Hang in there Gilad

Today is the first anniversary of the abduction and kidnapping of Gilad Shalit, who still sits and waits for freedom somewhere in the bowels of Gaza.

Here's what I wrote in my journal around that time, one year ago, in my pre-blogging days:

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June 2006

So you think that the problems of the Middle East will be solved if Israel cedes land to the Arabs?

Today we are only getting a little taste of what happens when we try to trade land for peace.

Immediately after we withdrew from Gaza last summer, the Arabs began firing rockets over the border into schools and living rooms in surrounding Jewish towns.

Today we have something new: Islamic rats are digging kilometer long tunnels under the border to murder and kidnap Jews.

The entire Gazan border is maybe 30 miles long. Imagine what would happen if Israel bowed to world pressure and pulled back to the 1948 armistice line (known as the Green line). That would create a winding, convoluted border of 240+ miles, leaving 60% of Israeli Jews living in a narrow 10-mile wide coastal plain wedged between the sea to the west and mountains on the Green-line to the east. Imagine the trouble and heartache that we would suffer from snipers, rockets, missiles and whatever stuff the Arabs manage to get their hands on!

Let me make it simple for all who don't understand: The Arabs are not fighting for land and justice. They are fighting to spread Islam and the rule of Sharia law through every corner of the world. They will not stop until Israel is completely destroyed, then they will march on to conquer Europe, and then the US and beyond.

To all of you in the "give them what they want and they'll leave us alone" camp, consider this: If you give them what they want then you may soon be reading the Koran with your morning coffee rather than the Washington Post.

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That's what I wrote one year ago. In the year since, the Arabs have fired hundreds of rockets at Sderot, southern Ashkelon and the western Negev, making normal life impossible for tens of thousands of ordinary people. Last week, Hamas kicked Fatah's butt out of Gaza and will shortly turn it into an Islamic mini-state ruled by Sharia law.

When I wrote my journal entry last year, I referred to the fact that 60% of the Jewish population of the country lives in a narrow 10-mile wide strip wedged between the sea on one side and the Samarian mountain range on the other. When I made that comment, I had in mind a certain memory that I'd like to share with you:

In January 1995 I was sitting in a doctors waiting room flipping through the pages of Newsweek . I skimmed an article about the Siege of Sarajevo. The bombardment of Sarajevo began in April 1992 after the breakup of Yugoslavia. The city is surrounded by mountains, as you may recall from the scenes of the Winter Olympics that were held there in 1984. During the siege of the city, snipers in the surrounding heights kilometers away, fired mercilessly at anything that moved in the city below, and hundreds of shells were fired into the city every day, destroying 35,000 buildings. By the time that NATO military intervention and the Dayton accords ended the siege three years later, 12,000 people in the city were dead, 50,000 injured.

What I remember so vividly was the photo that accompanied the article. In it, a young boy 8 or 9 years old lay sprawled face down in a giant pool of his own blood in a playground, a soccer ball resting at his feet.

I wondered then how much hate a Serbian sniper needed in order to put a bullet through the heart of a little boy playing soccer.

Looking at that photograph, I thought of a different small country on the sunny shores of the Eastern Mediterranean, where just 28 years earlier, snipers hidden in the commanding hills above fired on boys playing ball in fields below.

So people, lets have a show of hands: Who is in favor of giving the high ground to the Arabs?

Keep doing those acts of kindness folks, it's the only solution!

Calvin Coolidge. Enough said.

Quote of the day: "I have never been hurt by what I have not said." - Calvin Coolidge

Here's a tidbit to make sure that you keep coming back for updates:

Last night, Eileen made her way to Jerusalem to have dinner with Lori, Sammy, Brenda and Hindy Chazanow (and her friend from Morisstown). Hindy and friend were here with Birthright, and were able to extend their trip a few extra days. After dinner, they came back to Bet Shemesh to spend the night, and this morning we dropped them off at the airport at 8:30, after which we drove Lori and Brenda back to Jerusalem. After dropping Lori off so she could get a bagel before work, we headed down to the German Colony to drop Brenda off at an orientation day for the high school that she will be starting, B"EH in September.

After depositing Brenda where she needed to be, Eileen and I found parking and had a big breakfast at Cafe Aroma.

To get back home, I took a roundabout route to try to avoid the thousands of police that were deployed in the city for the Gay Pride parade scheduled for 5:00 PM today. As I write this, I am streaming the Channel 2 news and watching live coverage. It looks very, well, colorful.

Apparently, all it takes is a Gay Parade to divert the nations attention from the new terrorist state that Hamas has established on our border. Gotta love those gays? I hear that next week the Adulterers will be having an Adulterers Pride parade, followed by the Lovers of Incest parade.

Personally, I wish these people would stick to Tel-Aviv for their parades. Is this nonsense really a price that Jerusalem has to pay for being not only Gods Capitol City, but also the political Capitol of our secular state?

I just spoke to my mother-in-law. Somehow, they managed to get into the city and rounded up Lori and Brenda for dinner in a restaurant which is just down the block from one of the counter-demonstrations. Those girls sure are eating well this week.

That's about it, will keep you posted!

Death by Defenestration

I should really blog more often.

I see from other blogs that they build momentum and develop a certain rythym. My twice a month postings will never accomplish that. I think I should blog more often. What do you think?

So what's happening today in this small country on the sunny shores of the Eastern Mediterranean?

Here's a good one: Shimon Peres was selected by the Knesset to be the country's ninth president today. It's nice that they finally gave him a figurehead job where he can't cause any trouble. Thank you Knesset!

Next, we have civil war in Gaza. Here I am, sitting peacefully while full fledged civil war is raging just 40 miles away. That's less than the distance to the Lincoln tunnel from my former home in Marlboro (which means, for my non-New York area readers, not far at all).

Hamas (those are the religiously observant Islamic Arabs) have now added Defenestration as a method of disposing of their Fatah foes (Fatah are the secular, formerly Marxist, but now just plain corrupt Islamic Arabs). Recently, Hamas has been grabbing Fatah guys off the streets of Gaza, tying hands behind back and then hurling them from the top floor windows of the highest buildings in Gaza (about 18 stories). This comes on the heels of a rash of particularly cruel shootings committed by Fatah in recent weeks where dozens of bearded young Arab Gazan men are shot at close range in the legs and left in the street to bleed to death (although you can view videos on YouTube where the victims are mercifully shot through the head if they plead sufficiently). Apparently, bearded men in Gaza are presumed to be Hamas supporters. Now might be a good time to be in the disposable razor business in Gaza.

I took a walk today, and I realized that I sure do know a lot of people in this town. On my short walk to the Post Office and back, I saw at least 20 people that I know in one way or another. In all cases, smiles or waves were heartily exchanged. I exchanged greetings with familiar faces in passing cars, as I passed Mercaz HaPizza, Rafi the Pizza guy spotted me and gave a wave. I got a hello from Shai the Computer guy. In the post office I exchanged hellos with 3 familiar faces standing ahead of me in the line, and of course the nice Postal lady asked how things were, she knows me by name which is nice because I never have to show ID when picking up packages. After the Post Office, I got a wave from Dudu the grocer, Murray the other Pizza Guy (at Halav U'Dvash), and don't forget the nice guy at the Felafel stand. On the way back, more familiar faces stopped cars to offer a ride down the hill, but I declined. Passing the Matnas, a group of 8 special young people, mostly with Downs, were walking up the hill holding hands. As I passed through the group, I gave big "Shalom", and got a whole bunch of Shaloms in return. I exchanged Buenos Dias with the nice Argentinian fellow who I sometimes see when I daven at Chabad, gave a big Shalom and a smile to the neighbor next to the Shul who frequently accuses us of throwing our trash in his trash can, and got waves and hellos from all the kids playing outside their houses on the shvil. I would say that at least 10,000 people live in my part of town (out of a total population of 70,000 between Bet Shemesh and Ramat Bet Shemesh). That means that there are lots more people to meet out there!

What else happened today? The Sunnis in Iraq blew up the same revered Shiite mosque today that they blew up a little more than a year ago. Now there is a total curfew in the country, although if I lived in Iraq, I wouldn't need a curfew to know that it would be a good idea to hide in the basement after a thing like that happens. Sunnis make up 20 percent of the population of Iraq, but they want to be in charge of the whole country because they think that their version of Islam is superior. I think they also want to be in control all of the revenues from oil production. You know the old saying in the Arab world: He with the most money can have many wives, but then he needs many houses in which to keep them, and many cars, and many servants and therefore he needs the most money. Doesn't that sound like a circular argument? Or maybe it's a pyramid scheme... ha ha ha that's a funny one! (think Egypt).

Side note: Now that the Arabs are blowing up one another's mosques, I sure hope that we get plenty of advance notice if they are planning to blow up the big one on top of Har HaBayit.

Eileen did a big Chesed yesterday. As we were driving back from Yeheskels hardware store, I was looking out my own window, while Eileen, who was driving, let out a big gasp. I said "What?!" and she pointed to a lady on the ground on the other side of the street. Eileen had witnessed her trip and fall to the ground. We stopped the car, and by the time Eileen crossed the street, the lady was up on her feet. The sidewalk was wet for some reason, and the poor Russian lady was all muddy and scraped up on the arms. Eileen brought her across the street into the car, and we drove her to her apartment, which was pretty much on the other side of town, but that's OK since this whole city is only 1 kilometer wide, so the other side of town isn't really that far.

The Lebanese army has been flexing it's muscles in the last two weeks. They have been mercilessly shelling apartment complexes containing Al-Qaeda inspired "activists" (as the BBC likes to call them) who are hiding amongst the regular civilian population. Dozens have been killed so far. I'm sure this story will have the usual familiar ending: Syria will let loose a series of suicide bombings that will bring the country to a standstill, and the people will have to "invite" the Syrian army back (again) to help restore civil order. This time, it will probably take more than the 30 years that it took the last time.

I saw another photo in the paper of Sudanese refugees sneaking on foot across the Sinai border into our little country. A whole group was picked up yesterday just outside of Beersheva. There is a debate in our country about what to do with them. Not many in the world today are paying attention to the fact that the lighter skinned Islamists in Sudan are terrorizing the indigenous darker skinned African population. Well, terrorizing is not completely accurate. How about murdering, raping, maiming and then terrorizing? That's more accurate. Hundreds of thousands have already died, and millions have been displaced from their homes. I don't get it. Sudan is more than 10 times the size of our little country, but the Islamists can't find enough room there to just let the non-Islamists live in peace? Those Islamists sure do have a hard time getting along with other people. Just ask anyone who has had a car torched in France, or been blown up on the Underground in London. The European Union has it's hands full with it's own Islamists. I guess that's why they don't have the resources to do anything about the ongoing carnage in Sudan. In the meantime, we sit in this small country on the sunny shores of the Eastern Mediterranean, debating how many displaced Sudanese we can absorb into our own economy. I'm sure the UN will find a way to condemn us for that.

Here's a bit of positive news: On Tuesday, UK Conservative Party leader David Cameron said in a public forum that he is a Zionist. His words: "If what you mean by Zionist, is someone who believes that the Jews have a right to a homeland in Israel and a right to their country then, yes, I am a Zionist and I'm proud of the fact that Conservative politicians down the ages have played a huge role in helping bring this about." He took a firm stance on Hamas, saying that Israel "has a totally legitimate right to exist and defend itself." While Tony Blair, the former Labor Party leader and Prime Minister held a similar opinion, Blair frequently expressed his belief that the starting point for a comprehensive peace in the Middle East began with a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Cameron parts company with Blair on this point, saying "I think sometimes politicians can be a bit naive in believing that if only we solved the problem of Israel and Palestine then roadside bombs will stop going off in Iraq."

These words of clarity are welcome in light of the plethora of boycotts against Israel that have been recently declared by Academic and Trade Unions in the UK, who consider the Jooos to be the single greatest threat to peace in the world.

What is a simple Jooo to do? Why do Sunnis hate Shiites so much? Well, where I'm concerned, if the Sunnis and the Shiites and the Alawaites and Baathists and Sufis and Wahabis and Hashemites and Saudis and Persians and Kurds and Egyptians and Copts ever figure a way to live with one another, that's when the Jooos should start to worry.

In the meantime folks, just keep doing acts of random kindness. It's the only solution.

My Birthday, circa 1967

Did you miss it? Yesterday was the 40th anniversary of the start of the Six-Day War. It was all over when my seventh birthday arrived the following week. I didn't know anything about it at the time, it was lost in the background of Vietnam, civil rights demonstrations and Russian nuclear hegemony, broadcast by the ever friendly Walter Cronkite on the little black-and-white television in our living room. I was just an ordinary 2nd grade kid learning reading, writing and arithmetic, and being terrorized by Italian sons-of-mafioso on my twice daily round-trip walk to PS 216.

I wonder how different things would have been if I had been living in this small country on the sunny shores of the Western Mediterranean. I have a 7-year old boy somewhere here in the house! I'll have to remember to ask him when he grows up.

I caught this article on the war from the June 19, 1967 edition of TIME Magazine. It's worth reading if you have time (no pun intended :-). In this modern era of historic revisionism, it's refreshing to go back in time and see how things really were.

So here we are 40 years later, the world is no less dangerous as it was back then, intelligent people stumble around in the dark and still refuse to use their G-d given powers of free-choice for good.

See you all soon in Jerusalem!

Here's the link to TIME Magazine:

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,843937,00.html#

A Post-Holiday Wrap-Up

This small country on the sunny shores of the Eastern Mediterranean is a land of many contrasts. That contrast is most evident in the back-to-back observance of Memorial Day and Independence Day. First we observe 24 hours of greiving, followed by 24 hours of elation. Now that's a contrast!

Speaking of contrasts, I had some time to catch up on reading and saw two interesting items in the paper last Thursday, April 19th.

The first is entitled "The Good Jailer". Two weeks ago, a ceremony was held in which the Feinstein family of Jerusalem was reunited with a Bible that had been held by the Goodwin family of London for some 60 years. Thomas Henry Goodwin, a guard in the British prison in Jerusalem received the Bible from two condemned Jewish prisoners, Meir Feinstein, 19 and Moshe Barazani, 21. The pair were sentened to death by hanging by the British in 1947, Feinstein for his role in the bombing of the Jerusalem train station and Barazani for carrying a grenade for the purpose of assasinating the British military commander.

The second is titled "The Friendly Fires of Hell" by Robert J. White-Harvey. He tells the sad tale of 10,000 Jewish prisoners, survivors of the Holocaust, who were marched out of the camps as the war in Germany came to a close in May, 1945. Why did the Germans march at least 10,000 poor, wretched survivors to Lubeck Harbor on the German Baltic coast? One imagines that the Germans just didn't know what to do with them as the war was coming to a close, and they wanted to hide their crimes from the eyes of the approaching Allies. The motive becomes more clear when we see what the Germans did when the surviving survivors arrived at the port. They were put onto ships as follows: 4,500 were put aboard the Cap Arcona, a once elegant passenger liner, 2,800 were crammed onto on the Thielbeck, a small rusty old freighter flying a white flag, and the balance on the Athen.

It doesn't take much imagination to figure out that the Germans planned to set sail and then sink the ships at sea. I guess that's one way to get rid of Jews when the gas chambers are closed for repairs !

The plot thickens... At the very same moment that the Jews were boarding these ships, the British were arming four squadrons of RAF Hawker Typhoon fighter-bombers to carry out Operational Order 73: To detroy the concentration of enemy shipping in Lubek Bay.

When the British bombers arrived, they found the Cap Arcona teeming with 4,500 wretched passengers, not to mention two old rusty freighters flying white flags and obviously carrying 1000's of passengers, as well as the hospital ship Deutschland.

The British pilots completed their mission successfully. In just 20 minutes, four ships in the harbor were sinking in flames and 7,000 Jews were dead. The British called it a "friendly-fire" incident and slapped a 100 year top-secret classification on the files. The great-grandchildren of the 7,000 victims will have to wait until the year 2045 in order to learn any more about this "horrible accident". It's apparent that the British wanted to keep it quiet in order not to cast a sour note on an otherwise victorious conclusion to the war. Either that, or they were really emabarassed that the RAF hires pilots with really bad eyesight.

Until those files are opened in another 38 years, you can visit a small memorial erected by residents who lived near the beach where a great many of the Jewish bodies washed ashore and were buried. The Germans also opened a small two-room exhibit in nearby Neustadt-in-Holstein to document the tragedy in 1990.

Back to April 21, 1947. Anti-British "terrorists" Feinstein and Barazani await execution in their cell. The British acquiesce to Arab demands, and impose a blockade on Jewish immigration to Palestine. When ships laden with hundreds of thousands of Jewish survivors approach the beaches of Palestine, the British impound them and send the Jews to concentration camps in Cyprus and other locations. The British sit and wonder how they will solve their Jewish problem... Hmmm... where have we heard that before?

Feinstein and Barazani had been born in Palestine, and knew first hand what the British were up to. They joined underground Jewish organizations that were committed to driving the British out of the land... Hmmm... where have we heard that before?

They probably considered talking things over with the British military officers over tea at the King David first, but that wouldn't have made it to the front page of the New York Times. In the end, they decided to blow up the military officers. The Jew-haters of the world point to this as evidence that the Jews are the real terrorists in the world, and that the state that they created was created through terrorism. They still use this perverted calculus to justify destroying that state through terrorism, such as boarding school buses and putting bullets through the brains of young Jewish school children.

The end of the story: While in prision awaiting their execution by the British, Feinstein and Barazani decided to commit suicide so as not to give the British the satisfaction of seeing them hang. Feinstein had a Bible in which he and Barazani inscribed some last words, one inscription in Hebrew, the other in English, expressing their desire to die as proud men.

They presented the inscribed Bible to the aforementioned guard on duty, Thomas Henry Goodwin, and committed suicide shortly thereafter. Goodwin ultimately returned to England, taking the Bible with him. Before his death more than a half-century later, he asked his family to locate Feinsteins family in order to return the Bible to them. Goodwins son Dennis contacted the Prime Ministers office who in turn located Feinsteins nephew Elazar Feinstein. In a ceremony in Jerusalem a few weeks ago, Goodwin arrived from London and presented the inscribed Bible to Feinstein, who turned it over to be displayed at the Underground Prisoners Museum.

Post-script: We've heard this suicide thing before, just look at the story of Masada. So nu??? What would you do? Is suicide more noble than being put to death at the hands of an unjust authority.

In short, I don't think so. You never know from where your salvation will come. How did Feinstein and Barazani know for sure that the minute they were put on the gallows, some Zorro-like figure on a horse with a sword wouldn't come and slash the hangman's ropes? How do we know for sure that the British Governor wouldn't at the last moment issue a stay of execution? We will never know what could have been.

When you see the universe as G-d's handiwork, and trust that He runs the world in ways that we cannot see or understand, that there is no such thing as "coincidence" and everything happens for a reason, then to take your own life is arrogance, because it says that you think you know what is going to happen in the future better than the Big Guy upstairs who created you.

Well, hope you all had a meaningful Holocaust Memorial Day and a meaningful Memorial Day and a meaningful Independence Day. They come and go every year at this time, but believe me, they have an influence that lasts far longer.

To the Bat Cave

Our Memorial / Independence Day observances are now coming to a close in this small country on the sunny shores of the Eastern Mediterranean.

Sunday night we headed up to the Andarta for the central Memorial service at 8:00 PM, then made our way to the shul to see a documentary called "The 17th Victim". It starts with a bus that was bombed by terrorists near Megiddo in 2002. One of the victims was burned beyond recoginition, and as no one came forward to report a missing person, the body was buried in an anyonymous grave. The documentary maker, David Ofek, was so disturbed by this that he began his own private investigation. Time and time again he reached dead ends, but finally, in what can only be described as a miracle, he found his needle in a haystack and discovered the identity of the unknown victim, enabling the family to rebury him and grieve.

The next morning, the kids went off to school for their respective Remembrance ceremonies, and at 11:00 AM, the sirens sounded all over the country for the traditional minute of silence. Afterwards, Imma and I headed out to the supermarket to stock up for our Independence Day barbeque and then picked up all the kids from school.

Back at home, Imma prepared our traditional and quintessential Independence Eve meal: Homemade Felafel. After dinner, we headed up to the shul for the special Independence Day tefillot (prayers). I met Shalom there, and invited him back to our place. Back home, a group of us headed to the neighbors down the block who host an annual open house. We shmoozed, listened to the music from the big concert being given in the park across the road from us, and saw two sets of fireworks, one at 9:30, the second at 11:30. Got to bed around 1:00 AM.

I was the first one up at 7:00 AM, Ezri was the only one I was able to wake up to come to the morning davening (prayer) at 8:00, followed by a pancake breakfast. It was festive! I even treated Shalom to breakfast.

Back home, Imma made fresh waffles for those who didn't get out of bed on time, and then we packed up some snacks and lots of water and headed out for the traditional Independence Day tiyul (hike). We decided to hike the trail up Nachal Dolev to the bat caves. The trails were full of people so it was slow going. After a half hour of hiking we arrived at the bat caves, but the iron gates at the entrance were locked, so everyone (well, almost everyone) was disappointed. We decided to continue our eastward trek towards Yerushalayim. We hiked for a full hour more, climbing up the hills and down the valleys, hoping to reach Mayan Sifla (The Sifla spring). The trails were crowded and it was slow going. We proceeded eastward an additional half-hour, but the ladies decided that we should start to head back. We will try to make our way up to the spring on another day when it is not quite so crowded.

The hike down was a lot quicker, we made it back to the car in under 1 1/2 hours. As soon as we returned home, we started to prepare for the big barbeque.

Not only is today Independence Day, it's also Eli's 16th birthday! We invited Saba and Savta to our barbeque, and we put up steaks, burgers, hot-dogs and chicken. Yummy.

Now it's time for us all to rest our tired feet until the next day off, which is Lag B'Omer, which unbelievably is only 11 days from now!

Chances are good that you can see some nice pictures of our hike on Lori's blog, whose link you will find conveniently listed elsewhere on this page.

Our Memorial Day

Memorial Day begins Sunday evening here in this small country on the sunny shores of the Eastern Mediterranean.

Memorial Day in this country is a lot different than Memorial Day in the USA.

In the USA, memories are short. Memorial Day parades are becoming few and far between. Patriotism is out of fashion. Families spend the day at the beach, at the shopping mall and return home for a barbeque.

My first Memorial Day here was a real shocker. Tonight, Sunday, I will be observing my fourth. Let me try to describe it for you:

As the sun sets tonight, thousands of people will stream towards the Andarta (monument) to the fallen sons and daughters of the town. There, we will stand in line and pass a display of the photos and names of all the fallen. Memorial candles are lit everywhere. There are thousands of people milling about. Soon, the memorial Tekes (ceremony) will begin on a central stage. Family members of the fallen make their way to a reserved seating area in front of the stage. The chief Rav (rabbi) of the town delivers opening words, followed by the mayor, then a presentation by some school kids, high school kids read some poems, selected family members speak.

Then the grande finale: The family members rise from their seats and recite Kaddish in unison.

At that moment, in every city and town in this microscopic country of 8,000 sq. miles, the family members of over 22,000 fallen sons and daughters, PLUS the family members of the thousands murdered by terrorists, are all standing and reciting Kaddish in the evening darkness.

The sun rises the next morning. There are 5.5 million people in this country that will observe Memorial Day today. Hundreds of thousands of them travel to the cemeteries. They make their way to the graves of their loved ones. They grieve and they wait in the sun. Then, at 11:00 AM, a sound is heard throughout the land. Air-raid sirens wail simultaneously throughout the country for one minute. It is a minute that is spent reflecting on the sacrifices that enable us to live freely in the land of our forefathers.

The families return home. The sun sets again. Independence Day commences. Fireworks fill the sky. Barbeques are ignited. Freedom is celebrated.

Happy 59th Birthday to this small country on the sunny shores of the Eastern Mediterranean!