I Am A Zionist

At a time where Zionism is defamed and slandered, this article sets out the truth. Shabbat Shalom.

From YNet, by Yair Lapid:

I am a Zionist.

I believe that the Jewish people established itself in the Land of Israel, albeit somewhat late. Had it listened to the alarm clock, there would have been no Holocaust, and my dead grandfather – the one I was named after – would have been able to dance a last waltz with grandma on the shores of the Yarkon River.

I am a Zionist.

Hebrew is the language I use to thank the Creator, and also to swear on the road. The Bible does not only contain my history, but also my geography. King Saul went to look for mules on what is today Highway 443, Jonah the Prophet boarded his ship not too far from what is today a Jaffa restaurant, and the balcony where David peeped on Bathsheba must have been bought by some oligarch by now.

I am a Zionist.

The first time I saw my son wearing an IDF uniform I burst into tears, I haven't missed the Independence Day torch-lighting ceremony for 20 years now, and my television was made in Korea, but I taught it to cheer for our national soccer team.

I am a Zionist.

I believe in our right for this land. The people who were persecuted for no reason throughout history have a right to a state of their own plus a free F-16 from the manufacturer. Every display of anti-Semitism from London to Mumbai hurts me, yet deep inside I'm thinking that Jews who choose to live abroad fail to understand something very basic about this world. The State of Israel was not established so that the anti-Semites will disappear, but rather, so we can tell them to get lost.

I am a Zionist.

I was fired at in Lebanon, a Katyusha rockets missed me by a few feet in Kiryat Shmona, missiles landed near my home during the first Gulf War, I was in Sderot when the Color Red anti-rocket alert system was activated, terrorists blew themselves up not too far from my parents' house, and my children stayed in a bomb shelter before they even knew how to pronounce their own name, clinging to a grandmother who arrived here from Poland to escape death. Yet nonetheless, I always felt fortunate to be living here, and I don't really feel good anywhere else.

I am a Zionist.

I think that anyone who lives here should serve in the army, pay taxes, vote in the elections, and be familiar with the lyrics of at least one Shalom Hanoch song. I think that the State of Israel is not only a place, it is also an idea, and I wholeheartedly believe in the three extra commandments engraved on the wall of the Holocaust museum in Washington: "Thou shalt not be a victim, thou shalt not be a perpetrator, but above all, thou shalt not be a bystander."

I am a Zionist.

I already laid down on my back to admire the Sistine Chapel, I bought a postcard at the Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris, and I was deeply impressed by the emerald Buddha at the king's palace in Bangkok. Yet I still believe that Tel Aviv is more entertaining, the Red Sea is greener, and the Western Wall Tunnels provide for a much more powerful spiritual experience. It is true that I'm not objective, but I'm also not objective in respect to my wife and children.

I am a Zionist.

I am a man of tomorrow but I also live my past. My dynasty includes Moses, Jesus, Maimonides, Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, Albert Einstein, Woody Allen, Bobby Fischer, Bob Dylan, Franz Kafka, Herzl, and Ben-Gurion. I am part of a tiny persecuted minority that influenced the world more than any other nation. While others invested their energies in war, we had the sense to invest in our minds.

I am a Zionist.

I sometimes look around me and become filled with pride, because I live better than a billion Indians, 1.3 billion Chinese, the entire African continent, more than 250 million Indonesians, and also better than the Thais, the Filipinos, the Russians, the Ukrainians, and the entire Muslim world, with the exception of the Sultan of Brunei. I live in a country under siege that has no natural resources, yet nonetheless the traffic lights always work and we have high-speed connection to the Internet.

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I am a Zionist.

My Zionism is natural, just like it is natural for me to be a father, a husband, and a son. People who claim that they, and only they, represent the "real Zionism" are ridiculous in my view. My Zionism is not measured by the size of my kippa, by the neighborhood where I live, or by the party I will be voting for. It was born a long time before me, on a snowy street in the ghetto in Budapest where my father stood and attempted, in vain, to understand why the entire world is trying to kill him.

I am a Zionist.

Every time an innocent victim dies, I bow my head because once upon a time I was an innocent victim. I have no desire or intention to adopt the moral standards of my enemies. I do not want to be like them. I do not live on my sword; I merely keep it under my pillow.

I am a Zionist.

I do not only hold on to the rights of our forefathers, but also to the duty of the sons. The people who established this state lived and worked under much worse conditions than I have to face, yet nonetheless they did not make do with mere survival. They also attempted to establish a better, wiser, more humane, and more moral state here. They were willing to die for this cause, and I try to live for its sake.

Hands off of Israel

Barack Obama, only several days into his presidency, has already announced that it will be one of his commitments to "actively and aggressively" advance negotiations and talks between Israel and the Arabs. Obama's new Middle East envoy will arrive in Israel next week to begin to push the process. In his first call to a foreign head of state, Obama called Mahmoud Abbas, arch-terrorist leader of Fatah, to symbolize his dedication to "a two-state solution". In his words, he doesn't want a future "in which these is no hope for the Palestinians".

It is mind-boggling that, in light of the monumental challenges facing the United States and its new president, he should be meddling so much in the affairs of a sovereign country. Given the full-blown recession, approaching the levels of a depression, in the US, along with a host of other serious problems facing the decaying American super-power, Obama has chosen to concentrate his energy on the conflict in the Middle-East. Despite the almost-deified status that the media has given him, it is quite hubristic for him to believe that he will solve a close-to 100 year-old conflict within a few months of his reign.

Israel's relationship with the United States has often been a double-edged sword. George Mitchell, the new envoy to the Mid-East, will not even wait until after the Israeli elections to begin his work. This represents a great amount of arrogance and disrespect on the part of Obama. He clearly disregards the choice of the Israeli people in the coming elections. The political winds are changing in Israel and a new administration may not be as likely as Olmert to continue along the same path of concessions and surrender. Evidently, what Israelis choose for their future is irrelevant to Barack Obama.

Israel is a sovereign nation- not an American colony or a 51st state. The close relationship between the two countries is based on shared values and strategic interests. Yet, in the end, Israel must do what is best for itself. Obama has no right to force concession or make demands on Israel. It is not the place of the United States to meddle in the business or politics of another country. The new administration has many extreme challenges facing it, and it would do well to concentrate on solving those before committing itself to carving up Israel.

Regardless of whichever side in the conflict is right, this is just one case of a disagreement between two religious/ethnic groups among thousands. All around the world, various tribes, peoples, ethnic groups and nations are fighting over different land claims. The US has its own problems and should not interfere on these tribal squabbles. Unless there is a case of genocide or severe human rights abuses, the US should mind its own business. In Darfur, close to a million blacks have been murdered by Arab janjaweed militia. The humanitarian situation is dire and could use international intervention. Why doesn't Obama send his ambassador there? Why doesn't he exert the same pressure on the leader of Sudan responsible for this genocide as he plans to exert on Israel to commit suicide? Besides cases such as this, it is the height of arrogance for the American president to interfere with the politics of another country. Israel's leaders much decide what to do for the security and welfare of Israel.

Only a few days in power, Obama has shown himself to be incredible naive in terms of foreign policy. He is committed to advancing the same deadly and ultimately fruitless road as Bush and Clinton. Despite all of the various agreements and summits between Israel and the Arabs at American behest, Israel and the Arabs are no closer to peace today that they were in 1948. No amount of documents signed negates the generations of Arabs raised on anti-semitic and anti-Israel hatred. The Arab world today remains virulently opposed to Israel existence and any concession on Israel's part only encourages and increases terror. Israel cannot afford another disastrous Oslo, or a Road Map to oblivion, G-d forbid. Obama would do wise to butt out of Israel's politics and concentrate on the problems on the home front. Hopefully, in the coming elections, Israelis will elect leaders with the courage to tell Obama respectfully but firmly: "Hands off of Israel".

Cross-posted to Goat's Barnyard and Stop Raping Israel

Chutzpadik Haters

During the recent conflict in Gaza, anti-Israel rallies were held worldwide. They were noted for their sheer ferocity and aggressiveness. During these rallies, slogans such as "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas" and "Burn Jews as fossil fuel" were chanted. Another feature of these rallies were signs comparing Israel to the Nazis. A favourite tactic of Israel-bashers is to make comparisons between the IDF and the Nazis, thereby delegitimizing the State of Israel. Israel is demonized as apartheid and racist, guilty of the original sin of being in existence. By claiming such a state is the epitome of racist evil, Israel's foes legitimize her destruction.

Close to 70 years ago, one third of world Jewry were brutally murdered in the greatest crime ever committed in human history. The Jews of Europe were dehumanized, forced into ghettos, chocked and gassed, and then burnt in ovens and crematorium, while the world stood by silently. Once the war came to an end, the world realized the depths of depravity and evil to which it had sunk and resolved never to repeat the horrors of the Shoah. Today, the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the wicked Nazis who wantonly spilled Jewish blood are leading the campaign against the Jewish state. Instead of regretting their crimes, they have been denying and minimizing the Holocaust. Racked with guilt over their grandparents complicity to murder, they have decided to downplay and belittle the Final Solution with cynical and obscene comparisons between Israel and the Nazis. As witnesses to the Holocaust are dying out and becoming ever more rare, such historical revisionism cannot go unchallenged, especially as anti-semitism continues to rise in Europe and America. For the Jewish people, it seems to be 1939 all over again.

The German National Democratic neo-Nazi party announced that it will be holding a solemn vigil in downtown Berlin for the victims of 'the Gaza holocaust'. The NPD has seats in the national parliament, and has gained significant support both at the local and federal levels. "Joint hatred of everything Jewish is unifying neo-Nazis and Islamists... German-Palestinians protestors unashamedly admitted that they would vote for the NPD during the next election," Charlotte Knobloch, the head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, warned in her speech at a pro-Israel rally earlier this month in Munich. In a similar vein, the Spanish government has cancelled its Holocaust memorial ceremony in protest of the supposed 'genocide' in Gaza. Marking the Jewish Holocaust while a Palestinian Holocaust is taking place is not right," a local City official told Barcelona's La Vanguardia newspaper. Other European countries have taken to Holocaust references. A Norwegian diplomat stationed in Saudi Arabia sent a mass-distributed email stating that "the grandchildren of Holocaust survivors are doing the same thing to the Palestinians, as the Nazis did to their grandparents," using her official Norwegian Foreign Ministry address.

This abuse of history is so sick and twisted. Whatever one's opinion on the Gaza conflict, there is no comparison between the systematic campaign and extermination and annihilation waged by the Nazis against the Jews and a military struggle between a sovereign nation and terrorists. It is an insult to the victims of the Holocaust to equate them with civilians killed unintentionally in the cross-fires of battle. Apparently, anti-semitism and Holocaust denial allows history and events to be perverted. The same countries that happily delivered up their Jews for destruction are denying the grossness of their crimes, and allowing such a travesty to occur again.

Since the beginning of the Israeli operation in Gaza a few weeks ago, anti-semitism has flared up worldwide. Jews in Europe and North America have suffered the worst wave of anti-semitism since the Second World War. In Britain, there have been over 220 anti-semitic incidents, including bombings and vandalization of synagogues, Jewish institutions and kosher restaurants. Jews have been beaten up on the streets. In France, dozens of synagogues have been bombed as well as Jews threatened. Over Shabbat in Chicago, 5 synagogues were defaced. A homemade bomb was found outside of a Chabad House in Florence. In Rome, a trade union has proposed and put forth legislation to identify and boycott Jewish-owned businesses. Protesters have marched violently through Jewish areas in Antwerp and Paris and Italian police had to prevent protesters from entering Venice's historical ghetto area.

The hateful and ridiculous comparisons between Israel and the Nazis have made Jews targets once again. While any person has the prerogative to disagree with the specific policies of the State of Israel, accusing Israel of 'genocide' in Gaza is akin to blood libel. Those who besmirch Israel attempt to demonstrate the state as so evil that the only solution to the conflict is a Final one. According to their logic, such an apartheid racist state must be dismantled and destroyed. All decent and moral people must renounce their moral inversion and recognize that this is a conflict between terrorists and a democratic state. There are no similarities between those who shoved Jewish children into gas chambers, and Israeli soldiers trying to prevent jihadi rockets from falling on civilian targets. Those who are condemning Israel for defending itself are of the same stock as those who sat by while the Jews of Europe were being murdered. It appears that the world never learns.

Israel, Do Not Fear!

"Israel, do not fear, for your are a lion's cub. When a lion roars, who will not fear?"

Parshat Shemot: The Eternal Nation

This week's parsha of Shemot details the descent of the Jewish people into slavery and the beginning of their redemption. Pharaoh, alarmed over Jewish growth and prosperity, sets out his Final Solution to the Jewish problem. He afflicts the Jews with horrendous suffering and labour and decrees the death of all male babies. The future saviour of the Jewish people is hidden in a basket in the Nile and eventually found by Pharaoh's daughter, who nurses and mothers the baby.

The Torah recounts, in one of the most beautiful episodes in the Tanach, how G-d reveals Himself to Moses from a burning bush. The Torah tells us that "behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed" (Ex. 3:2). This powerful metaphor is symbolic of the Jewish people. Suffering under harsh taskmasters controlled by a tyrant who would bathe himself in Jewish babies' blood, the Jewish people seemed to be on the brink of extinction. The mighty Egyptian empire would surely outlast the Jews, the dregs of existence. Pharaoh's wicked enforces would cement Jewish babies into the walls of his monuments if the required amount of bricks were not met by the Hebrew slaves. Despite all this, G-d promised that His nation would endure. Out of this tremendous affliction came the Divine response: "I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt, and I have heard their cry because of their slave drivers, for I know their pains. I have descended to rescue them from the hand[s] of the Egyptians and to bring them up from that land, to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivvites, and the Jebusites. And now, behold, the cry of the children of Israel has come to Me, and I have also seen the oppression that the Egyptians are oppressing them." (Ex. 3:7-9) G-d had not forsaken His people. He would redeem them from Egyptian bondage.

Throughout history, the Jewish people has been tested under fire. We went through the "holy" fires of the Inquisition, which burned our holy books and our bodies at the stakes, tried for being true to our faith. The Nation of Israel was subjected to the ovens and crematorium of Auschwitz, Treblinka, Majdanek, Belzec, Sobibor, Bergen-Belsen and the other mass graveyards of Europe. Even today, the State of Israel remains under constant bombardment from jihadist rockets. Our enemies continue to proclaim the eventual destruction of the Jewish people. Like the Pharaoh of old, Hamas, Hizbullah, al-Qaeda, Iran and the like continue to plot out demise and annihilation.

As much as the Egyptian oppressed Israel, so the Jews prospered and multiplied. "But as much as they would afflict them, so did they multiply and so did they gain strength" (Ex. 1:12). They sought to break our backs and our spirit but our resolve only strengthened. This is Jewish history in a nutshell. Only two generations ago, we went from Auschwitz and built Jerusalem. We emerged from the ashes, from the graveyards and sites of death and established ourselves anew in our land. "Son of man, can these bones live?'... these bones are the whole house of Israel; behold, they say: Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are clean cut off. Therefore prophesy, and say unto them: Thus saith the Lord GOD: Behold, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, O My people; and I will bring you into the land of Israel." (Ezek. 37:3,11-12) The dry bones, left for dead, scorched by the raging fires of anti-semitism and hatred, arose and had live breathed into them again. Today, our resolve is tested by rockets, bombs, condemnations and threats. We will not be broken! Just as the Egyptian failed to break us, so will we not be broken by Hamas or any other murderous terrorists. From their attacks we will grown and be strengthened.

Our trials and tribulations are increasing right before the advent of the Messianic Era. G-d said to Moses: "Go and assemble the elders of Israel, and say to them, 'The Lord God of your forefathers has appeared to me, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, "I have surely remembered you and what is being done to you in Egypt." ' And I said, 'I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt, to the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivvites, and the Jebusites, to a land flowing with milk and honey.'" (Ex. 3:16) The same thing will happen again in our days, when G-d will remember our affliction and bring us out of our current captivity. We are the eternal nation, the bush caught in the flames but is not consumed.

Am Yisrael Chai! The Jewish Nation lives!



Cross-posted to Stop Raping Israel

My Letter to Canadian PM Stephen Harper

Canada was the only country in the UN to oppose the unfair and unbalanced anti-Israel resolution. Stephen Harper has shown himself to be a great friend of Israel. He can be contact at pm@pm.gc.ca. Here is the e-mail that I sent him:

Dear Prime Minister Harper,

Once again, you have shown yourself to be a man of incredible courage and moral strength by standing up for the right of Israel to defend herself. While most of the world has been very forceful of in their condemnation of Israel, Canada was the only country at the UN to oppose the unbalanced and unfair resolution targeted at Israel. Canada and Israel face the same enemies, the forces of Islamic fascism, whether they are in Afghanistan or in Gaza. Under a constant barrage of over 4000 missiles on southern Israel since 2005, Israel cannot allow such attacks to go unanswered. No other country would have waited for so long to defend its sovereignty and citizens. Mr Harper, your support for Israel makes me incredible proud to be a Canadian.

On June 25, 2006, an Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, was kidnapped by Hamas terrorists. He has been held, in unknown conditions, in Gaza for over 3 years, denied Red Cross access and the most basic human rights. Hamas's refusal to allow access to Shalit is a war crime and a violation of international law. As a friend and supporter of Israel and the Jewish people, please do not allow Gilad Shalit to be forgotten. Please do everything in your diplomatic power to ensure that Gilad Shalit comes home. I hope that Canada will raise this issue before the United Nations.

The attacks on Sderot and southern Israel come as a direct result of the Israeli Disengagement from Gaza in 2005, in which 10 000 Jews were expelled from their homes. Learning from this tragic mistake, it is time to bury the so-called "two-state solution". If an Arab terror state was created in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), every major Israeli city would come under rocket range. One single attack at Israel's international airport would effectively end Israeli tourism, trade and immigration. No friend of Israel can allow such a plan to come about. Judea and Samaria are the ancestral Jewish homeland and belong to the Jewish people by every conceivable religious, historic and political right. Israel cannot survive a terror state carved into its belly. The war in Gaza hopefully will put this terrible plan to rest.

Mr. Harper, you have shown the moral clarity to differentiate between a democratic state and a terror group. Israel is dedicated to peace and freedom while Hamas and the Islamic society which spawned it worships deaths and hatred. This hatred has manifested itself time and time again in NY, the London Tube, in Kabul or in Mumbai. Anti-Israel protesters in Canadian cities such as Montreal and Toronto have screamed such obscenities as "Jews to the ovens" and "Hitler didn't finish the job". This sort of anti-semitic behaviour cannot be tolerated in as civilized a country as Canada. Israel is the canary in the coal mine. It always begins with the Jews but it never ends with the Jews.

Sincerely,

xxx BK

Not a Tear!

Faced with a barrage of new footage of dead children, Israel's PR is negligible. Hamas has proven that it has no shame in abusing the dead, but gleefully shows pictures of maimed or killed children. The terrorists in Gaza use death pornography to further their nefarious plans of defaming Israel. The crowds worldwide scream "stop the holocaust in Gaza!" while employing the most cynical and obscene comparisons between Israel and Nazi Germany. Suddenly, the world pretends to be interested in human rights and uses them as a weapon against the Jewish state. Politicians and celebrities denounce the supposed massacres in Gaza and even Jewish leaders preface their support of Israel with apologies over civilian deaths.

Save me the pieties over Gaza. The very same people marching in the streets against Israel had nary a word to say when over 4000 rockets fell on Southern Israel during the past 3 years. When Jews were murdered by Hamas missiles, schools and hospitals bombarded and lives torn apart, the world was silent. The streets of Europe were empty as long as Arabs did the killing and Jews the dying. That is "peace" according to the "humanitarians". There were no pictures in the media of grieving Jewish mothers and fathers, or of children who lost limbs to jihadist bombs. Where were the marches and protests when a gunman murdered 8 teenagers studying in a yeshiva, or a berserk Arab bulldozer driver crushed a mother and her young daughter?

The same day that the operations in Gaza began, a Sunni suicide bomber blew himself up in a Shiite mosque in Iraq, murdering 40 people. This barely made news. When Jews kill Muslims, it is a massacre. When Muslims kill each other, it's like the weather. Nobody pays attention. In the past few years, close to a million black Africans have been murdered by Arab janjaweed militia in Darfur. Thats is a real humanitarian crisis. If the same protesters opposing Israel's right to self-defense would have used even a fraction of that energy to protest the situation in Darfur, there would be no genocide. The protests have little to do with human rights but are just another excuse to demonize and vilify the only democracy in the Middle-East. Over 60 years after the Holocaust, many are still uncomfortable with the idea of Jews fighting back. A "ceasefire" is when rockets fall on Jews and they do not retaliate.

The mainstream media feeds us constant images of dead Arabs. They inform us that women and children were among the dead in Israel's attacks. Somehow they neglect to mention that the blame for the dead lies squarely on Hamas, which hides among civilians when firing rockets at Israel. Hamas brazenly uses schools, mosques and hospitals to store weapons and attack Israel, then cries about Israeli retaliation. It has used women and children to carry out its murderous attacks against Israeli targets. The same group that self-righteously complains of Israeli attacks on children fires missiles on kindergartens and schools in Sderot, Ashklelon and Ashdod. They raise their children on a diet of hate, death and anti-semitism.

I have not a tear to spare for any Arab killed in Gaza. The international community treats Gazans as pawns, not letting them take responsibility for their own actions. Last year, the people of Gaza democratically voted Hamas, a terrorist organization, into power. They chose, of their own free-will, to have Hamas represent them as their government. As such, they should suffer the consequences of their choices. After the attacks on Merkaz HaRav in March, thousands of Gazans danced in the streets, giving out candies and celebrating the cold-blooded killing of Jewish teenagers. My tears are spent on the victims of Hamas, not their enablers. I wish that Israel would attack Gaza with a true proportionate response, letting the people of Gaza know the pain of the citizens of Sderot who have not had a complete night's sleep in a decade, or of the Jewish mothers and fathers who lost children to Hamas jihadist attacks.



The world does not deserve our apologies. They forfeited their rights to moral superiority after 2000 years of deportations, expulsions, forced conversions, persecutions and pogroms. A world that did not treat Jews as human beings for two millenia has no right to lecture us on how we may defend ourselves. At anti-Israel rallies worldwide, crowds chanted "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas!", hoping that the wicked smoke of the ovens should blow over to the Holy Land. A world that still dreams of Auschwitz does not deserve any explanations or justifications.

Am Yisrael Chai!

Cross-posted to Goat's Barnyard

The Real Issue: Gaza is Jewish

Israel has the world's 4th strongest army, superior weapons, arms and technology. Hamas, while armed with deadly weapons smuggled in from Egypt and supplied by Iran, is nothing compared to Israeli firepower. If Israel wanted, the Hamastan stronghold in Gaza could be wiped out in an aerial assault in a number of hours. Yet Hamas possesses something which the current Israeli leadership does not possess: confidence in the justness of its cause.

Watching the news, Israel's claim in defense of its actions has been that Israel the right to defend itself. Faced with a genocidal group of terrorists committed to murdering and maiming as many Jews as possible, all Israel has to say is that it has the right to defend itself. Lost amidst all of the rhetoric and slogans is the fact that Hamas has repeatedly and consistently violated Israel's sovereignty and contests its right to exist as a nation. Sadly, the war being fought in Gaza is not a war to conquer Gaza, but rather a war to get rid of Gaza. In summer of 2005, Israel unilaterally disengaged from Gaza, expelling close to 10 000 Jewish residents and dismantling their towns and villages, in an attempt to allow Gazans to build their own state. The discussion over the Disengagement consisted of mainly security, whether or not it would lead to peace or to rockets. Those who argued the latter were vindicated. Absent from the debate was Israel's entitlement to Gaza.

Israel's military failed miserably during the Second Lebanon War because its leadership lacked defined goals and objectives. While, thank G-d, Israel has been succeeding militarily in Gaza, it still lacks the same basic purpose. Israel's leaders have repeatedly emphasized that they do not intend to re-occupy Gaza and that should Hamas be destroyed, Gaza will be given over to Fatah. The powers that be see the current war as simply another means to further the two state (final) solution, the so-called "Road Map to Peace". In the minds of many Israelis, Gaza is simply not our land. The war is being fought to make the Disengagement final, to stop the rockets and finally be done with Gaza. Instead of realizing the errors of the Gaza Disengagement, Israel's leaders are determined to repeat the same mistakes in Judea and Samaria. Anyone with a limited amount of intelligence can see that the Hamas rockets in Sderot, Ashkelon and Ashdod are the fruits of the Disengagement.

Israel is in a stalemate with Hamas. It has surrounded Gaza City but hesitates to go in. The political leadership want to leave Gaza as soon as possible, and preferably hand it over to the more "moderate" Fatah murderers. The same mentality remains that Gaza is foreign turf. Because of this basic assumption, Israel cannot succeed in vanquishing Hamas. It must be repeated and repeated again, incessantly, to counter the Big Lie of Arab propaganda: The Land of Israel belongs to the Jewish people. There is no such thing as a Palestinian nation. Never in the annals of history has there been a sovereign Palestinian country, or a distinct Palestinian people, culture or language. The only three independent nations in the Land of Israel have been Jewish: the Davidic kingdom, the Hasmonean dynasty and the modern state of Israel. The term 'Palestine' was invented by the Roman emperor Hadrian after he crushed the Jewish revolt in 70 CE. Destroying the Temple in Jerusalem and scattering the Jews to across the world, he renamed Judea 'Palestinae', in the name of an ancient extinct people, the Philistines, in an attempt to erase the Jewish connection to Israel. Many successive empire conquered the Land of Israel yet none ever bothered to build their own nation. When Islam spread through the Middle-East in the 7th century, the Arabs moved into and occupied the geographical entity known as Palestine, yet never once did they consider themselves Palestinian. British document from the Mandatory period consistently refer to "the Jews and Arabs of Palestine", not the Jews and Palestinians. Only in 1967, once the Arabs had lost 6 wars against Israel did they decide on a new tactic and spun the tale of the "Palestine", stolen and occupied by the Jews.

This is not a conflict about territory, or about rockets and settlements. It is about moral rights, whether or not the Land of Israel belongs to the Jewish people or to the Arabs. In a betrayal of history, Israel's leaders do not have the strength and moral convictions to assert Jewish rights from river to sea. Precisely for this reason does Israel find itself incapable of dispatching a ragtag band of murderers and terrorists. The Arabs speak about "dying for Palestine", martyrdom, and will not compromise on an inch of what they consider holy soil. Israel speaks about self-defense, tactical victories, cease-fires, truces and the "peace process". It is no surprise that Hamas shows not signs of surrender despite an intense 11-day barrage while Israel's leadership (but not people) are demonstrating war weariness. The corrupt Kadima government is determine to surrender as much Jewish land as possible. A post-Zionist government does not have the capacity to implement the necessary solutions to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Gaza is firmly Jewish. It was a part of the tribal inheritance of Judah, was the site of Samson's campaigns against the Philistines and where David slew Goliath. During Greek times, it fell to Alexander the Great and was eventually recaptured by the Hasmoneans. It was home to a thriving and flourishing Jewish community. In 1967, A. Ovadiah excavated the area and discovered a synagogue from the sixth century C.E. Archaeology evidence supports the biblical premise of a continuous Jewish presence from the Late bronze period until the Byzantine period (ca. 1500 B.C.E. through 632 C.E.) It must be recalled that most of the Arabs living in Israel only came in the middle to late 1920’s to escape economic hardship and political persecution by their own people for better opportunity. Gaza, as well as Judea and Samaria, remain under illegal Arab occupation and must be returned to their rightful owners. International law, enshrined in the League of Nations mandate for Palestine and recognized by the UN, gives the Jewish people sovereignty over the entire Land of Israel, and both sides of the Jordan. Various British policies further limited and reduced the area to be given towards a Jewish homeland. However, the world body has never repealed the Jewish right to the Land of Israel under the International law.

A true and lasting peace will only come to the region once Gush Katif, Neve Dekalim and all of the destroyed Jewish towns are re-built on the ruins of Hamas. The Jews of Gaza were unjustly expelled from their rightful homes. The entire leadership responsible for the Expulsion must be tried for crimes against the Jewish people. Only once Israel has the strength to firmly declare that the entire Land of Israel belongs to the Jewish people, and only the Jewish people, will the conflict be resolved. Until then, rockets and suicide bombings will continually maim and kill Jews. Israel's leaders crave world attention and acceptance and therefore are hesitant to assert Jewish rights over the Land. The offensive in Gaza has been limited due to international pressure. What Israel's weak leaders don't realize is that the world body hates the Jewish people. Never will the UN and EU be satisfied until Israel is wiped off the map, G-d forbid. As a wise man once said: "It is better to have an Israel that the entire world hates than an Auschwitz that world loves". Jewish morality demands that Israel defend its citizens and re-conquer its land. Our enemies must be either completely destroyed or transfered from the Land.

History will judge harshly those who seek to separate the Jewish people from their inheritance. The nation that begged, three times a day that "our eyes should behold Your return to Zion in mercy", cannot be defeated. "And I will turn the captivity of My people Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them. And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be plucked up out of their land which I have given them, saith the LORD thy God." (Amos 9:14-15). May we see the day when the prophecy of Amos is fulfilled. Amen!



Cross-posted to Goat's Barnyard