What about us?
Zahava Englard
The other night, I stood in the pouring rain in front of the Prime Minister’s residence with hundreds of others that huddled together with bereaved families who have had their loved ones ripped from their lives because of Arab terror. A sea of black umbrellas appeared in the dark of the night as one canopy protecting us from the downpour, as our voices cried out in vain to the stones of Netanyahu’s home for him to protect us. We pleaded to our Prime Minister, to our leader, not to forsake his own people and set the murderers free.
For two decades, successive governments of Israel have pushed through “confidence building measures” for an Arab enemy whose leaders declare, to the delight of its people, that the negotiations with Israel is just one step in the process of destroying the State of Israel.
For two decades, the people of Israel watched the Arabs rejoice at each of these confidence building measures, knowing well that such actions on the part of the Israeli government is a sign of weakness and lack of conviction – interpreting it to mean that Israel does not have the staying power that they possess.
Indeed, the “confidence building measures” of freeing convicted terrorists give the Arab people the confidence to pursue their terror tactics with impunity. Hence, Israel joins the US and Europe in permitting their tactics to triumph.
For two decades, the people of Israel have watched the Oslo process unfold into a nightmare as thousands among us were brutally killed and maimed, and casually labeled as “sacrifices for peace” by our own leaders who displayed an unpardonable vulgar callousness to their fellow Jews.
For two decades, the government of Israel has bent over backwards to raise the moral of our enemy, which begs the question, what about us?
When is it our turn? What about our moral?
When will our leaders put the security of their own people first?
Where are the confidence building measures for us?
We give our lives to protect this land. We give our sons and daughters, husbands, brothers and sisters….We sacrifice to live here and we persevere in the face of extreme existential challenges.
So, prime ministers of Israel, whether you go by the name of Peres or Netanyahu, when will you stop behaving like subservient minions to the US and Europe and begin to care about your own people?
When will you stop contributing to our own destruction?
Detractors of Israel have a short memory of all the concessions that all of you have made on behalf of “peace.” Yet, rather than garner any backbone, you all continue, to the detriment of your own people, to appease your masters in Washington and in the capitols of Europe.
Prime Ministers of Israel, your people want to know… How many more terrorists will you continue to unleash from prison so that they may kill more of us?
How many more of us are to be savagely murdered in order to satiate your quest for acceptability among the nations?
Have these “confidence measures” helped in the past?
Have they brought us any closer to peace?
Has the enemy terminated their policy of terror tactics?
Have they stopped indoctrinating their young to carry on the legacy of murdering Jews?
Have they stopped speaking of a Palestinian State as one that would encompass the entire Land of Israel?
Have they stopped trying to erase our historical and biblical claims to our land?
Have they eased up at all in generating and propagating their hate-filled disinformation against Israel throughout the world?
Have these concessions and confidence measures instilled any serious desire in our enemy to make peace with us?
Quite the contrary.
Since you, O’ leaders of Israel suffer from a short memory as our detractors do, allow me to remind you with a brief timeline of Israel’s concessions and confidence measures and their resulting consequences.
September, 1993: Jericho and Gaza are transferred to the Arabs.
September, 1995: Under Oslo II, Judea and Samaria are divided into three areas: Area A, which is under exclusive PA control; Area B, where the PA have civilian control and Israelis control security; and Area C, which is controlled exclusively by Israel.
December, 1995: Israel withdraws its troops from five major Arab cities and RELEASES 1,000 terrorists from prison.
From February 25 through March 4, 1996 Arab suicide attacks kill dozens and wound hundreds. On March 4th alone, in a Tel Aviv mall, 13 people are killed and 157 are wounded. The dead are all under 17 years old.
January 15, 1997: Israel withdraws from Hebron, leaving behind only a small enclave of Jewish residents. Now Arafat’s Palestinian Authority controls all of the major cities in Judea, Samaria and Gaza.
March 21, 1997: A suicide bomber explodes himself in a packed café in Tel Aviv.
July 30, 1997: Two suicide attacks in Jerusalem’s main market (Machaneh Yehuda) within 10 minutes of each other killing 16. Hundreds are wounded.
September, 4, 1997: Three suicide attacks in Jerusalem. Five Israelis are killed and more than 200 wounded. Netanyahu blocks land transfers to the Arabs, declaring that no more land will be handed over to the Arabs as long as the terror attacks continue.
October, 1998: Wye River Memorandum is signed permitting the construction of an international airport for the Arabs in the Gaza Strip. Israel agrees to pull back its forces from an additional 13% of Judea and Samaria and to RELEASE 750 Arab terrorists. Due to the ceaseless terror, only half of the pull-back is finished and only 250 prisoners are released.
The Palestinian Authority agrees to combat terrorist organizations, to arrest those involved in terrorist activities, and to collect all illegal weapons and explosives. None of this is ever done.
September 3-5, 1999: Sharm El-Sheikh Memorandum – Israel AGREES TO RELEASE another 350 security prisoners in two phases.
May 24, 2000: Israel withdraws from southern Lebanon. Hezbollah considers Israel’s flight as a massive victory. The PA and their followers are encouraged by Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon and believe they, too, can achieve their aims by fighting rather than negotiating.
July 11-25, 2000: Camp David summit. Issues such as Jerusalem, statehood, boundaries, and refugees are put on the table. Clinton proposes that Israel relinquish almost all of Judea, Samaria and Gaza to the Arabs; the two sides would swap small parcels of land and they would agree to share control of Jerusalem. Barak uses Clinton’s proposal as a starting point and suggests several changes.
Arafat argues that the Jews have no claim at all to the area of the Temple Mount, and therefore, refuses any compromise and rejects the entire proposal. He returns home to a hero’s welcome.
Calls for an uprising, a new intifada, are heard and evidently planned.
September, 2000: Arafat is invited to Barak’s private residence. The meeting reportedly goes well. At the end of the evening, Arafat requests that Ariel Sharon be denied permission to visit the Temple Mount. Barak, however, saying he cannot prevent Sharon’s visit, coordinates the visit with the Palestinian Authority, which agrees to keep peace in the area.
Sept. 28, 2000: Sharon visits the Temple Mount and the PA uses this opportunity to initiate the “Al Aqsa intifada.”
October 12, 2000: Two Israeli reservists accidentally stray into PA territory and are lynched by an Arab mob.
During the “Al-Aqsa Intifada” (Sept. 2000 – Dec. 2005) another 1,100 Israelis were killed.
Among Barak’s staunchest supporters, many now distrust the Arab’s intentions and Barak announces his resignation in December, 2000. He then crosses all of Israel’s red lines and tries desperately to win support for reelection by quickly pushing through a reckless deal with the PA in Taba, January, 2001. The new terms go much further than what Israel and the U.S. had offered at Camp David. Yet, even this was turned down by the PA and once again the PA refused the opportunity to create a state.
February, 6, 2001: Sharon defeats Barak in a landslide.
Arab suicide bombings become an almost daily event.
March 27, 2002: Arab bomber explodes himself in a Netanya Hotel on Passover, killing 30.
Two days later, Israel finally launches Operation Defensive Shield. Israeli troops reenter cities given over to the PA, targeting terrorists. In Ramallah, Israeli forces enter Arafat’s compound and hold him captive and isolated for 31 days.
June 19-20, 2002: Two bombings kill more than two dozen Israelis in Jerusalem.
The terror continues.
February, 2005: At a meeting in Sharm el-Sheikh, Israel PLEDGES TO RELEASE another 900 Arab terrorist prisoners. By the spring of 2005, 500 of these are released, but after Qassam rocket attacks on Sderot in May, Ariel Sharon withholds the release of the remaining 400.
August, 2005: Israel withdraws all troops and all Israeli civilian residents out of Gaza. The Arabs, rather than prove their capacity to govern over their new acquisition peacefully and responsibly, use these areas as terrorist training grounds and rocket launching pads against Israel. For the next decade, more than 12,000 missiles strike the civilian population centers of southern Israel.
Since December 2005, Arab terrorist attacks have claimed at least another 135 Israeli lives.
August, 2008: Israel RELEASES 198 terrorists to encourage diplomatic relations and support Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas.
December, 2008: Israel RELEASES 224 terrorists.
In 2011, the Israeli government RELEASES 1,027 terrorists in exchange for captured soldier, Gilad Shalit, held hostage for over five years in Gaza.
August, 2013: The Israeli Cabinet agrees on a four-stage process by which 104 terrorists WILL BE RELEASED as part of a “confidence-building measure” just to get Mahmoud Abbas to the negotiating table.
Too many to enumerate in this post, a comprehensive list of all the victims of Arab terror since 1993 can be found at this link, http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Terrorism/victims.html
Prime Ministers of Israel, begging the enemy to negotiate for peace is a no-win situation. The past two decades have clearly proven that concessions and “confidence building measures” toward the enemy only serve to whet their appetite.
And above all, setting our murderers free and forsaking the security of your own people is wicked and reeks of cowardice.
עד מתי?
Until when?
We are indeed alone. Alone and abandoned by our own heads of government.
If not our own leaders, who will build our moral?
If not our own leaders, who will be for the Jewish people?
http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/what-about-us/
Zahava Englard
The other night, I stood in the pouring rain in front of the Prime Minister’s residence with hundreds of others that huddled together with bereaved families who have had their loved ones ripped from their lives because of Arab terror. A sea of black umbrellas appeared in the dark of the night as one canopy protecting us from the downpour, as our voices cried out in vain to the stones of Netanyahu’s home for him to protect us. We pleaded to our Prime Minister, to our leader, not to forsake his own people and set the murderers free.
For two decades, successive governments of Israel have pushed through “confidence building measures” for an Arab enemy whose leaders declare, to the delight of its people, that the negotiations with Israel is just one step in the process of destroying the State of Israel.
For two decades, the people of Israel watched the Arabs rejoice at each of these confidence building measures, knowing well that such actions on the part of the Israeli government is a sign of weakness and lack of conviction – interpreting it to mean that Israel does not have the staying power that they possess.
Indeed, the “confidence building measures” of freeing convicted terrorists give the Arab people the confidence to pursue their terror tactics with impunity. Hence, Israel joins the US and Europe in permitting their tactics to triumph.
For two decades, the people of Israel have watched the Oslo process unfold into a nightmare as thousands among us were brutally killed and maimed, and casually labeled as “sacrifices for peace” by our own leaders who displayed an unpardonable vulgar callousness to their fellow Jews.
For two decades, the government of Israel has bent over backwards to raise the moral of our enemy, which begs the question, what about us?
When is it our turn? What about our moral?
When will our leaders put the security of their own people first?
Where are the confidence building measures for us?
We give our lives to protect this land. We give our sons and daughters, husbands, brothers and sisters….We sacrifice to live here and we persevere in the face of extreme existential challenges.
So, prime ministers of Israel, whether you go by the name of Peres or Netanyahu, when will you stop behaving like subservient minions to the US and Europe and begin to care about your own people?
When will you stop contributing to our own destruction?
Detractors of Israel have a short memory of all the concessions that all of you have made on behalf of “peace.” Yet, rather than garner any backbone, you all continue, to the detriment of your own people, to appease your masters in Washington and in the capitols of Europe.
Prime Ministers of Israel, your people want to know… How many more terrorists will you continue to unleash from prison so that they may kill more of us?
How many more of us are to be savagely murdered in order to satiate your quest for acceptability among the nations?
Have these “confidence measures” helped in the past?
Have they brought us any closer to peace?
Has the enemy terminated their policy of terror tactics?
Have they stopped indoctrinating their young to carry on the legacy of murdering Jews?
Have they stopped speaking of a Palestinian State as one that would encompass the entire Land of Israel?
Have they stopped trying to erase our historical and biblical claims to our land?
Have they eased up at all in generating and propagating their hate-filled disinformation against Israel throughout the world?
Have these concessions and confidence measures instilled any serious desire in our enemy to make peace with us?
Quite the contrary.
Since you, O’ leaders of Israel suffer from a short memory as our detractors do, allow me to remind you with a brief timeline of Israel’s concessions and confidence measures and their resulting consequences.
September, 1993: Jericho and Gaza are transferred to the Arabs.
September, 1995: Under Oslo II, Judea and Samaria are divided into three areas: Area A, which is under exclusive PA control; Area B, where the PA have civilian control and Israelis control security; and Area C, which is controlled exclusively by Israel.
December, 1995: Israel withdraws its troops from five major Arab cities and RELEASES 1,000 terrorists from prison.
From February 25 through March 4, 1996 Arab suicide attacks kill dozens and wound hundreds. On March 4th alone, in a Tel Aviv mall, 13 people are killed and 157 are wounded. The dead are all under 17 years old.
January 15, 1997: Israel withdraws from Hebron, leaving behind only a small enclave of Jewish residents. Now Arafat’s Palestinian Authority controls all of the major cities in Judea, Samaria and Gaza.
March 21, 1997: A suicide bomber explodes himself in a packed café in Tel Aviv.
July 30, 1997: Two suicide attacks in Jerusalem’s main market (Machaneh Yehuda) within 10 minutes of each other killing 16. Hundreds are wounded.
September, 4, 1997: Three suicide attacks in Jerusalem. Five Israelis are killed and more than 200 wounded. Netanyahu blocks land transfers to the Arabs, declaring that no more land will be handed over to the Arabs as long as the terror attacks continue.
October, 1998: Wye River Memorandum is signed permitting the construction of an international airport for the Arabs in the Gaza Strip. Israel agrees to pull back its forces from an additional 13% of Judea and Samaria and to RELEASE 750 Arab terrorists. Due to the ceaseless terror, only half of the pull-back is finished and only 250 prisoners are released.
The Palestinian Authority agrees to combat terrorist organizations, to arrest those involved in terrorist activities, and to collect all illegal weapons and explosives. None of this is ever done.
September 3-5, 1999: Sharm El-Sheikh Memorandum – Israel AGREES TO RELEASE another 350 security prisoners in two phases.
May 24, 2000: Israel withdraws from southern Lebanon. Hezbollah considers Israel’s flight as a massive victory. The PA and their followers are encouraged by Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon and believe they, too, can achieve their aims by fighting rather than negotiating.
July 11-25, 2000: Camp David summit. Issues such as Jerusalem, statehood, boundaries, and refugees are put on the table. Clinton proposes that Israel relinquish almost all of Judea, Samaria and Gaza to the Arabs; the two sides would swap small parcels of land and they would agree to share control of Jerusalem. Barak uses Clinton’s proposal as a starting point and suggests several changes.
Arafat argues that the Jews have no claim at all to the area of the Temple Mount, and therefore, refuses any compromise and rejects the entire proposal. He returns home to a hero’s welcome.
Calls for an uprising, a new intifada, are heard and evidently planned.
September, 2000: Arafat is invited to Barak’s private residence. The meeting reportedly goes well. At the end of the evening, Arafat requests that Ariel Sharon be denied permission to visit the Temple Mount. Barak, however, saying he cannot prevent Sharon’s visit, coordinates the visit with the Palestinian Authority, which agrees to keep peace in the area.
Sept. 28, 2000: Sharon visits the Temple Mount and the PA uses this opportunity to initiate the “Al Aqsa intifada.”
October 12, 2000: Two Israeli reservists accidentally stray into PA territory and are lynched by an Arab mob.
During the “Al-Aqsa Intifada” (Sept. 2000 – Dec. 2005) another 1,100 Israelis were killed.
Among Barak’s staunchest supporters, many now distrust the Arab’s intentions and Barak announces his resignation in December, 2000. He then crosses all of Israel’s red lines and tries desperately to win support for reelection by quickly pushing through a reckless deal with the PA in Taba, January, 2001. The new terms go much further than what Israel and the U.S. had offered at Camp David. Yet, even this was turned down by the PA and once again the PA refused the opportunity to create a state.
February, 6, 2001: Sharon defeats Barak in a landslide.
Arab suicide bombings become an almost daily event.
March 27, 2002: Arab bomber explodes himself in a Netanya Hotel on Passover, killing 30.
Two days later, Israel finally launches Operation Defensive Shield. Israeli troops reenter cities given over to the PA, targeting terrorists. In Ramallah, Israeli forces enter Arafat’s compound and hold him captive and isolated for 31 days.
June 19-20, 2002: Two bombings kill more than two dozen Israelis in Jerusalem.
The terror continues.
February, 2005: At a meeting in Sharm el-Sheikh, Israel PLEDGES TO RELEASE another 900 Arab terrorist prisoners. By the spring of 2005, 500 of these are released, but after Qassam rocket attacks on Sderot in May, Ariel Sharon withholds the release of the remaining 400.
August, 2005: Israel withdraws all troops and all Israeli civilian residents out of Gaza. The Arabs, rather than prove their capacity to govern over their new acquisition peacefully and responsibly, use these areas as terrorist training grounds and rocket launching pads against Israel. For the next decade, more than 12,000 missiles strike the civilian population centers of southern Israel.
Since December 2005, Arab terrorist attacks have claimed at least another 135 Israeli lives.
August, 2008: Israel RELEASES 198 terrorists to encourage diplomatic relations and support Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas.
December, 2008: Israel RELEASES 224 terrorists.
In 2011, the Israeli government RELEASES 1,027 terrorists in exchange for captured soldier, Gilad Shalit, held hostage for over five years in Gaza.
August, 2013: The Israeli Cabinet agrees on a four-stage process by which 104 terrorists WILL BE RELEASED as part of a “confidence-building measure” just to get Mahmoud Abbas to the negotiating table.
Too many to enumerate in this post, a comprehensive list of all the victims of Arab terror since 1993 can be found at this link, http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Terrorism/victims.html
Prime Ministers of Israel, begging the enemy to negotiate for peace is a no-win situation. The past two decades have clearly proven that concessions and “confidence building measures” toward the enemy only serve to whet their appetite.
And above all, setting our murderers free and forsaking the security of your own people is wicked and reeks of cowardice.
עד מתי?
Until when?
We are indeed alone. Alone and abandoned by our own heads of government.
If not our own leaders, who will build our moral?
If not our own leaders, who will be for the Jewish people?
http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/what-about-us/
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