFE. IT'S UP TO ALL OF US!!! LOVE GAIL WINSTON Gail Winston is founder of M.E.I.R., Mid East Information Resource. To Go To Top

AN EXCHANGE ABOUT GAZA Posted by Itamar Weisbrod, April 30, 2004.

Someone sent around a letter to students encouraging them not to attend a rally on behalf of Gush Katif in Toronto, Ontario. I wrote back a response. I was factual but I hope I made the students understand our connection to Gaza and why we must not expel Jews from their homes. The Anti-Gush Katif letter: Hi everyone, I just have a thought that I'd like to share with you with regard to the rally for Gush katif. Ariel Sharon's unilateral disengagement plan and Bush's full (written) support has perhaps brought us the closest ever to a viable resolution to the conflict in Israel between Arabs/Palestinians and Israel and the Jewish people. Never before has the US actually backed Israel's demand that there should be no right of return for Palestinians, that a full return to the 1949 armistice lines is impossible and unrealistic, and Israel's full, unequivocal right to defend itself and its citizens. Settlement blocks like Gush Katif, neve dekalim, chevron, and many others at this time prevent Israel from having any reasonable chance at peace and security. In order for there to be peace in Israel compromises have to be made, even Ariel Sharon, notorious for his idealism, realizes this. Meanwhile, Sharon has secured Israel's ability to retain major west bank settlement blocks with large Jewish/Israeli populations and prevented jeapordizing Israel's status as a Jewish state by disallowing the right of return for 1948 displaced palestinians. Sharon has compromised in a manner that is truly maximally beneficial for Israel and at the same time provides innocent Palestinians a true Palestinian state. Israel will be able to defend itself more efficiently, and upon realizing that they can not and will not be able to destroy Israel and Israel's continued battle against them, Palestinian extremists will eventually lose support and die out. I remember learning in yeshiva that a negative nevuah (prophecy) can always be turned around. A positive one can not. In this light, we don't necessarily need an apocalyptic war to re-establish the nation of Israel in the land of Israel. We don't need soldiers and civilains regularly dying in order to sustain a rigid idealism, holding on to every little ounce of traditional Eretz Yisrael. I believe at a certain point Pekuach Nefesh (the sanctity of life) and Israel's peace and security prevails. Even without bits and pieces of the West Bank and Gaza we can all still return to Zion, build Jersualem and the nation of Israel. Please support Israel and Ariel Sharon in this incredible oppurtunity and let's stand united as one people all realizing the same dream. Thanks for reading, Anonymous [he prefered to keep his name a secret] My Response The rally in support of residents of Gush Katif is an event supported by the Toronto Zionist Council and supported by Mizrahi, a Zionist organization. As we all know, Bnei Akiva believes in Am Yisrael (the Nation of Israel), B'eretz Yisrael (in the Land of Israel), al pi Torat Yisrael (the Torah of Israel). Therefore, it is well within the ideology of Bnei Akiva/Mizrahi to be supportive of the Jewish communities in Gush Katif. Even we didn't have their support, I'd still encourage all to attend, as it is well within the Zionist values within which most of us have been taught since we were kids. I would also like to point out some factual inaccuracies in the letter. First of all, Bush's implicit stance on the issues raised remains just that - implicit. As Caroline Glick of the Jerusalem Post pointed out this weekend, at no time did Bush explicitly state that Washington's official policy will be that Israel can keep certain settlement blocks. Moreover, this is not the first time that a U.S. President has made such statements. Even Clinton stated that Israel would not be expected to withdraw to 1948 borders. Secondly, I would challenge the accuracy of the letter writer's geographical information. Neve Dekalim and Hevron are not settlement blocks; they are individual settlements. Nevei Dekalim is in the block of Gush Katif, and Hevron in the Kiryat Arba/Lower Gush Etzion Block. This geographical inaccuracy, while it may seem irrelevant, may actually shed light on the educational level of the opinion I am opposing, because this is largely a geographical issue. Additionally, Sharon is planning on withdrawal from Gaza and northern Shomron communities. The 5 settlement blocks that Bush hinted that Israel may be able to hold on to includes the Kiryat Arba block. Sharon hasn't yet planned on giving Hevron away, and it is even on the list of settlements he wants to keep. Attacking the holy city of Hevron by saying that it is "preventing Israel from having any reasonable chance at peace and security" is far from the truth and is void of logic. Blaming Israel's security problems on settlements is buying into one of the biggest lies the Palestinians have sold to the world. It is unfortunate that it was bought by some Jews too. Jewish presence in parts of Biblical Israel is no cause or reason for Arabs to not be able to live there also. The extent to which a "Jewish presence" causes 'difficulties' for the Arab residents of Yesha is not due to settlers, to Jews, living there, it is due to their society's and religion's embrace of terrorism! It is due to their savage murder of Israelis. It is their responsibility to take charge of their society. If they didn't kill and murder and steal and hurt us, if their imams didn't call for jihad, if they didn't send 13 year old's to blow themselves up, they would have all the same civil liberties that we do. Our right to life, our right to exist as a Jewish People in the Land of Israel, supercedes their 'civil right' to freedom of movement when they abuse that right and become murderers. For true equality, they need to take responsibility for their actions. 'Noble' liberals such as Dershowitz or Beilin (laughable) threaten true equality. For them, the belief that Arabs can actually be held responsible for their own society, that Arabs could actually live peacefully with us, is a myth. Therefore, we must separate ourselves from them to ensure 'peace'. We must make sure there aren't too many Arabs in Israel, because aside from the problem of the vote (a question I will leave for another letter), who wants to live next to an Arab? That is the 'liberal' thinking of Israel. I deplore this double standard - this hypocrisy. For them, the 'therefore' is that the Jews abandon their biblical homeland, so they are separated from the Arabs. NO! Jews will stay in Yesha, and the Arabs better just get used to it and accept it, and learn how to get along with us. And if they can't, we shouldn't be the ones who have to leave. Ripping Jews out of their homes, simply because they are Jewish, is discriminatory and racist. It is fascinating that many no longer even feel the need to cloak this discrimination, with many explicitly referring to the need to dismantle "Jewish settlements" and not even bothering to cloak the term by referring to them as "Israeli settlements". What bothers everyone so much about "settlements" isn't the settlements, it is the idea of, the horror of, having to have a Jewish neighbor. For the Arabs, this is out of pure hatred, and for others, especially 'Leftist' Jews, it is the fear of what empowerment and strength will be given to the right and to the religious sectors of Israeli society if Jews are allowed to maintain and keep their roots and attachment to such historic and religiously evocative areas as Hevron and Shechem. Michael Freund, a former advisor to Binyamin Netanyahu, stated this point powerfully in his op-ed in the Jerusalem Post on February 4th, 2004: the desire to expel Jews from Gaza because of their religious and or ethnic identity is pure and simple racism. If there were Israeli Jews, Christians, and Muslims or American 'olim' from Jewish, Christian, and Muslim origin, all would be allowed to stay and live in the "Disputed Territories" except for those that are Jewish. The only identifying mark that is of consequence is their religion, and if you are Jewish, then you aren't allowed to live in certain areas. If Israeli settlers are expelled from Gaza, Israel will not be able to defend itself efficiently, as is pointed out by top army personnel and even by the Chief of Staff himself, Moshe Yaalon. Yaalon came out against the plan for security reasons, claiming that withdrawal from the Gaza Strip will only encourage more terror and make it easier for Arab terrorist groups to perpetrate attacks. Aside from many other top army officials sharing this opinion, the thoughts of the army Chief of Staff should be making it clear enough that it is completely incorrect to think that expelling the Jewish residents of Gush Katif would in any way improve Israel's security. One should not assume there are people more knowledgeable on counter-terrorism tactics than the Chief of Staff of the Israeli army. Also, claiming that Palestinian extremists would lose support because Israel is willing to compromise is nothing more than a pipe dream. Israel has offered to compromise before and give up far more than Sharon is putting on the table now, and that has only resulted in increased terrorism. The letter writer shows a complete lack of understanding of the Palestinian/Arab culture and their history. Never once in the Arab/Israeli conflict has compromise on the Israeli side been met with Arab acceptance and a decrease in Arab terror - in fact, it has had the exact opposite. To deny this is denying factual history and ignoring the lessons from the past. It is correct that an "apocalyptic" war is not necessary to re-establish the Nation of Israel in the Land of Israel. The way to avoid that, according to commentary on the nevua of the final geula, is the return of the Nation to the Land (meaning Aliya). But to say that soldiers and civilians are dying in order to "sustain a rigid idealism, holding on to every little ounce of traditional Eretz Yisrael" is blaming the settlements for Israel's security problems. This is a total fallacy and one of the major lies told by the Palestinians to the world. There has been terror by Arabs against Jews before the state was created, long before the current settlement enterprise. It is wrong to demonize a sector of the nation and blame them for Israel's security problems, when that exact issue was in place long before 1967. This too shows a complete lack of understanding of Israel's history and ignores decades of Arab terror against Jews, and is, quite frankly, a misleading oversimplification. Let it be known right now that Jewish presence in Gaza is NOT causing the deaths of any soldiers or civilians. This is a myth, meant to blame someone other than the actual terrorists for terrorism. The settlement block of Gush Katif is further away from Gaza City (where 1 of the 1.2 million Arabs of Gaza live) than from major Israeli cities such as Sderot, Ahskelon, and Netivot. Between these cities and Gush Katif is the same protection: fences, army and space. When Sderot is rocketed from the northern Gaza, and when Gush Katif is rocketed - why is one met with a call to defend, and one met with a call to retreat? It is because of the myth that the settlements are at fault - a myth which even some Jews choose to pass off as truth. When any Jewish city is attacked, whether it be Gush Katif or Ashkelon, it is because they are JEWISH cities, NOT because they are settlements. Top army officials have even supported certain settlements, citing security reasons. They argue that having a Jewish presence in areas like Gaza and Hevron makes it easier for the Israeli army to operate and do their job. One last thing - it is questionable that the call for unity was sincere since the letter writer singled out and demonized a sector of out nation and called for the expulsion of Jews from their homes. Let's call a spade a spade. If one is in favour of discrimination against a part of the nation, then it is far from a unified vision of a dream. I realize that the opposing ideology is not discriminating against Jewish settlers as an end in and of itself. It is unquestionably a means to an end. It was an empty call for unity, while concurrently advocating fundamentally non-unified acts. David ben Gurion said it way back in 1937. "No Jew has the right to yield the rights of the Jewish People in Israel. No Jew has the authority to do so. No Jewish body has the authority to do so. Not even the entire Jewish People alive today has the right to yield any part of Israel. It is the right of the Jewish People over the generations, a right that under no conditions can be cancelled. Even if Jews during a specific period proclaim they are relinquishing this right, they have neither the power nor the authority to deny it to future generations. No concession of this type is binding or obligates the Jewish People. Our right to the country - the entire country - exists as an eternal right, and we shall not yield this historic right until its full and complete redemption is realised." -David Ben Gurion, at the Zionist Congress in Basel, Switzerland, 1937 B'Ahavat Yisrael, Itamar Weisbrod Itamar Weisbrod is at Bar Ilan University in Israel - in political science and war strategy. To Go To Top

THE PARASITES ARE SALIVATING OVER THE LOOT THEY EXPECT Posted by Emanuel A. Winston, April 29, 2004.

The talk of the parasites is over the transfer of what the Jews built in Israel with vision, sweat and hardship. But, the parasites have always fed on what Jews create, build and accumulate. We watched the Germans confiscate everything that the European Jews had built: homes, furniture, art, bank accounts, factories and, then when that was all in their hands, they stole the gold fillings from their teeth. Not to be left out, the French did the same. Ask Jacques Chirac about his days as Mayor of Paris when he gave Jewish apartments to his friends, business acquaintances and had stolen art from the Jews hanging on his office walls that had been turned over to the Germans. The same could be said for the Soviets, the Poles, the Lithuanians, the Croatians, the Dutch, the Swedes, the Finns, the Norwegians, et al. All the parasites fed on what they could steal from the industrious Jews. Just leave them alone for while and, when they have built what the predators want, they attack and plunder. When the Jews finally escaped from the graveyards of Europe to Israel, it was the Arabs turn to feed off the Jews. Armies from the surrounding seven nations attacked in 1948 and were ignominiously defeated. They were driven from the field of battle by untrained Jews, some straight off the boat or, at least, those boats the hateful British missed in their blockade. The Arabs, having lost to a rag-tag army of Jews with junk weapons from the scrap yards of Europe, were enraged. So, like hyenas, they fell upon the property of the Jews in their nations, just like the Nazis with whom they tried to partner up with during WWII. So, like the Nazis, they plundered the homes, factories, farms, bank accounts, inventories of whatever merchandise the Jews carried in their stores. Like the scavaging beasts they have always been, they fell on the loot and whatever the Jews had built. They drove their Jews out with only clothes on their back. But, the Jews of Israel who themselves had little, absorbed their 750,000 Jewish refugees forced out by the Arab countries and all those Jewish refugees from the death camps of Europe - unlike the Arabs who rejected their 450,000 or so refugees. Now, with the help of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and, at the insistence of the Bush family and cronies, the Arab Muslim Palestinian terrorist organizations will have their turn to snarl and hiss over whatever the Jews have built which they never could. Meanwhile, the corrupt parasites of the West have taken over the negotiations of how they will distribute the wealth and property of the Jews in Gush Katif, Gaza. Like the Nazis and their co-partners, the Europeans, they will be the overseers for the division of the loot. It was bad enough when the ravenous beasts of Germany gathered the Jews of Europe and plundered all they had - even to the gold teeth of the dead. But, what is worse is that this creature, for I cannot bring myself to call him a Jew, is the traitor who sold the land he did not own and wants to give their property to the lowest level of the Arabs, the Palestinians who have been murdering Jews for peace since 1993. They are a predatory people driven by a predatory religion. This is Ariel Sharon's choice of who is to receive his great gift of perfidy. May all those who feed on the bodies and properties of dead Jews be consigned to be buried in the sewers of Gaza. May their families suffer a thousand fold for their crimes against the Jews. May their nations fail - as have all other nations who fed on the Jews. Cursed be their days; cursed be their nights. Next Tuesday, the infamous Quartet composed of the U.N., the European Union, Russia and the Arabist U.S. Department of State representing the American Administration will meet to decide the fate of the Jews - much the same as the Nazis did at Wannsee. There Heydrich, Eichmann, among others of Hitler's executioners met to finalize their Final Solution to their Jewish Question and plan the confiscation of the assets of the Jews. The State Department wants the Quartet to dispose of the settlers' properties to the Arab Muslim Palestinians. They want this transfer of assets done in an "orderly manner". Translate that to mean that Sharon is supposed to deploy a Jewish army to force the evacuation of 8,000 Jewish men, women and children so the Arab Muslim Palestinian terrorists can occupy the homes, factories, farms with no resistance. The Jews will protest mightily but they will not lift up a violent hand against the Jewish army - although they may take appropriate action if the Arab Muslims try to take what belongs to the Jews by their work on the land, by their historical roots on the land and by the promise of G-d to the Jews for the land. Then the Quartet will try to carve up the Jews' property so the Arab Palestinians will not snarl and fight each other in greedy acquisition of what they could never have built up for themselves. These are the diseased carrion eaters who feed on the carcasses of the dead. I have no doubt that Jews will die defending their homes and all they have built. But, the hyenas, vultures down to the blue flies of the Palestinians' will pour in to feed. May G-d damn their eyes for all eternity. Emanuel Winston is a commentator and Middle East analyst. His articles appear often on Think-Israel, Gamla (http://gamla.org.il/english) and the Freeman Center for Strategic Studies (http://www.freeman.org/online.htm) To Go To Top

STAUNCHLY ANTI-ISRAEL Posted by David Basch, April 29, 2004.

"Traditional Israelis should not fool themselves about what is taking place. The shots that Sharon is firing are directed at the heart of Jewish Israel..." "The fortified and militarily supplied Gaza that Sharon will be creating, ... like Iraq, will have become the magnet for Muslim fighters worldwide...." "It is doubly exasperating that Sharon claims that Israel will be "tougher on the Arabs" after such a surrender.... Israel could be just as tough right now in responding to savage, beastly, Arab attacks and with the same results on world opinion...." It is disappointing to learn that some of the most staunchly anti-Israel forces in the world are none other than Sharon and his government. Sharon not only proposes to ethnically cleanse Jews from their homes and lands but he is engaged as a fervent supporter of Arab propaganda against Israel and as a slanderer of Israel. In Sharon's eyes, Israel is an "occupier" of Arab territory, though the territory Israel holds is the very territory set aside by the Mandate of Palestine for a Jewish homeland. It is not necessary now to go into all the reasons again as to why it is Israel that holds full claim to her lands against the fraudulently made Arab claims to them and to a national existence and history that never was. Sharon, sworn to falsehood, knows all this and is yet surrendering to the Arabs. With Israeli government support of the false claims of the Arabs, is it any wonder that universally everyone, including Diaspora Jews, takes the part of the Arabs in the Arab attempt to steal the heritage of the Jewish people in Israel? Mind you, Sharon does not state that Israel must withdraw from the Gaza territory because of military necessity -- which would be false anyway -- but he declares that otherwise Israel would be occupying Arab territory. What a slander!!! For Sharon's information, not only is there not such a thing as "Arab land" separate from that held by a bonifide Arab nation -- and the motley of Arabs in Israel's territories never in history was a nation -- to the Arabs ALL OF ISRAEL is "occupied Arab territory," a designation that the Arabs hold a priori as Muslim-Arabs and as counter to the categories of history. Thus, Arab views will not change one iota no matter what surrenders Sharon offers until the vanishing of Israel. Sharon ought to know by now that Arab determination to destroy Israel is a constant and that Israel must not to give this enemy any advantage that can be used in pursuing his goal. It is doubly exasperating that Sharon claims that Israel will be "tougher on the Arabs" after such a surrender. The fact is that Israel could be just as tough right now in responding to savage, beastly, Arab attacks and with the same results on world opinion. But the gains for Israel in responding in a firm way, right now, would be that Israelis would know that they fights for what belongs to the nation against those who will not acknowledge this right and that Israel will be undertaking such battles at a time that the Arabs will not be enjoying the enhanced military conditions of a fortified and militarily supplied Gaza that Sharon will be creating, which, like Iraq, will have become the magnet for Muslim fighters worldwide. It is clear to see that the Gaza surrender of land and the ethnic self-cleansing of Jews constitute solid defeats for Israel and her claims in the land of Israel. The Arabs will use this new gain to further bolster their falsely made claims as phony, "historic Palestinians" to demand the heritage of the Jewish people, including what the Arabs call their own, exclusive historic Jerusalem. It is a bad situation made worse by an Israel that insists on shooting itself in the foot. Traditional Israelis should not fool themselves about what is taking place. The shots that Sharon is firing are directed at the heart of Jewish Israel. It shows his contempt for the Judaism of Jewish Israel in the name of a half-baked universalism that is only universal in its hatred of Judaism. This must weaken the fabric of Israel and Israel's claims to world support of Jewry and its supporters on that account. For if Israel is in business for itself as "israel" with small letter "I" and is not the hope of the Jewish people and its heritage, what is it? A secular, Hebrew speaking version of Cuba is a thing unto itself and will reap the harvest of its actions like all nations of history, many of which having vanished into the dust-bin of history. What is to be done? In a nation in which general strikes go on paralyzing the country for what appear to the outside as trivial matters of a few bucks in salary raises, how is it that the traditional Jews of Israel cannot mount a national strike to shut down Israeli operations for the sake of the cause of Jewish Israel and its lands and communities? If the traditional sectors of Israel fail at this time to halt the despicable Sharon policy of turning against the Jewish people, they will be admitting to the ineptitude and incapability of their sector of society, as though being traditionally Jewish incapacitates Israelis in holding power and in influencing their society. It was bad enough that this sector could not in 50 years turn out a credible national leader -- the one that did emerge was roundly delegitimized and dismissed -- but it will have shown that the interests of this portion of traditional Israeli society could be summarily dismissed without consequences to those who flout them. Such a situation of traditional political paralysis should not go on for a day longer. Leftist Israel has for the past decades been in obsessive support of an incompetent and delusional Universalist philosophy that has empowered the Arab enemy. A glance at the record reveals the leftist ineptitude -- if not madness -- that has misread the character of the enemy, failing to see that this Arab enemy is implacably devoted to Israel's destruction. How else but as madness can one interpret the Israeli surrender to a defeated and exiled Arab enemy that was then brought in to inherit Jewish lands? Surely we deal with rank Leftist madness, which madness is even greater than anyone could anticipate since the Leftists have shown themselves incapable of learning from this history. How long will traditional Israel suffer such Leftist enemies of the nation to hold sway in the land without hearing from a solid, separate, traditional political party that finally acts in its own name? To Go To Top

GAZA, SHOMRON "DISENGAGEMENT" LACKS ANY THREAD OF LOGIC Posted by Moshe Burt, April 29, 2004.

By his renewed threats upon Arafat, on the heels of the assassinations of the two Hamas leaders, Arik Sharon has exposed the inconsistencies, contradictions and irrationality of his proposed disengagement and withdrawal from Gaza and from chunk of the Shomron in conclusive, unequivocal terms. And the argument against such a "disengagement" has been helped immeasurably by comments and clarifications made by none other than the administration of US President Gerorge W. Bush. When Prime Minister Sharon stated that "he no longer feels bound by a pledge he made three years ago to US President George W. Bush not to harm Yasser Arafat", he has blown his own arguments and logic to smitherines regarding American "promises" being rescinded if his dismantlement of Gaza and a chunk of the Shomron are not approved in the upcoming Likud referrendum. For if he were sooo concerned about possible cancellation of Bush's "committments or promises", why would he have spoken in a provocative way just now, mere days before the Likud referendum vote, as to perhaps anger or upset the Bush administration? By his own gaffe, Arik Sharon may have IY'H hammered yet another nail into the Disengagement coffin. That is unless Yosef Q. Likudnik can't grasp and sort out all of the lies, deception, contradiction, inconsistency and lack of coherence which is passed off as nice sounding platitudes designed to deceive and lull the masses into false complacency. And his! comments have all of the markings of desperate politician -- desperate to stay in office and out of court. Prime Minister Sharon returned to Israel, Neville Chamberlain-style, only missing the Chamberlain walking stick, clutching in hand his precious letter from President Bush. And they have heralded, as I've already seen written in one Israeli English-speaking newspaper, how "President Bush has once again rescued Israel in it's hour of need"; from a crisis she (Israel) manufactured herself. The Sharon letter alludes to Ambassador Kurzner's jurisdiction in defining "the construction line of each of the settlements." But now it is emerging that Sharon's heralded promises from President Bush, in his letter to Sharon, are merely "suggestions and observations", in the words of an unnamed State Department spokesperson. Consider the words of US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, who said in a report published in one of Israel's English-speaking newspapers, that Bush's position on the diplomatic process "'is unchanged," and that he (President Bush) is "committed to the proposition that all final settlement issues have to be resolved between the two parties" and that the United States is committed to the welfare, benefit, and the hopes and dreams and aspirations of the Arab nations, and especially the hopes and dreams and aspirations of the Palestinian people." Further, the report stated that "On the one hand Bush said it is unrealistic that Israel will be asked to return to the 1949 armistice lines, or that Palestinian refugees would be repatriated to Israel, yet on the other hand he said these are final status issues that will have to be negotiated by the sides. " This means the same old "Prim Rose Lane" of Arab demands followed by American pressure followed by the complaince of Israeli political grasshoppers. And we note how the words of Colin Powell and an unnamed State Department spokesperson closely resemble the words of former Clinton Middle East Envoy, Dennis Ross who wrote in an article entitled "Why are the Palestinians so worried?" for the Los Angeles Times " that although the US might have an opinion on the subject, there can be no final borders drawn without Palestinian approval. Palestinians will be free to insist on arrangements, including territorial compensation, to make a final agreement acceptable to them. Similarly, Bush expressed his belief that a 'just, fair, and realistic' solution would require refugees to be settled in a future Palestinian state rather than in Israel - but he never suggested that there should not be negotiations on the subject. His statement, which frankly reflects a reality that many people on both sides acknowledge privately, is simply an American judgment on the direction those talks should take. In that sense, it is similar to Bush's earlier call for an independent Palestinian state - not American policy prior to this administration - which reflected his belief that there would be no solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict without the creation of such a state. " Just what has brought about this "crisis" and this evil decree of a conniving, hard-hearted Prime Minister? Was it the result of immense pressure from Washington, or any other external source? Heck no. The American government has been involved up to it's eyeballs in an election campaign, in the War in Iraq and in trying to secure her military in Iraq against rebellion, bombings, lynchings, etc. There was no desire at present, on the part of the Bush Administration, for deep involvement in another huge tinder box -- the 56 year old Israeli/Arab conflict. That's if one assumes that should an American President demand, Israel must jump "how high?" That's if one has no divine connection with HaKadosh Borchu and assumes therefore, that a President Bush (or whoever occupies the Oval Office) is the ultimate force rather than Shemayim. But, alas Arik Sharon has awakened a sleeping lion. There was no pressure brought by America in the 1990's after Gulf War to force Israel into an Oslo-type accord. But America was all too happy to bring about a signing and photo ops on the White House Lawn. Yitzhak Rabin obm and the entire B'nai Yisrael were snuckered and manipulated by the Labor/Meretz troika of Peres, Beilin and Sarid who were working, and continue to do so, on behalf of their own self-interests (more often than not counter to Israel's national interest). This evil troika has long sought nothing short of uprooting Jews from their homes -- from Our Land, in Gush Katif, then in parts of Yehuda and Shomron, eventually throughout Eretz Yisrael. In their blind hate of Hashem and Yiddishkeit, this troika has tirelessly sought the separation of Israel from it's Jewish history, it's meaning and heritage, it's traditions and it's divine legacy. They have defamed Hashem and The Land of Israel at the cost of Jewish blood, the loss of hundreds of Jewish lives, the loss of Jewish identity and pride and loss of reason for being in and connection with The land of Israel at the cost of Jewish blood, loss of hundreds of Jewish lives, the loss of Jewish identity, pride and self-esteem. So, a decade later, what brought about today's Sharon-orchestrated crisis, this "hour of need" from which Israel had to be "rescued" by President Bush? Was it an armed military invasion or a Mega-Pigu'a from which Israel was compelled to surrender, sue for a cease-fire at any cost? As the late American comedian of John Belushi of "Saturday Night" used to say Nooooo!! Heaven-forbid!! What brought about this orchestrated crisis was the self-interest and continued prestige of one man -- Arik Sharon, who, in his arrogance and egomania, will do ANYTHING to retain the office of Prime Minister and avoid prosecution as alledged accomplice to the alledged graft and corruption of his sons. For, as everyone knows, while the Left does not constitute the current governing majority, in reality the Left controls all of the institutions which run Israel, including Justice and the Supreme Court. And Prime Minister Sharon knows that the institutional power of the Israeli Left can either see him brought to trial for these allegations, thus forcing him from office or can continue his tenure of power; his continued self-interest, self-aggrandizement, vested interests, preservation of his political power and influence by Labor's joining the government following possible resignations by the National Union and/or Mafdal. In his arrogance and spiritual or moral disease, Arik Sharon chooses President Bush, Shimon Peres, etc. rather than choosing Emunah in Hashem, the unity of B'nai Yisrael and the kedusha of Eretz Yisrael. Once again we hear echos of Rabin's Yehiyeh B'Seder as the playout of Oslo threatens yet a worse replay. Sharon seems truly desperate, because court may be exactly where he falls if the referendum fails, if Peres and company no longer have use for him and if the Attorney General files suit in court against the Prime Minister and his sons on alledged corruption, graft and influence-peddling charges. I won't speak here about the basis of our Biblical connection with Gush Katif as part of Eretz Yisrael, but rather will refer readers to a recent article "Gaza Israel: Our Halacha, Our History, Our Security are Tied to Gush Katif" by Menachem Kovacs (It's a feature article in this issue. See http://www.think-israel.org/kovcs.gushkatif.com.) Why did this Prime Minister and his corrupt advisors run to the super-power, to the very tip of the bosom of the annual US aid to Israel fix in effort to create a fait accompli to compell his program? Why? Why has this Prime Minister created artificial, false arguments and double-talk which hold no water, are totally inconsistent, contradictory and totally lacking in coherence, but which sound nice and serve to deceive and lull the masses into further false complacency? Why has he opportunistically undertaken targeted assassinations of Hamas leaders just now, in the midst of this whole "disengagement" affair, if not to divert the people's attention from the abandonment of Jewish land? And why, amongst his senior Ministers, are there no profiles in courage to stand up and call it like it is, to call a spade a spade? How, for instance, can the Prime Minister and his advisors assert that once we "disengage" from Gaza, the weapons smuggling will halt permanently? And how can he claim that by putting the "Philadelphi corridor" under Egyptian control that infiltrations by land and sea will cease? How will Israel defend herself from future attacks and Pigu'im and take retribution for them when they occur without first running to Washington to ask permission? And how can he now refute his own arguments of past years concerning the strategic necessity of Shomron towns such as Homesh? How does Prime Minister Sharon explain the abrogation of Israel's national sovereignty inherent in his letter to President Bush, in essence, ratifying American Ambassador Kurzner as a defacto "governor" over Israel with "yea or nea" power over construction in Eretz Yisrael? How can we measure the losses, in infrastructure investment, in personal investment and sweat equity of Gaza residents and affected Shomron residents in the four towns slated for dismantlement? How do we measure the collective scars, the loss of self-pride, self-esteem and Jewish self-pride and esteem and the massive decline in the national morale of B'nai Yisrael should, chas v'shalom, a part our legacy become Yudenrein? No matter how one slices the bread, Prime Minister Sharon, Defense Minister Mofaz, OC Intelligence Maj.-Gen. Aharon Ze'evi, etc. all come off as serial liars. No profiles in courage here, just perpetuation of the Oslo mentality dressed in sightly different clothing as Jewish blood continues to flow, that Arik Sharon perpetuates his hold on the office of Prime Minister. I challenge Prime Minister Sharon, Deputy Prime Minister Olmert, Bibi, Limor Livnat and the other Likud politicians favoring this abomination to give the B'nai Yisrael clear, full, consistent, concise, cogent answers to all of the above questions concerning the "disengagement" from Gaza and from part of the Shomron. Odds are, they can't. Moshe Burt, an Oleh, is a commentator on news and events in Israel and Founder and Director of the Sefer Torah Recycling Network (http://www.sefer-torah.com). He lives in Ramat Beit Shemesh. To Go To Top

WHY LIKUD VOTERS MUST REJECT SURRENDER TO TERRORISM Posted by Bernard J. Shapiro, April 29, 2004.

There are many reasons Likud voters should reject PM Ariel Sharon's plan to surrender Gaza to terrorist Arabs and expel its peaceful productive Jewish residents. I have broken these reasons into three categories: moral, strategic and security. Also I will discuss the fact that U.S. President George Bush's commitments to Sharon have no practical value and are of little more than "smoke and mirrors" to cover up a flawed plan. Then I will review the guarantees Israel has given Bush to achieve these delusions. When you look at the whole picture, I believe you will agree that all Likud members should vote a resounding NO against this surrender to terrorism plan. MORAL 1. The expulsion of Jews from Gaza is no different from the expulsion of Jews from any country. This includes the expulsions from Israel by the Romans, Assyrians and Babylonians. In Europe Spain, England, Germany, France, Poland and Russia drove Jews from their homes of many centuries. That Jews should be expelled from Eretz Yisrael by a Jewish government makes it all the more morally reprehensible. 2. Gaza is clearly a part of the Holy Land given by G-d to Abraham for the Jewish People in perpetuity. Sharon has no right to take it upon himself to divest all of us of our inheritance. 3. Sharon claims that the removal of Jews from Gaza would strengthen Israel's ability to protect other Jews. This goes against all Torah principles which state that it is wrong to sacrifice one Jew to save another. 4. One of the greatest moral flaws is the attempt to stifle debate on this crucial decision for the future of Israel. Sharon has refused to debate the issue. The media presents only one side, that of retreat. Israeli politicians are blackmailed into thinking that to go against Sharon's surrender the United States would be upset (which it would not). 5. Surrender to terrorism will embolden it and increase the killing worldwide and not just in Israel. STRATEGIC Gaza has always been strategically important. Throughout history it has been the route of invasion from North Africa into Israel and beyond. Egypt has used Gaza to attack Israel during warfare and with terrorism since before the State of Israel was declared. Jutting like a finger into the heart of Israel it sits only 40 miles from Tel Aviv. Rockets and missiles from Gaza, after retreat, will certainly hit Israeli population centers. Already the strategic port of Ashdod has been struck and most areas in the Negev will become front line communities. Worse still from a strategic standpoint will be the absence of good intelligence on the ground in Gaza. This will make impossible the targeted assassinations of terrorist leaders. It will also create a safe haven for the terrorists to do research and development on advanced weapon systems like missiles capable of carrying biological or chemical warheads. SECURITY Israelis are being promised security by leaving Gaza. Unfortunately this will not be the case for a number of reason: 1. Arabs will still enter Israel to work and a certain number will be homicide bombers. 2. The Gaza fence will not be a perfect barrier to infiltration of terrorists into Israel. With the increased motivation resulting from Israeli retreat, they will seek new innovative ways to cross the barrier. For example, their success in building tunnels into Gaza will be re-directed to tunneling into the Negev from Sinai or directly under the fence. 3. Israelis should expect the terrorists to place greater emphasis on involving Israeli Arabs in acts and support of terrorism. There will be no let up in the terrorist pressure despite assurance that leaving Gaza will have beneficial effects. PRESIDENTIAL DECLARATIONS - Are They Binding? Yoram Ettinger recently published a list of American commitments from history that have proven how worthless those promises were "when push came to shove." We should certainly not rely on American promises in our decision to vacate strategic territory and compromise or moral values and security interests. Here is his list of infamy: FACT: According to the US Constitution, no presidential declaration/promise is binding without a Congressional legislation or ratification. FACT: President Bush's statements (Apr. 7, 2004) on the "1967 Lines" and the "Claim of Return" are not binding. He did not oppose the "claim of return", did not recognize Israel's sovereignty over major settlement blocks in Judea & Samaria, and did not support Israel's sovereignty beyond the "1967 Lines." Presidents Johnson and Reagan stated (September 10, 1968 and September 1, 1982) that Israel should not be expected to withdraw to the "1967 Lines", but it has not prevented their successors - and did not prevent them - to expect such a withdrawal. FACT: President Clinton committed (in 2000) $800MN to Israel, to induce a withdrawal from So. Lebanon. Israel withdrew, Palestinian terrorism escalated, but the committed assistance has not been extended. FACT: Saudi F-15s are stationed at Tabuq, south of Eilat, threatening Israel, in defiance of President Reagan's 1981 commitment to Congress and to Israel. FACT: President Bush promised (in 1991) to direct 30% of US bombing to Western Iraq, in order to destroy the Scud missile launchers, dissuading Israel from a preemptive offensive against Iraq. However, only 3% of the bombing were directed at W. Iraq, the launchers were not destroyed, but Israel was hit in its Soft Belly. FACT: President Nixon committed (in 1970) the US to oppose the deployment of missiles, by Egypt, toward Sinai. Missiles were deployed, Israeli complaints were ignored by the US, and the 1973 War erupted taxing Israel with 2,800 fatalities (more than 100,000 in US terms). FACT: President Eisenhower issued (in 1957) Executive commitments to Israel, in return for a full withdrawal from Sinai. In 1967, Egypt violated the agreement with the US and Israel, the Egypt-Syria-Jordan axis tightened around Israel, President Johnson did not implement the 1957 commitments, which paved the road to the Six Days War. FACT: Presidential candidate Bush made a commitment (in 2000) to relocate the US embassy to Jerusalem. In 2004, the embassy is still located in Tel Aviv. Presidential Commitments - The Limits FACT: According to the US Constitution, international treaties and commitments assumed by the president must be ratified by 2/3 of the Senate, in order to be constitutionally binding. FACT: According to the US Constitution, the Power of the Purse is on Capitol Hill. No presidential financial commitment stands, unless legislated by Congress (which is constrained by rigid budget caps). FACT: According to the US Constitution, the president and/or Congress can rescind any international commitment by issuing an Executive Order and/or by a congressional vote. FACT: A President may bypass Congress by Executive Agreements and Executive Orders, which could be rescinded by the president, by his successors and by Congress. FACT: US international commitments (including NATO) are characterized by ambiguity, lack of specificity and by the absence of automaticity of implementation, in order to preserve the interests of the US (rather than the interest of other countries). THE BOTTOM LINE: The contention that presidential declarations/promises are carved in stone reflects misunderstanding of the US democracy, a dangerous delusion and ignorance of precedents, which have taxed Israel severely. In return for an ambiguous, non-specific presidential declaration - devoid of an automatic trigger - Israel is expected to carry out a specific, certain and tangible retreat, which would constitute - according to Israel's Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (Dec. 3, 2003) - a tail wind to Palestinian terrorism. ISRAEL'S COMMITMENTS TO BUSH Israel made many commitments to Bush which greatly limit Israel's sovereignty and its ability to act in its national interests. Some of them are listed below: 1. No settlement growth beyond the limits placed on Israel by the Americans. US Ambassador Kurtzer, who has a pro-Arab bias, will determine those limits. 2. Removal of unauthorized outposts. The list of such outposts will be presented to Ambassador Kurtzer within 30 days. 3. Palestinian revenues should be dispersed. This matter is pending in various courts of law in Israel, awaiting judicial decisions. 4. The Israeli government remains committed to the two-state solution - Israel and Palestine living side by side in peace and security - as the key to peace in the Middle East. 5. The Israeli government remains committed to the road map as the only route to achieving the two-state solution. 6. The Government of Israel supports the United States' efforts to reform the Palestinian security services to meet their road map obligations to fight terror. Israel also supports the American efforts, working with the international community, to promote the reform process, build institutions, and improve the economy of the Palestinian Authority and to enhance the welfare of its people, in the hope that a new Palestinian leadership will prove able to fulfill its obligations under the road map. The Israeli Government will take all reasonable actions requested by these parties to facilitate these efforts. [This is the most ridiculous of commitments. Can you train terrorists to fight terrorism?] THE BOTTOM LINE I hope the Likud voters will review carefully the material presented here. I believe there is an overwhelming case for voting no on the surrender referendum for moral, strategic and security reasons. And also, the commitments of Bush and Sharon do nothing to change the realities on the ground and we should be wary of falling for "nice words" that mask the real issues. The future of Israel is in your hands now, please do the responsible thing. Bernard J. Shapiro is the executive director of the Freeman Center For Strategic Studies (http://www.freeman.org) and the editor its monthly Internet magazine, THE MACCABEAN ONLINE. To Go To Top

THE EURO-MAN COMETH? Posted by David Vance, April 29, 2004.

Israel's assassination of Hamas terrorist leader Adbed aziz al-Rantissi earned the predictable scorn of the Euro-men, and the gratitude of the rest of us. Listening to the chorus of horrified outrage from European politicians greeting the news that Israel successfully killed Hamas terrorist leader Abdel aziz al-Rantissi, one could be forgiven for thinking that it had been these liberals' patron saint, Kofi Annan, which Israel had somehow targeted! British Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, summed up the views of the Euro-sheep when he bleated, "The British government has made it repeatedly clear that so-called targeted assassinations of this kind are unlawful, unjustified and counter-productive." This echoes similar sentiments he expressed on the occasion of the death of Sheikh Yassin. Then Straw informed Israel that "it is unacceptable, it is unjustified and it is very unlikely to achieve its? objectives." Straw is the archetypical Euro-man. Opposed to terrorism in theory, in practice he does all he can do pacify and appease it. Like most dripping wet liberals, Straw has never met a terrorist that he did not want to engage with. He shares the deep-seated illusion with others of his kind that terrorists can somehow be persuaded to turn away from their murderous path by a winning combination of "inclusive dialogue" and a sympathetic "reaching out." Those who have experienced the cutting edge of terrorism know that this laughable notion could not be more far-fetched. Terrorists deal exclusively in fear, mayhem and death, and they only understand resolute political will and crushing military strength. And yet the most cursory consideration of the current realities also confounds Straw's inane comments. For a start, killing all terrorist masterminds is obviously entirely justified and also highly productive. Who, after all, is Jack Straw to tell Israel what is lawful and what is not? Is he the new Moses? From whence does he derive his moral imprimatur? Has Straw noticed, for example, that Sheikh Yassin has not been unable to plan terror strikes in the past month and that now Rantissi has joined him in a period of eternal inactivity! How many innocent lives have been saved by the removal from planet Earth of these malignant killers? The cowards in Hamas now refuse to even name whoever has succeeded Rantissi because they now know the fiery fate that will befall such a person. That's further proof that terrorists do understand force. In summary, killing certain terrorists is a necessary step for a country determined to defend its citizens. The only issue under discussion should be how many and how quickly these terrorist war-lords can be taken out. But back in Euro-land there is only blank incomprehension at this. The crunch issue for all these straw men is that they cannot bring themselves to accept that Hamas really is a bloody "terrorist" organization. Equivocation has entered the very soul of this political class and rendered it incapable of distinguishing between right and wrong. We saw this manifest in their desire to keep Saddam in power and we see it most recently in the result of the Spanish election, when left-winger Jose Zapatero cruised to power on the back of his pathetic pleading for al Qu'eda to please leave his country alone. Thus the likes of the late unlamented Sheikh Yassin are portrayed as "deeply spiritual" men whose only crime was to be Palestinian. The Euro-media conspire in this nauseating fantasy through the repeated description of Hamas members as either "militants" or "activists." The "t" for terrorist word is never mentioned! This nuanced evasion instills the idea that somehow machine-gun toting Hamas thugs seeking to indiscriminately slaughter Israeli men women and children are a legitimate counter to the IDF. Welcome to the land of the Euro-man! By killing the terrorist Rantissi, Israel has done a great service to true democrats everywhere. It has shown that there is at least one nation outside of the United States that fully understands that terrorists must be brought to justice or justice visited upon them. It has demonstrated, once again, that it is a moral beacon in the darkness of the Middle East. For that, it earns the predicable scorn of the Euro-men and the gratitude of the rest of us. David Vance, an economist by qualification and successful UK businessman, has been actively campaigning against the decline in political standards in the United Kingdom. Living in Northern Ireland he has been prominent in opposing all forms of terrorism and is a fierce critic of the British government and its appeasement of terrorists. He has been writing political commentary for a number of years and has been published throughout the UK, Israel, Gibraltar and recently the USA. His website, A Tangled Web, takes issue with the leftist political elite and seeks to promote the upholding of conservative values and the nation state. This article was published in Intellectual Conservative (http://www.intellectualconservative.com/article3356.html) and Opinionet (http://www.opinionet.com) He can be reached by email at d.vance1@btopenworld.com To Go To Top

DON'T KILL ARAFAT: A REAL SOLUTION Posted by Irwin N. Graulich, April 29, 2004.

A promise is a promise. If Ariel Sharon indeed gave his scout's honor to President Bush not to kill "the inventor of modern terrorism," then Sharon must surely keep his word and continue to protect Arafat. Is it worth the effort to rid the world of this "architect of modern terror," when Israel already has him under virtual house arrest? Although the word is that he will become a "great martyr" in death, who was the last political leader killed who actually attained such an elite status? The Islamic world has quickly forgotten martyred leaders with names like Nidal, Al-Makadmah, al Qassam, Karmi, Shikalki, Sali, Uday and Quasay, the dead al Qaeda leaders, et al, who have merely become part of "the garbage heap of history." The only terrorists whose pictures and memories are still paraded throughout the fundamentalist Middle East and beyond are the likes of Barghouti, Saddam and bin Laden. It is precisely because these "heroes" are still alive that they are considered martyrs. Attention George Bush and all other Western leaders who love democracy, goodness and freedom. You have it all wrong. "Kill the martyr and you destroy the martyrdom!" Much of Europe and the American left is actually afraid of the Arab/Muslim street and its reaction, because their primary concern is not right and wrong. It is keeping angry, irrational people calm, so that they will not burn our flags or threaten us with terrorism. The liberal/left mentality wants to be "loved," or at least liked, while sitting in coffee shops discussing Marx, Nietzsche and Heidegger. It is much more important for the Islamic world to fear us. Why should anyone even care about being liked by people with such horrendous values. If winning over their passions means caving into decency, why bother? It should be so obvious that highly moral nations should support a tiny democracy called Israel over nations that are totalitarian, autocratic, consider women chattel, suppress all other religions, lie in their press, imprison and kill homosexuals, and seem to be naturally anti-American and antisemitic. The world must not treat both sides equally, when one side is so very wrong and morally corrupt. Support of the Jewish State seems obvious to George W. Bush, but difficult for the likes of Jacques Chirac, Gerhart Schroeder, much of the EU and most Scandinavian countries. Although Churchill and Roosevelt are spinning in their graves, Hitler is probably re-saluting the French and their followers amidst the flames of hell. So how does Israel honor a promise and still do the right thing? How about this for an innovative, non-military, compassionate solution. Don't kill Arafat; capture him. Send a special forces IDF team with their stun grenades and seizure tactics to snatch Yasser for trial. The creative part of the solution would be his unique detention facility. Since the world will be watching this case more carefully than the Nuremberg Trials, Israel must keep the good Chairman in a totally open environment. Otherwise, the pr savvy PA will take a page from the fictitious "Jenin Massacre" playbook and invent some new Israeli torture tactics performed on this poor old "innocent" man. Therefore, Israel must select the largest, most comfortable lion's cage, which would be set up in the lovely Tel Aviv Zoo, so that Mr. Arafat gets a nice view and continuous fresh air. This open air pen with steel bars and "a fence" in front of it, would contain a complete office and sleeping quarters, so that the world can witness his wonderful treatment. With a minimum of 100 cable tv channels including al-Jazeera and a high speed cable modem, his amenities would certainly be a whole lot better than any captured Israeli has ever received, or for that matter any person jailed in an Arab country. The PA leader could meet in full public view with his sophisticated French attorney, Jacques Verges, on the way to meeting his other "moral" client, Saddam Hussein. Human Rights Watch and the ACLU could be stationed there 24 hours a day to insure proper treatment under international law. This brand new incarceration scenario is not just some clever emotional fantasy or satirical editorial suggestion. It is a very real, well thought out solution to allow an overly concerned world the ability to monitor Israel's actions. It remains a mystery why the UN and most countries never seem to be distressed about the genocide in the Sudan or Rwanda, the death squads in Syria and Iran, the human rights abuses in North Korea and China, etc. Nevertheless, Chirac, Schroeder and Kofi Anan will be overjoyed to learn that the Palestinian "leader" will be getting his 3 decent square meals a day. In addition, think of all the fresh fruits, vegetables and candy bars that many concerned visitors will bring to toss into his "special facility" with love. Imagine what this idea will do for the Israeli tourism industry? The man who was most responsible for destroying visits to the Holy Land would now be instrumental in "resurrecting" it. This area definitely needs another resurrection, the way things are going! How many millions of additional visitors will come to view this spectacle in support or opposition? Zoo admissions alone would probably create a new GNP category. Hotels and restaurants would be filled once again with people who wish to see this new "wonder of the world," the so-called freedom fighter who somehow refuses to die. A man who has spent his entire career leading a people into oblivion and receiving the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts. After 40 years of Arafat's leadership, the "state" of Palestinians is actually quite horrendous. Obviously, many concerned citizens, especially intellectuals, will question the ethics of this new "zoo prison," and whether it is appropriate for a decent, moral democracy to use such methods for holding terrorist leaders. However, there is a deep sociological and societal response. Terrorists are a special category of non human species. They may look like us, but they are actually a new monstrous breed with human characteristics. Even animals want to live and do not send their children to die purposely. Therefore, Arafat, bin Laden, Rantisi, Yassin and their herd are a new life form that is actually much lower than the animal kingdom. The purpose of a zoo is to display all non human species and creatures for humanity to study. Perhaps we can learn why they seek to blow up babies in pizza parlors, slit stewardesses throats, run airplanes into office buildings filled with innocent people trying to make a living, all for a phony cause that they deem to be right. What President Bush does not understand about Iraq, and Prime Minister Sharon never seems to grasp about the Arab world, is that the key to winning is not only military success. It has virtually nothing to do with an intellectual battle for their hearts and minds. It has everything to do with a totally decisive military victory, so that every enemy of America or Israel feels the pain and fear, and is ultimately grateful for the freedom given by the victor. Secondly, and perhaps even important, is creating a feeling of humiliation, the most frightening emotion in the Arab/Muslim lexicon. Much of the Islamic Middle East would rather be dead than humiliated. Only when these macho men come to live by American Judeo-Christian values, which can indeed be coupled with Islam, will they begin to realize the insignificance of being the strongest, most powerful guy on the block. What is truly important is life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness....and taking your family to Disneyworld. Wake up President Bush. The Bronx Zoo has some room for Saddam! Irwin N. Graulich is a motivational speaker on politics, ethics, religion and Judaism. He is also president of a marketing, branding and communications firm in New York City. To Go To Top

THE AMERICAN JEWISH CONGRESS Posted by David Ben-Ariel, April 29, 2004.

"The spread of radical Islamic fundamentalism both here and abroad has brought us face to face with a new wave of violent anti-Semitism" - so read the American Jewish Congress Response Form I received, with appeals for contributions. I didn't check $50 or $500, but made my contribution with an asterix in Other, followed with my priceless offer and plea: Solution: 1) Let every Jew make aliyah to the Jewish Homeland and 2) Let Israel REMOVE THE THREAT of Arab terrorism, as taught by Moses and Rabbi Kahana, that they may become holy before G-d in the safe haven of Israel. Anti-Semitism ought to be condemned everywhere, but how can Jews have the chutzpah to ask other nations to do what the Jewish Homeland won't even do for themselves? This has got to change! Will you help it change, or just continue to whine and dine while the stormclouds of another Holocaust, ignited by the fascist EU, cast their dark shadows across the continent? For Zion's Sake David Ben-Ariel is author of "Beyond Babylon: Europe's Rise and Fall". See http://www.benariel.com. To Go To Top

THE LIKUD REFERENDUM Posted by Manhigut Yehudit, April 29, 2004.

This Sunday we will all have a golden opportunity to bring an end to the bloody Oslo decade. The central issue in question is not the fate of Gush Katif but that of all Israeli citizens. A clear decision by the ruling party against the destruction of Gush Katif means a deathblow to the Oslo process. You don't have to read the small print of the disengagement plan to understand that it is the direct continuation of the process of hatred for the land and those settling it, a reward for the murderers of Jews, a denial of the justice of our very existence here, and intensification of the processes of collapse and death that we have brought upon ourselves in the last decade. If the ruling party, the Likud, rejects this bad plan, no future leader (who will naturally come from this party) will dare to propose such ideas. It means the saving of the lives of tens of thousands of Israelis, in Tel Aviv, Haifa, Hadera, and everywhere in the country. Consequently this Sunday must be for everyone a day devoted to a struggle for life. Not everyone in Tel Aviv understands this, but this does not absolve us, the belief-based, realistic public, from responsibility for the lives and fate of all the Jews. Those who plan to go to work as usual on Sunday fail to realize that on that day we are fighting for our lives and that everyone has a task in order to continue to the victory: * Take a day off from work and come to the Likud voting booths near where you live. * Large crowds who stand near the booths throughout the day and demonstrate (in an orderly manner) against the disengagement plan will influence the floating voters, and will cause supporters of the plan to think again. * If there are already enough people at your nearby polling station, volunteer to stand outside other booths. We have a great problem with voting booths in the Arab sector. The family-controlled political machine arranged the voting booths inside the homes of their supporters. We need volunteers to create a presence there, as well as in kibbutzim and remote places. Please call 03-7415849 and be assigned a place. * Volunteer to transport people in your car. Even in Yesha there is a problem of voters who have changed their address without updating the Likud, and of soldiers who can only receive a few hours' leave to go and vote and then return to their units. Please call 1-800-260-240 to be added to the list of volunteers. * Continue to persuade Likudniks until the last moment - this is effective! Return to those you have already visited, and encourage them. Maintain contact with them even after the referendum. And when you've done everything you can, pray to our Father in Heaven. Pray that in this referendum the Jewish people will win. With G-d's help we will all hear on Sunday night the good news that the Jewish people chose to be loyal to their country and not to reject its Jewish identity. If this happens we shall all go at once to Jerusalem and at the foot of the Temple Mount we shall express thanksgiving to the Creator. We shall meet at the entrance to the Kotel Plaza. Our aim: To perfect the world in the kingdom of the Almighty Please help us expand Manhigut Yehudit's membership list. Send our updates to your list as well. Manhigut Yehudit (Jewish Leadership) is a group of people inside the Likud party who want to see Israel adopt a more Jewish character. Moshe Feiglin, cofounder, has emphatically said he does not want a theocracy, but he does want a State based on Jewish values. The Manhigut Yehudit website address is http://www.manhigut.org. To Go To Top

SENSE, SENSIBILITIES AND NONSENCE Posted by Ellen W. Horowitz, April 29, 2004.

Rumors are rife. A no-vote could mean an end to the Likud party, an end to Sharon's reign, and an embarrassment for President Bush and Prime Minister Blair. It could also spell an end to the UN and the G4's plans for the region. There would be harsh diplomatic, economic and security repercussions. The peace process could be left in shambles. The sky would fall and the stocks would crash. And yet I remain unmoved. The people of Israel have been saturated with political shenanigans, nonsense and negligence, and a good number of us have reached our limits. None of Ariel Sharon's bloated, scheming and meaningless doomsday scenarios touches us like the thought of uprooting even one Jewish community in the Land of Israel. Nothing repels our senses more than the sickening grin that would cross Arafat's face if this were to, G-d forbid, come to pass. Perhaps you were one of the fortunate ones to sense the breath of fresh air that blew in as you answered your door these past two weeks and were greeted by an authentic group of rootin', tootin' settlers. That strange, yet somewhat familiar sensation you felt as you conversed with them was a sense of clarity. Throngs of hard-working, honest people -the salt of the earth-speaking the truth. And it all made so much sense. Sharon declared: "Anyone who believes in me must vote for the disengagement..." Maybe we don't believe in you. Maybe we believe in the those brave, determined people and everything they represent. A lot of us are beginning to ask, is the enemy so formidable or is it our leadership that's been so weak? I mean the paralyzed Yassin and trembling Arafat hardly qualify as Goliaths or Roman legions? Perhaps it's the settlers and their faith and determination that's the only bright spot in what has clearly been an embarrassing chapter for the Jewish people - a chapter that many Israelis are more than ready to close. Maybe that's why the polls are tipped on the side of justice and Sharon is in a panic. Ellen Horowitz lives in the Golan Heights, Israel with her husband and six children. She is a painter, columnist for Israelnationalnews,com and co-founder of helpingisrael..com. She can be contacted through her website http://www.artfromzion.com To Go To Top

MOVING THE GOAL POSTS Posted by Ted Belman, April 29, 2004.

This is archived a t http://israpundit.com/archives/006013.html#more Bush's letter to Sharon made two declarations as opposed to promises or commitments. The United States is strongly committed to Israel's security and well-being as a Jewish state. It seems clear that an agreed, just, fair, and realistic framework for a solution to the Palestinian refugee issue as part of any final status agreement will need to be found through the establishment of a Palestinian state, and the settling of Palestinian refugees there, rather than in Israel. As part of a final peace settlement, Israel must have secure and recognized borders, which should emerge from negotiations between the parties in accordance with UNSC Resolutions 242 and 338. In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949, and all previous efforts to negotiate a two-state solution have reached the same conclusion. It is realistic to expect that any final status agreement will only be achieved on the basis of mutually agreed changes that reflect these realities. Having written all that, both Bush and Powell went on to also assert that all issues must be settled between the parties. In an address to the UN, the US Ambassador, James B Cunningham said My government has no intention of prejudicing the outcome of permanent status negotiations. A lasting settlement can only be reached through direct negotiations and mutual agreement between the parties. The problem is that you can't have it both ways. If all issues are to be settled by direct negotiations then assurances such as these have no meaning. In fact it goes without saying that the parties to a conflict must negotiate to reach an agreement. But there is no obligation to reach an agreement and there never is. If either the "Palestinians" or the Israelis won't make the necessary concessions to reach an agreement with the other, then negotiations won't lead anywhere and there won't be a settlement of the issues. The Quartet, including the US, know this and really do not intend to allow the parties to freely negotiate because they know an agreement won't be reached. They also know that the Palestinians will never agree to less than '67 borders with mutual exchanges of land and a right of return in whole or in part of the refugees. So the Roadmap was designed with the intention of forcing Israel to make the necessary concessions. To start with, it mandated the creation of a Palestinian State that is viable and contiguous. Normally these would be matters for negotiations. They were in Oslo. So the Roadmap improves on Oslo to better the position of the "Palestinians" by requiring Israel to ensure that the state to be is "viable and contiguous". Now that Bush has suggested that there won't be a right of return or that demographic realities have to be taken into account, meaning borders other than the '67 borders, the Arabs and the EU are up in arms. They argue that these issues shouldn't be pre-judged and even go so far as to say all the land east of the '67 lines is Palestinian and cannot be taken unless they agree. Anyone can see that to make such a stipulation is to pre-judge the outcome. But that is precisely what they want. They want to start from the position that all these lands are Palestinian lands and that Israel must compensate the "Palestinians" for any it keeps. What Sharon has attempted to do, and what Bush seems to support, is to make demographic realities the starting point and not the '67 armistice lines. This is what the present controversy is all about and why it is so crucial to the whole process. If the parties could agree on the starting point or if it can be imposed on one or the other, the negotiations have a chance to succeed. Another factor that Bush stressed that mitigates against the armistice lines as the starting point is that that the borders must be secure and recognized pursuant to Res 242. Such borders are decidedly not the '67 lines. This resolution was interpreted by its framers as permitting Israel to retain some of the lands so that the resulting border would be a secure one. The Arabs and the EU are adamantly against such interpretation and they prefer, nay, insist, that the '67 lines are the starting point. The Roadmap went so far as to suggest that security for Israel would flow from a peace agreement rather than from land retention. Bush also stressed in the letter that Under the road map, "Palestinians" must undertake an immediate cessation of armed activity and all acts of violence against Israelis anywhere, and all official Palestinian institutions must end incitement against Israel. The Palestinian leadership must act decisively against terror, including sustained, targeted, and effective operations to stop terrorism and dismantle terrorist capabilities and infrastructure. Palestinians must undertake a comprehensive and fundamental political reform that includes a strong parliamentary democracy and an empowered prime minister. The Roadmap stipulates that this is to be done as part of Phase 1 but includes a number of clauses that water down this requirement. I would have preferred that Bush would have reiterated that this must be done and completed before negotiations commence. But at least it is implied. If it were insisted upon then the Palestinians would no longer be able to trade the cessation of terror and incitement for land, otherwise called "peace for land", as they would have to abandon these things before trading started. Then they would be reduced to trading land for land. And the only land available for trading is parts of Yesha. This is the direction Sharon and Bush are heading. This is also a dramatic change from previous US policy. Ever since the Six Days War, the US has taken the position that settlement activity is illegal or at least an obstacle to peace. Furthermore it has always been against unilateral moves by any party which in reality, meant by Israel. In fact the Roadmap stipulates this. This policy, I might add, has been the bain of Israel's existence. It was intended to preserve all the land for the "Palestinians". While Bush still maintains the fiction that the US is still against unilateral moves, Bush can no longer claim that the settlements are illegal or an obstacle to peace. And what I might add is wrong with unilateral moves or on what basis can such a condition be imposed on Israel? This policy was manifestly unjust to Israel and certainly pre-judged the outcome. Unfortunately Bush is still demanding that Israel cease settlement growth. This whole process starts with the assumption that the Arabs and the Israelis can live on this small piece of land in two separate states in peace and harmony once they have reached an agreement. All experience tells us that this is a pipe dream. The Arabs have shown for over one hundred years that they are not prepared to accept the existence of the state of Israel. There is absolutely nothing to suggest that they have changed their minds in this regard. Secondly to work out a sharing of air space, water and other issues necessary for two countries to coexist together in such cramped quarters is bad enough if they get along but impossible if they are enemies. Finally the state to be will never be able to absorb all the refugees and create an economy robust enough to sustain the growing population. It will forever be a basket case and a hotbed of radicalism. To create such a state is not the end of the problem but the transformation of the problem into a bigger problem. Do you think that the Arabs will be satisfied with such a state? No way. They view such a state as a stepping-stone to the destruction of Israel. It is for this reason some of them are prepared to accept such a state. Just as they didn't honour their commitments in Oslo or the Roadmap, they won't honour the commitments, which they will make as part of an end of conflict agreement. Is it too much to hope that a two state solution will ultimately be abandoned? I hope not. Ted Belman is a major contributor to the Israpundit website (http://israpundit.com). To Go To Top

BRAHIMI, BUSH APPOINTEE; UN IGNORES MOST HUMANS' RIGHTS Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 29, 2004.

BUSH APPOINTEE FOR IRAQ Pres. Bush appointed a UN official and former official of the Arab League, Lakhdar Brahimi to set up a new Iraqi government. Mr. Brahimi said he came not as representative of the UN (or of the US) but as a fellow Arab. Two years ago, he laid the deaths of a couple of hundred thousand Iraqi children at the feet of UN sanctions. He ignored the decisive evidence that the children were deprived of the plan's financial underpinning by Iraqi connivance with corrupt UN and foreign officials. The US was instrumental in promoting that plan but not in perverting it (Eli Lake, NY Sun, 12/23, p.1). The State Dept. keeps appointing Arabs who stand for what we oppose and oppose what we stand for. The US retains them on the staff until protest forces them off. UN WATCH CHIDES UN UN Watch admonished the UN for its "traditional silence over the violation of political rights in Zimbabwe, women's rights in Iran, and religious rights in China. UN Watch also berated on the floor the legitimacy of the special meeting called by the Human Rights Commission over Israel's killing Hamas chief Yassin. It is an "unending pattern of discussion by this Commission against one state." PS, the UN condemned the "tragic assassination." (What about Rantisi?) In a new strategy, UN Watch introduced to the topic of violation of human rights in occupied Arab territories, the subject of the special meeting, a brief against Syria's illegal occupation of Lebanon and repression of its freedom and human rights. The UN Commission on Human rights, however, passed no resolutions except against Israel (IMRA, 4/22). If the UN were at all decent, it would have take up the plight of the Lebanese years ago. What purpose does the UN serve? Mr. Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at ricshulman@aol.com. To Go To Top

THOUGHTS TO PONDER: THERE IS NOBODY LIKE OUR GOD/WHO IS LIKE OUR GOD? Posted by Rabbi Dr. Natan T. Lopes Cardozo, April 29, 2004.

Commentators have noted that the sequence of the famous song-prayer "Ein Keloh-enu" ("Nobody is like our God") sang at the end of the morning service is somehow odd. In this prayer we first state that there is nobody like our God and then continue and ask "Mi-Keloh-enu" ("Who is like our God?"). Would it not be more logical first to ask who is like our God and afterwards continue to state that nobody is like Him? Even more surprising is the fact that the song does not answer its own question. Nowhere throughout the song is there any answer to "Mi-Keloh-enu" ("Who is like our God?") All what one could argue is that the song answers its own question ("There is nobody like our God") before the question is posed! It seems that it is not the answer, but the question that counts. By reversing the obvious order and refusing to answer its own question, Judaism wants to make the point that the recognition of God is first of all an act of faith and only in the second place an act of philosophical inquiry. This is not because reason has no place within Judaism, but because faith is more than reason. The first is absorbed by the brain and is not able to surpass it. When, however an act of faith takes place, it occurs in the form of an upheaval which agitates the whole of man far beyond the limitations of ratio. Faith, while recognizing the importance of reason, is contingent on the courage of the believer in realizing that reason can be abused and be presumptuous. By putting a non-starter kind of answer before the question, the song of "Ein Keloh-enu" asks a most powerful question: "How is reason able to understand which is absolutely different from itself?" For if God is absolutely unlike man then man is absolutely unlike God. But how then can human reason be expected to understand this? Merely for man to obtain the knowledge that God is unlike himself, man needs the help of God. At the same time one should use reason to demonstrate its own limitations. Reason can disclose eternal truths, including the opacity of reason. Its main function is to recognize that there is an infinity of things which surpasses it (Pascal). And just like power corrupts, so reason is able to corrupt, often enslaving all those whose minds are not strong enough to master it. The song of "Ein Keloh-enu" therefore reflects a deep Jewish sentiment. It rejects the traditional so called "rational demonstrations" for the existence of God since they exist of serious paradoxes. Once you prove God's existence, you have brought Him within the limits of reason and as such disproved the matter you wanted to demonstrate. To recognize that there might be something that not only transcends all concepts but even stands totally outside any "concept" is an important dimension of religious truth. "All souls descend from Heaven to Earth", said the Kotzker Rebbe "and once they have arrived the 'ladder' is removed. Then the souls are told that their life task is to find their way back to Heaven, so they start looking for the ladder...Some people give up, after all: How can one ascend to Heaven without the ladder? Others throw themselves to heaven and fall. But wise people are those who know that there is no alternative: What we are called up to try to do we must do. Whatever happens we must continue to strive upward till God Himself will come to our aid". "In the confinement of our study rooms our knowledge seems to us a pillar of light. But when we stand at the door which opens out to the infinite, we realize that all concepts are but glittering motes that populate a sunbeam" (1). This is the secret of "Ein Keloh-enu". Shabbat Shalom from Yerushaliyim, Notes: 1. Abraham Joshua Heshel "Man is not alone": A Philosophy of Religion", Farrar, Straus &Giroux, Inc; N.Y., page 35 (Because of the serious political situation in Israel, leading rabbinical authorities have suggested saying the following Tehilim (Psalms) every day: Chapters 83, 130 and 142.) Rabbi Dr. Nathan T. Lopes Cardozo is a member of the Council of Consulting Rabbis and Torah Scholars, Root and Branch Association, Ltd. He is Dean of the David Cardozo School for Jewish Studies and Human Dignity (Machon Ohr Aaron); This article was distributed by the Root and Branch Society of Jerusalem (rb@rb.org.il). To Go To Top

INTIMIDATION = BIAS Posted by Honest Reporting, April 29, 2004.

An important new documentary film, Jenin: Massacring Truth, debuted on Canada's Global TV last night. The film addresses the grossly irresponsible world media coverage of the IDF's 2002 Jenin incursion, which left an indelible stain on world opinion of Israel. The film includes this revealing exchange between filmmaker Martin Himel and Dr. Tim Benson, founder of the British editorial cartoonists' society that honored the Sharon-eating-babies cartoon with its 2003 'Cartoon of the Year': Himel: My question to you is, why, in all these [images] don't we see Sharon and Arafat eating babies? Benson: Maybe because Jews don't issue fatwas. Himel: What do you mean by that? Benson: Well, if you upset an Islamic or Muslim group, as you know, fatwas can be issued by Ayatollahs and such, and maybe it's at the back of each cartoonist's mind, that they could be in trouble if they do so. Himel: If they do what? Benson: If they depict, uh, say, an Arab leader in the same manner. Himel: Then they could suffer? Benson: Then they could suffer death, couldn't they? Benson's statement is an open admission that Arab/Palestinian intimidation produces an anti-Israel bias among western journalists. When HonestReporting confronted Dr. Benson about his organization's award last year, Benson wrote us: You have all taken this award completely out of perspective and context. Shame on you! We do so much good. If only you looked at our website properly you would have noticed that in fact we promote anti-fascism and educate about the dangers of extremism. Dr. Benson, in this film, educates everyone on one of the dangers of Muslim extremism - the intimidation of his journalist colleagues, cowed into a false portrayal of the Mideast conflict. We now also understand the proper 'perspective and context' of the Sharon cartoon - a threatening environment to journalists who dare portray Arab leaders in a negative light. HonestReporting has long maintained that Palestinian intimidation of the press is a key contributing factor to biased coverage of the Mideast conflict - see our special report on this topic. Perhaps such intimidation contributed to this event, two years ago in Ramallah, related this week by Jerusalem Post reporter Khaled Abu Toameh: With a crowd of international reporters standing around, two Palestinian policemen brought a man out, threw him up against a wall and shot him - right under the window of Arafat's office. When the reporters converged, the policeman seemed bewildered. It was just a simple execution, nothing to get excited about, he said. And no one did. In fact, according to Abu Toameh, no one else even mentioned it. HonestReporting encourages subscribers to contact your local cable companies to arrange broadcasting Jenin: Massacring Truth in your area. The film is available through CanWest. [Here's a good article on Jenin: Massacring Truth from the Calgary Herald.] NEW VERSION OF RELENTLESS Speaking of essential documentaries, HonestReporting has released a new version of our documentary film Relentless: The Struggle for Peace in the Middle East. This updated version includes added footage of current Mideast developments, and interviews with: *  Natan Sharansky, Israel Minister of Diaspora Affairs *  Yariv Oppenheim, Secretary General, Peace Now *  Mr. S. El-Herfi, Palestinian Ambassador to South Africa *  Tashbih Sayyed, Editor in Chief, Pakistan Today See the Relentless site for video trailers, upcoming screenings, and purchase info. Thank you for your ongoing involvement in the battle against media bias. HonestReporting Honest Reporting monitors the media for inaccuracy and unfairness in how they report the news about Israel. Ther website address is http://www.honestreporting.com. You can help support their research online or by sending contributions to: HonestReporting, 400 South Lake Drive, Lakewood, NJ 08701-3167 To Go To Top

ROBBERS DIE TRYING TO HOLD-UP SUICIDE BOMBER Posted by Aryeh Zelasko, April 29, 2004.

I know I am going to get a few nasty emails on this but this is really funny. No one could have made up a funnier Arab joke. It was a news item on April 27, 2004 in Ireland On-Line (http://212.2.162.45/news/story.asp?j= 42866720&p=4z867xy6&n=42867055) A Hamas suicide bomber blew up two armed Palestinians who tried to rob him at gun point in the Gaza Strip. Hamas claimed the stickup men" worked for Israeli intelligence, while Palestinian security forces said the two were ordinary thieves. Rather than give up his explosives, the bomber detonated them, killing himself and the two robbers near the border fence between Gaza and Israel. Palestinian security officials said the the gunmen were criminals who were involved in a car theft ring that brought stolen vehicles from Israel to Gaza. Hamas said the bomber was on his way to try to infiltrate into Israel, accompanied by another Hamas member and a guide, when they were stopped by the armed men. The robbers forced the bomber to lie on the ground and tried to steal the bomb, but the militant detonated it, killing all three. The other Hamas man and the guide escaped. There have been cases of rival groups stealing each other's explosives, but no group claimed the two gunmen, and their families did not go to the hospital to take the bodies, indicating that the two were not militants, who are revered in Palestinian society. A Hamas official said that whatever their intention, the two should be considered agents of Israel. "Anyone who tries to stop a fighter from doing his work is a collaborator," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Hamas has been threatening punishing retaliatory attacks since Israel killed the founder of the Islamic group, Sheik Ahmed Yassin, in a helicopter missile strike on March 22, and his successor, Abdel Aziz Rantisi, in another missile attack three weeks later. Because of the threats, security was especially tight for Israel's independence day holiday today. Police set up roadblocks on highways, checking drivers, as Israelis crowded public parks and forests for traditional holiday cookouts. Palestinians were banned from entering Israel, as they have been since a double suicide bombing attack that killed 10 Israelis in the port of Ashdod on March 14, idling about 16,000 Palestinian workers who have entry permits. In Gaza, tens of thousands of Israelis streamed to Gush Katif, a bloc of Israeli settlements, to celebrate Israel's independence day and protest at Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to withdraw from all of the coastal strip by next year. The members of Sharon's Likud Party will vote on the plan on Sunday, with polls giving Sharon only a slight lead. In an independence day interview on Israel TV, Sharon appeared confident that he would win the Likud vote on his disengagement plan. By this time next year, he said, "we will be in the midst of disengagement from Gaza." In the northern West Bank, Israeli troops raided the Tulkarem refugee camp with jeeps and armoured personnel carriers and conducted house-to-house searches. Soldiers exchanged fire with Palestinian gunmen, killing two and seriously wounding a third. Israeli military officials said one of the dead was Ashraf Nafa, 21, the Hamas leader in Tulkarem. The other was Amjad Amra, 21, from the Islamic Jihad group. The officials said both had links to Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas and planned attacks against Israelis. The wounded man, a member of Hamas, was taken to an Israeli hospital. Aryeh Zelasko lives in Beitar Illit, south of Jerusalem. He is Director of Sales and Marketing of Israel Visit (www.israelvisit.co.il) which provides information and an internet buying facility for American visitors to Israel. To Go To Top

PROCLAMATION OF THE BOARD OF GOVERNORS OF THE ITALIAN MUSLIM ASSOCIATION Posted by Aryeh Gallin, April 29, 2004.

I would like to bring to your attention the Proclamation of the Italian Muslim Board of Governors praising Israel for the execution of "Saudi" Arabian petro-dollar profit funded Wahhabi Hamas leader Ahmed Yassin. Blessings to you from Sheikh Palazzi in Rome. Shabbat Shalom from Liberated Yerushaliyim, Now Pharoah made himself a tyrant in the land [of Egypt]. He divided his people into castes, one group of which [Children of Israel] he persecuted, putting their [Israel's] sons to death and sparing only their daughters. Truly, he [Pharoah] was an evil-doer. But it was Our will to favour those [Children of Israel] who were oppressed in the land [of Egypt], to make them [Children of Israel] leaders [among men], to make them heirs [of the Land of Israel]; and to inflict on Pharoah, Haman and their warriors the very scourge they dreaded.  [Qur'an, Sura 28:4-6, al-Qasas/The Story] And Korah, Pharoah and Haman! Moses came to them with veritable signs, but they behaved arrogantly in the land [of Egypt and Persia], powerless though they were to escape Us [Allah]: and in their sinfulness, one and all, We [Allah] smote them [Korah, Pharoah and Haman]. On some We sent down a violent whirlwind; others the Cry overtook; some We caused to be swallowed up by the earth, and yet others We overwhelmed by the Flood. God did not wrong them [Korah, Pharoah and Haman], but they wronged themselves.  [Qur'an, Sura 29:39-40, al-'Ankabut/The Spider] And G-d said to Noah: "The end of all flesh is come before Me; for the earth is filled with 'hamas' [violence] through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth".  [Bereshit/Genesis 6:13] The Italian Muslim Association Board of Governors blesses Israeli President Moshe Katsav, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Israel's Government, the Israel Defense Forces and People of Israel for the noble act of justice which cleansed our earth of the unrepentant criminal Ahmed Yasin. We bless the Israeli Government for ending the mischief of one who sent scores of suicide slaughterers to murder hundreds of innocent civilians -- babies, women and men -- and to cripple and permanently maim hundreds more. We bless the United States President, Congress and American People for standing with Israel in this heroic act of self-defense. We condemn the shameless declarations by European Union and United Kingdom Foreign Ministers Solana and Straw "deploring" the execution of mass murderer Ahmed Yasin. Yasin trained an entire generation of people -- ignorant, scarcely literate and degenerate in their understanding of religion -- to commit suicide and murder. The victory of democratic Israel against global terror is a shining light in the war of civilized humanity against barbarian violence. Israel, in a legally and morally just operation carefully planned to avoid harming civilians, acted as a humanitarian democracy able to defend itself. Israel is the opposite of those nations which surrender to terror after a first strike, who run bleating to fulfill the demands of Bin Laden like frightened sheep. Those who raise white flags of fear and defeat after a first shot -- be they political parties or entire nations -- dare not "condemn" courageous nations such as Israel which successfully stand up to terror. Israel cleansed the earth of the bloodthirsty monster Yasin, granting all humanity the possibility of a better future. Yasin's elimination spread chaos and confusion through Middle East terror networks, triggering a deep crisis within the Saudi-funded "Muslim Brotherhood". With Yasin dead, Hamas wobbles. Hamas leadership is now problematic. Each prospective candidate for the head of this terrorist group knows that God's punishment awaits him. In Italy there have been immediate results. A former Hamas supporter from Tunisia who once worked with al-Qa'idah claims to have repented. He now works with the Italian judiciary and police. This change is local, yet it shows how the elimination of Ahmed Yasin makes al-Qa'idah weaker, plunges the "Muslim Brotherhood" into crisis and restricts Bin Laden's manoeuvres. This makes our world safer. In striking down Yasin, Israeli Prime Minister Sharon did justice to all victims of worldwide terror, not only to victims in Israel, but to those of 9/11 in New York and Washington, D.C., in Moscow, Istanbul, Bali, Nasiriyyah and Madrid. A morally opaque individual such as European Union Foreign Minister Solana well represents a country such as Spain, surrendering to terror and running with the bulls away from participation in the war against it. Spain shows terrorists that "our only defense is showing we have no defense". Let Solana escort Spain's immorality to Europe's perpetual political costume ball dressed up in drag as glorious virtue. Let Spain's Cowardly Conquistadores hide their shame in Solana's petticoats. But let them at least be silent in the presence of mighty nations and their leaders, such as Israel and its prime minister, who give humanity victories in our war of light against darkness. All people harmed by mass murderers worldwide thank Ariel Sharon for showing that "united we stand, united we win" when democratic nations have strong leaders. After the victories in Afghanistan and Iraq, the war of free peoples against global terror springs back from Madrid's slaughter with a critical victory. We Italian Muslims thank the People of Israel and their prime minister for freeing our world from one of its most evil criminals. Yasin was worse than Pharaoh. Pharoah murdered Israelite boy babies, while sparing girls, to make Egypt more powerful. Yasin sent women and children from his own people to commit suicide and murder innocent Israelis. Such was Yasin's "work", until the day came when Allah decreed that Yasin's target bank of sin had overflowed, and the penalty due to him finally be paid. We declare that a world without Ahmed Yasin is a better world. We look forward to a future when our world will spit out those who train illiterate and ignorant people, children and even mentally disturbed teens, in hatred, terrorism and apostasy from Islam. A world without Ahmed Yasin draws us closer to the Final Redemption, to a world where people will want to live, not want to commit suicide and murder. Our world today has men and women -- Jews, Christians, Muslims and others -- united in faith that the world war on terror launched after 9/11 will, with Allah's help, be won. The fall of the heroes of Nasiriyyah was followed by the capture of Saddam Hussein. The carnage of Madrid was followed by Israel's victory. Israel's people and their leader gave a practical gift and moral lesson to Europeans who fast forget their recent past. With one blow, Israel and Sharon showed our world that not all nations run like Spain. We thank Israel and Ariel Sharon for enlightening those who claim that mass murderers will overcome us, that our only salvation is through surrender (negotiating under fire). Israel and Ariel Sharon showed that we can fight mass murderers shot by shot, without surrender and flight, by mobilizing deterrence, locking on target to mass murderers and striking them down in places where they once felt safe. With Allah's help, may we all look forward to a redeemed world free of wicked men such as Ahmed Yasin, Osama Bin Laden and those who support them, and free of havens of refuge to which they can run and in which they can hide. Wa-s-salamu `alaykum wa rahmat-Ullahi wa barakatuH (May peace, God's mercy and His blessings be upon you) Board of Governors Italian Muslim Association www.amislam.com mailto:islam.inst@flashnet.it Mr. Aryeh Yosef Gallin is President of the Root and Branch Association, Ltd. He is a Member, Foreign Press Association in Israel and a Member, New York City Chapter, U.S. Society of Professional Journalists. To Go To Top

NEW COMPUTER IDENTIFIES, DESTROYS CANCER By Yuval Dror Posted by Mordechai Ben-Menachem, April 29, 2004.

Friends, Here is an article on the subject of Israel's newest scientific breakthrough. This may turn out to be one of the most significant scientific breaks in a decade. The article was written by Yuval Dror and appeared in Haaretz (http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/421446.html) Researchers from the Weizmann Institute have developed a prototype biological computer that identifies and diagnoses cancerous cells and then releases medication to destroy them. The results, to be published in the upcoming issue of Nature magazine, were presented yesterday by the head of the research team, Professor Ehud Shapiro, at a news conference in Brussels entitled "Life, a Nobel story." The team first reported the development of their molecular computer, which is built of synthetic DNA and various enzymes, in November 2001. However, Shapiro said, that was "a toy computer that didn't know how to do anything medically or computationally significant. This time, we are demonstrating a real use that could have medical applications." The computer makes its diagnoses by testing the concentration of mRNA molecules in the surrounding fluid, as changes in the quantity of mRNA often indicate the presence of cancerous cells. Once it detects the existence of a cancer, it performs additional tests to determine what kind of cancer is involved, and then releases the appropriate medication to cause the cancerous cells to self-destruct. These medications are attached to the ends of the DNA molecules that make up the computer, and are released by activating the relevant enzyme. Since the diagnosis is not always clear-cut, the computer has instructions to release the medication only if the certainty of the diagnosis is above a predetermined level. Though each molecular computer can only test for one type of disease, millions of such computers can be contained in a single drop of solution, Shapiro noted. However, he warned, the prototype computer that he and his colleagues designed is still far from being ready for use. Their product, he said, was built and tested on a solution that contains no proteins, fats or sugars - materials that in real life occur in every living organism, and that could both interfere with the working of the computer and be damaged by the computer. It will take many years, perhaps even decades, of additional work before the computer is adapted to be able to function in a living environment, he said. In addition to Shapiro, the other members of the research team were Dr. Rivka Adar and three graduate students: Yaakov Benenson, Binyamin Gil and Uri Ben-Dor. Mordechai Ben-Menachem is at Ben Gurion University. He can be reached by email at quality@computer.org To Go To Top

INVESTIGATIVE REPORT: DOCUMENTS PROVE U.N. OIL CORRUPTION Posted by IsrAlert, April 28, 2004.

U.N. program "one of the world's most disgraceful scams". This was written by Kenneth R. Timmerman. It appeared in Insight Magazine and is archived at http://www.insightmag.com/news/ 2004/04/27/World/Investigative.Reportdocuments. Prove.U.n.Oil.Corruption-657739.shtml A team of international forensic investigators is preparing to blow the lid off the much-disputed U.N. oil-for-food program in Iraq and will present new evidence of corruption at an upcoming congressional hearing that directly will implicate world leaders and top U.N. officials, Insight has learned. Investigators, led by Claude Hankes-Drielsma and the KPMG accounting firm, currently are in Baghdad sifting through mountains of Saddam Hussein-era records seized from his Oil Ministry and the State Oil Marketing Organization that detail payments by Saddam to his legions of foreign friends and political supporters. An Iraqi newspaper, Al-Mada, published the list of 270 recipients of special "allocations" (also known as vouchers) in January. But as Insight goes to press, the testimony of Hankes-Drielsma on April 22 before the House International Relations Committee is expected to provide new evidence of widespread international corruption. In a scathing letter sent to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan on March 3, which he made available to Insight, Hankes-Drielsma called the U.N. program "one of the world's most disgraceful scams," and said that "based on the facts as I know them at the present time, the U.N. failed in its responsibility to the Iraqi people and the international community at large." In an earlier letter to Annan, to which he received no reply, Hankes-Drielsma noted that allocations of "very significant supplies of crude oil [were] made to ... individuals with political influence in many countries, including France and Jordan," both of which supported Saddam and his regime to the bitter end. Under the U.N. program, the Dutch company Saybolt International BV was paid hefty fees to inspect oil tankers loading Iraqi crude in Basra, to make sure no cheating took place. "Now it turns out that the inspecting company was paid off," one investigator said, "while on the ground, individual inspectors were getting cash bribes." Saybolt denies it received an oil allocation, although the Iraqi documents show it was down for 3 million barrels. Saybolt spokesman Peter Box tells Insight that the company's own investigation of two known incidents of "topping off" involving the oil tanker Essex in 2001 "found no involvement of our staff at that particular time." Saybolt continues to operate in Iraq today, although it now has an "entirely new group of people," Box adds. Among the revelations at the April 22 hearings, Insight has learned from investigators directly working on the case, will be new details of oil vouchers allegedly granted to Patrick Maugein, a prominent crony of French President Jacques Chirac, said to total 72.2 million barrels. Maugein's involvement in the U.N.-approved oil deals is significant, investigators say, because he is believed to be a conduit for backdoor payments to Chirac and his family. It was Chirac who spearheaded a worldwide coalition last year that opposed the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and tried desperately to keep Saddam in power. When the allegations of backdoor payments first surfaced in a Paris courtroom in 1998, Maugein swept them aside as "pure fantasy." And in a statement provided to Insight, he denies having raised funds for Chirac, his family or his political campaigns. But as more evidence begins to leak from the archives of Saddam's former oil ministry, such denials may become harder to sustain. The vouchers were assigned to two trading companies, identified in the Iraqi documents as Trafigura and Ibex, both of which were involved in the Essex incident. Investigators say they believe both companies are tied to Maugein, either through beneficial ownership or contractual arrangement. Vouchers for an additional 11 million barrels were granted to Maugein business partner Cabecadas Rul de Soussa, according to the original Al-Mada list. The ties between de Soussa and Maugein were first revealed by Therese Raphael of the Wall Street Journal Europe. Asked about the allegations by Insight, Maugein denied he was involved with either company, although he did acknowledge knowing their principals, with whom he had worked as an oil trader with Marc Rich in Switzerland. He insisted that all his dealings with Iraq were legal and conducted through the oil-for-food program. "Patrick Maugein bought oil for his refinery in Mantua, Italy," a spokesman said. "All the oil deals were run by the U.N. They were paid through the U.N. and monitored by the U.N." But those denials might not withstand the onslaught of the documents about to be released, investigators say. "Already we've got details of all the accounts held in the names of individuals," one investigator tells Insight in an exclusive interview. "On these records are exact details of which accounts were held by whom," including the foreign proxies and their ultimate beneficiaries - in Iraq and overseas. The Iraqi documents specifically tie Maugein to the 25 million barrels allocated to Trafigura Beheer BV, a company Maugein claims was a competitor of his own London-based SOCO International. Investigators say other information they have developed shows that Maugein could be a "beneficial owner" of Ibex Energy, a holding company registered in Bermuda that was awarded vouchers for 47.2 million barrels. "That is a very high allocation," an investigator tells this magazine. "If a Cabinet minister gets 12 million barrels, why would Ibex get 47 million barrels unless something much bigger was at stake?" Other French recipients named in the Iraqi documents include former Interior minister Charles Pasqua (12 million barrels), former French U.N. ambassador Jean-Bernard Merimee (8 million barrels) and Lebanese-French middleman Elias Firzli (14.6 million barrels). Firzli acknowledged in a lengthy interview with Insight in Paris that the Iraqis were desperate to meet with Chirac and were willing to pay a high price for access. Shortly before the war broke out in March 2003, Firzli says he introduced Iraqi diplomat Nizar Hamdoon - sent as an emissary from Saddam - to senior French government officials in Paris. But Firzli scoffed at the oil vouchers, calling them "small stuff compared to the billions of dollars people made in the 1980s." Published reports to date have focused on oil vouchers granted to the head of the United Nation's oil-for-food program, Benan Sevan, who has been on an extended vacation since the allegations first surfaced at the end of January. He denied the charges through a U.N. spokesman. And Insight has learned that as investigators pursue the document trail, they believe they are getting closer to world leaders, including Chirac. But can it be proved? "The Iraqi civil service, even under Saddam, was quite excellent. They kept meticulous records. Every order was cross-referenced, initialed and counterinitialed, so nobody could be accused of taking anything for himself," an investigator who recently returned from Baghdad tells Insight. Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.), chairman of the House International Relations Committee, sent a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Annan on April 1, which committee staffers tell this magazine was intended to "lay down a marker." It called the scandal "without precedent in U.N. history" and urged Annan to make his response "equally unprecedented." Annan has announced that he will name an independent panel to investigate. Fears of a U.N. whitewash run high on Capitol Hill. Hyde urged Annan to take steps to ensure that all documents relating to the oil-for-food program "be preserved and secured," and asked that special measures be taken to protect potential whistle-blowers who could provide testimony on the illicit deals. The United States General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, told Hyde's committee recently that $10.1 billion of the estimated $60 billion handled by the United Nations under the program was paid in kickbacks, bribes and set-asides to Saddam and his cronies. The KPMG forensic-accounting investigators were brought to Baghdad by the Iraqi Governing Council to get to the bottom of the scandal. But Insight has learned that the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), led by J. Paul Bremer, recently took over the investigation, just as the accountants were stumbling over evidence of corruption by Americans working for the CPA. "We were hearing stories of contractors passing envelopes with huge amounts of cash to CPA officials," an investigator says. "As much as $300,000 in cash passed hands." Speaking from Baghdad, an Iraqi official confirmed to this magazine that the CPA was now in charge of these matters, although the Iraqi Governing Council was footing the bill. "We no longer have control over the documents or the investigation," the official said. In Washington, the State Department's Bureau of International Organizations is in charge of relations with the United Nations. In preparation for the April 22 hearing, Chairman Hyde has sent two letters to Assistant Secretary of State Kim Holmes requesting that State provide full documentation of the oil-for-food program, including commercial contracts. Since the United States is a permanent member of the Security Council and a leading member of the U.N. Sanctions Committee, State has access to the full United Nations record but has been unwilling to make incriminating information public until now for fear of angering U.S. allies. France accounted for approximately 25 percent of all U.N.-approved trade with Iraq, according to an estimate by the CIA. "Give France a break," says French ambassador to the United States Jean-David Levitte, writing in the Los Angeles Times. He said allegations that France condoned kickbacks or took bribes "are completely false and can only have been an effort to discredit France, a longtime friend and ally of the U.S." Kenneth R. Timmerman is a senior writer for Insight and author of "The French Betrayal of America", just released from Crown Forum. To Go To Top

THE IMPORTANCE OF THE THIRD TEMPLE! Posted by David Ben-Ariel, April 28, 2004.

This was written by Jan Willem van der Hoeven, Director of the International Christian Zionist Center in Jerusalem. (iczc@iczc.org.il) Moreover I will make a covenant of peace with them, and it shall be an everlasting covenant with them; I will establish them and multiply them, and I will set My sanctuary in their midst forevermore. My tabernacle also shall be with them; indeed I will be their God, and they shall be My people. The nations also will know that I, the Lord, sanctify Israel, when My sanctuary is in their midst forevermore. (Ezekiel 37:26-28) These are truly amazing verses - expounding as they do that Israel will never have a lasting peace with its G-d and with the nations until G-d's tabernacle or temple has first been built on His holy Mount in Jerusalem. The Bible is consistent in this: that only after the Temple has been built will the Messianic age and King Messiah Himself come to this city. All the present movements, such as those wanting 'Messiah now' to come are futile, unless they are coupled with a strong desire and willingness to act to see G-d's house restored on His holy hill. The official Jewish prayer book is full of references to this desire: Be favorable, HASHEM, our G-d, toward Your people Israel and their prayer and restore the service to the Holy of Holies of Your Temple. The fire-offerings of Israel and their prayer accept with love and favor, and may the service of Your people Israel always be favorable to You. Blessed are You, HASHEM, Who restores His presence to Zion. The prophet Ezekiel shows clearly that only after the glorious Temple - which he describes in such exquisite detail - has finally been built upon G-d's hill will the Messiah make his entry from the East, in glory and majesty: And behold, the glory of the G-d of Israel came from the way of the east. ... and the earth shone with His glory. ... And the glory of the Lord came into the temple by way of the gate which faces toward the east. ... and behold, the glory of the Lord filled the temple. (Ezekiel 43:2, 4-5) This, then, is clear in both the Old and the New Testaments: there will be no coming of the Messiah in glory until after His house or temple has been built upon His holy hill. Listen to the wonderful words of the Psalmist: Why do the nations rage, and the people plot a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord and against His Anointed, saying, "Let us break Their bonds in pieces and cast away Their cords from us." He who sits in the heavens shall laugh; the Lord shall hold them in derision. Then He shall speak to them in His wrath, and distress them in His deep displeasure: "Yet I have set My King on My holy hill of Zion." (Psalms 2:1-6) In 2 Thessalonians 2:1-4 the Word implies that there will be no coming of the Lord in glory until 'the temple of G-d' (note, not the temple of Antichrist) has been built even though just before His glorious arrival the man of sin and perdition (very much like Antiochus Epiphanies) will seek to be worshiped in that temple. It is therefore amazing that, among both Jews and Christians, there is so often haziness concerning these facts, and concerning the crucial importance of the restored Temple in relation to the Messiah's coming. If we want Him to come then, like David, we will have to prepare a house in Jerusalem for Him to come to. Without it He will not come! This may be precisely why such a fanatical battle is being waged to keep the Jewish (and Christian!) people from entering that Mount in order to worship the true and living G-d where He once dwelled between the Cherubim, when the Temple stood there. With Rome's destruction of the Temple in AD 70, G-d's presence left this place and it was left desolate for many centuries, trampled underfoot by various Gentile nations, such as those evil minded Muslim Arabs who to this day use this holy place to spew out their hatred and venom against G-d's own people. They even use the minarets of their mosques on this Temple Mount, standing with stones in their hands ready to throw down at the Jews still praying at their 'wall' - calling on their people to 'slaughter the Jews'. These men have not been struck dead for so doing - as they surely would have been had they carried on in this fashion when G-d still dwelled in glory in the Holy of Holies. This just proves that, with His house destroyed on His holy hill, the Shekinah glory of G-d left the place long ago, and for Him to come back as in the days of old, to dwell in this city, we must first welcome Him by building Him His House! If the High Priest himself could only enter the holy of holies once a year - lest he or anyone else who dared to died at the threshold because of the holiness of G-d's presence, then how can hate-filled Muslims run around everywhere on this mountain and yet get away with their lives and not die because of the holiness of the G-d of Israel? If the High Priest Himself could not walk into the holy of holies except on Yom Kippur, how is it that those who hate Israel and despise G-d's choice can walk anywhere they decide to? It is because G-d, together with His Shekinah glory, left this place when His house was destroyed, and He will only come back when that House is rebuilt. Then He will fill that House and the whole city again with His presence and glory! For this reason it certainly is permitted in G-d's eyes for Jews (and Christians) to go up to this hill - even as King David did when it was still a Jebusite stronghold - to worship and pray. It is therefore not right for some Orthodox rabbis to therefore keep their people from entering this mount out of fear they might trespass on the place that once was the holy of holies - where G-d's presence hovered over the Ark of the Covenant. G-d's special Shekinah glory and presence left this place after His Temple was destroyed by Titus, and IT WILL ONLY RETURN TO THIS HILL AND CITY when His House is rebuilt to invite Him and His presence back. This is what the Psalmist so clearly expresses: A Song of Ascents. Lord, remember David and all his afflictions; how he swore to the Lord, and vowed to the Mighty One of Jacob: "Surely I will not go into the chamber of my house, or go up to the comfort of my bed; I will not give sleep to my eyes or slumber to my eyelids, until I find a place for the Lord, a dwelling place for the Mighty One of Jacob." ... Let us go into His tabernacle; let us worship at His footstool. Arise, O Lord, to Your resting place, You and the ark of Your strength. Let Your priests be clothed with righteousness, and let Your saints shout for joy. ... For the Lord has chosen Zion; He has desired it for His dwelling place: "This is My resting place forever; here I will dwell, for I have desired it." (Psalms 132:1-5, 7-9, 13-14) What an example the young David is to us all - Jews and Gentile believers - in the way he could not be completely happy being in Jerusalem as king without the Lord Whom he loved also close by. This is what made him so close to G-d - a man after G-d's own heart: he could only be glad to reign as king over united Israel in Jerusalem when the Lord Who had sustained him all through his young life was there with him. This is why, dancing and singing, he brought the Ark of the Lord from Kiryat Yearim to his city - the city of David: To have the Lord close by. This is why he instructed Solomon, his son, to build a temple on this hill in which the Lord would make His dwelling place - close by His own people in majesty and glory. If we want Him back, then we must show Him as David did that no religion, no religious building, can take His place; that we - who have been commanded to love Him with all our heart, soul and strength - want Him enough to build His house and so to welcome Him back to His city with "Baruch Haba baShem Adonai." Today, many in Israel desire to receive the world's acclaim and approval, yet what we see is the opposite: New waves of anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism spreading in different parts of the world like wild fire. But this verse by Ezekiel that we have already quoted puts it amazingly when it concludes: and the nations also will know that I, the Lord, sanctify Israel, WHEN MY SANCTUARY IS IN THEIR MIDST. It will not be the construction of new synagogues, scientific, cultural or historic centers or places of sin that will cause the, still largely anti-Semitic, nations to respect Israel. What will change them is not when they find something in Israel which they can already find in their own gentile midst, but when they find something that will fill them with awe: when the Temple has been built. It has everything to do with what will soon happen upon this Temple Mount for Israel and all the nations to see, as the prophet Haggai foresaw: "For thus says the Lord of hosts: ' ... AND I WILL SHAKE ALL NATIONS, and they shall come to the Desire of All Nations, and I will fill this temple with glory,' says the Lord of hosts. ... The glory of this latter temple shall be greater than the former,' says the Lord of hosts. 'AND IN THIS PLACE I WILL GIVE PEACE,' says the Lord of hosts." (Haggai 2:6, 7, 9) What a truly, awesome day that will be! But do we love Him enough to want Him and His glory and presence to come back to dwell among us in this His city, the city of the Great King - Melech haOlam? Or are we satisfied with a piece of religion - a Western Wall; a favorite cantor; a preacher in a cozy place of worship? Have we already filled the void He left when His glory and presence departed from this city after His house went up in flames? For in the meantime, rather than longing for Him to return to His city, we have filled the void with all kinds of religious practices which largely have usurped His place? Him, to Whom in the end we owe our utter allegiance and love, as He Himself spelled out as His eternal rule: Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. (Deuteronomy 6:4-5) Who, then, will still require a religious structure or edifice, when the living Lord has descended again to dwell upon His holy hill for the entire world to see? Therefore Zechariah prophesies: And it shall come to pass that everyone who is left of all the nations which (in the past) came against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. (Zechariah 14:16) To have Him come again to this earth - to His city, His chosen eternal dwelling place will make all people come up to Jerusalem not to see new historic or other meaningful places, but to see Him - the Desire of all nations - as He has again filled His House with His glory and Shekinah presence! Jan Willem van der Hoeven is Director of the International Christian Zionist Center in Jerusalem. You can support them by making checks payable to ICZC, P.O. Box 49063, 91490 Jerusalem, Israel. Their web-site address is www.israelmybeloved.com To Go To Top

GERMAN COMMENTARY WARNS AGAINST DANGERS OF 'APPEASEMENT' Posted by IsrAlert, April 28, 2004.

This apeared in the Hamburg "Die Zeit" (Internet Version-WWW) in German, April 16, 2004. Isralert's source for this item: MidEastweb for Coexistence http://www.mideastweb.org Richard Herzinger's commentary: "The Open Flank: the 'Cease-Fire' offer From Al-Qa'ida was indignantly rejected by the European Governments. But how resistant is the European public to the temptation of 'Appeasement' in the long term?" The European governments indignantly rejected the "offer" in the statement supposedly from Bin Ladin, according to which Al-Qa'ida would dispense with terrorist attacks in Europe if the Europeans would no longer participate in "attacks against Muslims." That is, if they would withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan and submit to the demands of Islamic fundamentalism in their own European house, as in the question of head scarves. People unanimously say that there must be no negotiations with criminals. This is the only correct response to the brazen offer from the terrorists. The question, however, is whether Europe's steadfastness is really as great as expressed in these statements. After the attacks in Madrid, many commentators rejected the warning against a Spanish "appeasement" policy as absurd. Many disputed that there is any connection at all between the mass-murderous attack and the attitude of the Europeans toward the Iraq War. Accordingly, the terror of the terrorists is irrational and has nothing at all to do with specific political objectives. This view is no longer tenable at the latest after the more recent announcements from Al-Qa'ida. It is becoming clear that the extremists are pursuing precisely the strategy that previous totalitarian powers tried: that of separating Europe from America through intimidation, because they believe that they have recognized Europe as the weak point in Western unity. For this reason, they are linking their murderous threats with the offer of leniency under certain conditions agreeable to them. It should now be clear that Islamist terrorism is not blind with rage but is following a clearly discernible tactical and strategic pattern. Its first tactical goal is to make substantial progress in driving the Americans out of Iraq by forcing their European allies to withdraw from the coalition of supporters. This is also the intention of the hostage-takers in Iraq, who have already murdered one Italian and threatened to kill other Italian hostages if Italy does not soon declare its withdrawal from Iraq. The pattern is clear -- after Spain, now Italy. The big question is whether these murderous attempts at blackmail will really remain for long without effect on the attitude of the European governments. How long will a democratic public be able to stand such mental torture if, for example, the Italian people now see on television the desperate relatives of the hostages waiting for the barbaric slaughter of their husbands or brothers by the terrorists? Could one not be spared this -- so goes the seductive thought -- by withdrawing from a war about whose sense one was unconvinced anyway? The terrorism of the extremists is aimed at precisely this effect. It shows the humanistically sensitive public of the Western democrats that it will not shrink from even the most unbridled brutality to achieve its goal. At the same time, it is sending hypocritical signals that the threat can be avoided quite simply. Whether or not it is correct that the attacks in Madrid led to a change in Spanish policy, it serves as proof to the Islamist extremists that this is a fruitful course. Hence, was the recently affirmed announcement by Spanish Prime Minister Zapatero that he would withdraw the Spanish troops from Iraq at the end of June, if by that time the United Nations has not taken over the military mission, a first gesture of "appeasement?" In strictly historical terms, of course, "appeasement" is not the right word for the motives behind the Spanish election result and the new government's declaration of intention in regard to Iraq. In the "appeasement" policy of the Western powers Great Britain and France in the 1930s, it was a matter of a publicly formulated political strategy of governments with respect to another government and its explicit claims to a change in the status quo in Europe. After 1935, this policy involved a continual retreat from the demands and aggressive acts of Hitler's Germany: the conditions of the Treaty of Versailles were revoked and the unlimited rearmament of Germany and occupation of the Rhineland were accepted, just as was the annexation of Austria. At the Munich Conference in 1938, England and France agreed without the participation of the Czech Government to cede the Sudetenland to the "Third Reich." Even when Hitler violated this agreement and also occupied the rest of Czechoslovakia, the Western powers could not manage a decisive counterreaction. Behind the appeasement policy of England, at least, was more than just the calculation of placating the aggressive upstart by taking up supposedly "legitimate" German demands and preventing a new major war. British Prime Minister Chamberlain and, even more so, his Foreign Minister Lord Halifax harbored scarcely concealed sympathies for the regime of National Socialism -- primarily because of its ability to "deal with" communism. Hence, "appeasement" was not just a sign of objective (military) weakness and subjective indecisiveness on the part of the large European democracies; in its extreme moments, this policy bordered on collaboration with the Nazi dictatorship. Of course it would be bizarre to imply such a thing today for the Spanish and other West European governments. Al-Qa'ida, in contrast to Nazi Germany, is not a powerful state to which Western Europe should feel militarily inferior and with which it must therefore avoid a clash. It is an "irregular" enemy of a new type that combines its acts of violence with no clearly identifiable end objective with respect to power politics -- at least to the extent that the dream of the worldwide triumph of Islam is not viewed as such. The question of the legitimacy of the Iraq War and the presence of European troops in Iraq does not affect the fundamental unity of all Western states that one must also oppose terrorism with force of arms. And if Spain does indeed withdraw from Iraq, it would certainly not be doing so because its new government is deliberating abandoning the terrain to Al-Qa'ida or could even draw anything positive from the goals of this terror organization. One way or another, Spain will continue to participate in the fight against Islamist terrorism. Nevertheless, a comparison between the appeasement of the 1930s and the Spanish attitude -- which in many respects stands for that of all of Europe -- is not completely farfetched. The parallels become more plausible when one takes a look at the general mood, so to speak the collective psychological constitution of the European population. With all of the important differences, it is true for then and now that there is one thing above all else that the overwhelming majority of the European population does not want: to be drawn into a war about which people are convinced that they are not directly affected. A large share of the aggressiveness toward the United States that is being expressed in large parts of the European public is the result of the feeling that the Americans are drawing Europe into a conflict with the Islamic world that really has nothing to do with the Europeans. Precisely this wish (At times bordering on wishful thinking?) to be spared war at almost any price for as long as possible, however, opens up a vulnerable flank of West European democracies that violent totalitarian systems, which have only war in mind, are aiming at with the most extreme brutality. The appeasement policy of the 1930s was by no means only the action of inept or morally questionable politicians. Rather, it received the broad support of the populace. People still remembered the gruesome years of World War I too well to be able or willing to imagine accepting another bloody sacrifice. When Chamberlain told Czech Prime Minister Benes, who protested the Munich agreement, that Great Britain was not prepared to wage war on account of Czechoslovakia, he was speaking on behalf of the majority of the British people. Could one really expect the British to risk their own security on account of a relatively marginal European country? They preferred the illusion that Hitler would be satisfied with the booty that he had already obtained. It was only later that people recognized that this was a fateful wrong conclusion: totalitarianism will always understand retreat as weakness, which will not contain its aggressiveness but only stimulate it more. Just as then, today the prevailing idea in large parts of the European public is that one can avoid the murderous attacks of terrorists by staying out of the conflicts in the Arab region at least militarily. Certainly this reservation was not the only reason for the vehement rejection of the Iraq War by the overwhelming majority of the European populace. One of the arguments repeatedly used by leading European politicians, however, was that the Iraq War would "further inspire terrorism" and "produce even more terrorists." The argument established a causal link between the Western approach in the Middle East and the degree of radicalness of terrorism. The implicit logic of this argument is that if one had not further provoked terrorism through the military intervention, then some attack or other might have been avoided. With this conclusion, however, one has already fallen into the strategic trap of the Islamist extremists. As cultural anthropologist Thomas Hauschild accurately stated, a subliminal thought pattern has become established under which the terror attacks are to be understood as "punishment" for one's own mistakes. Such a projection in dealing with totalitarian movements is absolutely deadly for democracies, however, paradoxically because this projection is based on a key democratic virtue: the capability of sensing the motives of the enemy and the idea that any conflict can be settled by reconciling interests and that the enemy will therefore respond to a signaled willingness to compromise with a similar signal. Precisely this virtue of being able to compromise, however, is negated by totalitarian ideologies, which are intent on the absolute submission or destruction of their enemies. Even beyond that, totalitarian ideologies such as extremist Islamism deliberately consider the existence of such virtues in democratic societies and correctly identify them as their central weakness that must be attacked systematically. The most recent announcements by Al-Qa'ida should make clear the kind of tough test that the Western democracies face in the coming years. It must be expected that the scope and intensity of the violent actions of the terrorists will increase. "Terrorism" is almost a trivializing word for this. We are dealing with a full-blown totalitarian movement, the third totalitarianism, which may be structured differently from its predecessors but is in no way inferior to them with respect to its ruthless determination and cruelty. Its appearance finds the Western, especially the European, societies totally unprepared: they threaten to be overwhelmed by a willingness to engage in violence whose existence they did not imagine just recently. The overcoming of violence as a means to resolve political conflicts was the central credo of their identity. To be able to withstand Islamist violence, the European democracies must now assume a mental structure that can also withstand the heaviest blows. The unsolved and extremely disturbing question is how this can succeed without a degeneration of the democratic virtues in the open societies themselves. IsrAlert, a Jewish advocacy network, is hosted by Harv Weiner. To subscribe to IsrAlert, send an email to isralert@aol.com To Go To Top

BURNED ALIVE: AN EXCERPT FOR THE LIFE OF A "PALESTINIAN" WOMAN Posted by Dafna Yee, April 28, 2004.

This woman is not writing about Israel or Israeli "abuses" as she knows nothing about what life in Israel is like and has never met an Israeli. But, the "human rights" organizations who constantly condemn Israel for every conceivable -- and inconceivable -- crime don't find these barbaric practices among the Israelis! Those "peaceworkers" are obviously so busy making their reports of "Israeli atrocities" (which never have any evidence to back them up) that they can't be bothered to take care of genuine victims of horrible abuse -- "Palestinian" women and girls who live under the Palestinian Authority. This is what life is like for thousands of "Palestinian" women and girls. There is a lot written lately about the barbaric practice of using children as "suicide" bombers and how that is child abuse and I agree with that assessment. But, why haven't I read anything about this form of abuse that is carried out under the sanction of Islamic law? Why do people all over the world support giving these barbarians, AKA "Palestinians", their own state? Even more importantly, why do some ISRAELIS -- like Sharon and Peres -- advocate forming "Palestine" out of Israel's land for these people who don't value life and don't build the land? Take a good look at the type of people that the "Palestinians" are and remember that having their own country will not change them into humane, democratic people. If Sharon's nefarious plans go through, Gaza will change from thriving neighborhoods of Israelis to a massive camp of "Palestinians", eager to go and conquer the world! As a teenager in the West Bank, Soauad became pregnant by a local boy. Her 'shamed' Palestinian family condemned her to death and she was set on fire by her brother-in-law. Every year, thousands of women in the Middle East die in 'honour killings'. Souad survived. She was rescued by the Swiss charity SURGIR (Arise). You can send donations to Banque cantonale vaudoise, 1001 Lausanne, account number U 5060.57.74 or to the address on the www.surgir.ch website. This article was edited from "Burned Alive" by Souad (Bantam), published on May 1. (To order for 11.99 Br L plus 2.25 Br L for p&p, call Telegraph Books Direct on 0870 155 7222.) It appeared April 26, 2004 in the Telegraph in Great Britain and is archived at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml= %2Farts%2F2004%2F04%2F26%2Fftburn26.xml He came towards me and said, with a smile: "Hi. How goes it?" He was chewing a blade of grass. "I'm going to take care of you." I hadn't been expecting that. I smiled a little, to thank him, not daring to speak. Suddenly I felt a cold liquid running over my head; I was on fire. I slapped at my hair. I screamed. My dress billowed out behind me. Was it on fire, too? I smelt the petrol and ran, the hem of my dress getting in the way. Did he run after me? Was he waiting for me to fall so he could watch me go up in flames? I'm going to die, I thought. That's good. Maybe I'm already dead. It's over, finally. My name is Souad. My story began almost 25 years ago in my native village in the West Bank, a tiny place, in a region then occupied by the Israelis. If I named my village, I could be in danger, even though I am now thousands of miles away. In my village I am officially dead; if I were to go back today they would try to kill me a second time for the honour of my family. It's the law of the land. It's because I am a woman. A woman must walk fast, head down, as if counting the number of steps she's taking. She may never stray from her path or look up, for if a man catches her eye, the whole village labels her a charmuta, prostitute. A girl must be married before she can raise her eyes and look straight ahead, or go into a shop, or pluck her eyebrows and wear jewellery. My mother was married at 14. If a girl is still unmarried by that age, the village begins to make fun of her. But a girl must wait her turn in the family to be married. The eldest daughter first, then the others. There were four girls of marrying age in our household. There were also two half-sisters, by our father's second wife, who were still children. The one male child of the family, who was born in glory among all these daughters, was our brother Assad. Twenty-five years ago, I spoke only Arabic; I'd hardly been further than a few kilometres beyond the last house on the dirt road. I knew there were cities further away but I had never seen them. I did not know if the earth was round or flat. What I did know was that we had to hate the Jews, who had taken our land; my father called them halouf, pigs. We were forbidden to go near them for fear of becoming pigs like them. My brother went to school, but the girls did not. Where I come from, being born a girl is a curse: a wife must first produce a son - at least one - and if she gives birth only to girls, she is mocked. At most, only two or three girls are needed to help with the housework, to work on the land and tend the animals. Our stone house was big, and surrounded by a wall with a large door of grey iron. Once we were inside, it closed on us to prevent us going out. You could enter by this door from the outside, but you could not go out again. My father and mother went out, but not us girls. My brother went out and came back through that door; he went to the cinema - he did as he liked. A day without a beating was unusual. My father would shout, "Why have the sheep come back by themselves?" then pull me by the hair and drag me into the kitchen to hit me. Once he tied up my sister Kainat and me, our hands behind our backs, our legs bound, and a scarf over our mouths to stop us screaming. We stayed like that all night, tied to a gate in the stable. This was life in our village. The girls and women in the other houses were beaten regularly, too. You could hear the crying. My sister was beaten by her husband and she brought shame on our family when she came home to complain. My mother had 14 children, but only five survived. One day I learned why. I must have been less than 10; Noura, my elder sister, was with me. We came back from the fields, and found my mother lying on the floor on a sheepskin. She was giving birth, and my aunt Salima was with her. There were cries from my mother and then from the baby. Very quickly my mother took the sheepskin and smothered the baby. I saw the baby move once, and then it was over. She was a girl. I saw my mother do it this first time, then a second time. I'm not sure I was present for the third, but I knew about it. And I heard Noura say to her: "If I have girls, I'll do what you have done." That was how my mother got rid of the seven daughters she had after Hanan, the last survivor. From then on I hid and cried every time my father killed a sheep or a chicken. As long as I lived with my parents, I feared I would die suddenly. I was afraid of going up a ladder when my father was below. I was afraid of the hatchet used for chopping the wood, afraid of the well when I went for water. That well was my greatest terror, and my mother's too. I sensed it. Sometimes, coming back from the fields with the animals, my elder sister Kainat and I talked about what might happen: "Supposing everybody's dead when we get home . . . And what if Father has killed Mother? A blow with a stone is all it would take!" The possibility of our mother dying preoccupied us more than the death of a sister, because there were always other sisters. Our mother was often beaten, just as we were. Sometimes she tried to intervene when my father hit us especially viciously, and then he'd turn on her, knocking her down and pulling out her hair. I haven't seen my brother Assad for 25 years, but I would like to ask him one question: "Where is our sister Hanan, who disappeared?" Hanan was a beautiful girl, very dark and prettier than me, with thick hair and heavy eyebrows that joined above her eyes. She was not thin like me. She was dreamy and never very attentive to what was said to her. When she came to help us pick olives, she worked and moved slowly. This wasn't usual in my family; you walked fast, you worked fast, you ran out to bring the animals. I was in the house one day when I heard shouting. My little sisters and I ran to see what was happening. Hanan was sitting on the floor, arms and legs flailing, and Assad was leaning over her, strangling her with the telephone cord. We pressed ourselves against the wall to make ourselves disappear. Assad must have heard us come in because he yelled "Rouhi! Rouhi! Get out! Get out!" When my parents came home, my mother spoke to Assad. I saw her crying, but I know now she was just pretending: I've come to understand how things happen to girls in my land. It is decided at a family meeting, and on the fatal day the parents are never present. Only the one who has been chosen to do the killing is with the intended victim. I don't know why Hanan was condemned to die. Did she go out alone? Was she seen speaking to a man? Was she denounced by a neighbour? It doesn't take much for everyone to see a girl as a charmuta who has brought shame to the family and must die to restore their honour - as well as that of the entire village. As I grew up, I waited hopefully for a marriage proposal. I was 18 by then and had grown to hate village weddings because all the girls made fun of me. No one asked for Kainat, my elder sister; she had resigned herself to remaining an old maid. I found this terribly depressing, because I had to wait until Kainat was married before I could take a husband. Then I discovered that a neighbour, Faiez, had asked for me. "But we can't discuss marriage for the time being," my mother told me, "we have to wait for your sister." Faiez lived in the house opposite ours. Sometimes I caught sight of him from the terrace where I laid out the laundry to dry. He must have had a good job in the city because he didn't dress like a labourer. He always wore a suit, and he carried a briefcase and he had a car. I imagined that we were married, that he'd come back from work at sunset and I'd remove his shoes and, on my knees, I'd wash his feet as my mother did for my father. I would be a woman with a husband! Maybe I'd even be able to put on make-up, get into his car with him, and go into town to the shops. But what to do? I wanted him to know that I was waiting, too. I decided to do everything I could to speak to him, at the risk of being beaten or stoned to death. One morning I heard his footsteps on the gravel outside his house. I shook my wool rug over the edge of the terrace and he looked up. He saw me and I knew he understood, although he made no sign and not a word was spoken. There were regular, secret meetings. One day he placed his hand on my thigh. I pushed it off. He looked annoyed. "Why don't you want to? Come on!" I was so afraid that he'd go away, that he'd look for somebody else. So I let him do what he wanted - without quite knowing what was going to happen to me. He wasn't violent, but the pain took me by surprise. He told me he was in love with me. One morning, in the stable, I suddenly felt very strange. The smell of the manure made me dizzy. And later, as I prepared the meal, the mutton made me feel ill. I tried to find a reason that wasn't the worst one. Of course, I couldn't talk to anyone. If I was pregnant, my father would smother me in the sheepskin blanket. When I told Faiez, his face went blank. He promised to talk to my father. He said I should wait - "Until I give you a sign." The days passed, and he gave me no sign. I was hopeful all the same, every evening, of seeing him appear out of nowhere, as he had before, to the left or right of the ravine where I hid. Three or four months later, my stomach began to get larger. It was my father who came towards me, on a washing day, his cane striking the ground of the courtyard. He stopped behind me. "You're pregnant," he said. I dropped the laundry into the basin. I couldn't look up at him. "No, father," I insisted. Later, I pleaded with my mother, assuring her that I had had my period. There was a family meeting, which of course I wasn't allowed to attend: my parents, Noura and my brother-in-law Hussein. I listened behind the wall, terrified. My mother spoke to Hussein: "We can't ask our son. He won't be able to do it - he's too young." "I can take care of her." Then my father: "If you're going to do it, it must be done right. What do you have in mind?" "Don't worry about it. I'll find a way." I heard my sister crying, saying she didn't want to hear this and that she wanted to go home. Hussein told her to wait, then confirmed arrangements with my parents: "You'll go out. Leave the house. When you come back, it will be done." I couldn't comprehend what I had heard. I wondered if it could have been a dream, a nightmare. Were they really going to kill me? And if they did, when would it be? How? By cutting off my head? Maybe they would let me have the child then kill me afterwards? Would they keep the baby if it was a boy? Would my mother suffocate it if it was a girl? The next day my mother told me that she was going to the city with my father. I knew what it meant. I looked at the courtyard ; it was a big space, part of it was tiled, the rest covered with sand. It was encircled by a wall, and all around on top of the wall were iron spikes. In one corner, the metallic grey door, smooth on the courtyard side, without a lock or key, and only a handle on the outside. If he came, he could only enter by that door. Suddenly I heard it clang. My brother-in-law was there, he was coming towards me. He was smiling. Twenty-five years later I see these images again as if time has stopped. I was sitting on a rock, barefoot in a grey dress. I had lowered my head, unable to look at him; my forehead was on my knees. Then suddenly I was running and on fire and screaming. There were women, I remember, two of them, so I must have climbed over the garden wall and into the street. They beat at me, I suppose with their scarves. They dragged me to the village fountain; I felt the cold water running on me and I cried out with pain because it burnt me too. I heard women wailing over me. "The poor thing . . . The poor thing . . ." I was lying in a car. I felt the jolts of the road. I heard myself moan. Later, on a hospital bed, I was curled up in a ball under a sheet. A nurse had come to tear off my dress. She pulled roughly on the fabric and the pain jolted me. I slept, my head still stuck to my chest, as it was when I was on fire. My arms were extended out from my body and both were paralysed. My hands were still there, but I couldn't use them. I wanted to scratch myself, to rip off my skin to stop the pain. When I woke again I saw two bare feet, a long black dress, a small form like mine, thin, almost skinny. It wasn't the nurse. It was my mother. Her two plaits were smoothed with olive oil, her black scarf, that strange forehead, a bulge between her eyebrows over the nose, a profile like a bird of prey. She frightened me. She sat on a stool with her black bag and started to weep, her head rocking back and forth. She wept with shame, for herself and the whole family. And I saw the hatred in her eyes. Never will I forget that big glass she filled to the top with a transparent liquid, like water. "Drink this. It's me who gives it to you." I was so thirsty I tried to raise my chin, but I couldn't. Suddenly a young doctor - one of the few members of staff who had treated me kindly - came into the room. My mother jumped. He grabbed the glass from her hand and banged it down on the windowsill. "No!" he shouted. He took my mother by the arm and made her leave the room. "You're lucky I came in when I did," he told me when he returned. "From now on no one from your family will be allowed in here." Three or four days later, I still hadn't eaten or drunk anything since being admitted to hospital. I knew they were letting me die because it was forbidden to intervene in a case like mine. I was guilty in everyone's eyes. I would endure the fate of all women who sully the honour of men. They had only washed me because I stank. They kept me there because it was a hospital where I was supposed to die without creating more problems for my parents and the village. Hussein had botched the job: he had let me run away in flames. One night I felt a strange pain, like a knife stuck into my stomach. I could feel something strange between my legs. I didn't realise, at first, that I was giving birth. The doctor heard my cries and came into the room. He leant over and took the baby away, without showing it to me. Later he told me that I had given birth at six months to a tiny boy, but that he was alive and being cared for. I heard vaguely what he was saying to me, but my ears had been burned and hurt so terribly. Someone came into the room once, in the middle of this nightmare. A hand passed over my face without touching it. A woman's voice, with a peculiar accent, said to me in Arabic: "I'm going to help you, do you understand?" I said yes, without believing it. I was so uncomfortable in that bed, the object of everyone's scorn; I didn't understand how anyone could help me. But I said yes to that woman. I didn't know who she was. My second life began in Europe at the end of the 1970s in an international airport. Concealed behind a curtain, my body smelt so much that the passengers on the plane taking me to Europe protested. But next to me, in a cradle, was my son Marouan. I gazed at his face, long and dark, under the hospital bonnet. He had been found in an orphanage, where the hospital had sent him because I was expected to die. The woman, Jacqueline, a worker for a humanitarian organisation, had tracked him down. She had also persuaded my parents to sign me over to her, telling them that she was going to take me somewhere else to die. My father, I later learned, had made her promise that they would never see me again: "NEVER AGAIN!" They would tell the village that I had died, and their honour would be intact. Jacqueline was taking me to the serious burns unit of a Swiss hospital. The day after we arrived I had an emergency operation, to free my chin from my chest and allow me to raise my head. For long months there were skin grafts, 24 operations in all. My legs, which hadn't been burned, provided replacement skin until there was none left to give. At first, my arms hung stiffly at my sides, like a doll's, but eventually the medical staff straightened them so that I could move them. I began to stand, then walk in the corridors and to use my hands. I now live in Europe, where I am married to a good man, Antonio. We have two daughters. When Marouan was five, I signed a paper for his foster-parents to adopt him. We had lived together with this foster family for four years after our arrival; his parents were also mine. I still feel guilty for making this choice, but I knew he was happy, and he knew I was alive. I was 24 and I didn't feel I could stay any longer. I had to work, gain my independence and finally become an adult. I would not have been able to raise him alone. I am still Muslim, but I retain few of the customs of my village. I detest violence. If someone reproaches me for being critical of the Muslim religion I try to help them understand what they haven't understood before. My mother frequently quarrelled with our neighbours. She would throw stones at them or pull their hair. In our country, the women always go for the hair. More than 6,000 "honour" crimes are committed every year - in the West Bank, Jordan, Turkey, Iran, Iraq, Yemen, India and Pakistan. In Pakistan the custom is an accepted part of national culture. In Jordan, a man who has killed his wife in a state of rage is entitled to the judge's clemency; the same law applies to a man who kills his wife simply because he suspects her of adultery. It is increasingly common for "disgraced" families to hire bounty hunters, so women who manage to escape to other countries are forced into hiding. I have since met many of these women. One young girl has no legs: she was attacked by two men who tied her up and put her in the path of a train. Another girl's father and brother tried to murder her by stabbing her and throwing her into a dustbin. There is another whose mother and brothers threw her out of a window: she is paralysed. I have never met any other burned women. As far as I know, none of them have survived. Dafna Yee is director of Jewish Watch Dog (JWD). Its website address is http://jwd-jewishwatchdog.home.comcast.net To Go To Top

THE GIVERS, THE TAKERS AND THE LOSERS Posted by Emanuel A. Winston, April 28, 2004.

Regrettably, Jewish leaders have a terrible track record of giving up land and getting little or nothing in return. When then Prime Minister Menachem Begin abandoned the entire Sinai to Egypt, he gave up a $17 Billion investment in infrastructure, development of the oil fields, roads, 2 military bases, a city and several farming towns. What he got was a cold peace which was followed by a $60 Billion build-up of the Egyptian military force with free American tax-payers' dollars. Egypt is now considered a deadly threat to Israel, particularly as it drifts toward radical Islamization. Moshe Dayan, a long term Leftist and Arik Sharon were the lead characters in urging Begin to give up the hard-won Sinai Desert buffer. Sharon has invited Egypt back to supposedly guard its side of Gaza knowing Mubarak has facilitated smuggling arms into Gaza. Moshe Dayan's first act after Jerusalem was recaptured from the Jordanians in 1967 was to give up control of the Temple Mount to the Arab Muslim Waqf. As a non-Jewish Jew Dayan didn't want the Temple returned to observant Jews - lest they start to rebuild the Holy Jewish Temple. Moreover, Dayan thought he could bribe the Arab Muslims by pacifying them with Solomon's Temple - which meant nothing to him and his Leftist, anti-religious Party. In the end, the Arab Muslims claimed that the Temple never belonged to the Jews. Dayan gave away control over Israel's most precious holy place and got nothing for his perfidy. The full story of his treachery has not been told but it is likely that David Ben Gurion of the Leftist Mapai Party influenced Dayan's decision. Recall when Prime Minister Binyamin (Bibi) Netanyahu similarly tried to bribe the Arab Muslims, Washington and the Europeans by giving away control over most of Hebron. Although he owned nothing and was merely temporarily elected custodian of the land, he gave away most of Hebron - expecting those Jews who lived there to be driven out by Arab Muslim terror. Netanyahu, like Rabin, Peres, Beilin and Barak had little grasp of Jewish history or respect for the Nation's patrimony so he simply gave away Hebron and the burial cave of the Machpelah (the family of Patriarchs and Matriarchs): Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Leah. (Rachel is buried near Bethlehem.) Later, when it was too late to rectify his grievous misjudgement, he expressed regret for his actions. I do not believe he regrets his decision - except for the political fallout. But, Netanyahu expected gratitude and applause from the Arab Muslims, America and the Europeans. Instead, he too got nothing and was virtually sneered at for his weak appeal for gratitude. His unforgivable betrayal of our Jewish heritage only generated a demand for more concessions by Yassir Arafat and the U.S. State Department. Shimon Peres and his toady, the contemptible Yossi Beilin, went underground to Norway to secretly and illegally plot with the outlawed PLO what came to be known as the Oslo Plan. They, too, stole and gave away the rights of the Jewish people with disastrous results. They gave away land they didn't own to the arch terrorist, Arafat. They resurrected the terrorists who had been exiled from Jordan to Lebanon and from Lebanon to Tunis for creating terror states wherever he existed. For that bit of treachery, the Israeli people got a surge of terror launched from the areas the Leftists gave away - as if they owned and had personal title to the land. "Oslo" became a hunting license to kill Jews with the attacks launched from now safe areas given over by the Oslo gang. All later demands for a full investigation for the many Isarelis killed by what history would judge as treason, was quashed by Shimon Peres. Arafat turned those gifted areas into terrorist bases where they could train, plan attacks, accumulate smuggled weapons and use the thousands of automatic weapons given to them by Yitzhak Rabin, Peres and Beilin. These weapons were, as you have seen, turned against the Israelis, resulting in at least 1500 Jews killed since the Oslo Accords were signed on September 13, 1993 on the White House lawn (with President Clinton standing as guarantor for the U.S.) In addition to the 1500 Jews killed, tens of thousands were wounded, many maimed for life. Here again, giving away the land cost us dearly and we continue to pay the price in murdered and maimed Jews. Even more strange is that Sharon in his withdrawal/retreat commitment to Bush has agreed to train Palestinian Police to control their terrorists. (Bizarre?!) Now we have an elderly General, looking for his place in history. He wishes to give away Gaza and Gush Katif (the 21 Jewish farming communities) which supply Israel with bug-free produce, and export 70% of the produce to Europe. However, the world's experts on terror and intelligence know Gaza will turn into a fully operational international base for terror. Sharon, based on the U.S. State Department planning and a Bush mandate, wishes to leave everything in place so that the incoming Palestinians Arab Muslims have housing, factories, farms, water and even the gardens planted by the Jews. This requirement is so that President Bush will not have to pay for housing the incoming hordes of cast-off Palestinian Arab Muslims. Israel, according to Bush requirement, is supposed to continue providing electricity, water plus allowing the Arab Muslim Palestinians to enter Israel for jobs. The U.S. has stated they do not wish to pay for anything! As Begin chose to absorb the $17 Billion dollars Israel had invested in the Sinai, Sharon will absorb the cost of the Gaza investment which is valued at over $7 to 10 Billion dollars. But, Sharon really doesn't have the funds to pay for this evacuation and so he will merely evict, evacuate and remove the settlers and not pay. There are many stories based upon confirmed history when the Jews gave up land for peace and got nothing in return except for terror, death and destruction - along with broken agreements. If the Jews do not rise up this time and throw this pitiful, befuddled old man out of power, then, sadly, they will deserve the terror that will emanate from the international terror organization that will come from Gaza. The mujahadeen Islamic holy warriors, trained to fight in Afghanistan by the Americans are now infiltrating Iraq and killing Americans. They will move into Gaza, bring in a well-trained, well-armed force, furious at the Jewish infidels, and proceed to attack Israel in force. Perhaps the decline of the government for the people began in earnest when Rabin and Peres discovered that they could dictate government policy without answering to anyone. Not the Knesset (Parliament) and not the people. They discovered they could run the government by 'diktat under the cover of democracy'. From Rabin and Peres onward, the Prime Ministers could dictate policy, relying upon a weak Knesset to rubber stamp their orders. Ehud Barak, without consultation, was ready to gift Arafat every place Israel liberated in1967, including half of Jerusalem. Arafat refused and three months later started the Rosh Hashanah 2000 war (called the intifada) which killed almost 1000 Jews and as many as 45 Americans. Sharon has already said: "Have a referendum but I will not be bound by it." Sharon, in his old age, has become a clear and present danger to the future of Israel. Encouraging the international terrorists that terrorism pays, also endangers all of Western civilization. Sharon leans on the promises of President Bush, not understanding that the purse strings are held by Congress. Sharon has been told that the U.S. will not pay for his retreat/withdrawal - with costs exceeding $7 to 10 Billions of dollars in the first stage to re-settle the 8000 men, women and children who developed and grew three generations on the unwanted, barren, desert dunes, making them bloom and blossom. Then comes the Billions it will cost to keep the millions of Arab Muslims living in a dysfunctional terrorist haven into which all the Arab Muslim countries will dump their Palestinian Arabs. The Arabist U.S. State Department wants Israel to maintain the burden of supporting the Palestinians with jobs but, Israel does not have either the money nor sufficient Jews to sacrifice to further Arab Muslim Palestinian terror. The Jews of Israel have a choice. If they vote to support Sharon's plan of evacuation, uprooting, evicting ethnic cleansing of Jews from their ancient Biblical homeland - then they must pay the price in Billions of dollars and thousands of lives. Israel must choose between the Givers, the Takers and know that they will be the Losers if they vote for Sharon's retreat. Emanuel Winston is a commentator and Middle East analyst. His articles appear often on Think-Israel, Gamla (http://gamla.org.il/english) and the Freeman Center for Strategic Studies (http://www.freeman.org/online.htm) To Go To Top

SHARON HIDING THE DEPTH OF THE CONCESSIONS Posted by Unity Coalition For Israel, April 28, 2004.

This appeared as a news item in Arutz 7 today. Tensions are high in the Likud with only four days to go until its 193,000 members go to the polls to help decide the future of Gush Katif and the State of Israel. It is assumed that those who object to the plan are more motivated and thus more likely to vote. The higher the voter turnout there is, therefore, the more the Sharon camp has room for optimism. Efforts in both camps, though still concentrating on person-to-person visits - Prime Minister Sharon is engaged in phone calls this morning - are now turning to the logistics of "getting out the vote on Sunday." In the meantime, Mr. Sharon and his staffers are said to be hiding the truth from the public regarding the depth of his planned pullback from Judea and Samaria. "If the Likud members would know what Sharon is really planning," Likud leaders told Yossi Elituv of Mishpachah [Family] magazine, "they would be storming his office and demanding his immediate resignation." The Likud seniors told Elituv that Sharon has given the order to "hide the evacuation from Judea/Samaria, and concentrate only on the pullback from Gaza. His purpose is to lull the Likud members, obtain their consent for the disengagement from Gaza, and then to use that to move on to the next stage - a massive evacuation of Judea and Samaria." Specifically, the quoted sources in Elituv's article say, 20 Yesha communities are on the chopping block - involving the expulsion of some 100,000 Jews. This is in addition to the four towns that are to be uprooted simultaneously with Gush Katif, namely, Kadim, Ganim, Sa-Nur and Chomesh. The Likud members quoted by Elituv say that the Prime Minister does not plan another party referendum regarding the next stage of his plan. In confirmation of the above, an Associated Press article published today states, "In promoting his plan of unilateral disengagement from the Palestinians, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is evading a central question: what will happen to about 100 West Bank settlements on the 'wrong' side of Israel's separation barrier? Senior Israeli officials and government advisers acknowledge privately that many - if not all - of these isolated enclaves may eventually be taken down, even without a peace deal, if they become increasingly indefensible... These settlements will be ringed by individual fences. If the Palestinians don't agree to a resumption of peace talks, under terms acceptable to Israel, 'we take out those isolated communities that can't be defended and move on our way,' a senior Israeli official said on condition of anonymity." Prime Minister Sharon himself has said that he plans to leave only five large settlement blocs in place - meaning that all the other flourishing towns and communities in Yesha will be uprooted. Sharon says he wants to retain Gush Etzion, Kiryat Arba-Hevron, Givat Ze'ev, Ariel and Maaleh Adumim, while towns to be dispensed with include Elon Moreh, Ofrah, Shilo, Beit El, and more. WHAT SETTLEMENT BLOCS? Another aspect of the alleged Prime Minister's Office deception concerns the above-mentioned settlement blocs themselves (see previous article). Correspondent Haggai Huberman notes that U.S. President George Bush never said a word about them in his letter of two weeks ago to Sharon. He rather wrote that it "is unrealistic to expect" a full return to the 1949 armistice borders "in light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli population centers." Bush actually made sure to state that he is not endorsing any particular solution: "It is realistic to expect that any final status agreement will only be achieved on the basis of mutually agreed changes that reflect these realities." Even within the settlement blocs that Sharon says he hopes to keep, construction will be all but curtailed. As Huberman writes, "the only place that construction will be possible in Yesha towns under the Sharon government will be on the lawns between the existing houses or on their roofs." This is backed up by two official letters from Sharon's top aide Dov Weisglass, one from June 2003 and one this month. In the first, Weisglass wrote, "These are the understandings reached between Israel and the U.S. regarding the Jewish settlements in Judea, Samaria and Gaza: ... No new towns will be built, and construction will be frozen in the existing towns, except for building within the existing building lines - as opposed to the municipal border..." In his more recent letter, Weisglass wrote to U.S. National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice, "On behalf of the Prime Minister of the State of Israel, Mr. Ariel Sharon, I wish to reconfirm the following understanding, which had been reached between us: 1. Restrictions on settlement growth: within the agreed principles of settlement activities, an effort will be made in the next few days to have a better definition of the construction line of settlements in Judea and Samaria [the West Bank]. An Israeli team, in conjunction with Ambassador Kurtzer, will review aerial photos of settlements and will jointly define the construction line of each of the settlements." In related news, the text of another letter from President Bush - this one to King Abdullah of Jordan - was leaked to the press today, and includes language that seeks to "soften" the American commitments made to Sharon earlier this month. The letter is raising concern in the pro-disengagement camp in the Likud, as it is felt that it further erodes the "accomplishments" of Sharon's evacuation plan. Founded in 1991, the National Unity Coalition is "the largest worldwide coalition of Jewish and Christian organizations, with more than 200 groups representing millions of people dedicated to Israel. Though we have many different backgrounds, we have one common goal: A Safe and Secure Israel." "Israel is not just a Jewish issue. Millions of Christians resolutely endorse the principle of peace with security for the state of Israel. Because we work closely together and speak with a united voice, our message is being heard!" To Go To Top

WHAT IS SO GREAT ABOUT ISRAEL? Posted by Steven Plaut, April 28, 2004.

Israeli Independence Day is just behind us. We spend so much time on the mindless self-destructive insane side of Israel that we may tend to forget the positive aspects of life in Israel. And there are ever so many of those. Here is a small list of some of my favorite things about life in Israel: 1. Israel is the only country in the world where people can read the Bible and understand it. 2. Israel is the only country in the world where, if someone calls you a "dirty Jew", it means you need a bath (old Efraim Kishon quip, but still good). 3. Israel is the only country in the world where formal dress means a new clean Tee Shirt, sandals and jeans. 4. Israel is the only country in the world where one need not check the ingredients on the products in the supermarket to avoid ending up with things containing pork. 5. Israel is a country where the same drivers who cuss you and flip you the bird will immediately pull over and offer you all forms of help if you look like you need it. 6. Israel is the only country in the world with Avihu Medina, Zohar Argov, and Daklon (godfathers of "Oriental Music"). 7. Israel is the only country in the world with bus drivers and taxi drivers who read Spinoza and Maimonides. 8. Israel is the only country in the world where you dare not gossip about other people on the bus in Mandarin, Russian, Hindi, Lithuanian, Hungarian, Polish, or Romanian lest others on the bus understand what you are saying. 9. Israel is the only country in the world with northern European standards of living and southern European weather. It is the only place on earth with an Israeli spring, the most glorious time of year on the planet. 10. Israel is the only country in the world where no one cares what rules say when an important goal can be achieved by bending them. 11. Israel is the only country in the world where a pisher like me can once in a while get invited to give a talk at the parliament, or can get in to speak to a cabinet minister. 12. Israel is the only country in the world where reservists are bossed around and commanded by officers, male and female, younger than their own children. 13. Israel is the only country in the world with Eli Yatzpen (comedian). 14. Israel is the only country in the world where "small talk" consists of loud angry debate over politics and religion. 15. Israel is the only country in the world with Jerusalem, even if Israeli leftists would like to turn it over to the barbarians. 16. Israel is the only country in the world where the coffee is already so good that Starbucks went bankrupt trying to break into the local market. 17. Israel is the only country in the world where the mothers learn their mother tongue from their children (old Efraim Kishon quip but still good). 18. Israel is the only country in the world where the people understand Israeli humor. 19. Israel is the only country in the world where the news is broadcast over the loudspeakers on buses, where people listen to news updates every half hour, or whose people are capable of locating Bosnia on a map of the world. 20. Israel is one of the few places in the world where the sun sets into the Mediterranean Sea. 21. Israel is the only country in the world where, when people say the "modern later era", they are referring to the time of Jesus. 22. Israel is the only country in the world whose soldiers eat three salads a day, none of which contain any lettuce, and where olives are a food and even a main course in a meal, rather than something one tosses into a martini. 23. Israel is the only country in the world where one is unlikely to be able to dig a cellar without hitting ancient archeological artifacts. 24. Israel is the only country in the world where the leading writers in the country take buses. 25. Israel is the only country in the world where the graffiti is in Hebrew. 26. Israel is the only country in the world where the black folks walking around all wear yarmulkes. 27. Israel is the only country in the world that has a national book week, where almost everyone attends and buys books. 28. Israel is the only country in the world where the ultra-Orthodox Jews beat up the police and not the other way around. 29. Israel is the only country in the world where inviting someone "out for a drink" means drinking cola or coffee. 30. Israel is the only country in the world where people who want to go up in an elevator push the down button because they think this makes the elevator come down to get them 31. Israel is the only country in the world with white almond blossoms in January, purple "Judas Tree" blossoms in March, and crocus flowers in October. 32. Israel is the only country in the world where bank robbers kiss the mezuzah as they leave with their loot. 33. Israel is the only country in the world with "Eretz Yisrael Music". 34. Israel is one of the few countries in the world that truly likes and admires the United States. 35. Israel is the only country in the world that introduces applications of high tech gadgets and devices, such as printers in banks that print out your statement on demand, years ahead of the United States and decades ahead of Europe. 36. Israel is the only country in the world that has the weather of California but without the earthquakes. 37. Israel is the only country in the world where everyone on a flight gets to know one another before the plane lands. In many cases they also get to know the pilot and all about his health or marital problems. 38. Israel is the only country in the world where no one has a foreign accent because everyone has a foreign accent. 39. Israel is the only country in the world where people cuss using dirty words in Russian or Arabic because Hebrew has never developed them. 40. Israel is the only country in the world where patients visiting physicians end up giving the doctor advice. 41. Israel is the only country in the world where everyone strikes up conversations while waiting in lines. 42. Israel is the only country in the world where people choose which books to read and which plays to see based on what they plan to discuss with their friends in Friday evening "salon" get-togethers. 43. Israel is the only country in the world where hot water is an event and not a condition ("in" joke; you have to live in Israel to figure it out). 44. Krembos. 45. Israel is the only country in the world where people call an attache case a "James Bond", and the @ sign is called a "strudel". 46. Kumquats. 47. The obsession with sunflower seeds. 48. The kumsitz on the beach. 49. The people who eat watermelon with salt or with salty cheese. The wagons with horses that still sell watermelons on the streets, screaming "watermelon on the knife", whatever that means. 50. Israel is the only country in the world where kids read Harry Potter in Hebrew. 51. Hyssop (zaatar). 52. Where Memorial Day is actually a day for remembering and not buying pool furniture at the mall. 53. Really really good bread! 54. Israel is the only country in the world where there is the most mysterious and mystical calm ambience in the streets on Yom Kippur, which cannot be explained unless you have experienced it. 55. Where kids can really sleep in a Succah because it will not rain on them. 56. Israel is the only country in the world where making a call to God is a local call (old quip, still good). Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist, a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author of "The Scout." He frequently comments - both seriously and satirically - on Israeli politics and the left wing academic community. His website address is http://www.stevenplaut.blogspot.com. To Go To Top

KEEPING WAR A BAD THING Posted by Beth Goodtree, April 28, 2004.

People wonder how the world has gotten into such a mess. The answer is simple, as is the remedy. Unfortunately, implementing the remedy may not be so simple because it goes against the behaviors with which we in the civilized world have been so insidiously inculcated. Back before the insular academic community had so much influence in areas about which they know nothing, war was a bad thing. The consequences of instigating a war were particularly bad if the instigator lost. I remember the good old days when waging war meant loads of civilian casualties, utter destruction of property in the path of combat and horrific outcomes for the loser. These were the realities that made war a thing to avoid. Hirohito immediately conceded when he saw the consequences of an atomic enema administered to Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Loss of sovereignty, loss of territory, loss of rights, loss of life, loss of assets; these are all reasons to avoid war. Take away these consequences and waging war is a win-win situation. If you win, you win, and if you lose, you lose nothing and may actually gain something. Want a prime example? The Middle East on two fronts, Iraq and Israel, which actually have some of the same problems. Let's start with the first politically correct, kinder and gentler war in the history of the world. The time was 1991, the war was with Iraq, and the player's names were Saddam, Bush and Colin Powell. For the first time ever, one side of the warring parties did not try to wipe out the other side. The United States, at the behest of the UN (read Islamist-controlled UN), did not wipe out Saddam but let him live to menace and massacre another day. The US also did not wreak punishing attacks on the instigator of the Gulf War -- Iraq -- thus letting the world know that invading another country was no longer such a risky business. Fast-forward 12 years. Despite three elections, even the player's names are the same: Bush, Powell and Saddam. In the US's "war on terror" (which is a defeatist war since terror is merely the symptom -- the true enemy is radical Islam) America determined Saddam to be a threat. After fair warning for Saddam to step down, we invaded Iraq and performed a Saddamectomy. Unfortunately Saddam, like any other tyrant, does not operate in a vacuum. In America's ill-founded goal of making this as painless a war as possible, we left in place the entire war machine that supported Saddam. We are reaping the consequences of that now. The Islamists now attacking the Iraqi reconstruction forces were given a roadmap to the civilized world's Achilles heel. This weakness is our desire to make war as nice and people-friendly as possible. We shudder at the thought that anyone but our very specific target may get hurt. We try to minimize collateral damage. We go out of our way to insure the rights, the well being, and the sensibilities of everyone including our enemy. So the Islamists now use our abhorrence of true warfare against us. They go out of their way to create horror and collateral damage. They don't merely capture soldiers, they torture and kill them and then mutilate the bodies (this has been done to Israeli soldiers too). They also have no consideration for their fellow countrymen. If we hadn't been so nice when we were engaging the enemy, the coalition forces as well as whatever innocent population remains would not be undergoing round two of the war now. Then there is Israel. In an effort to appease misplaced international sensibilities, Israel has been making concessions to the losers/aggressors in all the wars she was forced to fight. Egypt attacked her, lost territory and was given it back in a peace treaty that Egypt breaks on a daily basis with anti-Semitic lies and propaganda. The Arabs now occupying Israeli land that she won when she was attacked are given royal treatment by the world as downtrodden victims. And these people were the aggressors. Now the world insists that Israel give the very people who are trying, thru an asymmetrical war, to wreak genocide upon her land, a portion of which she won when she was attacked. This is rewarding war and rewarding the aggressors. Meanwhile Israel, instead of being allowed to stop this 60 year war with extreme prejudice -- which would probably end the war once and for all -- is prolonging it by being "nice" to the enemy. Israel provides her enemy's citizens (who support the war by an overwhelming majority) with electricity, water, jobs, even medical services when necessary. Therefore, the aggressor in this war has no reason for stopping it. And as if treating the instigators of war in a kind way is not enough, the world wants Israel to reward her attackers with their own country in the heart of her territory. Again, rewarding warmongers and encouraging more of same. And if you have any doubt that the aggressors (Arabs living in Jewish Palestine) have any legitimate claims to back up their genocidal war upon Israel, one of their own leaders makes it very clear that they do not. PLO executive committee member Zahir Muhsein, in an interview with the Dutch newspaper "Trouw" (March 31, 1977) stated: "The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct 'Palestinian people' to oppose Zionism." Making war a nice thing is the last thing we should be doing if we want to prevent war. It is also the fast track to losing even though you've already won. Beth Goodtree is an award-winning writer, with a background in advertising. She writes political commentary and the occasional humor and science articles. To Go To Top

BUSINESS AS USUAL: NO LOVE FOR ISRAEL IN GENEVA. Posted by Anne Bayefsky, April 28, 2004.

Notwithstanding Kofi Annan's anxious disclaimers, U.N. special envoy to Iraq Lakhdar Brahimi's tendentious proclamation that Israel is "the great poison in the region" is no aberration. Assigning blame to Israel for the nonexistence of Arab democracy, the impoverishment of Arab populations, and the human-rights deficit throughout the Muslim world is standard U.N. policy. Indeed, in a subsequent interview, Brahimi affirmed his original incitement, saying "this is a fact - not opinion." The annual six-week ritual of the U.N. Human Rights Commission in Geneva, which ended on Friday, makes the point all too clearly. After more than a month of negotiations, the commission on its final day could no longer avoid the ethnic cleansing in Sudan, which has left 30,000 dead and 900,000 in deplorable conditions. The U.S. proposal to condemn "the grave violations of human rights and international humanitarian law in Darfur," and to call on the government of Sudan "to ensure all attacks against civilians are stopped" was defeated. Instead, the resolution announced: "the Commission expresses its solidarity with the Sudan in overcoming the current situation." The Sudan result was actually better than the commission outcomes on gross human-rights abuses in China and Zimbabwe. Resolutions on these states were blocked by the success of procedural no-action motions. Consideration of the human-rights situation in Iran didn't even make it to the floor. This was despite a report from one of the commission's working groups describing a legal system with the following features. "[E]vidence by a man is equivalent to that of two women"; punishments for sins "against divine law" are "the death penalty, crucifixion, stoning, amputation of the right hand and, for repeat offences, the left foot, flogging..."; and "criminal proceedings in their entirety are...concentrated in the hands of a single person since the judge prosecutes, investigates and decides the case." Iranian impunity from U.N. concern has practical results. Shortly after a meeting in Iran with the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression in November 2003, one person disappeared. Israel was treated somewhat differently by the U.N.'s primary human-rights body, which is composed of a majority of Asian and African states and whose membership includes countries with such appalling human-rights records as China, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Zimbabwe. Not only were five resolutions adopted condemning Israel, but the commission took three hours out of its schedule to mourn the death of Hamas terrorist leader Sheikh Ahmad Yassin. Yassin personally instigated and authorized suicide bombing and exhorted his followers to "armed struggle" against Israelis and Jews "everywhere." A special sitting for Yassin was convened on March 22, 2004, despite the fact that the commission was already in session, and about to consider the only country-specific agenda item at the commission for the past 34 years - on Israel. Although Israel's action was denounced by the commission and the secretary-general as an "extrajudicial killing," the conclusion is not only inflammatory, but incorrect. Both Yassin, and Abdel Aziz Rantissi, were combatants in a war. The legal term "extrajudicial," by definition, applies only to individuals entitled to judicial process before being targeted. Combatants - including the unlawful combatants of Hamas who seek to make themselves indistinguishable from the civilian population - are not entitled to such prior judicial process. International Committee of the Red Cross manuals state that civilians who take a direct part in hostilities forfeit their immunity from attack. Furthermore, judicial process was not an option for Israel since it would have placed both Israeli Defense Forces and Palestinian civilians at much greater risk. The legal limit in targeting combatants like Yassin is the rule of proportionality, or "incidental loss of civilian life" which is not "excessive" (in the language of the Geneva Conventions). In these cases, the outcome was proportionate since civilian casualties were kept to a minimum. What makes the U.N.'s professed interest in the subject even more unconvincing was the commission's total lack of response to a simultaneous report on recent extrajudicial killings in Brazil. The U.N. Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions attempted to raise the alarm on more than 3,000 civilians murdered in Brazil at the hands of military and civil police. Details of "poorly disguised extrajudicial executions...[in which] the lethal shots had been fired from behind and at close range" were provided. Two people brave enough to talk to the rapporteur were shot and killed shortly after the U.N. representative left the country. No mention was made by the Human Rights Commission of Brazil. The Commission Rapporteur on the Right to Food, while noting almost a billion people undernourished, spent his time issuing a special report on a "food crisis" in the "occupied Palestinian territory." He found blame on the "apartheid wall." No reference was made, however, to the inevitable disruption to the movement of goods and workers through passes subject to frequent terrorist attack, or the millions of dollars recently deposited in Mrs. Arafat's bank account. The Commission Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief managed to produce an entire global report without mentioning "anti-semitism." The commission does, however, continue to require the production of an annual report on the "situation of Muslim and Arab peoples in various parts of the world." To his credit, the author of that report suggested to the commission that a report on anti-semitism would also be appropriate. His suggestion was ignored. Perhaps the attitude of the U.N. towards Israeli victims of five decades of war and terror aimed at the destruction of the Jewish state is best summed up by the attitude of U.N. Special Rapporteur on Israel John Dugard. He told the commission "[a]fter the necessary disclaimer of sympathy for terrorism, the report will focus on two issues that...most seriously demand the attention of the international community - the unlawful annexation of Palestinian territory and the restrictions on freedom of movement." The 2004 U.N. Human Rights Commission produced 5,539 pages of documents. Six weeks later there had been 86 separate votes, with the U.S. being in the minority 85 percent of the time. In a final irony, the 2004 commission's last act was to consider that its performance warranted an additional six meetings next year - to be paid for, no doubt, from the U.N.'s regular budget, 22 percent of which comes from U.S. taxpayers. Anne Bayefsky is an adjunct professor of law at Columbia Law School. She is also a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute. This article appeared in the National Review and is archived at http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/bayefsky200404261515.asp To Go To Top

THE TRAFFIC JAM THAT SAVED ERETZ YISRAEL Posted by David Wilder, April 28, 2004.

Yesterday morning we left Hebron at about 10:30. The car was full - my wife, daughter and her two small children. The others were on one of the two Hebron buses. The destination: Gush Katif. THE referendum is scheduled for next week - Sunday, May 2. Ariel Sharon is worried. The Hebrew daily Maariv quoted the prime minister as saying, "Whoever votes against the 'disengagement' is voting against me." In other words, Sharon is transforming the referendum into a "no-confidence vote." Arutz 7 posted an article saying that Sharon is considering resigning should the referendum be defeated. In yet another article, Associated Press correspondent Ramit Plushnick-Masti writes: Sharon Plan would remove up to 100 west bank settlements. "Senior Israeli officials and government advisers acknowledge privately that many - if not all - of these isolated enclaves may eventually be taken down, even without a peace deal, if they become increasingly indefensible." Arutz 7 reports: "In the meantime, Sharon and his staffers are hiding the truth from the public regarding the depth of his planned pullback from Judea and Samaria. "If the Likud members would know what Sharon is really planning," Likud leaders told Yossi Elituv of Mishpachah [Family] magazine, "they would be storming his office and demanding his immediate resignation." The Likud seniors told Elituv that Sharon has given the order to "hide the evacuation from Judea/Samaria, and concentrate only on the pullback from Gaza. His purpose is to lull the Likud members, obtain their consent for the disengagement from Gaza, and then to use that to move on to the next stage - a massive evacuation of Judea and Samaria."" Yet it is vital to note that Sharon does not represent all of the Likud leadership. Speaking at Mt. Hertzl on the eve of Israel's 56th independence day, Speaker of the Knesset Rubi Rivlin, basing his speech on the famous words of Theodore Hertzl, "If you will it, it is no legend," said, "These words beat in its heart and drove its wheels, as Zionism succeeded, achieved the impossible, time after time. When we willed it - the legend became reality. When we willed it - the scattered exiles of Israel were gathered in. When we willed it - from a small, fearful community, we became a proud nation. And when we willed it; when we really willed it - the Land was conquered, and nobody stood in our way. But the story has not yet ended. Even today; on the one hundredth anniversary of Herzl's death; in the fifty-sixth year of the Independence of Israel; nothing is self-evident. Even today, every day, we must continue to will it, we must continue to believe." Speaking before lighting the traditional, honorary torch of honor: I, Reuven Rivlin, son of my father and teacher, Professor Yosef-Yoel Rivlin, may he rest in peace, researcher of Semitic languages, and translator of the Koran into Hebrew, and - may she live long - my mother and teacher, Rachel, who today, 6th Iyar, is exactly one hundred years old; seventh generation in Jerusalem; descendent of the Aliyah to Jerusalem, one hundred years before the vision of Herzl, by the disciples of the Gaon, Rabbi Eliyahu of Vilna; Speaker of the Sixteenth Knesset; am honored to light this torch, of the fifty-sixth Independence Day of the State of Israel. In honor of - The Knesset, the legislature of Israel, and the temple of democracy! In honor of - the pioneers, the vanguard of those who came to settle the Land of our Fathers, who redeemed the land - from Hanita - to Kfar Darom; from Negba - to Kiryat Arba, that is Hebron! In honor of - The heroes of all branches of the security forces. In honor of - Jerusalem, our holy city, our eternal capital and the heart of the nation. And for the glory of the State of Israel! Rivlin's initial speech most certainly alluded to the challenges of Zionism and the will to overcome - not only 100 years ago, not only fifty-six years ago, but also at the present. Rivlin's words, coming from the Speaker of the Knesset, articulating "the pioneers, the vanguard of those who came to settle the Land of our Fathers, who redeemed the land - from Hanita - to Kfar Darom; from Negba - to Kiryat Arba, that is Hebron!" reflect the true Likud ideology, the true Zionist ideology, which Ariel Sharon has so grossly warped. And Rivlin is not alone. Yesterday, some 150,000 Israelis voiced their opinion, not in words, but in actions, expressing themselves with their feet and with their tires. According to police reports, 70,000 people arrived yesterday in Gush Katif. Our experience has taught us that the "official estimate" is about a half of the "real thing." According to Gush Katif spokesman Eran Sternberg, over 100,000 people managed to get into Gush Katif. Tens of thousands of others, including yours truly, were crowded out. Traffic authorities said this morning on Israel radio that they have never before witnessed a traffic jam as large as yesterday's, tens of kilometers long. We left Hebron at 10:30 in the morning for a two hour ride to Gush Katif. I managed to drive the last 20 kilometers in about an hour and a half and we were still about 10 kilometers from our destination. After not moving for over an hour and having spent a grand total of five hours in the car we decided to pull into a nearby kibbutz, found a nice place for a picnic barbeque (not too far from some Bedouin tents), and camped out for a few hours. But you know something? No one complained. And I'm not talking about us. I'm talking about thousands and thousands of people stuck, just like us. Many of them were more daring than I was - they parked their cars on the side of the road and walked, 10 or more kilometers, in order to reach Gush Katif and participate in the main event at 3:30 in the afternoon. No one really cared how long it took to arrive, because the message was clear. Gush Katif is part of Eretz Yisrael and we have no intentions of leaving, not now, not ever. Over 100,000 Israelis shouted out to Ariel Sharon - "Go ahead, just try and evacuate Gush Katif, go ahead, just try to evict over 7,000 Jews from their homes. Because if you so dare, you will not be evicting 7,000 Israelis - you will have to evict hundreds of thousands of people!!!" Have not doubt: the almost 200,000 Likud members who will be voting on Sunday saw and heard yesterday's events. Many of them participated. I expect that early Monday morning the results will be self-evident. History will definitely remember Ariel Sharon from many diverse angles. But perhaps one of the most unique will be just this: Ariel Sharon initiated the greatest traffic jam in Israel's history, a traffic jam which may turn out to have saved Eretz Yisrael. With blessings from Hebron. David Wilder is spokesman for the Jewish Community of Hebron. You can contribute directly to The Jewish Community of Hebron, POB10, Kiryat Arba-Hebron 90100, hebron@hebron.org.il, 972-2-9965333 or write to The Hebron Fund, 1760 Ocean Ave., Brooklyn, NY 11230, hebronfund@aol.com To Go To Top

BLAMED BEFORE BIRTH; ASSERTION WITHOUT RESEARCH Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 28, 2004.

BLAMING ISRAEL BEFORE IT EXISTED Arab culture particularly abhors confession. Arab leaders are defensive about the problems they inflict upon their people. The Arab people are too ashamed to admit that their own society produces these problems. Most Arabs blame outsiders. They want sympathy accorded victims, although their problems victimize others. Whom do they blame? The US and Israel. The Arabs stultify their own economies, but claim Israel is smothering them. They promote terrorism, but attribute it to Israel or at best to Israeli policies. They plot to poison Israelis but accuse Israel, which wouldn't dream of such barbaric tactics, of actually poisoning them in ways that only the Arabs would dream up. Arab blame and accusation is pure assertion, unencumbered by proof. Arab culture doesn't require proof or logic beyond coincidence based on false claims, just belief. If assertion serves their cause, they believe it, no questions asked. The greatest failure of logic is in the Arabs blaming Israel for the problems originating in the pre-capitalist Arab economic, political, and social systems. The failure of Arab society was noted by the Arabs perhaps 150 years ago. Israel is barely more than 50 years old. Its existence has been characterized by a struggle to survive amid world ostracism. Israel has made great strides but has little to do with much of the Arab world it supposedly is influencing. Point is, the Arabs blame Israel for Arab problems that accumulated hundreds of years before Israel was established. When did logic ever enter into Arab criticism of Israel? POLITICAL ASSERTION WITHOUT RESEARCH An Israeli general explained the integrated defensive measures, of which the security fence in Judea-Samaria is one. Unfortunately, some of the others are not being implemented. In discussing this, he drew on experience in his field of expertise. Then he attempted to broaden the notion of defense to include economics. Citing neither experience nor research, he asserted his supposition dogmatically. That may be the usual way to develop failed policy; it is not the proper way to develop useful policy. It imposes questionable "do-good" ideology. With national survival at stake, this methodology is not acceptable. The general's theory is that by employing thousands of Arabs from the P.A., Israel dilutes Arab hatred, lessens participation in jihad, and encourages moderates to swing away from war. Arguments against that theory are based on experience and logic. In the approximately 80 years of modern Zionism, Zionism's economic benefits for the Arabs are denied and have increased Arab hostility. Decades ago, the effendi class recognized the threat of prosperity and example of democracy to its rule, so it led a nationalist offensive. The formerly uneducated Arab mass gained the education, funds, and the leisure to mount a more effective struggle. They migrate to where the work is, thereby increasing the demographic threat. Speculating about moderates is premature, since none have stood up. Polls showing the overwhelming majority favor dispossession of Israelis. Traditionally Arabs emigrate from impoverished areas. They are migrating now. Therefore, a strategy of denying Israeli payrolls and taxes to the Arabs and the P.A. has a practical basis for reducing the force of the Palestinian Arab war on Israel. To help resolve the issue and devise a suitable economic policy towards the Arabs, Israeli social scientists ought to study whether prosperity produces friendship and tolerance or subsidizes a religious hostility that material health does not overcome. Can employment neutralize the totalitarian media and education bombardment of a populace fertilized for bigotry and violence by culture and a still active religious establishment? Alternatively, does poverty cripple the Arabs' means of warfare and motivate them to move to where they might earn a living? Mr. Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at ricshulman@aol.com. To Go To Top

UP AGAINST FANATICISM Posted by Jack De Lowe, April 28, 2004.

It is interesting to note that the author, Executive Editor Phil Lucas, never mentions Israel once in his article. The struggle that has now become an open war with fanatical Islam would have occurred even if Israel was never created some 56 years ago yesterday. The fact that Israel has the audacity to continue to survive against their ongoing terror irritates them, but is not the cause of their attacks on non-Muslims world-wide. The sooner all of us face up to this unfortunate reality, the sooner we can all get down to doing what is necessary to begin the struggle to end this threat to all of us. I ask that each of you take the time to read this article carefully and pass it onto those on your list. A special thanks to Phil Lucas for writing it the way it is. This appeared in the News Herald of Panama City, FL, April 4, 2004. It is archived at http://66.21.108.67/interconnect/browser/intercon.dll He can be reached by email at plucas@pcnh.com If straight talk of savagery offends you, if you believe in ethnic and gender diversity but not diversity of thought or if you think there is an acceptable gray area between good and evil, then turn to the funny pages, and take the children, too. This piece is not for you. We published pictures Thursday of burnt American corpses hanging from an Iraqi bridge behind a mob of grinning Muslims. Some readers didn't like it. Mothers said it frightened their children. A woman who works with Muslim physicians thought it might offend or endanger them. Well, we sure don't want to frighten, offend or endanger anybody, do we? That's just too much diversity to handle. I mean, somebody might get hurt. We could fill the newspaper every morning with mobs of fanatical Muslims. They can't get along with their neighbors on much of the planet: France, Chechnya, Bosnia, Indonesia, Spain, Morocco, India, Tunisia, Somalia, etc. etc. etc. Can anybody name three ongoing world conflicts in which Muslims are not involved? Today, where there is war, there are fanatical Muslims. We might quibble about who started what conflicts, but look at the sheer number of them. One thing is sure. Muslim killers started the one we are in now when they slaughtered more than 3,000 people, including fellow Muslims, in New York City. Madeleine Albright, the former secretary of state and feckless appeaser who helped get us into this mess, said last week Muslims still resented the Crusades. Well, Madame Albright, if Westerners were not such a forgiving people, we might resent them too. Let's recap the Crusades. Muslims invaded Europe, and when they reached sufficient numbers, they imposed their intolerant religion upon Westerners by force. Christian monarchs drove them back and took the battle to their homeland. The fight lasted a couple of centuries, and we bottled them up for 1,000 years. Now, a millennium later, Muslims have expanded forth again. Ask France. Ask England. Ask Manhattan. Two-and-a-half years ago fanatical Muslims laid siege to us. We woke up to the obvious. Our president announced it would be a very long war, then took the battle to the Islamic homeland. Sound familiar? Let's consider the concept of a "long war." Last time it was 200 years, give or take. Anybody catch Lord of the Rings? You know, the good part, the part that wasn't fiction, the part that drew us to the books and movies because it was the truest part: the titanic struggle between good and evil, between freedom and enslavement, between the individual and the state, between the celebration of life and the worshipping of death. That's the fight we are in, and it never ends. It just has peaks and valleys. There may be a silent majority of peaceful Muslims - some live here - but that did not save 3,000 people in the World Trade Center, the millions gassed and butchered in the Middle East, the tens of thousands slain in Eastern Europe and Asia, the hundreds blown to bits in the West Bank and Spain, or the four Americans shot, burned and hung like sausage over the Euphrates as a fanatical minority of Muslims did the joyful dance of death. Maybe we are so tolerant, we are so bent on "diversity," we are so nonjudgmental, we are so wrapped up in our six-packs and ballgames that our brains have drained to our bulbous behinds. Maybe we're so addled on Ritalin we wouldn't know which end of a gun to hold. Maybe we need a new drug advertised on TV every three minutes, one that would help us grow a backbone. It doesn't take a Darwin to figure out that in this world the smartest, the fastest, the strongest, and the most committed always win. No exceptions. Look at your spouse and children. Look at yourself in the mirror. Then look at the pictures from the paper last Thursday. You better look at them. Those are the people out to kill you. Who do you think will win? You? Or them? Think you can take your ball and go home and they will leave you alone? Read a little history. Start with last week, last month, last year, and every other year back for half a century. Then go back a thousand years. Nobody hides from this fight. Like it or not, that's the way it was and that's the way it is. But many Americans don't get it. That's why I made the case to my boss and fellow editors to publish those pictures. If they jarred you off the sofa, if they offended you, if they scared your children and sent you into a rage at mass murderers or heartless editors, then I say, it's a start. To Go To Top

ON THE ROAD TO GUSH KATIF Posted by Judy Lash Balint, April 27, 2004.

Friends, The outpouring of popular support for the threatened communities of Gush Katif reached a pinnacle yesterday. Tens of thousands of Israelis jammed the roads into the area to try to celebrate Yom Haatzmaut. According to police reports, more than 60,000 people were forced to turn around. Many of them went home to write about their experiences. Below are two accounts of the day. Shlomo Zwickler of Kochav Hashachar and his family didn't get to the Gush but made some significant observations along the way ("The Mighty Power Of The Sixth Of Iyar"). The second is by Harvey Tannenbaum from Efrat, whose lucky family celebrated the holiday in Gush Katif ("We Are All Gush Katif"). Enjoy! THE MIGHTY POWER OF THE SIXTH OF IYAR  by Shlomo Zwickler of Kochav Hashachar. There was a great deal of "hulabaloo" made this year about today being Yom Haatzmaut - Independence Day, here in Israel. In reality it should have been yesterday, the 5th of Iyar, on which in 1948 the Jews of the Land of Israel declared their sovereignty over parts of Eretz Yisrael for the first time in nearly two-thousand years. But we celebrated this year on the 6th of Iyar in an effort to avoid unnecessary violations of Shabbat in preparing for the Memorial Day ceremony, which was to be held on Saturday night, twenty-four hours before the 5th of Iyar. So this year, we had Memorial Day on the 5th, remembering the valor of our soldiers who fortified our independence and the sacrifice of the victims of Moslem terror, just before the great celebration, this year on the 6th of Iyar, of the 56th year since the rebirth of Israel within its historical borders. Purists need not worry, though. For if one looks back into the annals of Jewish history, you will find that in actuality, the British Mandate in Eretz Yisrael actually ended on May 15th, 1948 - which was the 6th of Iyar that year. Even back then, the Jewish people managed a collective respect for the sanctity of its traditions and the "governing council" led by David Ben-Gurion actually declared Jewish independence a day EARLY - on Friday, the 5th of Iyar, so as to avoid desecration of the Sabbath from the ensuing festivities. Hence we see that the "ikar ha-nes" (majority of the miracle) was on the 6th of Iyar and not on the 5th as we celebrate every year. It seems that in the 56 year-young history of our Third Jewish Commonwealth, this year - 5764 - was the first time that we encountered the need to push forward Memorial and Independence Days by 24 hours. Perhaps the special spark of the 6th of Iyar, explained above, is what brought about one of the most promising signs that the Nation is not as weak as its leaders seem to suggest of late. This morning, my wife and I packed the kids into our minivan, along with our portable "mangal" (BBQ for those who are Hebraically challenged), and set out from our home In Kochav Hashachar, just north of the Judean Hills, on what we expected to be our 2 1/2 hour journey to make a statement in Gush Katif. We spent eleven hours in our car today. There was simply nowhere to move in Gush Katif, on the roads to Gush Katif or on the SIDES of the roads leading to Gush Katif. It was the "traffic jam of the century" in southern Israel. Cars and buses were bumper-to-bumper all the way out to Ashkelon and at times even back to Latrun on the way to Yerushalayim. The "official" police tally was that 70,000 people made it into Gush Katif and that "thousands of cars and buses" were turned back. Not being too familiar with the roads down there, I called one of the Beit Orot hesder boys who did his military service in the area to try and figure out some back way that would be open. I thought I was so brilliant by choosing to go all the way around to Kiryat Gat - but then Yoni (from Beit Orot) told me that the 2 busloads of families and hesder boys that we sent from our Har Hazeitim location one hour before the Zwicklers - were now right behind me. Great going, bigshot. So we sat in the car and saw what Yitziat Mitrayim (the Exodus from Egypt) must have looked like - only this time it was a "kneisa" (going-into) and not a "yetzia." When the buses and cars just had nowhere to move due to the maxed-out volume of the road, people just started getting out of their buses and cars, right there in the middle of the street. You had yeshiva boys marching through by foot, families doing their "mangal" thing off on the embankments, teenagers singing and dancing. I saw pregnant women pushing baby strollers trying to walk the 10 miles from where we were situated, just to get into Gush Katif. There was an elderly woman with a cane determined to make the trek. The most startling aspect of the experience for me had to have been the appearance of a not-insignificant number of men without kippot and women without head-coverings. After all, as drummed into our psyches by the oh-so-reputable Israeli and international media, I only expected "settlers" at this event (which has become a euphemism for any religious Jew physically present in the 50 mile proximity of a Jewish town across the "Green Line" even if they live in Ramat Gan!). But there they were - "regular", "normal", Israelis! Maybe the dumb-founded media should clue into some recent polls showing that some 80% of the Jews in the Land of Israel classify themselves as "traditional" and perhaps this will unravel the secret of the "settlers." But its not the secret of the "settlers" - its the spark of the Jew that is so baffling. The Jew, pardon me, the Israeli (for all Jews are Israelis, or ought to be) has inside him not just the traditions of his forefathers, but the long history of his People and his Birthright. It should not be confusing that difficulties bring out the best in Am Yisrael. Our Torah tells us "Ka'asher Ye'anu Oto, Kein Yirbei V'Kein Yifrotz" ("The more they are afflicted, the more they multiply and grow," referring to the Jews enslaved to Pharoh in Egypt). We are under pressure. There seems to be a new Arik Sharon, who "does not know Joseph." Some say he's the same Arik Sharon who hasn't changed one-bit, that he's always been a political opportunist who simply "played" the "settler card" when it was good for him. Either way, it makes no difference. As with all the great Jewish leaders of the recent past, even the leaders of the Likud, when you detour from the path of Calev and Yehoshua (Caleb and Joshua - the only 2 of the 10 biblical spies who spoke the truth about the Land of Israel), then Eretz Yisrael finds its way to spit you aside in return. There was a special feeling in the air on the traffic-jammed road to Gush Katif today: an aura of hope, of strength and belief in the justness of our cause. And here's proof: my kids barely complained about sitting in the car for eleven hours - ELEVEN HOURS! Maybe we should call it the power of the "Sixth Sense" being that this all happened on the 6th of Iyar. In reality, it was nothing more than just plain "Jewish sense" finally finding its way front and center. We can beat this. We will beat this. Hashem will help us beat this - but only if we show Him just how badly we want it. In the words of a true Jewish leader, Calev ben Yefuneh: "Let us rise up and posses it, for we are well able to overcome it!" (Aloh Naaleh V'Yarashnu Otah, Ki Yachol Nuchal Lah!). How mighty the power of the Sixth of Iyar. WE ARE ALL GUSH KATIF  by Harvey Tannenbaum from Efrat. Last night, several thousand of us lucky residents of Efrat gathered for the final fifteen minutes of Yom Hazikaron in our main park. As the countdown began from tears to laughs, our Chief Rabbi Riskin told us that "We are All Gush Katif!" Our 1st grader watched as the Israeli flag was being raised again to its full staff from the half staff of Yom Hazikaron and asked his Abba, "Don't we live in Gush Etzion, and not Gush Katif?" "I think Harav Riskin made a mistake and he meant to tell us that we are all Gush Etzion?" As the thousands here began to sing with Pirchei Efrat and watch the honored citizens light the torches of another year of independence, his Abba tried to explain what was meant by the words of "We Are All Gush Katif." This morning, we concluded a meaningful shacharit in our neighborhood synagogue in Efrat. Most of the men and women were wearing black and white or blue and white in honor of the holiday that one can only really feel in Israel in its entirety. The sandwich bags and nosh were packed and plenty of water bottles were being loaded into the car for our journey to Gush Katif in Gaza to join in solidarity with the Jews of Gush Katif, Neve Dekalim, Morag, Kfar Darom, etc. As the country ran to the different barbq locations, we joined 100,000 fellow Israelis to celebrate in a march along the Gush Katif communities and give our surrendering leaders a message that he is 'disengaged' from Am Yisrael and there will not be a disengagement of Jews from their land of Israel. At 10.30 AM, we drove from Kissufim to the Gush Katif entry area. The traffic was beginning to slow down as people, cars, and busses were arriving from as far north as Kiryat Shmona and from Eilat for this Yom Haatzmaut. The 'sitting duck' between Kissufim and the entry to the checkpoint towards Neve Dekalim reminded us in the car of the victims of terror who over the past years were attacked and ambushed on this road by terrorists using their Peres-issued guns. We parked in the Neve Dekalim center of town. On one side was a big stage for the festivities later in the day, and from close by we could see the greenhouses where all of our Gush Katif salads were grown. "Why are we here?" This was a good question for a 7 year old first grader. We began to talk and explain about Jews being moved out of their homes. "Why would the Jews move out of their batim(homes) and give these homes to the Arabs who live in their 'mechuar' (ugly) homes? "Didn't Zayde get moved out of his home in Munkatch when I was a baby?" (Zayde left his house by force to go to Auschwitz, way before our 7 year old was born!) We began to march and walk from Neve Dekalim towards the dirt road leading to Shirat Hayam, adjacent to empty buildings left by the Egyptian army in 1967. Shirat Hayam was founded after the terrorist murder of Ronnie Chefetz near Neve Dekalim several years ago. The walk led us to the Hof Gaza, the ocean front of Gaza. I looked behind us and in front of us and there were thousands of walkers along the sand and fishing area of Shirat Hayam. We reached the Pagoda on the beachfront of Gaza in Gush Katif, rested, had our ices and water and water. Next stop was Agam, which was near the Hof Dekalim Palm Hotel, once a haven for Israeli vacationers. The kids kept stopping to pick up seashells and after two hours of the solidarity march and hike, we got close to Morag and Kfar Darom. As we left the march and returned towards Efrat, we counted over 850 more buses and cars on the highway to Gush Katif at 2PM. The newscasts were all reporting as the lead story the 70,000, 80,000, or 90,000 Jews showing up today to Gush Katif. The traffic jams towards Gush Katif backed up as far as the Yad Mordechai junction near Ashkelon! The kids jumped into the bath at home to clean up from the sands of the beach of Gaza in order to prepare for our traditional Yom Haatzmaut barbq in Efrat with family and friends. The 5.00p.m news reported that the police had to close the highway and require the 30,000 people still stuck in traffic for hours to make u turns and return to all of Israel. The Gush Katif Jews were overwhelmed. The day was sold out and thousands were turned away and there was no charge except to recharge the batteries of all of us Jews that only a Prime Minister will be 'disengaged' from office before we Jews will be disengaged from our land. "Now I understand whey Harav Riskin told us last night that we are all Gush Katif." The closing words of the 1st grader who marched for two hours in the heat along the beach and in the communties of Neve Dekalim, Shirat Hayam, and more were emphatic before his recital of Shma Yisrael tonight. Yes, dear friends, here are some pictures that CNN and BBC will never show you. We're here to stay, and celebration of Yom Haatzmaut in Gush Katif was worth 10 years of aliyah to celebrate another way in our homeland of Israel. Chag Sameach, Plan Your Trip Now to Gush Katif "Jerusalem Diaries: In Tense Times" by Judy Lash Balint (Gefen) is available for purchase from www.israelbooks.com. To Go To Top

GUSH KATIF FILM - A MUST SEE Posted by Dafna Yee, April 27, 2004.

This is one of the most moving films that I've ever seen. Don't miss it. - Dafna This message came from Mordechai and Naomi Spiegelman. Dear All, Arutz Sheva has provided an address on the internet where you can see a movie about Gush Katif. It is a FANTASTIC movie. Please view it and send the address to your friends. http://www.israelnn.com/metafiles/asx/eng-video/gush-eng.asx This movie is in English. To Go To Top

AGAINST TERRORISM BUT DOESN'T UNDERSTAND THE ARABS Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 27, 2004.

The Daily Telegraph's Barbara Amiel wrote a piece against Arab terrorism but had some misguided notions. Here they are, followed by my explanations: 1. "The Palestinian cause is an honorable one, but Hamas and similar groups such as Hizbullah, Islamic Jihad, or Yasser Arafat's al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades have no interest in an honorable two-state solution. The terrorists' 'grievance is the existence of Israel.'" The notion of Palestinian nationality was advanced as a fraudulent way to cheat the Jewish people out of its entire patrimony. (Her point 4 implicitly admits this. The Arabs already have a state in Palestine, called Jordan, and 20 other states.) The Arab population there supports this quest and the violence by terrorists, except for excesses that bring bad publicity and threaten foreign aid. Further deception is in signing peace agreements the Arabs do not intend to keep. There is nothing honorable about the cause of jihad, at least not to the victims of its bigotry. 2."Arab terrorism against the State of Israel began in 1948 and never stopped." Realistically, Arab terrorism against Palestinian Jews began about 1920 and never ceased. 3. "Terrorism can be countered with guns or by preventive measures such as Israel's security fence. It cannot be appeased, which is perhaps why the Israeli government was intent on simultaneously assassinating Hamas leaders and announcing its withdrawal plans from Gaza." The fence is more a form of hiding than of defense. Once Israel withdrew, it would be unable to return to liquidate successor terrorist leaders if the area became sovereign or if Israel were unwilling to defy the US, which Israel usually caters to. Therefore, the assassination of Hamas leaders is not counter to appeasement but a face-saving mask for withdrawal, which is appeasement. 4. "Palestine as a political entity has never existed. It has been an area owned or ruled by Turks, Egyptians, Lebanese, the British, and Jordanians." (NY Sun, 4/20, p.9.) She forgot to mention that the area is owned and was ruled by the Jewish people. Mr. Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at ricshulman@aol.com. To Go To Top

100,000 SHOW UP IN GUSH KATIF; TENS OF THOUSANDS WERE TURNED BACK Posted by Menachem Kovacs, April 27, 2004.

This is a news item from Arutz Sheva (www.IsraelNationalNews.com). Over 100,000 people showed up in Gush Katif today - and several other tens of thousands were turned back by police for lack of room. Large traffic jams - 8 kilometers long (4.5 miles), in some cases - were registered throughout southwestern Israel - but, as the Gush Katif website Katif.net reports, "the people who were stuck in traffic did not honk and did not lose their tempers. Those who came to show solidarity with Gush Katif did so in the belief that this is what must be done at this time, and that it doesn't matter whether they actually made it or not." Most if not all of the visitors marched in the Gush Katif solidarity march from N'vei Dekalim (Palm Splendor) to Shirat HaYam (Song of the Sea). Many of those who could not make it into the Gush were redirected to Katif solidarity events in Yad Mordechai, Sderot, and Saad. Twelve busloads from Beit El, three hours away, were unable to get in to Gush Katif; at 3:15 they turned around and spent an hour or two in nearby Eshkol Park. Minister Natan Sharansky (Likud) was able to make it by car - taking four hours for a two-hour trip from Jerusalem - but Minister Effie Eitam had a slightly different experience. The traffic jam proved too much for him, and like many others, he parked his car near Kibbutz Be'eri and walked to the Kisufim Junction entrance into Gush Katif, ten kilometers away. Both said that the event was a clear signal to the Prime Minister that Gush Katif can never be abandoned. One Jerusalem family sent a message to friends in Gush Katif: "We also didn't manage to get in today, but still, it was great to be stuck in the traffic together with all of Am Yisrael [the People of Israel]. Be strong and courageous - and add some more lanes to the highway." IDF Soldiers at Kisufim greeted the arrivals with a flower and an ices. Witnesses said that never in history had the Kisufim parking lot held so many cars. Police and army sources said that they never expected so many visitors to arrive. Some 150,000 people thus sent a message to Likud voters, who are being called on to vote this coming Sunday in a party referendum on Prime Minister Sharon's unilateral Gaza withdrawal plan. The scores of thousands expressed their total opposition to any plan calling for the uprooting of the Jewish presence in Gaza.Gaza Regional Council officials say that today's mass event was "just the beginning." Residents will continue tomorrow (Wednesday) morning to travel around the country, meeting with eligible voters and seeking to persuade them to oppose the unilateral expulsion plan. Approximately 7,800 Jewish residents live in Gaza. Some of them moved to Gaza over 20 years ago after Sharon, in his capacity as Defense Minister, uprooted them from their homes in Yamit and other Sinai towns over twenty years ago. They now face a second expulsion. Rabbi Menachem Kovacs is Director of the Jewish Roots Center of Baltimore, an education and research center on Torah and social science topics. He is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Montgomery College in Maryland. To Go To Top

THE STRUGGLE FOR ISRAEL'S SOUL Posted by Michael Freund, April 27, 2004.

For a nation that rightly prides itself on its humane treatment of its enemies, Israel needs to start taking a long, hard look at how it treats its own citizens. This coming Sunday, the fate of some 8,000 Jews will hang in the balance, when members of the Likud cast their ballots on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's proposal to withdraw from Gaza and northern Samaria. It is a vote laden with significance, in political as well as diplomatic and strategic terms, one whose outcome will have far-reaching repercussions, both locally and on the international scene. But amid all the debate and discussion regarding the various aspects of Sharon's proposal, there is one key question that has been largely ignored: what kind of society is Israel becoming? After all, it is not every day that a liberal Western democracy considers the mass expulsion of thousands of its citizens from their homes, barring them from living in a certain area because of their ethnic and re. Nor does it happen very often that an entire community finds its right to exist called into question, thereby implying that it is somehow less legitimate or less equal than others. Put aside for a moment your thoughts about the wisdom of Jews living in Gaza, and consider this: what does it say about a society when it is willing to countenance the forcible eviction of Jews? And how does such a possibility mesh with the age-old vision of Zionism, or the modern day conception of the individual's right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness"? The vote this Sunday, then, is more than just a referendum on Jews living in Gush Katif. It is a vote for Israel's soul, a fateful verdict on the nature of what Israeli society and morality have become, and what they wish to be. Because deep down, we all know that if Gaza's Jews were Palestinians, this would never be happening. Indeed, if a government in Israel arose which sought to put the question of evicting Arabs up to a vote, it would rightly be denounced as racist and immoral. But when it comes to Jews, it seems that a double standard is too often applied. Take, for example, the issue of prayer on the Temple Mount. Week in and week out, thousands of Palestinians stream to Jerusalem's Old City for Friday prayers. Yet Jews who wish to do the same, tax-paying citizens of this country, who seek to exercise their basic right to freedom of worship, are subjected to all sorts of restrictions and limitations. When Palestinians suspected of terrorism are placed into administrative detention, the defenders of freedom and human rights raise a hue and a cry, denouncing the government for resorting to extra-judicial means. And yet, when the very same tool is used against a Jewish settler, an Israeli citizen ostensibly safeguarded by all the rights and protections that civil society affords him, the voices of concern suddenly fall silent. The obsession in certain circles with ensuring Palestinian rights has inevitably led to a lack of resolve when it comes to protecting Jewish rights. Indeed, although the Left likes to assert that the "occupation" is corrupting Israel's soul, the only thing that has truly been tarnished is Israel's treatment of its own citizens. And so, because Jews are not Palestinians, the government feels free to do things to them that it would never even consider doing to our foes. It is time for this to change, before a further erosion in our fundamental rights as citizens takes place. To begin with, the very idea of expelling Jews from their homes should be ostracized and removed from the political dialogue. It should be denounced and condemned and hurled aside with no less force than that with which the question of transferring Arabs has been sidelined. And the notion that because Israel is a Jewish state somehow grants it the right to do things to Jews that would otherwise be denounced elsewhere has also got to go. If Jews were forbidden access to a synagogue in London, Paris or New York because it upset their Muslim neighbors, the outcry would be deafening, and justifiably so. Why, then, should it be any less forceful when it comes to the Temple Mount, in the heart of our ancient capital? If a Jew were to be imprisoned without trial anywhere in the world, rallies and protests would be convened, petitions would be signed, and appeals would be sent to the US State Department. But when an Israeli Jew is taken into detention, denied access to a lawyer or even the right to see the evidence against him, little if anything is done on his behalf. However odious his views, or even his actions, he too has the right to a fair trial, and we should expect nothing less from the Government of Israel. In recent years, the media and others have done their best to demonize and delegitimize certain sectors of society, chief among them the Jewish residents of Judea, Samaria and Gaza. Whatever their failings might be, we must never forget that they are no less deserving of precisely the same liberties and protections as their brethren in Tel Aviv, Holon and Beersheba. Despite living under siege from Palestinian terror, Israel has gone to great lengths to ensure that the rights and dignity of innocent Palestinians are not harmed. It must now do the same with regard to the Jews, and stop undercutting their freedoms. Michael Freund served as Deputy Director of Communications and Policy Planning in the Prime Minister's Office under former premier Binyamin Netanyahu. This appeared today in the Jerusalem Post. To Go To Top

TARGET: ARAFAT Posted by Rachel Neuwirth, April 27, 2004.

After the killing of the appointed Hamas leader, Dr. Abdelaziz Al-Rantisi, three weeks after the demise of his predecessor Sheik Ahmed Yassin, it is apparent that Israeli leaders such as Shimon Peres, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, have finally realized that there is no peaceful way to deal with terrorists. Peres told Israeli TV, "Whoever deals in murder will pay the price, and it will lead to his own death." Ironically, Mr. Peres continues to believe that Yasser Arafat is a "partner for peace" with whom the Israelis can negotiate. However, Peres knows that Arafat is both the founder of modern terrorism and continues to support, fund and direct everyday terrorism against Israelis and Americans. If perchance Mr. Peres is not aware that Arafat is the main driver of Palestinian terrorism, then he should read what Farouk Kaddoumi, the PLO's hard-line "foreign minister", had to say on April 22, 2004. In an interview with the Jordanian newspaper Al-Arab (as reported by the Jerusalem Post), Kaddoumi said that Arafat means 'armed' when he says 'struggle'. Additionally, Kaddoumi revealed that the PLO has given him the "portfolio" of supporting the Iraqi resistance against the U.S.-led coalition forces in Iraq. In the same interview, Kadoumi was quoted as saying: "There is no doubt that the Palestinian revolution supports the Iraqi resistance, and we have seen demonstrations in the occupied Palestinian territories backing the intifada and resistance in Iraq." He also admitted that the PLO Charter, which denies Israel's right to exist, has never been changed. Mr. Peres was one of the leaders who claimed that Arafat did in fact change the Charter as a result of the Oslo accords. Unfortunately, Mr. Peres' statement on targeting terror leaders comes eleven years too late -- after the murder of over 1,300 Israelis, the maiming of thousands of people, and tens of thousands of Israeli and Arab/Palestinian lives shattered. Arafat's minions, who include Al-Aqsa Brigades, Tanzim and other factions of Fatah, and even elements of the Palestinian Authority police, are the main perpetrators of terrorism against Israeli and American civilians. Even the European Union, which continues to bankroll Arafat, knows that he is directing the war against Israel. In fact, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, along with other splinter groups, have carried out fewer attacks than the groups under Arafat's personal control. Therefore, one can only conclude that Arafat deserves the same fate as the late leaders of Hamas, that is, if the Western world is serious about eradicating worldwide terrorism. Proportionately, Arafat has done much more damage to Israel than Osama bin Laden has done to the United States. Arafat's Palestinian Authority is now in close cooperation with Hamas. After the killing of Rantisi, Arafat repeatedly phoned senior Hamas officials in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and attempted to persuade them to resume inter-Palestinian talks about establishing joint leadership. According to a senior Fatah official in Gaza, his organization supports giving Hamas and Islamic Jihad a key role in the PA decision-making process: "We can't ignore the role of Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the resistance against Israel," he explained. The newly appointed Hamas leader, Dr. Mahmoud Zahar, told Matthew Kalman (The Toronto Globe and Mail, April 24, 2004) that the assassination of Rantisi by the Israelis "is new fuel for our movement." He also said, "Our motto is very simple: either to achieve martyrdom or to liberate our land." In addition, he reiterated that Hamas will continue to struggle for the elimination of the State of Israel: "We are not willing to accept Israel as a legitimate state in this area." The same message was sent to Western leaders who back Israel, and to the coalition forces in Iraq. He threatened that President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair would suffer the same fate as the victims of the Madrid train bombing. Now, Hamas is in the process of regrouping and cooperating even more closely with Arafat than ever before. Diana Buttu, a legal advisor to the Palestinian negotiation team, told UPI that the Palestinian leadership firmly believes that Israel now intends to force Arafat out of the Palestinian territories and exile him to Egypt (where he was born). She added that Hamas restrained its people from retaliating for the deaths of its two high-ranking officials, but she believes the Islamist group is waiting out the 40-day mourning period, as demanded by Muslim tradition. So, more Hamas and PA terror is imminent. Israel, along with the West, is fighting global terrorism. In its modern form, terror was first utilized by the Arab Palestinians. But we now know that for decades Arafat has been financed and armed by Islamic countries, such as Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Arafat has been the pioneer and the point man in the emergence of global terror. Mr. Peres, isn't time to see the reality that Arafat deserves the same fate as the previous leaders of Hamas? Must we wait for more deaths to understand that Israel and the West should have long ago sent Arafat to the dustbin of history? The fact is that it will take all freedom-loving peoples, including those in the Arab/Muslim World, to wake up to the reality of who Yasser Arafat really is. George Jonas understood what needs to be done when he said: "To put the genie of anti-civilizational ruthlessness back into its bottle, to defeat terrorist despotism from the nuclear labs of North Korea to the alleys of Falluja and the caves of al-Qaeda in the Hindu Kush, America will need to reconsider decades of ultra-liberalism and political correctness, and revert to earlier models of national purpose." And this applies to Israel, too. We will have to become as ruthless as our enemy is, and a lot less reluctant to kill its leaders, if we ever want to see an end to the war on terror. The enemy is ruthless and has a heart for the fight. Do we? Rachel Neuwirth is a Los Angeles-based analyst on the board of directors of the West Coast Region of the American Jewish Congress and the chairperson of the organization?s Middle East committee. This article appeared as an Opinion piece in Arutz-Sheva (www.IsraelNationalNews.com) today. To Go To Top

FACE TO FACE WITH ISRAEL Posted by Israel National News, April 27, 2004.

This is an Op-Ed by Rabbi Zalman Baruch Melamed, who is the Dean of Beit El Yeshiva Center Institutions and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Arutz Sheva Israel National Radio. It was in Arutz-7 (www.IsraelNationalNews.com) yesterday. A Value-Added Campaign The Face-to-Face campaign - that which the residents of Yesha (Judea, Samaria and Gaza) are currently waging with the Likud membership on behalf of the Land of Israel - has a value above and beyond that which we see in the polls. In addition to other short-term benefits, the Face-to-Face door-to-door campaign has the value of compensating for and repairing, to some extent, the infamous Sin of the Spies. Our teacher and former Chief Rabbi of Israel Rabbi Avraham Shapira has pointed out that the famous work Eim HaBanim Semeichah by Rabbi Yisachar Teichtal writes some very timely things about this point. House-to-House With the Spies The book in question was written by a learned rabbi in Europe during the Holocaust years. Though he was brought up and schooled in the anti-Zionist yeshivot and ideology of early-20th century Europe, he came independently - but with the help of many traditional Jewish sources - to the realization that as many religious Jews as possible must return immediately to the Land of Israel, despite the irreligious nature of the Zionist movement. In the passage beginning on page 256 of Eim HaBanim Semeichah (p. 396-403 in the English edition, translated by Moshe Lichtman, published by Kol Mevaser Publications, 2000), Rabbi Teichtal quotes the Medrash describing the methodology used by the Ten Spies. The Spies had been sent by Moses to scout out the Land, but instead acted to weaken the nations resolve to enter the Land. Each of the ten - leaders of their respective tribes - went from house to house, acting faint and falling down and crying, explaining that they were sick with worry over the terrible things that would happen to their sons and daughters when they entered the Land - and they would then start crying again, and the household members would cry along with them. And thus they would do in each and every house," Rabbi Teichtal writes, "sparing no effort until every house in the tribe was crying over the entry to the Land of Israel, and all were one unit against the Land. This is what is referred to in the verse, "Our brothers melted our hearts," and when Moshe said, "You murmured in your tents." Rabbi Teichtal continues and writes that the way to repair this terrible Sin of the Spies is to do the same type of thing that they did - i.e., to go from house to house, without being lazy and without calculating the time or trouble it will cost, and to speak to every Jew on behalf of the Land of Israel. If we take this course of action, he writes, then with G-d's help we will be able to turn all of Israel into one pro-Land of Israel sector - and this will be the correction of the Sin of the Spies, and we will thus pay up our debt regarding this bad loan of the this terrible sin. So writes Rabbi Teichtal in Eim HaBanim Semeichah, 60 years ago. And today we see his words coming true, with the Yesha residents' Face-to-Face campaign gaining momentum and piling up good will and positive feedback. What People Are Hearing The results are welcome and blessed. People are hearing for the first time that Prime Minister's disengagement plan is not a disengagement from the Arabs; in that respect, things will remain as they are. Instead, they are learning, the plan calls only for the uprooting of blossoming Jewish communities built and populated by the wonderful pioneers of Gush Katif. When people hear the truth, it makes an impression. People are hearing that Arik Sharon is taking this path because he thinks that the nation has no more strength, that the nation is weak. Sharon himself says he wishes the people were strong, and that then he would be able to take a different path. We must therefore show him that he is wrong, that we are in fact a tough and resilient nation. The media, which are controlled by the extreme left-wing, are that which create the impression of national weakness - but in actuality, whenever we are tested, our true character of strength is revealed. When there was a wide-scale call-up of reserves after the Passover Seder massacre in Netanya two years ago, the response was over 100% - even more people showed up than were called! The press was taken by surprise. According to its reports, no one wanted to fight, and national will and drive had dwindled to nothing. But in actuality, we saw that our nation is strong. As we explained to the thousands of people whom we have met in their homes, we must vote against the evacuation and retreat, and against the uprooting of Jews from their homeland. It appears that every time we strike out at the terrorists and weaken them, ideas begin to fly about agreements and understandings. This is what happened with the catastrophic Oslo Agreements, and the same type of catastrophe can be foreseen with the current ideas of concessions and retreat. It must also be kept very much in mind that the plan as it stands includes a full stop on all development in Yesha communities - a near-total building freeze, and with nothing in return. Providing the Leaders With Strength What we must do is to give strength to the government to be strong - and this can be done by the Likud members who vote against the plan. These true and simple words penetrate the hearts of the Likud members. The way to defeat terrorism is not by giving up, but by settling the Land and by holding fast onto it. This is the path we must take - and this is how we will atone for and repair the Sin of the Scouts. Be of good courage and let us be strong for our people and for the cities of our G-d. (Sam. II 10, 12)) You can subscribe to Arutz Sheva News Service on the http://subscribe.israelnationalnews.com/subscribe.asp page and receive a well-written and insightful daily summary of the news from Israel. To Go To Top

NO MORE APPEASEMENT Posted by IsrAlert, April 27, 2004.

This was written by Joseph Farah, editor of World Net Daily. It is archived at www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38200 Most Americans probably think the Islamic terrorists declared war on the United States Sept. 11, 2001. Actually, it started a long time before - right from the birth of the nation. When George Washington was serving as president in 1784, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and Benjamin Franklin were commissioned by the first Congress to assemble in Paris to see about marketing U.S. products in Europe. Jefferson quickly surmised that the biggest challenge facing U.S. merchant ships were those referred to euphemistically as "Barbary pirates." They weren't "pirates" at all, in the traditional sense, Jefferson noticed. They didn't drink and chase women and they really weren't out to strike it rich. Instead, their motivation was strictly religious. They bought and sold slaves, to be sure. They looted ships. But they used their booty to buy guns, ships, cannon and ammunition. Like those we call "terrorists" today, they saw themselves engaged in jihad and called themselves "mujahiddin." Why did these 18th-century terrorists represent such a grave threat to U.S. merchant ships? With independence from Great Britain, the former colonists lost the protection of the greatest navy in the world. The U.S. had no navy - not a single warship. Jefferson inquired of his European hosts how they dealt with the problem. He was stunned to find out that France and England both paid tribute to the fiends - who would, in turn, use the money to expand their own armada, buy more weaponry, hijack more commercial ships, enslave more innocent civilians and demand greater ransom. This didn't make sense to Jefferson. He recognized the purchase of peace from the Muslims only worked temporarily. They would always find an excuse to break an agreement, blame the Europeans and demand higher tribute. After three months researching the history of militant Islam, he came up with a very different policy to deal with the terrorists. But he didn't get to implement until years later. As the first secretary of state, Jefferson urged the building of a navy to rescue American hostages held in North Africa and to deter future attacks on U.S. ships. In 1792, he commissioned John Paul Jones to go to Algiers under the guise of diplomatic negotiations, but with the real intent of sizing up a future target of a naval attack. Jefferson was ready to retire a year later when what could only be described as "America's first Sept. 11" happened. America was struck with its first mega-terror attack by jihadists. In the fall of 1793, the Algerians seized 11 U.S. merchant ships and enslaved more than 100 Americans. When word of the attack reached New York, the stock market crashed. Voyages were canceled in every major port. Seamen were thrown out of work. Ship suppliers went out of business. What Sept. 11 did to the U.S. economy in 2001, the mass shipjacking of 1793 did to the fledgling U.S. economy in that year. Accordingly, it took the U.S. Congress only four months to decide to build a fleet of warships. But even then, Congress didn't choose war, as Jefferson prescribed. Instead, while building what would become the U.S. Navy, Congress sent diplomats to reason with the Algerians. The U.S. ended up paying close to $1 million and giving the pasha of Algiers a new warship, "The Crescent," to win release of 85 surviving American hostages. It wasn't until 1801, under the presidency of Jefferson, that the U.S. engaged in what became a four-year war against Tripoli. And it wasn't until 1830, when France occupied Algiers, and later Tunisia and Morocco, that the terrorism on the high seas finally ended. France didn't leave North Africa until 1962 - and it quickly became a major base of terrorism once again. What's the moral of the story? Appeasement never works. Jefferson saw it. Sept. 11 was hardly the beginning. The war in which we fight today is the longest conflict in human history. It's time to learn from history, not repeat its mistakes. IsrAlert, a Jewish advocacy network, is hosted by Harv Weiner. To subscribe to IsrAlert, send an email to isralert@aol.com To Go To Top

A DISPASSIONATE VIEW OF THE SHARON PLAN: FROM A DISENGAGEMENT PLAN TO A RETREAT PLAN Posted by Emanuel A. Winston, April 27, 2004.

SHARON'S 'DISENGAGEMENT' = RETREAT I strongly urge you to read this analysis by David Bedein of Prime Minister Sharon's withdrawal plans. As you read, you will see the fingerprints of the Arabist U.S. State Department and the Bush advisors. Note particularly the concept of leaving homes, factories, farms, businesses intact for the Arab Palestinians - all are to remain as if Gaza is a protectorate of Israel and without cost to the incoming recipients or just compensation for the evicted Jews who invested their own money, blood, sweat and tears for 3 generations. Note also the pledge to provide employment, electricity, water, sewage treatment, telecommunications, gasoline - and training of the Arab "Security Forces". What you will likely conclude is that President Bush and the U.S. State Department do NOT wish to take responsibility for what they have provoked. They refuse to finance the Arab Palestinians but rather have Israel surrender the land and all its hard-earned infrastructure. Then they expect Israel to continue supporting the international Terrorist Organizations who will take over after Sharon's shameful retreat. Because this Gaza retreat plan is a direct extension of the failed Oslo plan and the newly re-packaged Geneva plan (all promoted by the E.U., the U.N. and the U.S. State Department) it would wise and prudent to vote against its adoption. PLEASE FORWARD THIS TO YOUR LISTS, THE MEDIA, CONGRESS AND OTHER INFLUENTIALS! The Sharon Plan will be voted on in an unprecedented referendum which will take place among the 200,00 members of the Likud Party in Israel this coming Sunday [May 2]. This is no internal election. The Sharon Plan has become a hotly debated news item in Israel and throughout the world. Essentially, the vote on the Sharon Plan will provide the first referendum on the eleven year Oslo process. Whatever the result, the situation in Israel will radically change. If the Sharon Retreat Plan is ratified, the precedent will be established for the Israeli government to uproot Jewish communities. A new government will be formed. The architect of the 1993 Oslo process, Shimon Peres, once again the leader of Israel's Labor Party, will again assume the post of foreign minister. The Oslo process will continue. If the Sharon Plan is rejected, the Oslo process will be dead in the water. Yet what is even more newsworthy, given the charged emotions that this debate has created, is the fact that very few people across the political spectrum in Israel, and even in the media and diplomatic corps represented in Israel, have bothered to read the Sharon Plan. Even though it is posted on the official web site of the Israeli Prime Minister, at http://www.pmo.gov.il , I repeat, few people have taken the time to read the Sharon Plan. On one of Israel's most popular call-in shows last Friday morning, where everyone calling in had a passionate comment on the issue, the talk show host revealed that not one of the callers had read the Sharon Plan. Likud Party Chairman and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had promised to mail out a copy of his plan to all of the Likud voters. Well, if you take a dispassionate view of the plan, you will understand why he did not send it out. The Sharon Plan is officially called the Disengagement Plan, because, according to the preamble to clause 1, section 1, "Israel has come to the conclusion that there is currently no reliable Palestinian partner with which it can make progress in a bilateral peace process." The preamble goes on to say that "In order to break out of this stalemate, Israel is required to initiate moves not dependent on Palestinian cooperation... Accordingly, it has developed a plan of unilateral disengagement." In other words, after 12 years of negotiations with the PLO, the Israeli government has reached the solemn conclusion that the negotiations have failed completely, and that the PLO is indeed at war with the state of Israel. After more than 22,000 terror attacks and almost one thousand people murdered in cold blood by Palestinian Arab terrorists in less than four years, that would be a seeming understatement. [1500 Jews have been murdered since Oslo in 1993, with tens of thousands injured - many maimed for life.] Yet the paragraph that follows the preamble of the Sharon Plan is a seeming non-sequiter: The Sharon Plan's answer to the PLO terror campaign is that "there will be no Israeli towns and villages in the Gaza Strip" and that "upon completion of this process, there shall no longer be any permanent presence of Israeli security forces or Israeli civilians in the areas of Gaza Strip territory which have been evacuated." Why retreat in the face of PLO adversity? No reason is given. The plan offers an analysis, however, which states that "The relocation from the Gaza Strip and from Northern Samaria will reduce friction with the Palestinian population, and carries with it the potential for improvement in the Palestinian economy and living conditions." Why would the Israeli government suddenly state that Jewish communities in Gaza and Northern Samaria are a "source of friction"? No reason is given. Why would it improve the economy and living conditions to abandon Jewish homes and farms? Again, no reason is given. After all, the Jewish communities in Gaza and Northern Samaria did not replace a single Arab family nor do they encroach on any Arab owned land. They were, in fact, built on vacant land not owned by any individuals, be they Palestinian, Jordanian or Egyptian after 1967 Six Day War. The Sharon Plan does state that now "there will be no basis for claiming that the Gaza Strip is occupied territory," a specious claim that no government of Israel has ever accepted, since Israel does not define itself as a foreign "occupier" of any area of the historical land of Israel. The Sharon Plan continues with a statement that seems to belie the preamble that the PLO is not a "reliable Palestinian partner" by stating that "the hope is that the Palestinians will take advantage of the opportunity created by the disengagement in order to break out of the cycle of violence and to reengage in a process of dialogue." Why would an Israeli abandonment of Jewish communities cause the Palestinians to "break out of a cycle of violence"? It got them all of Gaza and will result in the deportation of Jews. Since the majority of the Palestinians in Gaza, who live in the squalor of UN Arab refugee camps, are nurtured by the ideas of the "right of return" to liberate lands where their Arab villages existed in 1948, why would Israel's dismemberment of Jewish communities established on lands where no Arab villages were lost in 1967 satisfy their political goals? Meanwhile, another premise of the Sharon Plan is that "the process of disengagement will serve to dispel claims regarding Israel's responsibility for the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip." So why does the plan continue to obligate Israel to provide water pipes, electricity, industrial zones, markets and employment to sustain the Palestinian Arab economy of Gaza? In the words, the Sharon Plan promises that the "Infrastructure relating to water, electricity, sewage and telecommunications serving the Palestinians will remain in place" and that "In general, Israel will enable the continued supply of electricity, water, gas and petrol to the Palestinians, in accordance with current arrangements. Other existing arrangements, such as those relating to water and the electro-magnetic sphere and economic arrangements shall remain in force". These arrangements include, inter alia: i. The entry of workers into Israel in accordance with the existing criteria. ii. The entry and exit of goods between the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, Israel and abroad. iii. The monetary regime. iv. Tax and customs envelope arrangements. v. Postal and telecommunications arrangements. Meanwhile, Israel will continue to operate The Erez industrial zone, situated in the Gaza Strip, which employs some 4,000 Palestinian workers." So what the Israeli Prime Minister's office describes as a "disengagement plan" does anything but disengage Israel from the Palestinian Arab population. For whatever reason, the Sharon plan assumes that the PLO will abandon its terror campaign. The plan says, "When", and not "if" "... there is evidence from the Palestinian side of its willingness, capability and implementation in practice of the fight against terrorism and the institution of reform as required by the Road Map, it will be possible to return to the track of negotiation and dialogue." While the premise of the Sharon plan is that the PLO will not fight terrorism, and with evidence that the PLO continues to run a system based of corruption, what basis does the Sharon plan have for any assumption that the PLO will "fight against terrorism" or institute any "reform"? There is no answer. And when it comes to security issues in other areas, the Sharon plan promises to "evacuate an Area in the Northern Samaria Area (the West Bank) including 4 villages and all military installations, and re-deploy outside the vacated area. The move will enable territorial contiguity for Palestinians in the Northern Samaria Area "while Israel will improve the transportation infrastructure in the West Bank in order to facilitate the contiguity of Palestinian transportation." Israel will provide them buses as they blow ours up? Does this also mean that abandoned villages and military installations will be handed over to a PLO that is "not a reliable peace partner"? Once more, since the Sharon Plan defines the PLO as maintaining a state of war with Israel, why does the same Sharon Plan provide the PLO with the strategic assistance of "territorial contiguity"? No answer is given as merrily we roll along. Meanwhile, the Sharon Plan mandates that the Gaza Strip "be demilitarized and shall be devoid of weaponry, the presence of which does not accord with the Israeli-Palestinian agreements." However, the Sharon Plan does not even allude to the fact that the PLO violated all previous agreements in this regard and refused to implement the agreement with Israel to have their personnel vetted by Israel. Did Sharon forget that the PLO increased - against the Oslo agreement - the size of the agreed upon security force from 9,000 in 1993 to more than 50,000 by 1995, ignoring protestations of the government of Israel? The Sharon Plan that demilitarizes Gaza provides no process to disarm the PLO armed forces now in Gaza. And what does the Sharon Plan mandate in terms of Israeli security? The Sharon Plan asserts that " Israel reserves its inherent right of self-defense, both preventive and reactive, including where necessary the use of force, in respect of threats emanating from the Gaza Strip." Incredibly, Israel's right to pursue terrorists into Gaza is not mentioned anywhere. They can shoot at us but we may not go after the terrorists. As far as the security situation in the West Bank is concerned, the Sharon Plan states that "upon completion of the evacuation of the Northern Samaria Area, no permanent Israeli military presence will remain in this area," while another section states that " Military Installations and Infrastructure in the Gaza Strip and Northern Samaria will be dismantled and removed, with the exception of those which Israel decides to leave and transfer to another party ..." Does that mean that the PLO security forces, described in clause 1 of the Sharon Plan as "not a reliable peace partner," will now inherit Israel's abandoned IDF miltary bases? Why would Israel cede military installations to an entity with who it is in a state of war? The Sharon Plan also states that "In other areas of the West Bank, current security activity will continue" and that "... as circumstances permit, Israel will consider reducing such activity in Palestinian cities?" and that "Israel will work to reduce the number of internal checkpoints throughout the West Bank." So here we have a situation where Israel moves its forces out of cities and reduces checkpoints and is expected to maintain mobility to respond to the PLO terror war. Perhaps the most amazing issue of all is that the Sharon Plan agrees to provide "advice, assistance and training" to "the Palestinian security forces for the implementation of their obligations to combat terrorism and maintain public order, by American, British, Egyptian, Jordanian or other experts, as agreed with Israel." The Sharon Plan ignores Israel's decade-long failed experience with security assistance that Israel facilitated for the PLO. The Sharon Plan ignores how military training facilitated by Israel and western countries for the PLO was abused to conduct a terror campaign against Israel in every part of the country for the past four years. The U.S. State Department trained Palestinian policemen for "security" who then used that training to kill Israelis. The Sharon Plan goes on to say that "Israel will be willing to consider the possibility of the establishment of a seaport and airport in the Gaza Strip, in accordance with arrangements to be agreed with Israel." Did Israel not try that already? And weren't guns and rockets smuggled in? In terms of Israel's border area between the Gaza Strip and Egypt, (called the Philadelphi Route), the Sharon Plan only states that "Initially, Israel will continue to maintain a military presence along the border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt" and that "...subsequently, the evacuation of this area will be considered... dependent, inter alia, on the security situation and the extent of cooperation with Egypt in establishing a reliable alternative arrangement." Why "initially" and "subsequently"? Does Israel expect that situation on the Egyptian border to change? Will weapons continue to be smuggled through tunnels on Egypt's frontier? And how does the Sharon Plan deal with the fate of the 25 Israeli communities that it has slated for abandonment? Three generations of families who worked hard and built productive lives on vacant sand dunes to make a thriving agricultural community? The Sharon Plan makes no mention of the property rights, human rights or civil liberties of the residents and landowners in these communities. Instead, the Sharon Plan relates only to the property values of Jewish owned property in terms of how they might help their new occupants, stating that "Israel will strive to leave the immovable property relating to Israeli towns and villages intact," while "Israel reserves the right to request that the economic value of the assets left in the evacuated areas be taken into consideration" and that "The transfer of Israeli economic activity to Palestinians carries with it the potential for a significant improvement in the Palestinian economy." In other words, terrorism pays. But worse still, the Sharon Plan does not take into account that only the leadership of the PLO would likely take this property for themselves, irrespective of the economic needs of the Palestinian society. The record of corruption of the highest levels of the PLO is a matter of public record throughout the world. Instead, the Sharon Plan states that "Israel proposes that an international body be established (along the lines of the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee), with the agreement of the United States and Israel, which shall take possession from Israel of property which remains, and which will estimate the value of all such assets." In other words, the Israeli government has decided to implement a process designed to confiscate the private property belonging to thousands of people, without any mention of the human rights, civil liberties or the property rights of people who have the rightful deed to their homes, businesses and farms. Instead of recognizing the rights of landowners of the Israeli communities scheduled for abandonment, the Sharon Plan offers hundreds of Israeli homes to the PLO, stating that "Israel will strive to leave in place the infrastructure relating to water, electricity and sewage currently serving the Israeli towns and villages." Finally, The Sharon Plan envisions continued international support for the PLO , " in order to bring the Palestinians to implement in practice their obligations to combat terrorism and effect reforms, thus enabling the parties to return to the path of negotiation." And if the support for the PLO continues and the terror does not cease? What then? The Sharon Plan provides no answer. So there you have it. The text of the Sharon Plan speaks for itself: Ethnic Cleansing of Jews, strengthening of the PLO, and no disengagement whatsoever. This is not a disengagement plan. This is a plan of hasty retreat that doesn't even include a request of the Palestine Authority to stop endorsing the murder of Jews from their government's Public Broadcasting Corporation shows. What sanctions are listed if the PLO does not comply? Is this not worse than the Oslo Accords? David Bedein is Bureau Chief, Israel Resource News Agency, Beit Agron International Press Center, Jerusalem. Emanuel Winston is a commentator and Middle East analyst. His articles appear often on Think-Israel, Gamla (http://gamla.org.il/english) and the Freeman Center for Strategic Studies (http://www.freeman.org/online.htm) To Go To Top

WHEN HALF A PICTURE TELLS ONLY HALF THE STORY OF ISRAEL: Posted by Leo Rennert, April 27, 2004.

This is letter sent to the New York Times, which carried a picture of a soldier grieving at the grave of a fellow soldier: I call your attention to the very moving picture, "Grief and Remembrance in Israel," that encapsulates Israel's Memorial Day ceremonies on Monday, April 27. Unfortunately, the picture tells only half the story. Under a custom that goes back to Israel's founding, Memorial Day is followed immediately by Independence Day, featuring huge celebrations, dances, fireworks, outings to national parks, concerts, etc. The symbolism of twinning Memorial Day and Independence Day represents the essence of life in Israel -- grief over sacrifices to secure its independence, inseparably linked to a huge outpouring of joy to celebrate the vibrant country made possible by these sacrifices. This year, Independence Day began Monday evening and continued until Tuesday. Since there were many photogenic celebrations Monday evening (Monday afternoon NY time) in the same news cycle as Memorial Day events, a twinning of contrasting pictures -- grief and joy -- would have told the real story. Perhaps, next year. To Go To Top

"NY SUN'S" EVOLVING EDITORIALS Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 27, 2004.

Alternative views about what Israel should do with Judea, Samaria, and Gaza are: (1) Give them away to the Arabs, and there will be peace; (2) Make peace, or at least get the Arabs to quash terrorism, and then give the Territories to the Arabs; and (3) Keep the Territories, as entitled to and need to, and the Arabs would have less of an advantage in the war they seek. In short: (1) Land then peace; (2) Non-violence then land; (3) Keep land, try for peace. The second view is a sophisticated scam. It professes courage but foretells appeasement. All the Arabs have to do is pretend long enough to have stopped terrorism - the great powers do not hold the Arabs to their commitments - and they get what they have fought for, and then fight again. How ironic! If they suspend their war, they win it. Past terrorism would pay. For Israel, such a position is worse than ironic. It is tragic. It is faithless. The tragedy and infidelity in it lay in failing to fight hard enough to win fast and thereby keep Israeli casualties down, and in failing to make Israel's case against the Arabs. Think about it! Israel decries Arab terrorism but hardly exposes the Arab case's falsity. This half-hearted struggle on Israel's part allows the world to think that the Arabs have a good cause and the better case. This is the position of the "New York Sun" and its columnists, including Daniel Pipes. They defend Israel's reputation from Arab slander and they denounce Arab terrorism. They do not, however, uphold Israel's historical, religious, moral, and legal claim to the core of its homeland, Yesha. Neither do they suggest that the egregious Arab misbehavior and the fraudulent nature of "Palestinian nationalism" forfeit the Arab case for the Territories. For eventual Arab domination of those strategic territories, despite Arab adherence to the Islamist goal of eventually expelling the infidels from Israel, itself, "Sun" and Pipes have infinite patience. That, to me, is not being pro-Israel as professed. It simply is not being as extremist against Israel as the Islamists. I think that the position of the "Sun" is evolving towards the Arab side in the Arab-Israel conflict, though not in the Arab-U.S. conflict. An example is a recent article that explicitly assumes the Arab "cause" is legitimate. Religious hegemony is not a legitimate cause. "Sun" columnists who write about Israel take such a position, however. These and the other columnists take at face value the territorial surrender to the Arabs planned by PM Sharon as beneficial for Israel, though they don't say how. They fall for the implied support for Israel in Bush's letter, although the language of that letter and the US record of breech of promise make the letter a snare. Columnist William F. Buckley, Jr., believes that Bush would let Israel keep some of the communities it built in Yesha, and objects. Indeed, IMRA predicted its points of deception. Dr. Aaron Lerner of IMRA warned that the letter would in a vague and ambiguous way make those points in order to seem to support Israel, but would be shown later by the US not to support Israel. A White House briefing sooner rather than later assured reporters it does not support Israel. The State Dept. assured Arab governments likewise. Nevertheless, "Sun" staffers think it does. No logic and quotation from me dislodges them from their illusions. These opinion-makers can be impervious to fact and logic. Complicating one's evaluation of the newspaper is its reliance for most of its foreign news upon the Associated Press. The A.P., as I took pains to point out to the "Sun," colors its news green for Islam. That is, it reports Arab false statements as if factual or seriously to be considered. It makes pro-Arab or even-handed descriptions of events, rather than stating what occurred. Further complicating the "Sun's" approach to reality is its excessive partisanship or conservatism. Since George Bush is a Republican and a conservative, the "Sun" people rarely criticize him except for violating those positions. It is enough that he says he supports Israel somewhat. This newspaper, which has a field day ridiculing Sen. Kerry for major, minor, and imaginary inconsistencies give far less scrutiny to Pres. Bush's. This makes it inconsistent. Mr. Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at ricshulman@aol.com. To Go To Top

REMEMBERING DAVID Posted by Judy Lash Balint, April 28, 2004.

Beit El--Every year for the past seven years on Yom Hazikaron (Memorial Day) the 11th grade students of the Mateh Binyamin Yeshiva High School (MBYHS) in Beit El walk out of school, past the 8 foot high protective wall surrounding their building to a modest memorial plaque on the old road into the community. Here the boys commemorate the life of David Boim, an American-born MBYHS student who was murdered by Hamas terrorists as he stood waiting for the bus at this spot with two fellow students on May 13, 1996. David was 17, an 11th grader. David's father, Stanley, always attends the ceremony. His mother, Joyce finds it too difficult, and this year she is in Chicago attending to the family's legal efforts to bring down Hamas front groups in the US. The students, with blue Yizkor (Remember) stickers stuck on their white shirts, carry full size Israeli flags as they gather quietly around the stone plaque. A few hundred yards away are the newly-built spacious villas on the edge of Ramallah. Three jeeps of IDF soldiers, barely two years older than their charges, stand by scanning the horizon. After a few words from their teacher, the boys recite Psalms together and link arms to sing the ancient song of Jewish resolve and faith: Ani Ma'amin (I believe in the coming of the Messiah) Stanley Boim turns toward Jerusalem to recite kaddish for his son, and Moshe Eyal, director of the school, explains to the boys that "David will be with us forever as part of the 11th grade." The boys have to leave to make it back to the courtyard of the school in time for the 11 a.m. siren that marks the commencement of the main Yom Hazikaron ceremony in Beit El. MBYHS hosts a unique memorial event that brings hundreds of kindergarten, elementary, middle school and high school students together with dozens of IDF soldiers and police stationed in the community. On the steps leading to the courtyard, MBYHS students have erected displays with photos and text about each fallen soldier and terror victim in the community. Dozens of Israeli flags flutter alongside flags of the IDF brigades and police represented, as the white shirted students stand to attention for the two minute siren. As the siren winds down, two teenage boys light the memorial torch. Impassively, the MC announces that the brother of one of the boys was killed while serving in the IDF, and the other torch lighter is Dor Hershkowitz,14, whose father Arye was killed by terrorists in January 2001. For four months Dor said kaddish for his father together with his brother, Assaf,30, until Assaf too was murdered at the same spot on May 1, 2001. With all his pain, Dor is grateful to MBYHS. "At Mateh Binyamin I have good teachers. They know what I'm going through and because they know me and my family so well, they know how to help me," says the freckle-faced teenager. Addressing the crowd, one of the rabbis points out that Israel is not only a place to escape the galut when things get bad. "We're building a state that will be a light unto the nations," he says, "and all of you have a role in it. More than 21,000 people paid a heavy price, but in the end, our job is not to just remember their names, but to ask 'why--what is the significance of their sacrifice?'" Geula Hershkowitz, the widow and bereaved mother of Arye and Assaf rises to address the students. Geula is totally composed and exudes strength. The kids have been sitting in the sun for some time, but they're still attentive as Geula recites a poem composed by her daughter-in-law. Several male teachers, a few with pistols tucked in to their belts next to their tzitzit, bring water around. At the close of the ceremony, after the recitation of Kel Mole Rachamim and the Hatikva, the MBYHS students quickly and efficiently dismantle the stage and chairs. A few of the adults linger to shmooze, and the level to which terror has touched our lives is evident. Along with Geula Hershkowitz in this small group of people is Yoel Tzur, Beit El leader and father of Ita and Ephraim Tzur, murdered in December, 1996, as well as the father of one of the young men murdered in Wadi Kelt. Current security concerns have severly impacted the operations of MBYHS on many levels. Originally built to grace the main entrance to Beit El, the school now sits secluded at the back of the community since the main gate had to be moved due to incessant Arab gunfire. The 8 foot wall was erected to allow students to use the outside basketball court in relative safety. When the violence started in 2000, construction of the dining hall was just getting underway. MBYHS students and staff took their meals in a series of large pre-fab buildings on school grounds. After a few months of eating under fire, administrators had no choice but to move the students into the half-finished dining hall. Their new premises have no heat or air conditioning, and exposed concrete and wires are still in evidence. Bulletproof windows, an internal security system and a strong perimeter fence have all been added in the past three years, but there are still strict restrictions on student's outside activities causing some tension for the naturally active teenagers. One outlet is the radio studio for students enrolled in the communications course. In a state-of-the-art studio, some twenty students learn and practise their media skills, leading to the hope that they will one day take their place as sorely needed Torah observant media professionals. Another focus at MBYHS is instilling a love and respect for the land. One large classroom dedicated to this project is filled with the inspiring landscape and flora photography of MBYHS graduate Ovad Pedahel, who died in a traffic accident. The sandbags have been taken down from the Beit Midrash (study Hall), but many challenges still remain for the 11th graders who started their day by remembering David Boim. Foremost among them is living up to the expectations of a school that is struggling to continue to produce Israel's future defenders and leaders. "Jerusalem Diaries: In Tense Times" by Judy Lash Balint (Gefen) is available for purchase from www.israelbooks.com To Go To Top

RESPONSE TO A CALL TO SUPPORT SHARON Posted by Dafna Yee, April 27, 2004.

I received the article, "Support It" from Isi Leibler, the V.P. of the World Jewish Congress, with whom I've enjoyed a long time correspondence. (see attached) I was positively flabbergasted at the position that he took to support Sharon's "disengagement plan" and wrote this response to him. I'm asking all of you who agree with me to take the time to write your own responses to him as well. His e-mail address is: ileibler@netvision.net.il I am absolutely distraught after learning that you now are in SUPPORT of Sharon's heinous plan to give yet more land to the Arab terrorists in a misguided bid for peace! Your reasoning seems to be that "politics is the art of the possible". I don't agree that this applies to the present situation at all. The very fact that Israel exists at all today is because people were willing to work toward the politically impossible. Political maneuverings involving compromise and "negotiation", when they are with your sworn enemies, are destined to lead to nothing but disaster. But politics with your so-called friends can also lead to catastrophe, and that is what has happened with Sharon's bid for Bush's approval for his Gaza plan. You pointed out that Ben Gurion and the early Zionists did compromise their hopes that all of the Palestine Mandate would become Israel, and they settled for far less than they had been promised when they accepted partition. But look at what they received in exchange for their compromise -- a Jewish State where they would be free to build a real homeland for all Jews! In contrast, Sharon is proposing political compromises that will get Israel nothing but empty promises and more deaths in return for REMOVING all Jews from their established homes. He is also promising that Jews will be forbidden ever to live there again -- land where Jews have lived for thousands of years (until the politics of the 20th century)! Sharon is using Bush's assurances about protecting Israel as guarantees for "Palestinian" behavior as if the promises of the "Palestinians" to halt terror are worth the breath used to make them! NO American president can give surety for Arab behavior even if his intentions are good, so it is stupid for Israel to endanger the lives of its citizens and possibly its very survival on the statements made by any American president. The idea of "land for peace" is intrinsically flawed no matter who advocates it or with whom Israel is negotiating." No matter how sincere that person is, it can only bring more death and destruction to Israel. Any psychologist will tell you that the best predictor of anyone's future behavior is an examination of their past behavior, and that is true for governments as well as for individuals. Retreating from Lebannon did not bring about peace, it brought about more Israeli deaths and set a dangerous precedent. The exact same thing - only worse -- will happen if Sharon's misguided plan to ethnically cleanse all Jews from Gaza takes place. The land of Israel belongs to all Jews everywhere, in this and in future generations. NO Israeli politician, and certainly not an American president, has the right to give away the Jewish heritage that so many people have died to protect. To quote David Ben Gurion: "Israel must discern the needs of the hour in all their cruel clarity, but not, on that account, overlook the needs of generations yet to come. The present situation, with all its grievous dangers from which we draw inescapable conclusions, ought not to limit our visual horizons." Unfortunately, your visual horizons are being limited by your philosophy of seeing politics only through the eyes of the possible. You mentioned that you were surprised at Bush's support for Sharon's plan. Why should you be surprised? Bush's personal goal, which he has reiterated many times, is to create a "peaceful Palestinian State" headed by "Palestinian moderates." These two terms, "peaceful Palestinian State" and "Palestinian moderates," are oxymorons. Sharon's plan to ethnically cleanse (AKA "evacuate") all Jewish communities in Gaza and some from Judea/Samaria is merely one step closer to his own "Road Map"! I do not understand why President Bush's approval of Sharon's plan is considered a good thing, when that same plan has been hailed as a triumph by some "Palestinian" terrorists. Barghouti praised this plan as "the most important achievement of the Palestinians in the intifada." (www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/417205.html) Why would anyone want to support the creation of a country which states in its proposed constitution that no Jews will be allowed to live there? The world keeps accusing Israel of plotting to commit ethnic cleansing against the Arabs living in Israel, when no actual Arabs have been forced to leave their homes (except for the single circumstance when their homes were destroyed because of their participation in terrorist activity). Yet, it seems perfectly acceptable to make Gaza judenrein by forcing nearly 8000 Jews from their homes that have been established for three generations! THIS is the plan that gets Bush's -- and your -- approval! And for what? For Bush agreeing that Israel has the right to exist? Or for Bush agreeing that the "Palestinians" would go there instead of Israel in their mythical "right of return"? Or for acknowledging that Israel has the right to protect its citizens without answering to foreign powers? Would you please explain to me exactly what Israel could possibly achieve by Sharon's nefarious plan that was not already promised many times before, the last time at Oslo. Tell me what would allow me to think that this repeat of giving "land for peace" could possibly do anything but divide Israel into pieces. Moreover, what could possibly make me want to support this plan under these conditions? Many people, including you, are making a big deal out of the fact that Bush did not insist that the "Palestinians" had the "right of return" to Israel. But Bush only said that he believes that the "Palestinians" will want to go to "Palestine" once they have the opportunity; he did NOT say that the "right of return" issue was dead! It was a suggestion to the "Palestinians", not a directive. When talking of the mythological "right of return", everyone ignores the fact that "Palestine" could not handle the influx of millions of impoverished people; it doesn't have the resources to take care of the "Palestinians" now. The fact is that while the surrounding Arab countries could handle them, they have always refused to. (Even today, the "Palestinians" are refused citizenship in every Arab country.) The "Palestinians" are almost totally dependent on foreign donations, which include the UN, the USA, the EU, and even Israel! (Note that Arab countries have never supported the "Palestinians" economically; they just finance their terror tactics against Israel!) The "right of return" demand has absolutely nothing to do with justice for the Arab stateless people; rather, it is part of a deliberate plan to destroy Israel through negotiation which is an intrinsic part of the PLO! That is why the "Palestinians" have never accepted any of the many offers that would have given them their own country years ago! That is also why Arafat is not willing to accept the offer of Gaza. Gaza, even as a gift without conditions, will not accomplish the purpose for which Arafat was granted leadership of the PLO at the Rabat Conference in 1974 -- the total destruction of Israel! The other point that people are making a big deal of is Bush's acknowledgement of Israel's "right to exist". Frankly, I am sick of the expectation that Israel should give up the right for its citizens to live on their own land, or that it should give up the right to protect its citizens from enemy attacks, all for the acknowledgment that Israel has the right to exist. No one put it better than Abba Eban when he said: "Nobody does Israel any service by proclaiming its 'right to exist.' Israel's right to exist, like that of the United States, Saudi Arabia and 152 other states, is axiomatic and unreserved. Israel's legitimacy is not suspended in midair awaiting acknowledgment.... There is certainly no other state, big or small, young or old, that would consider mere recognition of its 'right to exist' a favor, or a negotiable concession." Sharon's turning to any American president for approval, even if Bush were the true friend to Israel that you maintain, is establishing another very dangerous precedent. Israel is not a colony of the US, and Israelis do not need anyone's "approval" to operate their government. That would be like Americans taking a referendum of Canadian voters or their Prime Minister for advice on trade issues. Frankly, if Israelis do vote for someone based on their approval rating from America, they will have damned themselves and their country. The same is true for any Israeli who votes to support Sharon position as Prime Minister based on Bush's, or indeed any American president's, approval. The biggest drawback to accepting any of Bush's statements about the situation in Israel, is that Bush still doesn't accept the unalterable fact that the "Palestinians" never wanted another country NEXT to Israel; they want to REPLACE Israel with a 23rd Muslim nation. Please don't forget that Bush still talks of "illegal Israeli settlements being a cause of the conflict" and "occupied Palestinian land." Why is the "land for peace" philosophy applied to no country except Israel? Perhaps because no other country would agree to such insanity. Let us not forget Bush's statement about being "troubled" about Israel's decision to execute Sheik Yassin, or his comments about Israel's antiterrorist fence being a "problem for peace". (Please read the official statement at: http://usinfo.state.gov/xarchives/ display.html?p=washfile-english&y=2003&m =November&x=20031104182826namfuaks0.2471277&t =usinfo/wf-latest.html Note the comments about the PA retaining control of all "security forces and antiterrorist activity" -- what a joke!) Bush did NOT agree to even one of the Israeli reservations and specifically refused to "allow" Israel to respond to terrorism in Gaza with force after withdrawal. When you speak of Bush's "war on terror", please do not forget that when it comes to Israelis' fight against terrorists, Bush always calls for them to show "restraint"! Here is what counting on American support has done: "After March 31 talks at the White House with President Bush, the Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said Israel accepted Bush's approach to peacemaking with the Palestinians." (www.imra.org.il/story.php3?id=16563) Just what "peacemaking activities" is Bush referring to? Another reason not to count on statements of support from any American president, is that a president alone does not control American actions. In addition, a president's personal guarantee means very little in the long-term. Not only do American policies change, but its president does too. How are we supposed to believe in American support against terrorists when Colin Powell, as Bush's official representative, reassures the PLO that American policy defining Israeli -- not Arab -- settlements as illegal is still in force. (www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=11073), and calls for BOTH Israel and the PLO to stop terrorist activity! (When was the last time you saw an Israeli "suicide bomber"?) Another factor that you and other plan supporters are not taking into account is Bush's promises to Mubarak, which I suggest that you reread. (http://usinfo.state.gov/xarchives/display.html?p= washfile-english&y=2004&m=April&x= 20040413173208ndyblehs8.268374e-02&t=livefeeds/wf-latest.html) They are at least, if not more, significant than his verbal promises to Sharon in determining Bush's true state of mind about Israel and the "Palestinians". What is also important to consider is that Mubarak himself is listed as one of the chief backers and formulators of the proposed "Palestinian Constitution." If you read my commentary on that document, you would know that the "Palestinians" confirm the fears of every Israeli who is against the "evacuation"! (www.think-israel.org/apr04bloged.html#apr04.32) Bush is NOT Israel's friend -- NO AMERICAN PRESIDENT HAS EVER BEEN, WHETHER DEMOCRAT OR REPUBLICAN, since America's friends and allies also include those countries who are Israel's sworn enemies. However, being the first American president to actually declare his support for a "Palestinian State", which reverses all former American guarantees on the subject, and who makes its creation a personal project, certainly takes that title away from Bush. Aside from all of his "peacemaking" activities, why hasn't Bush moved the American Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, which Congress voted to do in 1995, if he is indeed "the best friend that Israel has ever had" as you maintain? He gave his "personal promise" to that proposal, too. Seeking American approval has cost more Israeli deaths and loss of land than dealing with her enemies. Remember, Israel won the actual wars; it is the propaganda war that she is losing! Nothing but disaster can possibly come from voluntarily giving away even more of Israel's land to her enemies, from where her enemies can launch more and stronger attacks with complete impunity. Please take a good look at the pictures of Israeli homes in the communities that you have given your support to eliminate at: www.geocities.com/m_yericho/home1.htm. Israel has always advocated destroying the houses of terrorists rather than going after terrorists themselves (the recent assassinations of Yassin and Rantisi notwithstanding). It is extremely ironic that now Israel is contemplating destroying the homes of the Israelis who have been living with terrorism for so many years and whose only "crime" is that they are living in a place that Sharon has now decided to award to these same terrorists (completely reversing his earlier promises). As for "guarantees" that the homes would not be used by the terrorists themselves, they are worth as much as similar "promises" made by the "Palestinians" in the past - NOTHING! (It's been proven that money raised for charitable causes, such as the "destroyed olive groves" cited by that despicable group, Rabbis for Human Rights, actually went to the families of "suicide" bombers! (www.chretiens-et-juifs.org/article.php?voir[]=316&voir[]=2846) The "Palestinians" are not even waiting for withdrawal to show their true intentions. Probably Arafat no longer feels it necessary to even pretend to want "two states living side by side in peace"; he has already stated that without the "right of return" TO ISRAEL, he will not agree to the Bush/Sharon agreement. After all, why should the "Palestinians" accept only part of what they want, when all the evidence shows that if they continue to refuse to accept Israeli concessions, eventually they will get more, until they get it all? This time, Israel is not even making a show of demanding anything in exchange; the "Palestinians" don't even have to make more empty promises! This "right of return" is nothing but the latest (and, indeed, the cleverest) propaganda ploy to eradicate Israel. Israel must not make a single "concession" until AFTER the "Palestinians" cease all terrorist activity, actively work to punish known terrorists, start to build the land they already have control over, and take care of its own people instead of using nearly all their funds for terrorism. Israel must stop accepting "promises" instead of actions! It doesn't matter in the least if Israel's demands are considered "impossible", any more than it matters to world leaders that bringing in millions of poverty-stricken Arabs into the country would bankrupt Israel even if the "Palestinians" were not also determined to destroy Israel by coming there. I'll end with another quote from David Ben Gurion which still holds true today: "No Jew has the right to yield the rights of the Jewish People in Israel. No Jew has the authority to do so. No Jewish body has the authority to do so. Not even the entire Jewish People alive today has the right to yield any part of Israel. It is the right of the Jewish People over the generations, a right that under no conditions can be canceled. Even if Jews during a specific period proclaim they are relinquishing this right, they have neither the power nor the authority to deny it to future generations. No concession of this type is binding or obligates the Jewish People. Our right to the country -- the entire country -- exists as an eternal right, and we shall not yield this historic right until its full and complete redemption is realized." Dafna Yee is director of Jewish Watch Dog (JWD). Its website address is http://jwd-jewishwatchdog.home.comcast.net To Go To Top

IN THE STRICTEST SECRECY! BUT FEEL FREE TO PASS IT ON! Posted by Steven Plaut, April 27, 2004.

This message is in the strictest of secrecy! Honorable comrade and most merciful friend!: Hi! Do you remember me? I was the guy who single handedly rescued the Oslo "peace process" when I abandoned my Right-wing Knesset faction with my buddy Alex and we agreed to join Shimon Peres' leftist Oslo coalition in exchange for a cushy cabinet post for me! Yes, I am an ex-cabinet minister from the state of Israel. And as you know, there are all sorts of funds missing from the Israeli Treasury, and there are also unaccounted funds from my own drug smuggling business. Those ecstasy pills are worth a fortune! SO here is what I propose. I am stuck here in an Israeli prison, but my friends will transfer to your bank account the tidy sum of 25 million dollars if you just provide me with your bank account number, your credit card numbers, and your PIN numbers for your account and credit cards. And right after that my business colleagues will deposit into your account a cool 25 million bucks, scout's honor! Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist, a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author of "The Scout." He frequently comments - both seriously and satirically - on Israeli politics and the left wing academic community. His website address is http://www.stevenplaut.blogspot.com. To Go To Top

WE'RE RIGHT, THE WHOLE WORLD'S WRONG Posted by IsrAlert, April 26, 2004.

This article was written by Dov Fischer and appeared on the Forward website (http://www.forward.com/issues/2002/02.04.19/oped3.html) April 19, 2002. "The whole world is demanding that Israel withdraw. I don't think the whole world, including the friends of the Israeli people and government, can be wrong." - Kofi Annan, United Nations Secretary General, speaking in Madrid, Spain At this moment in time, many Jews who love and support Israel hear the soft voice within, asking the question to which Kofi Annan recently alluded in Madrid: Can we alone be right, while the whole world around is wrong? The evidence that we are standing on the other side of the "whole world" is manifest. The Arab League is united in condemnation, and Egyptian students march for an end to their country's diplomatic relations with Israel that were engraved at Camp David. The United Nations Security Council roundly condemns Israel several times in mere weeks, and its human rights commission again takes up the Durban chant against Zionism that was silenced by September 11. The European Union is rife with talk of boycotting the Jewish state. Synagogue attacks in France give vent to the feeling expressed with gentility by the French diplomat who termed Israel "that sh--y little state." All three major political parties in Germany vie to lead their nation in condemning Israel. England accuses Israel of using British-made tanks illegally. Mobs attack Jews from Ukraine to Belgium to the Netherlands. The pope condemns Israel for its military presence outside the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, while armed Arab terrorists repose inside, holding monks and nuns as icons for terror. We Jews are bemused. Are we the only ones who see the unrelenting suicide bombings of women and children at pizza stores, of teenagers at a discotheque, of families at a Seder celebration? After 19 months of slaughter at open-air fruit markets and bus stations and bat mitzvah parties, deadly shootings of motorists, stabbings of school children in caves, has no one seen this but us? Do we alone notice that the attacks target Jewish and Arab civilians alike throughout pre-June 1967 Israel, from Haifa to Hadera, West Jerusalem to Beersheba? The whole world demands Israel take risks for peace with Yasser Arafat - again. Are we the only ones who perceive that, after he was conferred a Nobel peace prize and given authority to create a new polity and a new atmosphere for coexistence, he desecrated the next eight years by wielding television to inculcate grotesque images of murder, radio to disseminate a culture of hate, schools and summer camps to train young people to murder the Jews they were being taught to hate? Can no one but us decipher the receipts he signed, authorizing funds to purchase weapons of terror? The whole world endorses President Bush's call for war against terrorists and those who harbor them. The United States invades Afghanistan to uproot the infrastructure of terror and hunkers down there for seven months, preparing to extend the incursion into Pakistan. Aerial bombs strafe cities. Thousands of civilian non-combatants are believed dead. The Taliban government crumbles, but the incursion continues. We must find Osama bin Laden. We must find Mullah Omar. We must reach Daniel Pearl's killers. And we yet shall begin the mother of all incursions into Iraq. We Jews see this. We also see the same "whole world" roundly condemn Israel for its incursion into a jungle of terror. Israel will not drop incendiary payloads from the air on civilians, so Israeli reservists, husbands and fathers, die in house-to-house fighting in Jenin, where the terrorists booby-trap buildings, station snipers and outfit children as human bombs. Israel asks that Arafat turn over the assassins of an Israeli cabinet minister and the mastermind of the Karine-A affair that tried to smuggle 50 tons of explosives to his minions. But the whole world wants Israel instead to pull back while the bombers of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade and the Tanzim play for time. Doesn't the whole world see what we see? Can we alone be right? Well, yes. If we Jews are anything, we are a people of history. From our first patriarch to Israel's precision-targeted destruction of the Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981, which laid the foundation for a successful Operation Desert Storm and the rescue of Kuwait, our history provides the strength to know that we can be right and the whole world wrong. We have confronted the question many times. The whole world was polytheistic, and we alone preached belief in one God. We preached a Day of Rest, and the whole ancient world mocked us as lazy people. We were right, and the whole world was wrong. They said we crucified a Jew - as if the Romans would have allowed any of its subjects to do such a thing, as if Jews ever had such a punishment in our code - and we insisted such a thing was beyond impossible. We were right, and the whole world was wrong. In the Middle Ages, the whole world said that we use children's blood to make matzo; we denied it. They said that we poisoned the wells of Europe, and we denied it. We were right, and the whole world was wrong. The Crusades. The blood libels and Talmud burnings in England and France, leading those nations to expel Jews for centuries. The Spanish and Portuguese Inquisition. The ghettoes and the Mortara case in Italy. Dreyfus in France. Beilis in Russia and a century's persecution of Soviet Jewry. The Holocaust. Kurt Waldheim in Austria. Each time, Europe stood by silently - or actively participated in murdering us - and we alone were right, and the whole world was wrong. Today, once again, we alone are right and the whole world is wrong. The Arabs, the Russians, the Africans, the Vatican proffer their aggregated insights into and accumulated knowledge of the ethics of massacre. And the Europeans. Although we appreciate a half-century of West European democracy more than we appreciated the prior millennia of European brutality, we recognize who they are, what they have done - and what's what. We know, if they don't, that they need Arab oil more than they need Jewish philosophy and creativity. We remember that the food they eat is grown from soil fertilized by 2,000 years of Jewish blood they have sprinkled onto it. Atavistic Jew-hatred lingers in the air into which the ashes rose from the crematoria. Finally, the best of Europe truly are wracked by the burdened conscience of what they, their parents and their bubbes and zeides did, or failed to do, in the 1940s. So, instead of confronting a shameful past that belies their self-vaunted Romantic civilization, they seek now to assuage their consciences with the mendacity that Israel 2002 is no different from Europe 1942. Yes, once again, we are right and the whole world is wrong. It doesn't change a thing, but after 25 centuries it's nice to know. Rabbi Dov Fischer, an attorney, is a board member of the Los Angeles Jewish Federation-Council's Jewish Community Relations Committee and national vice president of the Zionist Organization of America. He is the author of "General Sharon's War Against Time Magazine." To Go To Top

IS FORD STILL FUNDING DISREPUTABLE NGOS? Posted by Lise Rubin, April 26, 2004.

These are some NGOs funded by the Ford Foundation and the European Union: - The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network (EMHRN), - EIDHR also funds Adalah. -Ford funds Adalah directly and also via New Israel Fund -Ford funds B'tselem. The EU is a major source of funding for B'tselem. B'tselem devotes most of its activities and resources to a specific political agenda, and is closely connected to the most blatant anti-Israel political organizations such as PCHR. -Ford funds PCHR. -Ford funds Miftah. Ford started Miftah, and funded for 4 years, $650,000. - Ford funds UNRWA. EU funds for UNRWA -Ford funds Physicians for Human Rights. The EU Commission Office in Israel and the Finnish Embassy have funded (without public disclosure) Physicians for Human Rights. -Ford funds the Israeli Committee Against House Demolition, either directly or via New Israel Fund. The EU Commission Office in Israel has funded (without public disclosure) the Israeli Committee Against House Demolition. This excerpt is from the NGO Monitor Special Edition: "Summary of EU Funding of Politicized NGOS" (www.ngo-monitor.org/editions/EUSpecialedition/euspecial-conthtm), 22 April 2004. In contrast to the Ford Foundation, which has suspended funding for some NGOs involved in these activities, is investigating others, and has appointed a special investigator for this issue, the EU and the European governments continue to avoid this issue. (NGO Monitor (www.ngo-monitor.org), 8 January 2004) So I wrote this to the NGO Monitor personnel: I have received the newsletter, and the references to EU Funding. Please note that Ford also funds the programs mentioned. It does not appear that Ford has in any way at all addressed the significant harm it has caused. If you do not have the data on this, please ask for it. Who is the Ford "investigator"? Ford is still attacking Israel and Judaism world wide. Furthermore, much of what is perceived as European money actually originates with Ford. Ford just money launders it through the European named operatives. Further, it was Ford who brought the EU into play in the first place. Why are you comparing it favorably? Please respond. I am waiting for a response. To Go To Top

THE LAST LION Posted by David Ben-Ariel, April 26, 2004.

William Manchester's book, "The Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill; Visions of Glory", is quite remarkable considering its principles pertain to Israel's situation today. Churchill was considered an "enemy of peace" by those who failed to recognize the German threat. He was basically abandoned in a political wilderness until the time came for him to come out in the spirit of the judges of Israel and deliver Great Britain from the Nazi menace. Don't we realize that whenever we warn about the Beast Power rising in Europe that we'll be falsely accused of hating Germans, Europeans, and Catholics? Years ago certain ones on AOL accused my book, "Beyond Babylon: Europe's Rise & Fall," of hating Catholics and of German-bashing. I replied that it's actually because I LOVE the Germans, the Europeans and the Catholics that I want to help warn them to not blindly follow their leaders! It's not only because I love our British-Israelite and Jewish brethren that the warning message must go out! Both Israelites and Europeans must be warned! I'm of German descent, in part, from the Palatinate in West Germany. I certainly don't hate Germans, but I do hate what the Nazis did and what Bible prophecy clearly says a German-led Europe will do again on an even greater scale! This time their Satan-inspired hatred and murder won't just be against our Jewish brethren but against Joseph: the Anglo-Saxons! Consider this excellent quote from "The Last Lion": Speaking of the type of leader necessary to stand up to Hitler: "England looked for another Alfred, a figure cast in a mold which, by the time of the Dunkirk deliverance, seemed to have been forever lost. England's new leader, were he to prevail, would have to be everything England's decent, civilized Establishment had rejected (sound familiar? those impotent ones who worry about reputation and remaining polite and respectable aren't effective in facing the Challenge)... Their successor would have to be a passionate Manichaen who saw the world as a medieval struggle to the death between the powers of good and the powers of evil, who held that individuals are responsible for their actions and that the German dictator was therefore wicked...Like Adolf Hitler he would have to be a leader of intuitive genius, a born demagogue in the original sense of the word, a believer in the supremacy of his race and his national destiny (not one who has forgotten or miserably doubts his Identity), an artist who knew how to gather the blazing light of history into his prism... Such a man, if he existed, would be England's last chance. In London there was such a man." The question begs to be answered whether or not there's such a man in Jerusalem today; whether Israel will finally have a leader who will boldly reclaim Judaism's holiest site, the Temple Mount, and will refuse to tolerate Amalekites claiming Jerusalem as their capital! A leader who knows and understands that the Holy Land was promised to Israel and not to Ishmael. If not, and Zion and Jerusalem fall to Catholic Europe because we've failed to heed Churchillian warnings, and shamefully despised those Christian-Zionists and Jews who delivered them, then the Messiah will surely save us out of the dreadful "Time of Jacob's Trouble" - but we'll have first suffered the greatest tribulation to strike planet earth. David Ben-Ariel is author of "Beyond Babylon: Europe's Rise and Fall." To Go To Top

ISRAELI ART IS IN THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER, GOOD TASTE IS NOT Posted by Ariel Natan Pasko, April 26, 2004.

If you've wondered lately what's wrong with Israel, just look at the recent winner of the prestigious 2004 Israel Prize for sculpture. It was the proverbial "bad boy" of the Israeli art world, Yigal Tumarkin. He was recognized for his long career and "diverse artistic vocabulary." The Prize Committee called his work, "a central contribution to Israeli art." The judges who decided to grant him the prize wrote, "Tumarkin's monumental works are exhibited at many sites in Israel." The prize is always awarded on Israeli Independence Day. Presumably long years of work, juvenile style, and wide distribution alone entitle him to the prize. As an article in an Israeli newspaper - reviewing the prize offer - commented recently, "Tumarkin already deserved the prize 30 years ago due to his innovation and audaciousness in the Israeli art scene." But not everyone agrees. Three petions to Israel's Supreme Court were filed against awarding Tumarkin the prize, but were ultimately turned down. National Religious Party, Member of Knesset Shaul Yahalom - one of the petitioners - called Tumarkin, an "embarrassment to the nation," and unfit to become a recipient of the prestigious prize. "It is unreasonable that a man, as an artist and as a sculptor, whose actions bordered on criminal activity, who acted violently towards his family, disrespected people and the values of the Jewish people and made racist and anti-Semitic remarks, will receive in a democratic Jewish state the Israel Prize," MK Yahalom wrote in his petition to the court. After the Supreme Court announcement that Tumarkin could be awarded the Israel Prize for Sculpture, Shas Party head, MK Eli Yishai said, "The Supreme Court approved, through its decision this morning, the honoring of a man who, by his expressions, intentionally and inexplicably runs roughshod over sectors of society, with the exception of [those holding] his racist worldview." Referring to Yigal Tumarkin as an "artist of racism," MK Yishai then called on President Moshe Katzav to avoid shaking Tumarkin's hand at the Israel Prize ceremony. Some of his most famous or should I say infamous pieces, include a pig wearing "Tefilin" (phylacteries worn by Jewish men during prayer), and a lithograph of an aerial view of Jerusalem's Old City, with a huge thumbprint superimposed over it. Written in pen on the top is, "From June 1967 Jerusalem started to turn ugly. Why? It's a fact." How profound! As for the "praying pig," back in January 1998, Israeli artist Tatiana Susskin received a two-year prison sentence for drawing a picture depicting the founder of Islam, Muhammad, as a pig. The court considered it an act of racial incitement against Islam and the Arabs. But in Israel, putting a pig - the most disgusting animal by Jewish standards - in "Tefilin" - Jewish ritual objects - isn't incitement, it isn't criminal, it's "art," and worthy of a prize. These themes of degrading the Jewish religion, and all that Jews hold dear, such as Jerusalem, run throughout Tumarkin's work. Among his other "famous" works are "Hu Halach Basadot" - He Walked in the Fields - from 1967, a bronze statue of a torn figure whose innards are exposed and pants are rolled up. It symbolizes the complete opposite of post-Six Day War Israeli self-confidence, and the joy of victory. Evidently he likes to disgust. His troubled personal background is evident in his work and public statements. Tumarkin was born in Germany in 1933, to a Jewish mother and Christian father. His father, Martin Helburg, was an actor. While Tumarkin and his mother fled Nazi Germany to the Palestine Mandate during the pre-state period, Tumarkin's father became a culture officer in the Nazi SS during World War II. Tumarkin spent the 1950s in Europe, mostly Paris and Berlin. He broke the post-Holocaust Israeli taboo of moving back to Germany. When Tumarkin found out about his father's death during a newspaper interview in 1966, he told the reporter that he had no feelings toward his parents, and was sorry that he did not drop his sister when she was a baby. Outrageous statements like this have helped gain him the spotlight throughout his career. Tumarkin returned to Israel from Europe in 1960 to exhibit his works at Jerusalem's Bezalel Museum, the predecessor to the Israel Museum. He exhibited polyester reliefs for the first time in Israel and was hailed as an innovator. The pieces that he created - with screws, forks, junk and bottles - and his combination of painting and sculpture were considered unique and thought provoking at the time in Israel. In the 1960s and 1970s, he was considered to have personified the spirit of modern art, according to many art critics. He became very "prolific" throwing together combinations of junk, and giving them offensive interpretations. In 1992, a comprehensive retrospective of his works was held at the Tel Aviv Museum. Tumarkin, who is very prolific, exhibited a great number of pieces, 120 sculptures and about 150 prints. But Tumarkin has been criticized for shallowness. He has made a name for himself, some say, thanks to works that are considered innovative only to those who don't know about the history of art. He puts out art in a mechanized way. Yet, the cultural supremacy that he radiates, as one of the leading representatives of European Art in the Middle East, allows him to bully the Israeli art world. Tumarkin frequently attacks other artists and has been known to send scathing letters to critics. He's been involved in several court cases and has also been known to threaten lawsuits to shut up criticism of his work. Although he has received many prizes and critical acclaim, and has exhibited in Israel's major museums, Tumarkin claims to be persecuted by the establishment, and has never missed an opportunity to say so, even while accepting the prize. It is no secret that Tumarkin wanted to receive the Israel Prize. In an interview that appeared in Yediot Ahronot in 1997, he said, "The Israel Prize is important to me for one reason, to say what I am now saying from their stage. When I see the Rafi Lavies and the Moshe Gershunis [other Israeli artists], how they sit there so full of themselves, of their art, so politically correct, then either I am too young, or I will die as someone who throws rocks at windows." One only need listen to him, to ask, who really is "full of himself"? Since the 1980s, Tumarkin hasn't gained his reputation for works of art, but for his habit of lashing out at religious Jews, right-wingers, and Sephardim, whoever he dislikes. He once said, he wished he had gunned down Israeli politicians on the right, Raphael Eitan and Rechavam Ze'evi. Tumarkin has also remarked that his "true contribution will be the taking of a submachine gun instead of pen and pencil, and killing the religious settlers on the West Bank." When Shas MK Eli Yishai reminded the public of Tumarkin's slurs against Sephardim. Tumarkin shot back that; "Moroccan Jews are indeed crybabies" and "ought to stop burdening us with so many poor children." In a November 1988 interview with "Tel Aviv Magazine," Tumarkin said, "When you see the "Haredim" - ultra-Orthodox Jews - you can understand why there was a Holocaust." And in response to criticism, he wrote in "Hadashot" later, "The outward strangeness of the Jew and the pretentiousness of the notion that God chose us...caused violent surrounding cultures to clash...with this arrogant minority...The image of the cunning, ambitious scoundrel, lending money at exorbitant interest, turned the bent, hook-nosed bearded Jew into the enemy of civilization...which didn't help belatedly enlightened Jews." Look who's calling other Jews, "arrogant and ambitious"? He's been known to comment that, "The Jewish Holocaust wasn't the only holocaust." Imagine what Israel's response would have been, if an international artist had expressed similar sentiments? Yet Yad VaShem in 1998 almost gave him the Zussman Prize, until there was a public outcry, and they retracted the offer. How is it that they would consider giving it to him in the first place? But this is the sickness of the cultural elites in Israel today. One only has to be disgusting, perverse, degrade all that is holy and beautiful, and have the artistic talent of a four-year-old to get noticed. Become self-promoting, attack the competition, cry foul, attack Haredim and "settlers," and they drown you in accolade. Israeli art is in the eye of the beholder, good taste is not! /font> Ariel Natan Pasko is an independent analyst and consultant. He has a Master's Degree in International Relations & Policy Analysis. His articles appear regularly on numerous news/views and think-tank websites, in newspapers, and can be read at: www.geocities.com/ariel_natan_pasko To Go To Top

GAZA WITHDRAWAL COULD REPEL US EVANGELICAL CHRISTIANS Posted by AFSI, April 26, 2004.

This was written by Herb Keinon, a Jerusalem Post columnist and appeared on the Jerusalem Post website (www.jpost.com) April 24, 2004. An Israeli withdrawal from the territories could lead to an anti-Semitic backlash among evangelical Christians who are today among Israel's strongest US supporters, said Herbert Zweibon, an American Jewish activist with close ties to the evangelical community. Zweibon, chairman of Americans for a Safe Israel, a US Jewish organization fighting a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, explained that evangelical Christian support is based on a deep belief that God has a covenant with Israel that includes the Jews' return to the biblical Land of Israel. "If the Jews give up on their part of the covenant," said Zweibon, "I think the Christians will walk away from their support for Israel. Why should they stand by it, if the Jews don't?" Zweibon said that if the "road map goes through as stated, and Israel withdraws from Judea, Samaria and Gaza, I think you will see anti-Semitism in America like you have never seen. These people will see it as a betrayal of their own trust." Asked what good the support of this community is if the relationship could so quickly turn from love to hate, Zweibon said, "Every divorce turns from love to hate, often because of a feeling of betrayal." Zweibon was behind an effort last year to place evangelical Christian pressure on US President George W. Bush to ditch the road map initiative. His organization sponsored the placement of some 130 billboards, at a price of $75,000, in the US Bible Belt calling on people to phone the White House to tell Bush to "honor God's covenant with Israel." The billboards read: "And the Lord said to Jacob... Unto thy offspring will I give this land (Genesis 35:11-12). Pray that President Bush honors God's covenant with Israel." The billboard then listed the White House phone number and urged people to call. Although no similar campaign is currently planned to battle Bush's support for the disengagement plan, Zweibon, in Israel for a brief visit, is currently putting together for settlement leaders a tour of churches in a number of states expected to be key in the upcoming US elections. The leaders will urge the evangelical community to press Bush to back away from any diplomatic process leading to a two-state solution. The states to be targeted are Florida, Ohio, Tennessee and Missouri, which all went to Bush in the 2000 elections by slim margins. Zweibon hopes evangelical Christians from these states will make their concerns known to Karl Rove, Bush's political strategist. In 2001 Rove, according to Zweibon, said that prior to the 2000 election the Bush campaign's premise was that 19 million Bible-believing Christians would come out to vote for Bush. In the end, he quoted Rove as saying, four million of these voters never turned up to vote - a real concern now for Bush's reelection campaign. The Israel issue may be a catalyst to get them to the polls, Zweibon said. Americans For a Safe Israel/AFSI is a pro-active pro-Israel advocacy group. AFSI may be contacted by mail at 1623 Third Ave., Suite 205, New York, N.Y. 10128, Tel: 212-828-2424; Fax: 212-828-1717; by email at afsi@rcn.com; or by accessing its website: www. afsi.org. Helen Freedman is Executive Director. To Go To Top

ISRAELI BUS NUMBER 19 COMES TO THE CAPITAL Posted by Deb Kotz and Warren Manison, April 26, 2004.

This is an opportunity to do something that the Washington Jewish Community Council appears to be unable to do - namely, to support a Christian organization showing the kind of support for Israel that should be foremost in the agenda of the Washington Jewish Community. We encourage everyone to please support this critical event by participating in the Rally on Capitol Hill. Israel benefits from Christian support. Israel benefits from Jewish support. Christian for Israel is an organization that brings in thousands of Christians from all over the country to voice their denunciations of Palestinian terror and to support Israel. Let's us Jews of Washington rally with our friends - all of us in support of Israel. Please pass this message on to others. WHERE: in front of the Capitol Building on the Mall. WHEN: 12 noon until 4 pm. May 6, 2004 SPONSORS: Christians for Israel On January 29, 2004, a homicide bomber boarded bus #19 in Jerusalem and exploded, killing 11 civilians and wounding dozens more. Just three months later, on May 6th, the very same bus will touch U.S. soil for the first time in history when Christians for Israel USA holds a rally in support of Israel during the National Day of Prayer. The rally, scheduled from 12:00 pm until 4:00 pm, will be held in front of Capitol building on the mall. The theme of the Rally will be "Terror, A one way ticket." At the rally, Christians for Israel will bring bombed out Israeli bus no. 19 and place it on display in front of our nation's Capitol, where it will continue to be shown during much of the month of May. Speakers for the May 6 rally will include Carrie Devorah (sister of a murder victim on Bus 19), Gary Bauer, Rev. George Morrison, Rabbi Aryeh Spero, Congressman Butch Otter, Beth Galinsky, Conservative Journalist Ami Horowitz, Holocaust Survivor Lea de Lange, Dr. James Hutchens, Robert Stearns and many more. The homicide bomber that brutally murdered innocent Jews on Bus Number 19 marked the 140th homicide bombing. Thus far, 577 people have been killed and 3,543 injured in homicide bombings throughout Israel. "We hope this historical bus trip brings to light, from a Biblical perspective, the horror that Israelis face on their homeland on a daily basis," said Dr. James M. Hutchens, President of Christians for Israel (USA) and a retired Brigadier General in the U.S. Army. "Many of the everyday activities we take for granted here in the United States - even something as simple as riding a bus - are literally life-threatening activities in Israeli daily life. Both Christians and Jews must stand together with the Israelis in their fight for freedom and peace." Christians for Israel will be taking Bus 19 on tour around the United States throughout the next year. We want to help Americans visualize the terror that Israelis face on a daily basis and to heighten the public conscience in regards to terror. Being able to come close to the bus, to look inside will remind people that this type of violence can occur anyplace, anytime, including right here in America. We hope it brings a refreshed understanding of the evil that the Jewish people and Israel face. This is important. Anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism are being morphed together against Israel throughout the world. We need to make a united statement of our willingness to stand and support Israel. For updates on the rally and to see the full speakers list please visit www.bus19.org or call toll-free 877-200-7249 with any questions. Christians for Israel (USA) is located in Washington, D.C. Reach them by mail at P.O. Box 20295, Washington, DC 20041. For more information call toll free 1-877-200-7249 or visit their website: http://www.c4iusa.org Deb Kotz and Warren Manison are active members of the Brandeis Chapter of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) Deb maintains an email list to distribute articles of interest to the local (Washington DC and Maryland suburbs) community. She can be reached at DebKotz@aol.com To Go To Top

UPDATE ON SALAH CHOUDRY, PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE Posted by David Ben-Ariel, April 26, 2004.

This is a letter written to me from Dr. Richard Benkin about Mr. Salah Choudhury's condition. There is some good news to the extent that he has received some of the medical treatment he needed so badly. On April 11, the High Court ordered the prison authorities to send him to a hospital that would provide treatment for a serious eye ailment. The ailment was confirmed during a visit by Dr. Shahinul Islam (Opthalmology Dept. Dhaka Medical College Hospital). On Thursday, he was sent to the hospital, but had to come back yesterday for further tests. At least that's something. The jail authorities ignored the last court order for treatment. Also, through my communications with him and his family, I can tell you that he remains strong in his faith and in his determination to continue seeking peace and understanding among Jews, Muslims, and Christians. (You know, prior to his arrest, he had visited the two Christian communities outside Dhaka, and we even included some of his impressions of that in the speech I wrote for him.) Thank you for asking after him. [Editor's note: Salah Shoaib Choudhury is a senior journalist and editor of the "Weekly Blitz" in Bangladesh. He was arrested in the airport on November 29, 2003 on his way to visit Israel. He was 'interrogated', tortured and has been in prison ever since, where he receives threats from fundamentalist prisoners. His crime? He believes in "better relations and understanding between Moslems and Jews around the world." In this country, Dr. Richard Benkin has devoted himself to Mr. Choudhury's defense. Dr. Benkin can be reached by telephone at 847-922-6424 or 847-922-6426. Or email him at mailto:drrbenkin@comcast.net] To Go To Top

STATISTICS ON THE NUMBER OF ISRAELIS KILLED BY ARAB AGGRESSION Posted by Bryna Berch, April 26, 2004.

What makes this news item from today's Arutz-7 (http://www.IsraelNationalNews.com) so appallng - aside from the number of Jewish lives lost to Arab aggression - is that these figures are familiar to Defense Minister Sha'ul Mofaz, who wrote to the bereaved IDF families on occasion of Israel's Memorial Day is "... a day of remembrance and sadness for its heroes, the fallen of the campaigns of Israel, whose bodies and strength of spirit formed for it a protective wall, and whose blood and very lives were a foundation stone for its establishment and existence." Yet he is all set to expel the Jews of Gaza and pull the IDF out of Gaza, making it easier for the Palestinian Arabs to manufacture Weapons of Jewish Destruction (WJD) without hinderance. The number of soldiers and security personnel who have fallen since Nov. 29, 1947, when the UN accepted the partition, thus mandating the creation of a Jewish State, is 20,297. The struggle to re-create a Jewish homeland beginning in the year 1860, when Jews began to move outside Jerusalem's Old City walls, claimed an additional 1,485 victims, for a total of 21,782. Since 1920, over 3,500 Israelis have been murdered in terrorist attacks (see and ). Since last year's Memorial Day, 185 people have been killed. The War of Independence was Israel's costliest war, with more than 6,000 dead and 15,000 wounded. The war consisted of 39 separate operations, fought from the borders of Lebanon to the Sinai Peninsula and Eilat, and ended in 1949. Virtually the entire Jewish population of Israel, then numbering 650,000 people, was mobilized in order to meet the coordinated assault of five regular Arab armies, in addition to the 1,000,000 Arabs living west of the Jordan River. Then followed several years of "relative" quiet - during which there were "1,339 cases of armed clashes with Egyptian armed forces, 435 cases of incursion from Egyptian-controlled territory, and 172 cases of sabotage perpetrated by Egyptian military units and fedayeen in Israel," in which 101 Israelis were killed, as Israeli Ambassador to the UN Abba Eban explained to the Security Council on October 30, 1956. Eban gave these statistics the day after Israel began the Sinai Campaign - its military response to Egypt's violation of international agreements with its sealing off the Israeli port of Eilat, effectively stopping Israel's sea trade with much of Africa and the Far East. A total of 231 Israeli soldiers died in the fighting. In March 1957, after receiving international guarantees that Israel's vital waterways would remain open, Israel withdrew from the Sinai and Gaza - yet the Egyptians still refused to open the Suez Canal to Israeli! shipp ing. The Six-Day War broke out on June 5, 1967. Despite the stunning victories, over 770 Israelis were killed. Then began the period of the War of Attrition. The Israeli death toll between June 15, 1967, and August 8, 1970, when a cease-fire was declared, was 1,424 soldiers and more than 100 civilians. Egypt and Syria attacked Israel on Yom Kippur, 1973. The IDF ultimately emerged victorious, but a total of 2,688 soldiers were killed. In June 1982, in response to continued terrorist attacks from across the Lebanese border, and most specifically an assassination attempt by a Palestinian terrorist group on Israel's Ambassador to Great Britain Shlomo Argov - which left him crippled and hospitalized until his death last year - Israel attacked Lebanese terrorists - who would become organized as Hizbullah - in what was known as Operation Peace for Galilee. Close to 460 soldiers were killed between June and December 1982, and another 760 in daily ambushes against Israeli forces by May 31, 1985. In December 1987, the first Arab "intifada" broke out, lasting for some three years. In more than 3,600 Molotov cocktail attacks, 100 grenade attacks and 600 assaults with guns or explosives against civilians and soldiers, 27 Israelis were killed and more than 3,100 Israelis were wounded. In the years following the signing of the Oslo Agreement in 1993, 250 Israelis were killed up until the beginning of what became known as the Oslo War. Approximately another 937 Israelis have been felled by PA terrorists and gunmen since September 2000. To Go To Top

REBUTTING "WHY I WON'T BE SEEING THE FJORDS THIS SUMMER" Posted by Per Sebak, April 26, 2004.

I came across the article "Why I Won't Be Seeing The Fjords This Summer" by Bennett M. Epstein, posted by Janet Lehr on Feb. 29 and I have seldom come across more rubbish and false accusations towards the kingdom of Norway. [Editor's note: See http:/www.think-israel.org/feb04bloged.html. Bennett Epstein wrote the first of the two essays posted by Janet Lehr. See also http://www.think-israel.org/saperstein.reporters.html in this issue.] I really feel sorry for the people who have had this Mr Bennett M. Epstein as a criminal defense lawyer, and how on earth has he become a professor of criminal justice, having brought the below matter completely out of proportion... (is this normal practice on his part?) As a Norwegian myself and proud of my heritage, I feel obliged to make the following remarks: 1. Yes, some food chains and labor organizations have tried to encourage a boycott of Israeli products in recent years, but this has by no means been any great success and is BY NO MEANS OFFICIAL NORWEGIAN POLICY. This is ABSOLUTELY NOT a sign of ANTI-SEMITISM, and is ONLY a reaction to Israeli policy by some groups in Norwegian society (in Norway we have freedom of speech and are proud of it!). One must be allowed to criticize Israeli Government's policies without being marked an Anti-Semitic, just as one must be allowed to criticize Britain's policies towards Irish-Catholics in Northern-Ireland without being marked "Anti-British", or the government of South-African without being marked a racist. This "sticker business" and "proposed boycott" doesn't really apply anymore anyhow, and believe me, the average customer doesn't pay any attention to it. I personally did not support it, like most Norwegians, as it won't help the situation in Israel in any way. Has trade between Israel and Norway really changed much lately? NO! 2. Norwegians are neither "overwhelmingly Palestinian" or "overwhelmingly Israeli", but we do support and pray for a peaceful solution which both Palestinians and Israelis can endorse. 3. Regarding the supposed "shameful past", this is totally untrue and false propaganda on Epstein's part. No other European country has been more sympathetic to Israeli policies than Norway since World War II. It is only recently that this has changed. You should have been in Norway when Arafat was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, then you would know what I am taking about. Would a supposed Anti-Semitic country have had a Jewish President of Parliament (the person second-in-line after the monarch)? 4. Yes, there was some Anti-Semitism in Norway during the 1920s and 1930s, as was in most other European countries, which was largely a result of ignorance. But there was no violence of any sort against the Jewish community in Norway before the Nazis took power. I agree this part of Norwegian history is shameful, but Vidkun Quisling's party was never of any significance in Norwegian politics, more an outcast of society. After the War, he was charged with treason and hanged. And yes, there are a few people with Nazi views in Norway today, like probably in all countries, but these are minute. I think it is unfortunate that Epstein gives them such free publicity though. 5. Were all Norway's Jews deported to Auschwitz? Another example of terrible propaganda on Epstein's part. Almost half of Norway's about 2000 Jews escaped to Sweden (mostly by the help of Norwegians). Some were also helped across the North Sea by the so-called terrible Norwegians (according to Epstein) to fight the Nazis. Several more were also encouraged to leave the country, but didn't believe there was any danger (just like Dutch Jews, for example). Many Norwegians also hid Jews in their homes, risking certain execution if they were caught. Epstein should have been at the quayside in Oslo when most of the Norwegian Jews were deported. They had no idea where they were going, but several Norwegians tried in vain to help the Jews who were brutally taken on board the ship. Mr Epstein is effectively "peeing on these people's graves", as an expression goes here in Norway. Furthermore, every November ceremonies are held in Norway to remember the 750 Norwegian Jews who were murdered, even in Bergen where there were only about 25 Jews. The national media also makes sure that Norwegians are aware of this, year after year. 6. Fremskrittspartiet (Progress Party) is Norway's second largest party, yes, but it is totally incorrect to claim that they are "extreme right". Anyway, Fremskrittspartiet IS MOST ISRAEL FRIENDLY OF ALL NORWEGIAN POLITICAL PARTIES, so Mr Epstein shouldn't be concerned in that respect (in fact, the leader, Carl I. Hagen, refused to attend the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony when Arafat received the award). Also, it should be noted that many members of the Christian Party have gone to Fremskrittspartiet only because of their pro-Israeli position. Also, I should mention that the Labor party, which partly encouraged these childish boycotts of Israel, has gone from about 39% to about 27% of the parliament in recent years... Yes, the sad situation in Israel today has entailed much heated discussion in Norway, which has involved much emotion, demonstrations, etc., not least because there are many Palestinians living in Norway today. Such debates are important in a country that encompasses democratic values. Some of the media may, at times, also appear more Palestinian friendly, yes. But I think it is sad when a lawyer/ professor circulates such propaganda about ALL Norway and ALL Norwegians on the Internet only because all Norwegians don't necessarily support his political views.... WELCOME TO NORWAY! [Editor's note: Mr Sebak didn't provide any biographical information. You will have to judge for yourself whether he provided an adequate rebuttal - or confirmation.] To Go To Top

THE OVER-REPORTING OF ISRAEL Posted by Honest Reporting, April 26, 2004.

When was the last time your daily paper didn't include an item on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? With over 900 articles on this conflict emerging on an average day from English-language media outlets, Israel - a tiny nation the size of the state of New Jersey - receives approximately 75 times more coverage than other areas of equal population. In comparison to other nations involved in armed conflict (where world media attention increases), Israel receives over 10 times more coverage by population. As a Jerusalem correspondent from a major American paper recently told HonestReporting, 'My editor wants a story from me every day - even on very slow news days - and that's unique in our international coverage.' Two fascinating new 'real-time' web pages illustrate this phenomenon of the over-reporting of Israel: 1) NewsMap (www.marumushi.com/apps/newsmap/newsmap.cfm) represents in graphic format the content of the GoogleNews aggregator. The more stories GoogleNews (http://news.google.com) is currently providing on a given topic, the larger that headline appears on NewsMap's page. Israel nearly always occupies the largest block in the red 'World News' section of NewsMap. A mere statement from an Israeli leader (i.e. 'Sharon Vows to Continue Strikes', 4/21) is enough to overwhelm coverage of actual human tragedies elsewhere in the world. 2) Harvard's Ethan Zuckerman takes another approach - his Global Attention Profiles (http://h2odev.law.harvard.edu/ezuckerman/) maps out what nations of the world the major news agencies currently deem significant. Though Israel is certainly a 'red zone' (very high interest), it's telling that one can't even see the red of Israel on Zuckerman's color-coded world map, since Israel is so small! So click through to the tables format, (h2odev.law.harvard.edu/ezuckerman/results/ap20040426.html) where you find that on the AP wire, Israel and the West Bank's coverage-to-population ratio far outweigh anywhere else in the world (with the occasional exception of Iraq). What does this mean for Israel? The over-reporting of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is an important element of anti-Israel bias for two reasons: * DISTORTION OF GEOGRAPHIC REALITY - The prominence granted to Israeli power though massive news coverage distorts the geographic reality: Israel is a tiny nation surrounded by Arab states that, at best, coldly tolerate Israel's existence. To the average news consumer, this key strategic reality is lost behind the barrage of Israel headlines that give one the impression Israel has a large physical presence in the Mideast. In fact, one could jog from the West Bank to the Mediterranean Sea in little over an hour. Israeli leaders communicate this point to foreign diplomats by taking them on a helicopter ride from Tel Aviv, flying east toward the West Bank. After a few short minutes, they turn to guests and say: 'I'll let you know when we've crossed into the West Bank... We already did.' This, to disabuse them of the notion that Israel is much larger than their regular news providers suggest. * EXCESSIVE SCRUTINY OF ISRAEL - Israel's conscientious anti-terror effort is scrutinized by the world press in a manner no other nation is forced to confront. For example, while tens of thousands have been massacred and gross human rights violations have struck African nations such as Congo and Sudan, the over-reporting of Israel focuses far more concern on alleged IDF insensitivity to Palestinians. As Harvard's Zuckerman finds himself asking, "How many Congolese would need to be slaughtered to make the front page of the New York Times?" Then there's the overriding matter: Since Israel is so disproportionately covered, any media bias against Israel of the sort documented by HonestReporting is amplified beyond compare. Another question remains, outside the scope of this communique: Why is Israel so over-reported? Is it the convergence of three major world religions in Jerusalem? Is it the fact that Israel is a Jewish nation? Or is it something else entirely? Please share your thoughts on these matters with other HonestReporting subscribers on our weblog: BackSpin. Thank you for your ongoing involvement in the battle against media bias. Honest Reporting monitors the media for inaccuracy and unfairness in how they report the news about Israel. Ther website address is http://www.honestreporting.com. You can help support their research online or by sending contributions to: HonestReporting, 400 South Lake Drive, Lakewood, NJ 08701-3167 To Go To Top

INTIFADA, DISENGAGEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ITEMS Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 26, 2004.

"PEACEFUL INTIFADA?" Daniel Pipes reports that Arafat's Arabs are concluding that warfare doesn't pay. He cites a petition calling for a "peaceful, wise intifada." He wonders whether more of them "will realize the time has come to accept the existence of the Jewish state." (Op. Cit..) "Peaceful intifada" is an oxymoron. When the Arabs refer to it, they mean waging a struggle against Israel by protest marches, riots, rock-throwing, and fire-bombing, with all the current, false incitement to violence against Israel and retention of the goal of displacing the Jewish state with a Muslim Arab one. Therefore, they do not accept the existence of the Jewish state. Which P.A. Arabs does Mr. Pipes suppose accept the existence of the Jewish state? What does he mean by "acceptance"? We would like to think it means accepting the legitimacy of Jewish sovereignty and entitlement to exercise that sovereignty in its homeland. What it really means is begrudging acceptance that at present, the Arabs are not able to overthrow the Jewish state. In Arab Muslim ideology, such an acceptance is considered temporary, a truce. In their view, if and when they gain the strategic advantage over Israel, they no longer would tolerate an infidel state in their midst. Meanwhile, they work at gaining that strategic advantage. How? By agreements such as Oslo and Map, which transfer strategic territory, secure borders, scarce water sources, and national history and morale from Zionism to Islamism. The Arabs use the term, "peaceful intifada," in as deceptive a rationalization as "peaceful jihad." Jihad could be peaceful, but it isn't now. It rarely refers to peaceful struggle. Why should there be any struggle, first to wrest Yesha with or without negotiation, and then to take over Israel? ARAB DOUBLE GAME ON DISENGAGEMENT PLAN The US-Israeli double game on PM Sharon's "disengagement plan" is that it is neither a disengagement plan nor would it accomplish what Sharon praises it for. The Arabs have their double game, too. The Arabs: (1) Receive proof from the US that the Bush letter about the plan makes no US concessions to Israel and does not change in US policy; but (2) Ask that US concessions to Israel be offset by concessions to them. They urge the UN to intervene in their behalf. The EU agrees with them that the US changed its policy by "endorsing" the plan. Arab propaganda is like complaining about NOT having cake and eating it too. As the US advised the Arabs, its letter neither changes US policy nor endorses the plan. US policy is to give Israel false assurances, anything to get Israel moving out of Yesha and into Arab hands. The State Dept. may not care that the Arabs hate the US anyway, as they do despite State Dept. goodwill gestures towards the Arabs at the expense of Israeli security. Unfortunately, Congress does not realize or care that US appeasement of the Arabs does not win Arab approval. Appeasement of totalitarians short of surrender never can. The US bars totalitarians from world domination. It does not matter to the Arabs that we toss them Israeli bones, when we are their main enemy, because we represent tolerance, civilization, technical might, and some decadence. WEAKNESS OF ISRAELI INTELLIGENCE Israeli intelligence has had breathtaking successes and spectacular failures. The inability to properly warn of the impending Arab invasion of 1973 imperiled national survival. What causes such a failure? Has Israel overcome the cause? The main cause of the 1973 surprise is well known. Israel's intelligence profession and political rulers did not want the Arabs to make another war on Israel, so they did not think the Arabs would make another war on Israel, so they did not examine whether the Arabs could make another war on Israel, and so they misunderstand the signs that the Arabs were about to make another war on Israel. Wishful thinking guided policy; policy dictated to intelligence gatherers. Less perceived is the subsidiary cause. Israeli intelligence agents in Egypt failed not only to discover that invasion was intended, but also to discover what new tactics Egypt was training in. Egypt surprised Israel with water cannon that deflated Israel's sand bags fortifying the barrier to Canal-crossing, infantry that fired an inordinate number of anti-tank missiles, and anti-aircraft missiles that were impenetrable. Those tactics proved devastating. Israel's intelligence profession and political leadership has returned to a dangerous frame of mind about the Arabs. Again it is based on leftist illusions about the Arabs wanting peace. With this attitude, the guardians of Israel fail to keep their guard up. The politicalized agencies don't do their professional job. National security is too important for them to indulge in leftist illusions. Heads and former heads of intelligence project an unsubstantiated and refuted notion that Egypt's treaty with Israel has taken that major foe of Israel out of the order of battle. Has Egypt spent the past few decades deepening peace? No. It arms for a final battle. It smoothes the way by encouraging a PLO war of attrition against Israel and by using diplomacy to delegitimize Israel (as if the bigoted Arab dictatorships were legitimate) and to deprive it of defensible borders, strategic depth, and morale. Israel's intelligence leaders maintain a naive faith in Arab fidelity to treaties they violate. These leaders tend to oppose strong measures against terrorism, too. They sympathize with the Arabs, whose true menace they don't realize. Former head of Israeli intelligence Ayalon declared that the PLO fights Hamas more effectively than did Israel. He hates the idea of Israel ruling another nationality, regardless that the other one wants to dispossess if not murder his. He shares Peres' "vision of a new Middle East." His concern about violence not the violence of Arab terrorism and war, but that settlers night refuse to submit to ethnic cleansing by Israel. He is pleased with greater Israeli sensitivity to the formerly harsh treatment of the Arabs. He thinks that criticism of Oslo and government policy threatens democracy, and supports judicial activism (Prof. Steven Plaut, 4/19, email) repressing criticism. Judicial activism often reverses government policy, when that policy is not leftist. Stifling criticism of government policy threatens democracy. It allows leaders paid or intimidated by foreigners or naive about the Arabs to produce disasters such as being unprepared for the 1973 war. Israel did not treat harshly enough the Arab enemy, striving then and now to destroy Israel. Nor does the PLO fight Hamas, whom it allows to keep attacking Israel. Not recognizing that is a serious deficiency in an intelligence agent, much less in an intelligence chief. Had Peres suggested that his vision of a new Mideast -- tolerant countries interested in mutual improvement and peace - was his hope for development in the next couple of centuries, he would have been considered a prophet. Instead, while they prepare weapons of mass destruction, he insists that the Mideast already has attained that utopia. Obviously he is deluded. Mr. Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at ricshulman@aol.com. 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HERE'S THE PLAN Posted by Mikimia and Herbert Sunshine, April 26, 2004.

(A hypothetical explanation of the plan by the Prime Minister finally to solve the problem of Jews living in Gaza, Samaria and Judea.) "In our "democracy" the people get in the way. Remember how Rabin passed Oslo. We can do as much; secret agreements secretly arrived at. Change the rules of the game. Labor only had to give a Mitsibushi (not even a Volvo) to Goldfarb for Oslo to pass by one vote. Let us not hear any "jewish guilt" about this. Those 8500 settlers in Gaza are not our kind of Jews. There is probably not a single PhD. among them. Recall what Kastner did in Hungary; you have to save the best and forget the rest. Transfer of Jews has a long history and we can be ceretain that the world (America, the EU and the UN) are in our corner. We must begin with the usual disinformation. the press or media will be forbidden to mention the Biblical rights to Gaza; Our education system has kept several generations ignorant of this fact as well. We must never remind Jews that there are legitimate claims to this land. Term the "settlers "thieves; So long as they are deemed "occupiers", dragging them off will appear to be their just punishment. Still, to prevent slip-ups, pictures of our Army and Police using force to evict women and childen, and all photos of the Palestinians moving in to abandoned homes, should be suppressed. Next, the government must cut off the financial support for the Jews. Stop subsidizing mortgages. Suspend all bank loans. Never mind that builders and farmers may go bankrupt. We should never have let such people live there in the first place. The pinch of poverty will loosen their grip on their illegal outposts. Karl Marx taught us that migration follows the economy. Lack of income and jobs will stimulate emigration. Transfer of Jews will have the added benefit of inducing thousands of Arabs to enter Gaza preventing the return of the dissident Jewish elements. To his credit, Attorney General Mazuz hs begun this phase of the plan. It is unfortunte that a railroad line to Gaza has not yet been built. Swiftness and efficiency of the expulsion could be enhanced by employment of rail box cars. Sealed trucks or buses will have to serve the same purpose. I predict that after Gaza is freed from its Jewish occupation, the Palestinian State will build the railroad to connect Gaza to Jerusalem, its Capitol. Holding pens for those rounded up both at the capture point and at the journey's terminus should be constructed in advance of the expulsion. Those with experience in round ups of Jews conducted these operations in the early hours of the morning. Since the Gaza illegal settlements are discontinuous, all must be attacked at once. Telephonic and electronic communications must be terminated to prevent concerted resistance. An unimportant by-product of the plan could be the temporary demoralization of certain elements of the Zionist, "Greater Israel," segment of the population. This element is statistically and politically negligible. Should they resist in any form, their efforts can immediately be stifled by banning their newpapers, e-mail bulletins, pirate radio stations and by administrative arrests of their leaders. Our University Professors have determined that disengagement from the Arabs will end the violence of the Arab freedom fighters and result in the emergence of a peace loving PLO State. No one should view this plan as a withdrawal under terror or as a victory for our current peace partners. No critic has the stature or authority to oppose the Prime Minister, and by so doing to give affront to our special friend, the United States of America. Your Prime Minister has been given iron- clad guarantees in a letter from President Bush that no Arab refugees will return to Israel. Israel is assured of retaining some of our communities in Samaria and in Judea, even parts of Jerusalem. America will permit us to fence our people in for security and we will be allowed to defend ourselves to some limited degree. (We cannot, of course, assassinate President Yasser Arafat.) History, which is written by the victors, will record how this wise and far-sighted plan will bless the Nation withpeace and security. Economic prosperity will inevitably accompany the withdrawal of Jews from large portions of Israel. What will emerge will be a State of all of its people, pluralistic, multicultural, modern and secular, with open borders and liberal immigration. Never again will Israel suffer isolation and sanction from the United Nations or the European Union. No longer a nation that lives alone; Israel, a state like any other state, free at last from Anti Semitism and war." Herbert B. Sunshine is Professor of Law (U.S.). He and his wife live in Jerusalem. To Go To Top

WHY LISTEN TO US Posted by Arlene Peck, April 26, 2004.

We, in the United States have a lot to talk about. We talk, and we talk, and we talk. Committees are continuously set up and conferences held to discuss. Unfortunately, with all that talking, our country carries a big stick, but, talks too softly. In addition, our soldiers are getting killed at an alarming rate by the same savages who have been blowing up the buses and discos in Israel for the past three years. Despite 9/11 it hasn't quite hit our shores yet. The depressing vision of Arab fundamentalism blowing up Starbucks and Macys hasn't happened yet. And, I hope it never does. But they are marching over the hill if you look really closely. Why do I mention this? Well, according to a recent Jerusalem Times (independent Palestinian weekly) US officials are actually leading mediation efforts with the terrorists organization, Hamas. They are trying to achieve a compromise with Hamas who is going to give one of their promises to be really, really good and freeze all anti-Israel attacks, including retaliations to Yassin's and company's deaths. Of course, in return the Israelis agree to halt assassination against Hamas leaders. Hey, I'm surprised that our State Dept. hasn't worked a codicil in there to release a few hundred more prisoners from jails around the country. That is if there are any left after the last amnesty which wasn't so long ago. And, who incidentally have already been responsible for more Israeli deaths. Truly, do any of you see anything wrong with this picture? Is that like sending in the fox to check the hen house? And it's all so cozy. During all of this hustle and bustle of negotiation with the savages, Hamas has voiced it's readiness for joining the PLO. They do state however that "Our position is clear. That is, we don't mind joining the PLO for certain conditions." All of them detrimental for the future existence of the Jewish State. What I find amazing is why on earth Israel would even consider listening to advice from Uncle Sam. Hell, we don't have enough confidence in our county to hire workers from here. It is virtually impossible to call any airline for reservations, or computer company for technical help, without getting someone from India and sometimes the Philippines to help you. Now that tax season is over our own IRS is sending out their business to India. My friends who are out of jobs are complaining that all the work is being 'farmed out'. Here, in tinsel town, emergency meetings are being held by the Screen Actors Guild to complain about 'runaway production' to places like Australia, New Zealand and Canada. Hollywood is alarmed and hey, with good reason. Gas prices are at an all time high and still they insist on driving SUV's and continuing to remain at the mercy at of the Arabs for our nightly oil. It's depressing to read the nightly news and see the multitude of articles expounding on how the world hates the Americans. Gone are the days when all we had to worry about was whether Britney Speers wore implants, people kept their doors unlocked or, whether Ricky Martin was gay. The Arabs have brought to our door fear, loss of innocence, economic collapse and our borders are unchecked and millions of illegal immigrants are filtering through our borders each year. Hey, if I had my 'druthers' I'd take every serviceman that we had around the world defending countries that hate and envy us and bring them back to guard our borders. My disgust with the United Nations knows no bounds. They are ridden with corruption and deceit and these evil and primitive governments have the nerve to meet on a regular basis to vote against Israel. Who cares? I could continue but, frankly, it's too early in the morning to get so depressed. The question that plagues me however, is why on earth would anyone, especially Israel, even listen, much less pay attention to the 'advice' the United States leaders give about anything? One interesting aspect that I've noticed is that since our nightly news, are so filled with scenes out of Iraq and newspapers showing page after page of the savage deaths of our American servicemen, they don't seem to have time to propagandize for the Palestinians. Gone are the platitudes for the "poor, downtrodden Arabs." People, I believe, are finally beginning to wise-up and realize that the Muslims weren't so peaceful after all. It took a year or two of them pounding our boys with 'suicide bombings' to have us wake up and notice that although the Muslim religion might have started out with lofty goals they have been infected with a virus that glorifies death and carries it our with cold, unfeeling and evil calculation. It's now down to "them" against "us". The air-waves no longer fault Israel as I noticed not so long ago. I suppose we've just gotten too busy noticing the problems on our own shores - finally! Arlene Peck is an internationally syndicated columnist and television talk show hostess. She can be reached at: bestredhead@earthlink.net and www.arlenepeck.com To Go To Top

SOLVING THE IRAQI STANDOFF Posted by Peter Brookes, April 26, 2004.

April 26, 2004 -- SUCCESSFULLY ending the festering insurgencies in Fallujah and Najaf in the upcoming days could be the most important event of the entire Iraqi campaign. Terminating these bold-faced symbols resistance could send the insurgents, terrorists and their supporters reeling, undermine their recruiting of Iraqis and foreign jihadists and keep the June 30 political transition to Iraqi sovereignty on track. Failure could embolden the insurgents and terrorists, lead to more violence and reconstruction disruptions, delay the return to Iraqi rule and diminish the Iraqis'-and the world's - confidence in the Coalition. Arguably, the political and military stakes embodied in these thorny standoffs couldn't be greater either in Iraq - or here at home. The fact that President Bush consulted with his top national security advisers and military commanders in Iraq over the weekend to consider what to do specifically about Fallujah and Najaf is evidence of how critical these matters are. Of course, the situation doesn't have to come to blows in Fallujah and Najaf. A negotiated settlement is still possible and preferable to sending our troops into harm's way. An agreement would be ideal if it leads to the surrender of the terrorists and the insurgents, including radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and the killers of the four American contractors in Fallujah. In fact, the very threat of serious military force could bring the militants to the negotiating table - but, unfortunately, it's unlikely. If the Fallujah civic leaders can't get the insurgents to turn in their heavy weapons as a first step, American and Iraqi troops will likely start to put military pressure on the Sunni city of 200,000. If military action is required, civilians should be encouraged to leave the city in advance of a full-court press by the Marines and Iraqi forces. (One-third of the city has fled since the siege began April 5th.) In Najaf, American and Iraqi troops will likely have to enter the city to crack down on Sadr and his Shi'a al-Mahdi militia. Fighting in Najaf is more complicated than Fallujah because of the sensitivity of Najaf's Shiite holy sites. There is a strong possibility of stirring up religious outrage among Iraq's Shi'a majority (60 percent of Iraqis are Shiite) just by entering the holy city itself. Violating a holy site is another matter altogether. Of course, if a holy site is used for military purposes, it's no longer a holy site - it becomes a legitimate military target. Getting rid of Sadr and disassembling his alliance with his Iranian supporters is critical to pacifying the Shi'a South. But standby for some heavy weather if Coalition forces move into Fallujah and Najaf to root out the insurgents and their terrorist allies. Hopefully the resistance would crumble quickly, but the fighting could turn ugly and rapidly become reminiscent of the street fighting seen in the movie "Black Hawk Down" or the last minutes of "Saving Private Ryan." Door-to-door, urban warfare can be nightmarish. If it does comes to a military showdown in Fallujah and Najaf: * Use Iraqi forces to the greatest extent possible. This is their fight as much as - if not more than - ours. We should be using them wherever we can and accelerating the training of other Iraqi forces for counterinsurgency operations as soon as possible. It's time for Iraqi soldiers to earn their battle stripes in fighting for their country. We've certainly earned ours. * Employ overwhelming force. There has been plenty of debate about the number of American troops in Iraq. It seems we need an upsurge in troops there and the commanders should have them, especially for these operations. We should use maximum violence to end these insurgencies if necessary, but we should be careful to avoid civilian casualties to the extent possible. We need to keep as many Iraqi hearts and minds on our side as we go forward. Security and stability is critical to moving forward in Iraq and getting a handle on Fallujah and Najaf is fundamental to doing so. Even if these standoffs are resolved successfully, dustups with the bad guys will happen from time to time, but, in the meantime, the Coalition has to show the insurgents, terrorists and their supporters - inside and outside Iraq - who's the boss. This was a Press Room Commentary April 26, 2004 on the Heritage Foundation Policy Research and Analysis website (www.heritage.org/Press/Commentary/ed042604b.cfm). It also appeared on the New York Post Online Edition (www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/brookes.htm). Peter Brookes' e-mail is Peterbrookes@heritage.org To Go To Top

US HATRED AMONG THE ARABS Posted by Jeff Jacoby, April 25, 2004.

Hosni Mubarak, the president of Egypt, delivered some unhappy tidings the other day. The US occupation in Iraq, he said, has turned the Arab world against the American people. "In the beginning, some people thought the Americans were helping them," Mubarak told the French newspaper Le Monde. "There was no hatred toward Americans." But "after what has happened in Iraq, there is an unprecedented hatred." Well, if anyone should be up on the latest Arab scuttlebutt, it would be Mubarak, ruler of the world's largest Arab nation. But why didn't he break this bad news a little earlier? After all, a week before his interview with Le Monde, he was with President Bush in Crawford, Texas. Shouldn't he have told him then, face-to-face, just how things stand in the Arab world? When Bush opened their joint press conference on April 12 by hailing "the bonds of friendship" between America and Egypt -- when he called Mubarak "my good friend, Hosni" -- shouldn't the Egyptian ruler have set him straight? Then again, Mubarak might have had good reason to hold his tongue. Bush probably wouldn't have taken kindly to being told a baldfaced lie like "There was no hatred toward Americans" before the Iraq war. Egypt's strongman may not have wanted to give the president an excuse to point out that four of the Sept. 11 hijackers, including mastermind Mohamed Atta, were Egyptian -- as is Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's top deputy. Or maybe Mubarak confined himself to diplomatic pleasantries so as not to provoke any rethinking of the nearly $2 billion a year that Washington pours into his coffers. Since 1975 Egypt has received more than $50 billion in US foreign aid -- more than any other country except Israel. "Why should America keep showing such generosity to the world's leading Arab state," Bush might have asked if Mubarak had started talking about Arab hatred, "if it is going to be repaid with resentment and violence?" Bush might have pointed out that while Israel routinely supports the US position in international forums like the UN, Egypt almost always votes against it. If Bush were to demand an explanation for such rank ingratitude, what could Mubarak say? "There was no hatred toward Americans." What a howling falsehood. Arab regimes have been inciting hatred toward Americans for years, and few have done so more consistently than the thuggish autocracy of Mubarak, who has ruled for 23 years. For example, it was Al-Ahram, a newspaper controlled by the Egyptian government, that claimed in October that US pilots flying over Afghanistan were dropping "genetically treated" food into areas booby-trapped with land mines, in the hope not only of making Afghans sick but of crippling or killing those who attempt to gather the food. It was Al-Akhbar, another regime-sponsored daily, that declared in August: "The Statue of Liberty... must be destroyed because of the idiotic American policy that goes from disgrace to disgrace in the swamp of bias and blind fanaticism... The age of the American collapse has begun." Examples of the anger engendered by the Iraq war? Hardly. Al-Ahram and Al-Akhbar published those statements in October and August of 2001. A few months earlier, Al-Akhbar had sneered that Secretary of State Colin Powell "has the brain of a bird" and acts "like a stupid teenager." Ground Zero was still smoldering shortly after 9/11 when a writer in Al-Arabi, a Nasserist weekly, cheered the attacks: "In all honesty, and without beating around the bush," Ahmad Murad wrote, "I am happy about the great number of American dead." (All quotes are from of the Middle East Media Research Institute, whose invaluable website -- www.memri.org -- translates a vast array of material from the Arab and Iranian media.) It isn't only Egypt's media that whip up anti-American animus. Cairo's influential Al Azhar seminary, a government-backed institution, urged Muslims more than a year ago to wage "jihad" against the United States. A popular Egyptian singer has recorded a song accusing the United States of perpetrating the 9/11 attacks. A former Egyptian minister of war compares Bush's policies to Nazism. And Mubarak himself, as the Washington Post recently observed, aggressively opposes the Bush administration's campaign for democracy in the Middle East, denouncing it as an outside imposition. If Americans are hated in the Arab world, much of the blame can be laid to the influence of thugocracies like Mubarak's. Which is one good reason to stop supporting those thugocracies. The man Bush calls "my good friend, Hosni" is responsible for a good deal of cruelty and repression within Egypt's borders. If we truly want to neutralize the anti-American venom that has poisoned so many Arabs, we could begin by breaking off our embrace of the autocrats who oppress them. Jeff Jacoby is a columnist for the Boston Globe. His e-mail address is jacoby@globe.com. To Go To Top

PALM BEACH EAST Posted by Judy Lash Balint, April 25, 2004.

At Palm Beach there are no sun umbrellas, no crowds and no traffic jams to impede a drive on a sunny spring day alongside the bright blue waters and the pristine sand. That's because Hof Dekalim (Palm Beach) is in the Gaza Strip, about 15 miles south of Gaza City. But Hof Dekalim is also less than a mile away from the Jewish community of Neve Dekalim in the Gush Katif area of the Strip, and just a few minutes up the beach from the tiny Jewish beach communities of Shirat Yam and Kfar Yam. It's difficult to understand, particularly for anyone who has not visited the area, the real meaning of Ariel Sharon's disengagement plan. The image of a few thousand Jews embedded in communities in the midst of millions of Arabs, guarded by platoons of IDF soldiers are what prevail. The real picture of 21 thriving, economically productive communities peopled by idealistic and industrious Jews, separated from the Arabs of Gaza and living on terrain whose beauty far surpasses that to which East Coast Americans run every winter, rarely emerges. Gush Katif is the micro version of the state of Israel. The country is surrounded by hostile Arabs,as are many Israeli communities, so why the retreat mentality for Gush Katif? Jewish settlement in the area was founded during the Hasmonean Period and continued in Gaza City for two thousand years until the riots of 1929. The remains of the 7th century Great Synagogue of Gaza are supposedly protected by the 1995 Interim Agreement of Gaza-Jericho. To confront the reality, make the two and a half hour scenic drive from Jerusalem that will bring you to the Kissufim checkpoint half way down the Strip. As in Judea and Samaria, Gush Katif residents travel in and out at all hours of the day and night, some in protected vehicles, some in regular cars. There's heavy military presence at Kissufim, despite the fact that Israel actually disengaged from Gaza 10 years ago in May 1994. According to the Gaza-Jericho Agreement, Israeli troops withdrew from the area with the exception of forces protecting Jewish communities. Today, the Kissufim road has been denuded of the trees and Arab houses that once lined the road that provided cover for a series of murderous attacks against Jews driving in the area. Kfar Darom lies to the north of Kissufim on the main north-south road that dissects the Strip. The scene of repeated mortar attacks, Kfar Darom is a main commercial center of Gush Katif (Harvest Bloc). The community's claim to fame prior to Sharon's retreat plan, was for the bug-free produce sold in every supermarket and exported worldwide. At the packing plant, work goes on as if nothing were amiss. New immigrants work at the conveyor belt, shoving romaine lettuce into plastic bags bearing a rabbinic hechsher. Since my last visit more than a year ago, a new row of homes has been built. Thanks to Kfar Darom's openness to resettling immigrants from the Bnei Menashe, the village has doubled in size over the past three years, with 80 families now making their homes behind the concrete barriers protecting them from the neighbors in Deir El Balah. The majority of Jewish communities in Gush Katif are clustered together about a mile south of Kfar Darom, miles away from Gaza City and the Jabalya refugee camp. Unlike many moshavim and kibbutzim in the rest of Israel, Gush Katif communities are economically self-sufficient. The high level of production and state of the art technology has produced extraordinary results. Netzer Hazani farmers lead the nation in cultivation of cherry tomatoes; at Moshav Katif it's the dairy that lays claim to being one of the largest and most modern in the country; Atzmona boasts a thriving nursery that raises houseplants, as well as being the leading producers growing organic potatoes for export. Driving between the villages through the sand dunes, with picture-perfect glimpses of the Mediterranean Sea and stately tall palm trees dotted all around it's hard to believe that this is a place that experiences regular shelling or any kind of violence. We drive on roads forbidden to Arabs, with only the occasional military vehicle in sight. Teenage hitchhikers stand at the entrance to every village, and the general quiet is broken only by the scream of an Israeli jet overhead. Almost every car and the gate to every community is adorned with a blue and red poster proclaiming the slogan that Gush Katif residents are trying to impress on Likud voters: Dismantling settlements is a victory for terror. It's a message that is being carried throughout the country in a systematic door-to-door campaign mounted by the local council. Armed with lists of Likud voters, teams led by Gush Katif teenagers and retirees are fanning out to ask Likudniks to look them in the eye and tell them they're still going to vote to dismantle their homes. Reports coming back to campaign central command indicate that the reaction has been mixed. Neve Dekalim resident Rachel Saperstein, a teacher at the local girls high school, recounts that several of her students are shocked that some people won't even open the door to them. Neve Dekalim, at the center of the group of communities, appears to be command central. It's here that the foreign journalists descend on a daily basis to interview English, French and Spanish speakers and local political figures. Teenage activists man a large blue tent at the entrance to the town and politely hand out background material, CDs and bumper stickers. More than 500 families now live in Neve Dekalim in tidy single-family homes surrounded with gardens bursting with color. There's a central square with small shops, a zoo, a central library, eight synagogues and an industrial zone. Two yeshivot and a women's college complement the elementary and high school educational institutions. Inside the hesder Yeshiva at Neve Dekalim is an artistic interpretation of the 1982 destruction of Yamit, a town of 2,000 families in the northeastern Sinai, given away to Egypt as part of the Camp David peace deal. Then Defense Minister Ariel Sharon was the one who convinced Prime Minister Menachem Begin that Yamit would have to go. Many people from Yamit pioneered settlements in Gush Katif. Among them was Esther Bazak, today a fiery, auburn-haired grandmother and one of the founders of Neve Dekalim. Esther explains that almost every house built in Neve Dekalim has one wall rescued from Yamit. The glass and white ceramic of the Yamit monument opens up to the beit midrash (study hall) of the yeshiva. The meaning is clear. "It's destruction and continuation," Esther says. In the late afternoon sunlight, the courtyard of the two main synagogues is filled with modestly dressed women of all ages quietly reciting Psalms. The women have been gathering every afternoon at 5 p.m as their part of the campaign to prevent the retreat. There's no idle chatter here, just the quiet whispering of ancient words of comfort and hope. A similar atmosphere prevails at the Mechina (pre-military training academy) located in Atzmona, one of the communities closest to the Egyptian border, a little more than a mile south of Neve Dekalim. Two years ago, five students were killed at the Mechina when a terrorist lobbed two hand grenades into a packed classroom during evening study. Eli Adler, the American-born rabbi who was teaching the class that night, notes that applications for places at the remote academy have risen significantly since the terror attack. "Nothing has changed with our boys since then," he says. "We're deepening our roots here," he adds. As he speaks to a visiting group in that same classroom, facing the memorial plaque for his students and the cabinet labeled 'Emergency Equipment,' a heavily armed student patrols the academy grounds. The heaviest visible army presence is reserved for the 13 couples and families living out the fantasy of many a veteran of the 60s and 70s. Who didn't want to be living on the beach, next to the surf, under the endless sun? But the residents of Shirat Hayam have more than sun and fun in mind. Shirat Hayam is a collection of mobile homes, donated by the Norwegian friends of Gush Katif, sitting directly on the beach across the road from Neve Dekalim. The first settlers moved in 2001 to old abandoned summer homes last used by Egyptian officers prior to 1967. The move was a concrete way for several young people to channel their grief over their friends murdered in the Kfar Darom terror attack a few months earlier. Today military guard posts protect their presence there. No soldiers are needed to guard the nearby deserted Palm Beach Hotel, which once accommodated foreign tourists and Israelis looking for an idyllic, secluded, kosher Mediterranean beachside getaway. Doors flap in the breeze, and weeds cover the open-air dining area, tennis courts and mini-golf course. A few local students occupy some rooms, but there's a sad air of abandonment about the place. It's hard to conceive that this will be the fate of one of Israel's most productive and naturally beautiful areas. It's even harder to assess the impact the unprecedented destruction of thriving Jewish communities by a Jewish government will have on Israelis and Jews worldwide. Judy Lash Balint is author of "Jerusalem Diaries: In Tense Times" (Gefen), which is available for purchase from www.israelbooks.com To Go To Top

THE RIGHTNESS OF TARGETED ASSASSINATIONS Posted by Leo Rennert, April 25, 2004.

I wrote this to Professor Scharf about his article, "The Rightness Of Targeted Assassinations," published in the Washington Post Dear Prof. Scharf: Your criticism of targeted assassinations as reprehensible, ill-advised and counter-productive unfortunately is based on premises and arguments that are so weak and unpersuasive as to fall of their own weight -- or rather the lack of it. Let me explain: In your Washington Post column, you begin by citing international outrage against Israel's killing of Hamas leader Sheik Yassin as expressed in a 31-2 vote of the U.N. Human Rights Commission. When it comes to respect for human rights, the two dissenters (the U.S. and Australia) rate far higher than the majority, which includes some of the worst human rights abusers. The commission has become a farce precisely because of its exclusive obsession with Israel, while it turns a blind eye on far worse examples elsewhere. The commission has demolished its own legitimacy. Why you would use it as an international standard is beyond comprehension. You then go on to acknowledge that targeted assassinations may be legal, so you put forth a variety of political problems supposedly created by targeted assassinations. You make the following points: 1. Collateral damage often results in the killing of innocent bystanders. But Israel and the U.S. are in a war against terrorism and you concede their right of self-defense under the U.N. Charter. As in any war, there will be collateral damage. The issue is not whether surgical strikes can be conducted in totally perfect fashion, but whether every possible precaution is taken to avoid or minimize collateral damage. 2. Faulty intelligence leads to mistakes that are "surprisingly common." But when you're in an existential war, you inevitably will have to depend on imperfect intelligence. I would dispute your allegation that such mistakes are very common in the case of Israel. You can obviously cite a few instances, but Israel's targeted killings have demonstrated overall a rather fantastic accuracy because of a usually reliable intelligence base. 3. Assassinations create cascading threats to world order by fueling more anger against the U.S. (you cite Hamas' sharp anti-U.S. rhetoric after the killing of Hamas leaders). But such anger already was rampant long before these actions. Hamas' paymasters have pursued an anti-U.S. agenda for years. 4. By creating martyrs, you strengthen enemy morale. Wrong. By aggressive pursuit of terrorist kingpins, you put a big dent in their operations. It is precisely Israel's robust anti-terrorist strategy, including targeted assassinations, that has resulted in a sharp decline of suicide bombings and other terrorist horrors. So what's left to sustain your thesis? How are the U.S. and Israel to defend themselves if you handcuff them militarily? Your solution: Go back to the criminal approach by putting the bad guys on trial in an international court and follow with sanctions as we did with Libya. And that's the only evidence you cite in support of your entire position. Except, it's totally irrelevant when it comes to dealing with Al Qaeda or Hamas. The shootdown of Pan Am 103 was instigated by a NATIONAL leadership. The U.S. and the international community could deal with Libya's role as TERRORISM BY A STATE -- not rogue outfits like Al Qaeda or Hamas. The U.S. response was a state-to-state response. Libya could be influenced by being isolated and economically punished. And Qadafi as head of state was was in the cross-hairs and, willy-nilly, he did take international reaction into account. None of this applies to Al Qaeda and Hamas. After 9/11, we actually tried to deal with Afghanistan as a sovereign state. But the Taliban fanatics who harbored Osama didn't care a fig about Afghanistan as a nation, refused to give him up (unlike Qadafi who gave up a couple of his bad guys) and were willing to go down the tubes with him. In the case of Hamas, what nation would you suggest should be put in the international dock or punished with international sanctions? The nation of Gaza? The nation of Palestine? Should Arafat as head of the Palestinian Authority be held accountable since he violated his pledge to forgo terrorism? Would you try him? Would you try Iran for funding Hamas? Would you try Egypt for looking the other way while weapons are funneled for Hamas in Gaza from its territory? The questions answer themselves. It's highly disingenuous to acknowledge that Israel and the U.S. have a right to defend themselves, but then to come up with all kinds of nice-soundings "buts" that effectively would leave them naked to the depredations of Al Qaeda and Hamas. To Go To Top

THE BEAUTY OF THEIR HATE Posted by Beth Goodtree, April 25, 2004.

Israel: Another attempted terroristic genocide/homicide bombing. More rocket barrages on innocent civilians. Again more shooting attacks on commuters. Europe: More attacks on synagogues. Again, attacks on Jewish school children. Again more threats to Jewish-owned businesses. A normal people would despair. A normal people would capitulate. A normal people would have already been wiped out. But not the Jewish people. And herein lies our beauty and their hatred and jealousy of us. We Hebrew people are unique in the annuls of history. If it were not for us there would be no Christianity and Islam. There would be no America as it is today. The American Revolution was successful because it was funded in large part by Jews. In the United States, the law of the land is based upon the 10 Commandments. We gave the world high moral standards not merely through our Bible but by example. We gave the world a system of true justice that did not mean the mutilations of Hammurabi, but the wisdom of Solomon. We gave the world the concept of one God, neither of flesh or blood, but so beyond our ken as to be unimaginable. By our very survival, despite their attempts to exterminate us, we have defeated some of the mightiest empires the world has known. The Romans, The Crusaders, the Catholic Church during the Inquisition, Stalin's Russia, Nazi Germany -- all are gone and we are here. Curiously, time after time, without fail, no nation or group has been successful in the world arena without a Jewish presence that was welcomed. And so groups like the Islamists hate us, for they know that by demonizing and murdering us they also seal their inevitable fate. If you don't believe we are unique, even our detractors prove it in their every move. Israel, as representative of the Jewish people is the only nation not allowed a seat on the UN Security Council. Terrorist nations are allowed seats there. Even repressive, torturing and murderous countries like Syria have chaired it. But not Israel. The Jewish people, well-known champions of human rights, will never hold the chair of the UN Commission on Human Rights unless the UN as we know it today is totally revamped. And yet they claim to honor the very values that we Jewish people codified and set forth. So even without a seat on the Security Council, our presence overwhelms and guides it. Despite their exclusionary and anti-Semitic stance, our influence is supreme. Meanwhile, according to the UN, Palestinian Arab children, as well as all other children should be protected from war, but not Jewish children. In fact, specifically not Jewish children. When a motion was passed to protect the Arab children, it carried easily. When the same motion was put forth changing the words to Israeli children (who, unlike the Arab children are the deliberate targets of Arab/Islamist terror and genocide bombings), it was so altered to exclude Jews and favor Arabs that it had it be withdrawn (1). They are so afraid of us that they want our future generation destroyed. And yet we continue to live and thrive. The bar is always set higher for the Jews. In the past, many countries denied the Jewish people the opportunity for an education. So we studied in secret and as a group, more Jews are educated than anyone else. There are overwhelmingly more Jewish Nobel Prize winners than from any other group (2). And Israel produces more scientific papers per capita than any other nation by a large margin - 109 per 10,000 people -- as well as having one of the highest per capita rates of patents filed (3). Even when Jews were not allowed any occupations but those considered 'dirty' (such as banking) we still succeeded and thrived. Witness the Rothschild success story. We are the valedictorians of the human race. And no matter if they change the grades in the book, alter the test, make separate rules for us, cheat or try to prevent us from even taking the tests, we still prevail. And they will never catch up to us. And this is why they hate us. And their hatred is a glorious and beautiful confirmation of our righteousness, truth and contributions to all that is good and uplifting about humankind. Could 'they' ever win' Certainly. But then, they'd have to become moral, tolerant, virtuous, honorable, fair, educated, and a plethora of other things that are both enlightened and evenhanded. In other words, they'd have to become more Jewish. And in the end, this is why they will lose and we will prevail. (1)http://www.israelnewsagency.com/israelichildren.html (2) http://www.arthurhu.com/index/jewish.htm (note: the compiler is apparently Oriental) (3) http://www.masada2000.org/israel-stats.html and Prof. D. Koller; Institute of Life Sciences; The Hebrew University; Jerusalem 91904, Israel Beth Goodtree is an award-winning writer, with a background in advertising. She writes political commentary and the occasional humor and science articles. To Go To Top

SOME MORE INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT ISRAEL Posted by Leo Rennert, April 25, 2004.