Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Free Gaza...

Monday, September 27, 2010

Jumbled News and A Clear Message of Triumph

Sometimes, the news jumbles together and you wonder how it is possible not to learn a lesson from the very clear path it builds for you. There is a truth, even in the lies our enemies tell. A truth so bitter, so real, that our leaders refuse to listen, even if it means our deaths.

As I drove to work recently, I listened as the news reported that Abbas was telling Israel that we had to choose between peace and settlements. It is a formula that might make sense, if it was the settlements that prevented peace. It is a lie that might fool the most ignorant but for those who understand that we have not built for 10 months while Abbas made no effort to make peace, it is yet another abomination. We have done so much; Abbas has done nothing but avoid negotiations, set preconditions, and spin truths into the most horrid of lies.

For 10 months, we caved into Obama; to the US, the UN, the EU, and worst of all, our own desperation to believe that peace can be shoved down the throats of the Palestinians despite their very clear message that they worship death and violence, not peace and harmony. For 10 months, Netanyahu wanted us to believe the impossible – that you can dance alone to a tune only he hears; that you can convince those who seek to confuse, that honesty is the better road. For 10 months. For 10 months there was nothing. Nothing but rockets, stone throwing attacks. Nothing but accusations, preconditions, demands.

So, having done nothing but wait until the last possible minute to even agree to talk to Israel, the Palestinians are now positioning themselves to say that it is Israel that has not done enough, not cared enough, not sacrificed enough. It’s true, they laugh to themselves, for 10 months nothing…and for how much longer can we watch Israel dance while we laugh on the side? I have no sympathy for the Americans who come to the party so disastrously ignorant. I have no compassion for the Blairs of the world who cannot comprehend a world, a culture that raises its children to martyrdom. We are finished, I want to scream at Abbas. Your lies won’t work. But they do, and I am left to wonder, again and againt.

Obama – for God’s sake…how stupid can you be? How can you look at our country and believe we have not done all we can. Now in these last 10 months? Five years ago when we destroyed the homes of 10,000 people for nothing? You want us to give more? Tell that to the orphans, the widows, the bereaved parents.

Abbas says Israelis much choose. The anger encompasses the brain at times, chokes you beyond words.

That was the morning. In the afternoon, there was a conversation with an Israeli aboard a boat heading to Gaza – a flotilla with a message; he said. And what, the newscaster asked, what was the message? My mind flashed, as it often does, to Gilad Shalit – it makes sense – they are trying to grab the attention of the world to focus on Gilad. They sail to gain the attention of the world, to turn it to the cause of the naval blockade – the ongoing, illegal captivity or our son, Gilad.

I was so busy hoping they would succeed, it took me a few moments to realize the treachery, the deceit, the horror. No. Not Gilad – not for these publicity-hungry, self-hating Jews who dared to talk of “true Judaism” as they desecrated Jewish law, ignored it, debased it. They want to show their solidarity, these stupid idiots, with the beleaguered Palestinians; they want to break the naval blockade and declare themselves heroes. They dare Israel to stop them – in the name of Judaism because those who sailed in the name of Islam already failed. But there is no difference between the Judaism of these people and the Islam that pushed the last flotilla to violence. I would not trust these self-proclaimed “peace activists” any more than I trust the last group of thugs.

They sail for the Palestinians, but not for Gilad. The anger grows as an ache deep inside; how blind, how naïve, how destructive, how wrong.

And then in the evening, I got a call from my son who was with the army in Hebron hours before. He is fine. He’s left the city, though he may go back. Slowly the mind takes in the information. Another shooting attack; indiscriminate; meant to kill. Another pregnant woman – but this time a miracle. Though the woman was shot, her husband was able to continue driving until he got her to help; she delivered her son in health and safety – a miracle.

What lessons do we learn this day of such jumbled news?  So many confused thoughts; so much anger. The journey of the day took me through the feeling that the world will fall, yet again, for Abbas’ lies and Palestinian propaganda and past the idiocy of those who are blind enough to help our enemies but care nothing for our own. It ended with the wails of a newborn baby boy, born of a terrorist attack that might easily have claimed his life and those of his parents. But a birth, a joy, a message that comes clear and washes away the anger. Tell your lies, follow the wrong path, but know that at the end of the day, there is a rebirth, a dedication.

I don’t know what the parents will name this child – perhaps Baruch, for blessing – for truly he is blessed. Perhaps David, who led his people in strength and war. Or Chaim, for he lives to triumph and show the world the determination of his parents and his people.

Or perhaps, though it is not my place to name him – perhaps they will call him Israel. I hope they will – for it was Israel that rejoiced in his birth last night as we put aside the anger and the lies to celebrate the most important part of our religion – life.

May God bless this baby boy, son of Netta Zucker. May he be welcomed into the covenant of Avraham, Isaac, and Jacob and may he be granted a long and happy and healthy life here in our land…the land that will remain ours, despite Abbas, Obama, the idiots on the flotillas, past, present and future.

May God bless this boy with life.

Friday, September 17, 2010

Dear World

In a few short hours, we, the Jewish people, will withdraw from your presence. We’ll ask you to leave us to ourselves in peace. We have had enough of all you speak of, all you hold hear. For the next day or so, we turn ourselves inwards, to the people we are, to the God we worship.
We have done much for you this year, sacrificed too much. We have lost friends and loved ones, too young to die and we ask ourselves “Why? For what?” But now we have to make peace with the truth. We did not sacrifice these to you, nor even to the mythical god you call peace. No, we simply are living God’s plan and for some reason we cannot fully understand, it was God’s will that these people fall to the Arab knife, gun, rock, explosion, attack, terror.
This past year, we did not build in our land – that too was a sacrifice you demanded and we offered but tomorrow, we return to ourselves. The European Union wanted to come talk to us today and feels snubbed that we refused. We offered alternative days and like the petulant children they are, they refused. We will talk to you today, or not at all, they cry out in their temper tantrum.
For once, we are united. We are the adults we should be. Whatever you want, we explain to them. There really are things more important, more crucial, than a bunch of EU representatives who demand to come hours before our holiest day. For once, we are above that.
This week, Secretary of State Clinton came to our land and instructed us, yet again how we should behave before the Arab world. We were bombarded with missiles and mortars, even some containing illegal chemicals and the world and Hillary Clinton were silent about these abominations. This week, they were silent and we allowed this – this too was a sacrifice you demanded and we offered. But for once, we are united. We are the nation we were meant to be. Whatever you wanted, we explain to Hillary Clinton, but no more. There really are things more important, more crucial, than the approval of Hillary Clinton and Barack Hussein Obama.
Once before, we were attacked on this holy of holy days and so tomorrow, our soldiers, our sons will not stand down. Many will not come home. They will stand there and fast, guard our borders so that we can negotiate the most important of deals, the most precious requests we place before the Almighty.
Dear World, there is nothing you can do to us, that God cannot do worse. There is no fear greater than our not being granted His blessings for the year to come and so tomorrow, we leave you to return to Him. Our airports close in a few hours – you cannot enter our land and we will not leave. Our radios and televisions stop – it is not the time for entertainment and frivolous activities. We speak of our lives, our futures, and those of our children.
Yes, we impose a closure on the Arab population and that infuriates the so-called human rights organizations who fail to understand that we too have a closure on ourselves. There is no work in Israel tomorrow – not for the Arabs, and not for the Jews. We have more important things to do, to consider, to repair.
Dear World, for once we do not ask your understanding, we do not ask for your forgiveness. For once each year at least, we turn in the proper direction – to our holy city Jerusalem and to our God. Forgive us for our sins, we beg You. Remember our land and all You have given to us. For once, God, believe that we understand and are focused properly. They can do nothing to harm us because we give You our faith, our love, our beliefs, our future.
May we all be written in the Book of Life and inscribed for a year of peace and health and happiness and growth and may we understand that it is that blessing that will grant us a year of peace – that, and nothing else, and no one else. G’mar hatima tova.

Friday, September 3, 2010

The Anger of an Infidel

There is an anger, so deep and vast, that it can choke you. It comes and goes without much warning, much like the terror attacks that cause its rebirth. It is a feeling of confusion, of wonder. How, you want to cry out. How can you be so stupid? How can you be so blind? How could you think this was anything but inevitable? Why? Why didn't you think? Why didn't you do something to stop it? Worse, why did you do something to cause it to happen now?
You can’t say you didn’t know. It’s happened so often, each time, really. The inevitable outcome of all attempted "peace" negotiations is death. Harsh though that sounds, that is reality. If you offer a hand to the Palestinians, there will be much conversation and discussion among the Arabs. Stupidly, the world, the western world, the United States, the State Department, even our out stupid, stupid leaders, will think the Arabs are discussing our latest offerings and the talks that will take place.

They will dream of peace and international fame for each of them. They will imagine the spotlights shining as the world deems them the ultimate peacemakers. They will dream of Nobel Prizes and going down in the history books. It’s true. The Arabs are discussing something, but the world is too stupid, too blind, too naïve and too ignorant to understand or accept that what the Arabs ARE discussing, what they are planning – is how to cut off that hand that the world demands we reach out.

That hand offered in peace is an abomination to their culture. It is the hand of an infidel, they will whisper among themselves. Easily ignored, even laughed at. How stupid these infidels are, let us offer them the peace of Mohammed. We can agree to anything. There is no dishonor in betraying a hand offered to an infidel, an agreement made with these non-Muslim leaders.
Perhaps even stronger, the greater the lie, the more impressive, the more powerful, the more manly, is the Arab leader that pulled off the ruse. That conned the infidel into making the deal. How much sweeter the deal, how much weaker the opponent, when you can get them to offer something for nothing but words. Stupid infidels.
There is an anger that burns inside me that so many of my own people refuse to understand this; that many say we settlers are the cause. The Arabs have murdered a pregnant woman. Shot her as she drove with her husband, and then again in the head to crown their victory. The agony incapacitates; the pain overwhelms and so the world rationalizes. Wait, it’s bad, but wait, she lived where? She makes her home over there? Ah, six children she had…she must have been one of those. Religious. Right-wing. Settler. Labels meant to separate when the only really important label here is the one the Arabs have given us. She was murdered because she was an infidel, like you, like me. Like so many of us.
We settlers can ask a simple question, a most logical one - if it is the SETTLERS that stopped peace from happening, why was there no peace in 1966 before there were any settlers or settlements? Why did we not all bask in the sunshine of peace and humanity in 1949 when the Arabs had more land than they are supposedly willing to settle for now? The answer, of course, is so obvious. We are all settlers – each and every one of us Israelis. We settled Tel Aviv as much as we settled Har Bracha and Beit Haggai. This week, it was two parents from Beit Haggai; next week, it could as easily be parents from Netanya. Why can’t you understand that in this battle, we are all settlers, all infidels?
Why, oh why, do you believe that the Arabs will not return, again and again, to the gun, to the bomb, to the rock, to whatever they can use to destroy in anger, the infidel among them. The reality is so simple. We Israelis dared to claim our homeland, which rests deep in the midst of their world. We dare to breathe the air Allah meant for them, to drink the water Allah intended they have alone. We are unworthy. But the stupidest, saddest, most infuriating question of all is why, oh why do you think that I am the infidel alone and you are not?
This week was a terrible one for Israel. No, wait. There are two Israels. One born of a drive to settle our land, to love it, to plant in its soil and one born of a need to smile before the world and assimilate into it. It is a drive to be like you out there, to pierce our bodies wherever you do, to dress as you do, to be all that you are, lest you think we are different.
To the Moslems, we are infidels; to much of the rest of the world, we are idiots. We were idiots this week and we have paid a horrible price for our stupidity. Three families lay in pain and ruin; seven more orphans added to our nation. An unborn child lost to us in the womb of his murdered mother. A beloved teacher gone. Seven orphans.
A couple graced with life, marvel the miracle that allowed them to escape death when 10 bullets riddled their car. A family ponders the life of a young girl, now wounded in moderate condition with doctors warning there may be permanent damage. All she did was drive in her parents car when an Arab decided to launch a large rock at the car, and hit her in the head. There, in the blink of an eye - five families' lives are forever changed.
All while far away, our leader dances before the world. You are my peace partner, he lies to Mahmoud Abbas. While we are burying our dead and caring for our wounded, the stabbing pain turns to boiling anger.
It is not that we are settlers - it never was. It is, if we are to be brutally honest, not even that we are Israelis. The bitterest pill to swallow, the reason why it is accepted with a sad nod that a pregnant woman and her husband, a teacher, and a newly-married young man, can be shot in the head and leave her children orphaned, is that we are Jews.
It isn't politically correct in this advanced year of 2010, in the early part of the 21st century. Anti-Semitism is from the dark ages of World War II. We are so much more advanced, so much more civilized. We, the world tells us, are no longer anti-Semites, not that we admit to ever being. No, we are anti-Israel and that is politically accepted, even praised.
But what of those Jewish mothers that we buried this week? Ah, it presents a problem to the world unless we can excuse it. Wait, they were settlers, weren't they? They chose to live on that other side of a line drawn in the land. Extremists, explains US Department of State Crowley, extremists on both sides are trying to stop the peace process.

And so the anger returns. Dear Mr. Crowley, what exactly did the Israeli side do to torpedo your peace talks in Washington? We sent you our idiot leader to stand there and say that he has a peace partner, and we buried our dead.

And after doing all this, the pain and anger rise to choke us because we watch as the world moves on to other things, while seven orphans never will. And somewhere, deep in the midst of this anger is the amazing bewilderment. Perhaps, after all is said and done, we really are as stupid as the Arabs believe us to be, we infidels of Islam.