Not a Parody: Peace Now Shocked to Discover Arabs Don’t Want Peace

Jonathan S. Tobin
What will it take toconvince supporters of Peace Now the imperative of their organization’s name depends on the Arabs rather than the Jews? After 18+ years of Arab terrorism and rejection of peace offers since the Oslo Accords, it’s hard to say whether anything the Palestinians could do or say would cause them to rethink their myopic view of the world. But give Americans for Peace Now’s Lara Friedman a little credit. After schlepping to an Arab League conference on Jerusalem, she at least had the wit to notice that just about everybody else there was focused on delegitimizing Israel, denouncing its existence within any borders and denying thousands of years of Jewish history.

However, it’s hard not to chuckle a little bit at the indignant tone affected by Friedman inher op-ed published in the Forward as she conveys her shock and dismay to discover the Arab world believes Jews have no rights in Jerusalem or any other part of Israel. She and her group had so convinced themselves all it will take to create peace “now” was for Israelis to support a two-state solution and negotiate, it appears they never took the time or effort to realize the other side has little interest in peace, now or at any other time. This gives her piece the tone of a parody worthy of The Onion even though it was written in deadly earnest. Indeed, it must be considered in writing such an article she has demonstrated the utter cluelessness of her group better than anything the group’s critics could have come up with.

What is so touching (as well as more than a bit comical) about Friedman’s piece is that much of what she says in it is true. For example:

If President Abbas cannot acknowledge Jewish claims in Jerusalem, even as he asserts Palestinian claims (a problem Yasser Arafat suffered from), he should not be surprised if it is more difficult for Israelis and Jews, wherever they are, to believe that he can be trusted in a peace agreement that leaves Jerusalem sites precious to Jews under Palestinian control.

If representatives of the organization that sponsored the Arab Peace Initiative cannot bring themselves to acknowledge the legitimacy of Jewish equities in Jerusalem, they should know that they discredit their own professed interest in peace. …

All throughout the day, it was unfortunately the same story. Participants talked about Jerusalem as if Jewish history did not exist or was a fraud — as if all Jewish claims in the city were just a tactic to dispossess Palestinians.

Friedman is quite right about all of this. But does it really need to be pointed out that she needn’t have traveled to Doha to figure this out? The Palestinians and their cheerleaders have been making this clear for decades. That is why Peace Now in Israel has been discredited by the events that have transpired since the Oslo Accords were signed, and their political supporters in the Knesset have been trounced in election after election. The traditional left in Israel, at least as far as the Palestinian issue is concerned, is barely alive, though you wouldn’t know it from the way many on the Jewish left in the United States talk. The conceit of groups like Americans for Peace Now and J Street — that Israel must be pressured to make peace by the United States for its own good — makes no sense once you realize the Jewish state has repeatedly tried and failed to trade land for peace and the Palestinians have little interest in a two-state solution no matter where Israel’s borders would be drawn.

Friedman archly compares the Arab hate fest she is attending to Jewish conclaves where only pro-Israel speakers participate. This is a bit much as is her insinuation no one who cares for Israel’s future can possibly oppose a partition of Jerusalem that would place Jewish holy places in the tender care of Abbas and his Hamas allies. As she has discovered to her consternation, Palestinians don’t care about Jewish sensibilities, let alone Jewish rights. Her failure to draw any rational conclusions from what she has heard in Doha tells us all we need to know about the irrelevance of Peace Now to any serious discussion about the future of the Middle East.

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2012/02/28/peace-now-shocked-arab-league-jerusalem/

White House Wants to Keep Gas Prices High

White House Wants to Keep Gas Prices High

Mike Brownfield



With the national average of gas prices hitting $3.65 a gallon, nearing $6 in some parts of the country, and poised to head even higher, America’s families are wondering when the bleeding at the pump will stop. But for Secretary of Energy Stephen Chu, those steep prices aren’t even a concern. In fact, he says his goal is not to get the price of gasoline to go down.

Chu delivered those stunning remarks in testimony before Congress yesterday. When Rep. Alan Nunnelee (R-Miss.) asked Chu whether it’s his “overall goal to get our price” of gasoline lower, Chu said, “No, the overall goal is to decrease our dependency on oil, to build and strengthen our economy.” As shocking as his remarks are, they shouldn’t come as a surprise. Chu has a long record of advocating for higher gas prices. In 2008, he stated, “Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.” Last March, he reiterated his point in an interview with Fox News’ Chris Wallace, noting that his focus is to ease the pain felt by his energy policies by forcing automakers to make more fuel-efficient automobiles. “What I’m doing since I became Secretary of Energy has been quite clear. What I have been doing is developing methods to take the pain out of high gas prices.”

One of those methods is dumping taxpayer dollars into alternative energy projects like the Solyndra solar plant. Another is subsidizing the purchase of high-cost electric cars like the Chevy Volt to the tune of $7,500 per car (which the White House wants to increase to $10,000). In both cases, those methods aren’t working. Solyndra went bankrupt because its product couldn’t bear the weight of market pressures, and Chevy Volts aren’t selling, even with taxpayer-funded rebates. What’s the president’s next plan? Harvesting “a bunch of algae” as a replacement for oil.

Meanwhile, the Obama Administration is seemingly doing everything it can to make paying for energy even more painful by refusing to open access to the country’s oil and gas reserves and blocking new projects that would lead to the development of more energy in America. Case in point: the president’s decision to say “no” to the Keystone XL pipeline, a project that would have delivered hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil from Canada to Texas refineries, while bringing thousands of jobs along with it.

Sensing impending political fallout from the high cost of gas, President Obama last week spoke on the subject and attempted to deflect blame for the pain. He said that there is no quick fix to high gas prices and the nation cannot drill its way out of the problem, but as Heritage’s Nicolas Loris writes, the president ignored reality and dished out a series of half-truths. Among them, the president claimed oil production is its highest in eight years, that increasing oil production takes too long, and that oil is not enough. Loris writes that while production is up on private lands, unrealized production on federal lands and offshore could have yielded even more output, increasing supply and driving down costs. If the president had said “yes” to Keystone, oil could have reach the market quickly. And as for the president’s push for alternative energy, those sources simply cannot stand the test of the market.

There are steps the president and Congress can and should take today to bring down the cost of energy. Namely, end the de facto moratorium on drilling, open offshore areas that are off-limits to drilling, place a 270-day limit on environmental reviews for energy projects on federal lands, remove regulatory delays, and approve Keystone.

As Loris writes, “The market would respond if Congress and the Obama Administration allowed it to work.” But Secretary Chu and the Obama Administration are evidently not interested in market-based reforms that bring down the cost of energy. Instead, they’re bent on keeping energy costs high in order to placate the environmental left. And now Americans are paying the price.

VIDEO: Watch President Obama and Secretary Chu describe in their own words their vision of higher energy prices. See the video on YouTube.

Quick Hits:

Former governor Mitt Romney won the presidential primary contests in Michigan and Arizona last night. Now the GOP race heads to Washington state for caucuses, then on to Super Tuesday when ten states will hold primaries and caucuses.

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) will not seek reelection in 2012 because of increasing polarization in Washington. “Unfortunately, I do not realistically expect the partisanship of recent years in the Senate to change over the short term,” Snowe said.

The U.S. Treasury Department has disrupted a Dubai-based banking operation that Iran was using to evade sanctions in order to process oil sales.

Egyptian authorities say they have arrested a leading member of al-Qaeda. The man they arrested, Egyptian-born Mohammed Ibrahim Makkawi, is a former Egyptian military officer who was dishonorably discharged for joining Jihadist fighters in the 1980s.

VIDEO: Britain’s Liam Fox has a warning for America: Fix the debt problem now or suffer the consequences of less power on the world stage. Watch the exclusive interview on The Foundry.

http://docstalk.blogspot.com/2012/02/white-house-wants-to-keep-gas-prices.html

The United States, a Hijacked Country

The United States, a Hijacked Country

By Nurit Greenger

The United States of America has been hijacked by Barack Hussein Obama; he has turned to be a president who is anti-America; he is a profound liar, lacks manners and humility and a narcissist; an opportunist who is feckless, lazy and indecisive, who lacks leadership, is a cowardice, naïve, and delusional. Obama is totally inept for the job, as the president of this country. This man promised to make a change and he has been doing just that, changing all that America stands for. Obama's millions of victims are those who elected him who are suffering from the Stockholm syndrome and star gazing disease; they see Obama a rising star. Obama's supporters lack nationalism, patriotism, the pride in their country as well as the knowledge of what the constitution of their country stands for. They also do not know what their country stood for, until Obama took office. Obama and his supporters want to see the destruction of America. Unless we stop them, they are well on their way to push this country off the cliff.

Obama is the blame everyone else president. He blames all that has gone or is going wrong on others and he will fast take credit for all that goes right, whether he has done the right thing or has not. Obama scapegoats the American people; he makes them bear the blame and suffer for others.

Obama is the disgracing America president. He has the propensity to apologize for everything. Obama's ongoing apologies stands as a metaphor; it is like when a waiter in a restaurant pours hot coffee all over a guest, and while the gust is aching with burns pain, he turns around and apologizes to the waiter for his clumsiness.

Obama's latest shameful, apologetic behavior was his apology to the president of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai and the Afghan people, for American troops burning Qur'an books; he deliberately left out that the only ones who, in fact, desecrated the Qur'an books, bought by American tax payers' money, were extremist Moslems, who were writing and passing message in their holy books, which they are not suppose to do, as this dictate is written in the Qur'an itself. In his kowtowing to evil in the world, Obama has not demanded an apology from the Afghans for killing American troops, who are fighting a war, with the stated goal of dismantling the al-Qaeda terrorist organization and ending its use of Afghanistan as their base.

Obama also has omitted the importance of the United States' goal, which is to remove the extremist Taliban regime from Afghanistan and create a viable democratic state instead. A decade into the war, that began on October 7, 2001, the U.S. still continues to battle a widespread Taliban insurgency and the war has now expanded into the Tribal areas of neighboring Pakistan, with no end in sight.

Obama has supported the "Arab Spring" that has turned into radical Moslem gathering storm that will destabilize the entire world.

Obama is the appeasing the environmentalists president; in time when the United States' dependency on foreign oil, from non-friendly Moslem oil producing countries, is greatly threatened and the cost of gas is at a new height, instead of allowing drilling for fossil fuel on American soil, Obama is appeasing his environmentalists supporters, thus making the US much more dependent on its enemy's oil supply.

Obama is the cowardice president. He is terrified to show the world Americas' might. The worst case is with Iran. His fear for their reaction, should he put his foot down with the Iranian regime that is pursuing to produce nuclear weapons, has left Iran hands totally free to continue developing nuclear weapons with which they will threaten every American and the entire world's security.

Iran is at war with the USA and Israel and their intent is clear. They want to expand their autocracy and expand their Moslem caliphate, the domination of Islam all over the world. Obama needs to make sure that Iran will not be permitted to have nuclear weapons, however, he has been scared to take the right and effective actions to stop Iran's nuclear ambitions.

Islam is at war with the entire free world and that includes Iran. For the past ten years, large percentage of the people who believe in the Qur'an have radicalized. It is estimated that there are over 100 million radical Moslems in the world, ready to cause terror and mayhem all over. They are ready to use the Qur'an to justify evil and murder around the world. It is mainstream Moslems who have radicalized and are radicalizing, and moderate Moslems, who are very few and far between, are afraid to speak up.

Islamic supremacist ideology is on the rise among mainstream Moslems. It is Moslem neighbor against other Moslem neighbor.

The time has come to recognize that mainstream Islam has declared a war on the West and it is time be begin defending ourselves.

Since Obama took office he has denigrated the United States. His claim to fame is that the US does not possess exceptionality. Obama has become the official Denigrator in Chief.

Obama has bowed to Islam time and time again; in the Middle East, where Moslems only understand strength and heavy hand, bowing means submission and weakness and brings about lack of respect and denigration. Since Islam declared a war on the West, they see the west a weak enemy they can win against.

The United States has been a force of good around the world and Obama has shaken the roots of this force, thus have put doubt in many that the US no longer stands for good against evil.

So far Obama has done nothing right; he has been systematically destroying the American society's fiber and taking the country in the wrong direction.

I, for one, do not respect a meek president and that is what Obama is, a submissive president.

I, for one, want the United States to have a president who will lead with strength and confidence, traits Obama totally lacks.

I, for one, want the United States president to make it clear to our enemy that if they mess with us they will suffer hash consequences.

This is an elections year. When participating in election every American has the opportunity to cause America to get back on the right track, the track it has fallen off because of Obama's lack of leadership.

With the possibility of Obama being at the helm of the US for four more years, no American should be fooled and no American should expect for things to change for the better, at home and around the world.

With the defeatist attitude that Obama posses and his total oblivion to reality, the United States is now dwindling from a steep cliff.

Even the stock market will suffer greatly, because people will be getting rid of their dollars to buy something else that may retain a better value, the value the dollar is fast losing.

The American voters will be tested this year; they must elect a veritable leader, or else!

http://docstalk.blogspot.com/2012/02/united-states-hijacked-country.html

Thieves, Protection, Law and an Email

Thieves, Protection, Law and an Email

How's that for a title? 

Every once in a while, a wave of thefts plague our city of Maale Adumim. Most times, it turns out to be the Bedouins, who live in the dry river bed and across the mountain. Sometimes, it is Arabs from nearby neighborhoods and yes, there have been times when it was Jews. The Bedouins have an interesting and simple life, for the most part and there are times in my hectic run to and from one meeting to another, that I almost envy them. A Bedouin once tried to explain his theory of life and theft. According to this kind man who felt hospitality was not just a virtue, but an obligation - we all own things. If he can steal...I mean take...something from you, it is your fault, not his. It isn't theft because if God had not wanted him to have it, he would not have been able to steal...I mean take...it from you.

After a short time of trying to explain my philosophy, I gave up. Different worlds, different philosophies. I also gave up trying to convince a very nice Arab from Hebron that polygamy wasn't right. He asked if I wouldn't prefer my husband to move his second wife in with me, rather than sneak off and cheat somewhere. As I couldn't fathom being one of two (or more) wives, he simply couldn't understand the concept that I'd be handing my incredibly beloved husband the door. In his world, the first wife's only option would be to return in disgrace to her father's home - in my world, the man would walk around with the "first" wife's footprint on his...well, never mind.

Getting back to the Bedouins that have settled around my city. Every once in a while, usually at night, they climb up the mountains to my city and try to enter a house, and, if God lets them, they take whatever they can. For the most part, when Bedouins enter, they rob, but do not harm. They want property. That doesn't mean they can't or won't cause physical harm when confronted, but rather it isn't their intended result.

By contract, when Arabs enter a Jewish home with criminal and/or terrorist intent - as we have learned to our great anguish, it is not possible to predict the outcome. There have been a series of carjackings by Arabs in recent weeks. They have targeted lone women drivers. When they see them, they block the woman's car with another; then smash the windows and pull her out. One woman was injured when she was dragged with the car. Luckily, she was able to separate from the car before more serious injury was caused.

Two weeks ago, there were a series of break-ins in Maale Adumim - including one in my neighborhood - a religious area that is known to be quiet on Fridays and Shabbat. Cars do not travel into, out of, or through the neighborhood unless it is security (or a medical emergency). During the robbery, the thieves took light things - jewelry, money, a child's iPod. The first time it happened, the robbers got away clean. The family returned from eating with neighbors (friends of Aliza) to find they'd been robbed. I do not know what the police know of the identity of the robber. Last week, again on Friday night, the family returned. This time and it was Arabs who were in the process of robbing their home and with a quick call to the police, the Arabs were caught.

Yesterday morning, driving into the city, I checked my email (Elie was driving). One of the main rabbis in our community and the spiritual leader of what I believe is the largest synagogue in our area, a man well loved and respected even by those who attend other synagogues, sent out an email. On the Sabbath, we do not use the telephone, except in what is considered life-threatening circumstances.

To save a life, Judaism takes a very broad definition of life-threatening. For example, few women in today's society - certainly in Israel, face death when giving birth. Prenatal care is almost universally available with our national health care system we pay virtually nothing for the most modern health checkups and facilities. And yet, where there is potential, the law is clear. If a woman goes into labor on the Sabbath - an ambulance is called, a car driven.

My oldest daughter was born on Rosh Hashana - the celebration of the new year. Like the Sabbath, it is a day we do not drive, do not use electricity, money, telephones. I woke in the morning - she was my first. How was I supposed to know that this was really labor? Denial was so much easier. I dressed and told my somewhat surprised husband and mother-in-law that I wanted to go to the synagogue. They probably thought I was insane, but they went along. I sat beside my mother-in-law and every nine or ten minutes tensed up as a cramp distracted me. Was this labor? I didn't care so long as I could pretend that things were normal.

Suddenly, the rabbi of the synagogue, a man who I respected greatly, came into the women's section and called me out. I wondered if I had done something wrong. As soon as we got outside, I saw my wonderful and worried husband standing there - along with three men. Doctors, it seems, that the rabbi had gathered. "Are you in labor?" the rabbi asked me in front of the men.

Leave me alone, I wanted to tell him. "I don't know," I said quietly. "Maybe." I was so embarrassed standing there in what seemed like a world of men.

"What should she do?" he asked the doctors, who universally answered that I should be checked and be in touch with my doctor. I was having none of that. I could go back inside and stand near my mother-in-law and pretend that this birthing thing wasn't going to happen, or I could face reality and these men. Oh, I desperately wanted to go away from them, even my husband who seemed to be nodding proudly.

There is a beautiful tradition on Rosh Hashana to blow the shofar or ram's horn. At the bottom of this post is a beautiful video of someone showing how it sounds. I insisted I'd go call the doctor - AFTER I'd heard the shofar. I'd have promised anything, if they'd leave me alone.

It seems the will of the many was stronger and my body was quite insistent. The rabbi himself insisted on blowing the shofar for me IN HIS OFFICE...NOW...and when that was done and I still hesitated in picking up the phone and calling my doctor on this holy day, the rabbi picked up the phone himself - on Rosh Hashana and dialed the number. It was that moment that made me understand - for pikuach nefesh - the saving of a life, you break Shabbat (or Rosh Hashana). My baby was going to be born and I had to take care of her.

So, what does all this have to do with today's post and the recent thefts? The email addressed the question about whether it is permissible to call the police in the event of a break-in on Shabbat. If you think about it from a simplistic point of view, once the robbers leave the house, is anyone's life in danger? For what purpose would you violate the Sabbath? The email is entitled "Is it permissible to call the police in the event of a break-in?" followed by the rabbi's name.

His answer is clear and unequivocal. I love his answer - but more, I love the fact that he felt it relevant enough to send it to hundreds of people in my neighborhood - I view this as a slice of what my community is like, a slice of Israel, a slice of what it is to be a Jew in a land of Jews.

Here's his note (and the video after that):

Is it permissible to call the police to report a break-in on Shabbat?  Rav Elisha Aviner

Question: Approximately one month ago there was a break-in on Shabbat night in the neighborhood. Last Shabbat night there was an additional attempted break-in. The burglars were Arab. Is it permissible to call the police on Shabbat to report the break-in?
Answer: Not only is it permissible to call the police, but one must report it immediately. The reason is simple: the saving of a life takes precedence over Shabbat. Therefore, it takes precedence not only to make the phone call but also takes precedence in regard to all of the police activity to locate the thieves.

This is a clear ruling in the Shulchan Aruch [called the Code of Jewish Law, an authoritative legal code of Judaism] “In a city that is on the frontier, even if [non-Jews] came only to take (or destroy) property, Shabbat is put aside”. Maale Adumim is “a city that is on the frontier”, surrounded by Arab villages and a hostile population. The Israel Police does not regard break-ins in Maale Adumim by the Arab population as just property crimes, but rather as actions that endanger life. A break-in is liable to end in bodily harm, Heaven forbid. A kitchen knife or iron bar can be used as murder weapon, Heaven forbid. On this there is no dispute. Even if the thief fails to steal and escapes, there is a requirement to capture him in order to prevent additional attempts by him or his conspirators in crime.

Also regarding burglary attempts in the central cities that are not on the frontier, there are great poskim [judges or rabbis that rule on the law] that have instructed that it is permissible to alert the police on Shabbat, lest crime increase on Shabbat and its end will be the endangerment of life. This is the halachic basis for the actions of the police on Shabbat (patrols, etc.). Event those who disagree with this opinion do not doubt that in Maale Adumim, which is on the frontier, there is a full requirement to alert the police immediately for every attempted break-in on Shabbat whether Arab or Beduin.

All of the above is simple and clear, therefore I will not trouble the reader with references to halachic sources and responsa that are based on the above. Anyone interested is invited to turn to me.

The local police is doing its best to capture the thieves and put an end to this phenomena, as I have heard recently from the Commander of the Maale Adumim Police. However the police cannot do this alone, they need the alertness on our part and our immediate reporting of incidents.

We should merit “the One who spreads the sukka of peace upon us and upon all of His people Yisrael” and “Shabbat is relief from anguish”.

How's that for a title?

Every once in a while, a wave of thefts plague our city of Maale Adumim. Most times, it turns out to be the Bedouins, who live in the dry river bed and across the mountain. Sometimes, it is Arabs from nearby neighborhoods and yes, there have been times when it was Jews. The Bedouins have an interesting and simple life, for the most part and there are times in my hectic run to and from one meeting to another, that I almost envy them. A Bedouin once tried to explain his theory of life and theft. According to this kind man who felt hospitality was not just a virtue, but an obligation - we all own things. If he can steal...I mean take...something from you, it is your fault, not his. It isn't theft because if God had not wanted him to have it, he would not have been able to steal...I mean take...it from you.

After a short time of trying to explain my philosophy, I gave up. Different worlds, different philosophies. I also gave up trying to convince a very nice Arab from Hebron that polygamy wasn't right. He asked if I wouldn't prefer my husband to move his second wife in with me, rather than sneak off and cheat somewhere. As I couldn't fathom being one of two (or more) wives, he simply couldn't understand the concept that I'd be handing my incredibly beloved husband the door. In his world, the first wife's only option would be to return in disgrace to her father's home - in my world, the man would walk around with the "first" wife's footprint on his...well, never mind.

Getting back to the Bedouins that have settled around my city. Every once in a while, usually at night, they climb up the mountains to my city and try to enter a house, and, if God lets them, they take whatever they can. For the most part, when Bedouins enter, they rob, but do not harm. They want property. That doesn't mean they can't or won't cause physical harm when confronted, but rather it isn't their intended result.

By contract, when Arabs enter a Jewish home with criminal and/or terrorist intent - as we have learned to our great anguish, it is not possible to predict the outcome. There have been a series of carjackings by Arabs in recent weeks. They have targeted lone women drivers. When they see them, they block the woman's car with another; then smash the windows and pull her out. One woman was injured when she was dragged with the car. Luckily, she was able to separate from the car before more serious injury was caused. 

Two weeks ago, there were a series of break-ins in Maale Adumim - including one in my neighborhood - a religious area that is known to be quiet on Fridays and Shabbat. Cars do not travel into, out of, or through the neighborhood unless it is security (or a medical emergency). During the robbery, the thieves took light things - jewelry, money, a child's iPod. The first time it happened, the robbers got away clean. The family returned from eating with neighbors (friends of Aliza) to find they'd been robbed. I do not know what the police know of the identity of the robber. Last week, again on Friday night, the family returned. This time and it was Arabs who were in the process of robbing their home and with a quick call to the police, the Arabs were caught. 

Yesterday morning, driving into the city, I checked my email (Elie was driving). One of the main rabbis in our community and the spiritual leader of what I believe is the largest synagogue in our area, a man well loved and respected even by those who attend other synagogues, sent out an email. On the Sabbath, we do not use the telephone, except in what is considered life-threatening circumstances. 

To save a life, Judaism takes a very broad definition of life-threatening. For example, few women in today's society - certainly in Israel, face death when giving birth. Prenatal care is almost universally available with our national health care system we pay virtually nothing for the most modern health checkups and facilities. And yet, where there is potential, the law is clear. If a woman goes into labor on the Sabbath - an ambulance is called, a car driven.

My oldest daughter was born on Rosh Hashana - the celebration of the new year. Like the Sabbath, it is a day we do not drive, do not use electricity, money, telephones. I woke in the morning - she was my first. How was I supposed to know that this was really labor? Denial was so much easier. I dressed and told my somewhat surprised husband and mother-in-law that I wanted to go to the synagogue. They probably thought I was insane, but they went along. I sat beside my mother-in-law and every nine or ten minutes tensed up as a cramp distracted me. Was this labor? I didn't care so long as I could pretend that things were normal.

Suddenly, the rabbi of the synagogue, a man who I respected greatly, came into the women's section and called me out. I wondered if I had done something wrong. As soon as we got outside, I saw my wonderful and worried husband standing there - along with three men. Doctors, it seems, that the rabbi had gathered. "Are you in labor?" the rabbi asked me in front of the men.

Leave me alone, I wanted to tell him. "I don't know," I said quietly. "Maybe." I was so embarrassed standing there in what seemed like a world of men.

"What should she do?" he asked the doctors, who universally answered that I should be checked and be in touch with my doctor. I was having none of that. I could go back inside and stand near my mother-in-law and pretend that this birthing thing wasn't going to happen, or I could face reality and these men. Oh, I desperately wanted to go away from them, even my husband who seemed to be nodding proudly.

There is a beautiful tradition on Rosh Hashana to blow the shofar or ram's horn. At the bottom of this post is a beautiful video of someone showing how it sounds. I insisted I'd go call the doctor - AFTER I'd heard the shofar. I'd have promised anything, if they'd leave me alone.

It seems the will of the many was stronger and my body was quite insistent. The rabbi himself insisted on blowing the shofar for me IN HIS OFFICE...NOW...and when that was done and I still hesitated in picking up the phone and calling my doctor on this holy day, the rabbi picked up the phone himself - on Rosh Hashana and dialed the number. It was that moment that made me understand - for pikuach nefesh - the saving of a life, you break Shabbat (or Rosh Hashana). My baby was going to be born and I had to take care of her.

So, what does all this have to do with today's post and the recent thefts? The email addressed the question about whether it is permissible to call the police in the event of a break-in on Shabbat. If you think about it from a simplistic point of view, once the robbers leave the house, is anyone's life in danger? For what purpose would you violate the Sabbath? The email is entitled "Is it permissible to call the police in the event of a break-in?" followed by the rabbi's name.

His answer is clear and unequivocal. I love his answer - but more, I love the fact that he felt it relevant enough to send it to hundreds of people in my neighborhood - I view this as a slice of what my community is like, a slice of Israel, a slice of what it is to be a Jew in a land of Jews.

Here's his note (and the video after that):

Is it permissible to call the police to report a break-in on Shabbat? Rav Elisha Aviner

Question:
Approximately one month ago there was a break-in on Shabbat night in the neighborhood. Last Shabbat night there was an additional attempted break-in. The burglars were Arab. Is it permissible to call the police on Shabbat to report the break-in? 

Answer:
Not only is it permissible to call the police, but one must report it immediately. The reason is simple: the saving of a life takes precedence over Shabbat. Therefore, it takes precedence not only to make the phone call but also takes precedence in regard to all of the police activity to locate the thieves. 

This is a clear ruling in the Shulchan Aruch [called the Code of Jewish Law, an authoritative legal code of Judaism] “In a city that is on the frontier, even if [non-Jews] came only to take (or destroy) property, Shabbat is put aside”. Maale Adumim is “a city that is on the frontier”, surrounded by Arab villages and a hostile population. The Israel Police does not regard break-ins in Maale Adumim by the Arab population as just property crimes, but rather as actions that endanger life. 

A break-in is liable to end in bodily harm, Heaven forbid. A kitchen knife or iron bar can be used as murder weapon, Heaven forbid. On this there is no dispute. Even if the thief fails to steal and escapes, there is a requirement to capture him in order to prevent additional attempts by him or his conspirators in crime.

Also regarding burglary attempts in the central cities that are not on the frontier, there are great poskim [judges or rabbis that rule on the law] that have instructed that it is permissible to alert the police on Shabbat, lest crime increase on Shabbat and its end will be the endangerment of life. This is the halachic basis for the actions of the police on Shabbat (patrols, etc.). Event those who disagree with this opinion do not doubt that in Maale Adumim, which is on the frontier, there is a full requirement to alert the police immediately for every attempted break-in on Shabbat whether Arab or Bedouin. 

All of the above is simple and clear, therefore I will not trouble the reader with references to halachic sources and responsa that are based on the above. Anyone interested is invited to turn to me. 

The local police is doing its best to capture the thieves and put an end to this phenomena, as I have heard recently from the Commander of the Maale Adumim Police. However the police cannot do this alone, they need the alertness on our part and our immediate reporting of incidents.

We should merit “the One who spreads the sukka [canopy] of peace upon us and upon all of His people Yisrael” and “Shabbat is relief from anguish”.

Harvard's Latest Assault on Israel

Promoting the Jewish State's destruction at a school dedicated to 'democratic governance.'

By RUTH WISSE

In 1948, when the Arab League declared war on Israel, no one imagined that six decades later American universities would become its overseas agency. Yet campus incitement against Israel has been growing from California to the New York Island. A conference at Harvard next week called "Israel/Palestine and the One-State Solution" is but the latest aggression in an escalating campaign against the Jewish state.

The sequence is by now familiar: Arab student groups and self-styled progressives organize a conference or event like "Israeli Apartheid Week," targeting Israel as the main problem of the Middle East. They frame the goals of these events in buzzwords of "expanding the range of academic debate." But since the roster of speakers and subjects makes their hostile agenda indisputable, university spokespersons scramble to dissociate their institutions from the events they are sponsoring. Jewish students and alums debate whether to ignore or protest the aggression, and newspapers fueling the story give equal credence to Israel's attackers and defenders.

A featured speaker at Harvard's conference is Ali Abunimah, creator of the website Electronic Intifada, who opposes the existence of a "Jewish State" as racist by virtue of being Jewish. A regular on this circuit, he also keynoted a recent University of Pennsylvania conference urging "Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions" (BDS) of, from and against Israel. Ostensibly dedicated to protecting Palestinian Arabs from Israeli oppression, BDS has by now achieved the status of an international "movement," some of whose branches exclude Israeli academics from their journals and conferences.

But the economic war on Israel did not start with BDS. In 1945, before the founding of Israel, the Arab League declared a boycott of "Jewish products and manufactured goods." Ever since, the Damascus-based Central Boycott Office has tried to enforce a triple-tiered boycott prohibiting importation of Israeli-origin goods and services, trade with any entity that does business in Israel, and engagement with any company or individual that does business with firms on the Arab League blacklist. Although the U.S. Congress took measures to counteract this boycott, and the Damascus Bureau may be temporarily preoccupied on other fronts, the boycott momentum has been picked up by Arab students and academics.

Freedom of speech grants all Americans the right to prosecute the verbal war against Israel. But let's differentiate toleration from abetting. Harvard may tolerate smoking, but its medical school wouldn't sponsor a conference touting the benefits of cigarettes because doctors have learned that smoking is hazardous to health. The avowed mission of the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, host of the upcoming conference, "is to strengthen democratic governance around the world by preparing people for public leadership and by helping to solve problems of public policy." How farcical that instead of seeking to strengthen democratic governance, its students hijack its forum for "studying" how to destroy the hardiest democracy in the Middle East.

The pattern of anti-Israel attack, administrative embarrassment, Jewish confusion, and media exploitation of the story will continue until all parties realize that the war against Israel is fundamentally different from biases to which it is often compared. Once Americans acknowledged the evils of their discrimination against African-Americans, they abjured their racism and tried through affirmative action to compensate for past injustice. Arab and Muslim leaders have done the opposite. Having attempted to deny Jews their right to their one country, they accused Jews of denying Arabs their 22nd. After losing wars on the battlefield, they prosecuted the war by other means.

Students who are inculcated with hatred of Israel may want to express their national, religious or political identity by urging its annihilation. But universities that condone their efforts are triple offenders—against their mission, against the Jewish people, and perhaps most especially against the maligners themselves. Smoking is less fatal to smokers than anti-Jewish politics is to its users. Remember Hitler's bunker.

Ms. Wisse, a professor of Yiddish and comparative literature at Harvard, is the author of "Jews and Power" (Schocken, 2007).

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203960804577244932732348366.html?KEYWORDS=Harvard%27s+Latest+Assault+on+Israel

Fogel Murders in Itamar - One Year Ago

Fogel Murders in Itamar - One Year Ago

It's been a year since the horrible attack on the Fogel home in Itamar. Rabbi Udi Fogel, his wife Ruti, and three of their six children were murdered. It was an attack that shocked a nation that didn't believe it could be shocked. It brought us to our knees with its depravity, its barbarity. We are not strangers to blood, to death, to murder. It has been done to us before and long ago, we accepted that it would continue - until the Arabs want it to stop.

But this was so much worse. This was just beyond unthinkable. How, how in God's name does a human being slit the throat of a three-month-old infant? Why, why couldn't they have left her there, alive and crying, but at least alive? Why did they have to kill Hadas too?

How, how in God's name does a human being stab a three-year-old in the heart? Couldn't little Elad have been spared? Why did they have to kill him too? And Yoav, 11-year-old Yoav?

And a mother who stood in front of the door where her two young sons were asleep - they killed her too. And a father, unarmed and at home with his family. Too much for the mind, too much for the heart and the soul. A year has passed. How are the Fogel children coping? If you can stand the pain it will cause (and even if you can't), read this A Visit with the Fogel Children.

And since life is about our own experiences and what touches us up close, I'll tell you of another effect, nothing compared to the Fogel children and yet a factor in our lives). Our youngest daughter, Aliza, is doing well a year later. Friday nights - the night the Fogel family was attacked - she still locks the room to her door. She was frightened again when she heard that there had been some robberies in our neighborhood recently. In one case, Arabs were caught; in another, the family came back to find some of their possessions gone. It scared Aliza - happening so close to us, but it didn't shake the foundations of her world. It didn't happen now, but it did happen last year.

As details of the horrible murders came out, Aliza found some comfort when she heard that Ruti Fogel had protected her two sons as they slept. At one point she asked me why I was saying we would protect her when Ruti and Udi weren't able to protect their children. What answer could I give her? What comfort could I bring to ease her trauma? With her body, Ruti blocked the door, and this is where her body was found. Sickening though it is, this was one point their killers chose to mention - that their only regret was in not finding and murdering the two little boys that thankfully managed to sleep through the nightmare taking place just outside their room. And that attempt, knowing she'd tried and perhaps succeeded because the two boys were alive, helped Aliza.

Sometimes, you can see something happen and think it is interesting, even as you are so involved in the details you know that later you'll want to look at it all again. This is what happened with Aliza. I was fascinated at the process of a child coping with unspeakable horrors and tragedies even as I was focusing on trying to help her. I felt completely out of my depth - completely unsure of what I was doing. I was afraid I would make it worse, increase her trauma rather than ease it.

I spoke to parents of her friends - all seemed very upset, but not to the same degree as Aliza. At first, I gave in to her every fear - she wanted the doors locked - I made sure they were. Not just the house - but her room too. I agreed. She wanted to sleep with the light on, I let her. She wanted the windows locked and the thick plastic shutters closed day and night - and I didn't argue. Elie bought her an alarm that fit on her window and I watched as he carefully "installed" it. On and on, she asked and I gave in. After a few weeks, maybe it was longer - I just don't remember the timing anymore, she started having nightmares and I began to think that I was wrong to have thought I could handle this.

I spoke to her teacher and the school counselor and to a psychologist. I thought the nightmares were a bad sign and even as I took her into my bed some nights or sat with her on other nights, it turns out that the nightmares were a good sign. She's learning to cope with it, explained the school counselor. Already her mind has brought it to a level that she could cope - before she dreamed, it was so traumatic, said the counselor, she couldn't even dream. Her subconscious was finding paths to acceptance or perhaps acceptance is too great a word - maybe a truce with reality?

A year later, Tamar Fogel and her brothers are still in such pain and it is hard to believe the time will ever come when they won't be. A month ago, Ruti's mother asked one of her grandsons, "What do you say, Roee, are we going to overcome this?’ and he answered, ‘Yes, Grandma, we will overcome.’ Then she asked, ‘Is this world good or bad?’ And this special child of Ruti and Udi Fogel answered, ‘Despite everything that happened to us, Grandma, the world is good." They are learning to cope, learning to smile, learning to live. I am awed by their strength and I know it was planted in them by parents who loved them and protected them.

A year later, in my little world, Aliza has learned to cope. It has been an unbelievable year - one of her brothers got married; another got engaged. She became an aunt, and an adult according to Jewish law with the celebration of her bat mitzvah. It's been a year of growth - our family has added Shmulik's beautiful wife, Na'ama, Amira's amazing son, and soon, Elie's so-special Lauren. It's been a year of celebration as we danced and laughed at weddings and parties and through it all, we remember the Fogels and worry about their orphans.

It's been a year without five members of the Fogel family...and many others who have been murdered in the name of a war we did not choose. Often those who wish to argue against my beliefs speak to me of occupation and my response is always the same...and never addressed - if the so-called occupation is the only reason why we are at war today and the occupation began in 1967, why then was the Palestine Liberation Organization founded in 1964? One responded that the occupation began in 1948 when we attacked the Arabs...no one could accuse this person of having learned history.

You cannot stop or start history when you want. It did not begin in 1967, nor did it begin in 1948. But beyond history is today's realities and we must all learn to cope with them. At the start, I asked what kind of human being could have murdered little Hadas, Elad and Yoav. I have yet to receive an answer to that question.

A year later...and we are all no wiser. Several months ago, a father and his baby son were murdered by rock-throwing attackers. This past week, a young mother was attacked but thankfully managed to escape.

It's been a year since the Itamar murders. May God avenge their blood and continue to bless us all with their memories.

http://israelisoldiersmother.blogspot.com/2012/02/fogel-murders-in-itamar-one-year-ago.html

Arabs against absorption of refugees

Arabs against absorption of refugees (NYT, 1966)

From  The New York Times, April 4, 1966:

JERUSALEM (Jordanian Sector), March 30—"The Arab states will not integrate the Palestine refugees because integration would be a slow process of liquidating the Palestine problem," Ahmed Shukairy, chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization, declared in an interview today.

"Consequently, the refugees don't want to be integrated," he continued. "If there are no Palestinian people, there is no Palestinian cause. We can't conceive of a Babylonian cause today because there are no Babylonians. But we start from the premise that we will achieve the liberation of Palestine soon."

Arab refusal to assimilate the 1.3 million refugees now living in four host countries— Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, controlled by the United Arab Republic—has been the subject of criticism from Israel and from the Western nations that have contributed to supporting the refugees for most of the 18 years since Israel came into existence.

Most of the critics would agree with Mr. Shukairy that the Arabs will not assimilate the refugees because they want to keep tie Palestine issue alive. But few of them would be likely to agree that the refugees do not want to be assimilated, and almost none would accept the premise of "liberation of Palestine soon."

Indeed, questions about why the refugees persist in their hopes when Israel appears to have consolidated her position bring a different, but fairly standard, Arab retort:

"The Zionists remembered Palestine for 2,000 years. Why should we begin to forget in 18 years?"

When leaders of the Arab nations are asked why they do not assimilate the refugees, they reply that Israel and the West, not the Arabs, were responsible for the refugee exodus in 1948 from the part of British Palestine that became Israel.

These leaders ignore the rebuttal that the Arabs shared largely in the responsibility because their radio stations broadcast propaganda about Israeli atrocities designed to panic the refugees and that the refugees were told to flee.

...

The basic problem is that integration of the ordinary, uneducated peasant refugee requires land. In Jordan, the only host country that has given refugees the full privileges of citizenship, arable land is not available. The other Arab countries reserve what land they can develop for their own citizens, who want it badly.

Iraq, where there are almost no refugees, has the most favorable land-to-man ratio among the Arab states, but even there any significant assimilation of outsiders would require large scale development of irrigation

A Western ambassador in one host country said recently:

"The way to solve the problem is to stimulate Arab economic development to the maximum. If the Arab countries begin to need manpower, refugees will automatically be absorbed."

The psychological and emotional obstacles to integration are great. The refugees and their hosts feel strongly that they got a raw deal in 1948, and their self-esteem demands formal reparation, particularly because of the impression that the Israelis are cleverer, abler and more modern than the Arabs.

The Arab armies that moved against Israel in 1948, after the Arabs rejected the United Nations partition of Palestine, were beaten, and the defeat still Irankles.

One educated refugee said the other day in private conversation that he favored going back to the original partition plan, which would cost Israel 27 per cent of her present territory.

...

The mystique of the refugees,  fed by Arab broadcasts and by nostalgic talk, is based on the conviction that they have been grievously wronged. One commentator, Cecil Hourani, has written: "In the dim twilight of the camps it is what has been lost that still beckons, not what can be done to take its place." 

At a United Nations school in Gaza, a young refugee was learning the trade of an auto mechanic. He was scheduled to I go to Sweden for on-the-job training. He spoke a little English. Asked what he would do if he could get a permanent job in Sweden and if he met a girl, he liked, he said: "I would come back. My country needs me." 

Hamdi Hirzallah, 40 years old, a representative of the Palestine Liberation Organization, was present at the interview. A native of Beersheba, now part of Israel, he said with great intensity: "I will tell you something, and I wish you would quote me. If they try to leave, we will stop them, by force if need be." 

http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2012/02/arabs-against-absorption-of-refugees.html