Yerushalaim Shel Zahav,Moscow Male Jewish Cappella,Alexander Tsaliuk

                         

"Jerusalem of Gold" (Hebrew: ירושלים של זהב‎, Yerushalayim Shel Zahav) is an extremely popular Israeli song written by Naomi Shemer in 1967. It is also the unofficial national anthem of Israel, often contrasted with the secular Hatikva. The original song described the Jewish people's 2,000-year longing to return to Jerusalem; Shemer added a final verse after the Six-Day War to celebrate Jerusalem's re-unification, after 19 years of Jordanian control.

Naomi Shemer wrote the original song for the Israeli Song Festival (it was Teddy Kollek), held on 15 May 1967, the night after Israel's nineteenth Independence Day. She chose the then-unknown Shuli Nathan to sing the song and not in competition but had been commissioned by the Mayor, 

Some of the song's melody is based on a Basque lullaby, Pello Joxepe (Pello is a typical basque name, but it can also mean Foolish Joseph), composed by Juan Francisco Petriarena 'Xenpelar' (1835–1869). Shemer heard a rendition by singer/songwriter Paco Ibáñez, who visited Israel in 1962 and performed the song to a group that included Shemer and Nehama Hendel. She later acknowledged hearing Hendel perform Pello Joxepe in the mid-1960s, and that she had unconsciously based some of the melody on the lullaby. Shemer felt very bad when she found that it was similar toPello Joxepe, but when Ibáñez was asked how he felt about the issue, he replied he was "glad it helped in some way", and that he was neither angry nor did he perceive it as plagiarism.

At that time, the Old City was still controlled by the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and under its sovereignty rule. Jewshad been banned from the Old City and the rest of Jerusalem east of it, losing their homes and possessions and becoming refugees. All Jews were barred from either returning or entering the areas under Jordanian control, and many holy sites were desecrated and damaged during that period. Only three weeks after the song was published, the Six-Day War broke out, and the song became a morale-boosting battle cry of the Israel Defense Forces. Shemer herself sang it for the troops before the war and the festival, making them among the first in the world to hear it.

On 7 June, the IDF wrested eastern Jerusalem and the Old City from the Jordanians. When Shemer heard the paratroopers singing "Jerusalem of Gold" at the Western Wall, she wrote the final verse, countering the phrases of lamentation in the second verse. The line about shofars sounding from the Temple Mount is a reference to an event that actually took place on that day.

Many of the lyrics refer to traditional Jewish poetry and themes, particularly dealing with exile and longing for Jerusalem. "Jerusalem of Gold" is a reference to a special piece of jewelry mentioned in a famous Talmudic legend about Rabbi Akiva; "To all your songs, I am a lyre" is a reference "Zion ha-lo Tish'ali", one of the "Songs to Zion" by Rabbi Yehuda Halevi: "I cry out like the jackals when I think of their grief; but, dreaming of the end of their captivity, I am like a harp for your songs.

The poem is woven with mournful Biblical references to the destruction of Jerusalem and subsequent exile of the Jewish people. "The city that sits alone" is from the first verse of the Book of Lamentations; the first word after the first chorus, איכה (the lament "How?") is its Hebrew name. "If I forget thee Jerusalem" is a quote fromPsalm 137, i.e. "By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down and wept, when we remembered Zion." This contrasts with the joyous return from exile in the fourth verse.

Opera in Shuk -Yerushalyim shel zahav

                   

Yom Yerushalayim, Jerusalem Day, celebrating 48 years of the reunification Jerusalem, this year it begins Saturday night and goes to Sunday, May 17.

From 1948 until June 1967, no Jews were allowed in the Old City which was occupied and divided by Jordan.

JERUSALEM, THE ONE AND ONLY CAPITAL OF THE JEWISH STATE OF ISRAEL

THE NON-NEGOTIABLE PIECE OF REAL ESTATE IN THE WORLD

THE NON-DIVISIBLE, THE MOST UNIQUE CITY IN THE WORLD

GENUINELY JEWISH...

THERE IS NO EAST JERUSALEM NOR WEST JERUSALEM

THERE IS NO NORTHERN JERUSALEM NOR SOUTHERN JERUSALEM

WHY?  BECAUSE IT IS VERY SIMPLE...

JERUSALEM IN ONE!!!!!!

G-D WILLS IT SO!!!!

AMEN

Mordechai Gur: "The Temple Mount is in our hands!"

Lt. Gen. Mordechai "Motta" Gur (Hebrew: מרדכי "מוטה" גור‎, May 6, 1930 – July 16, 1995) was an Israeli politician and the 10th Chief of Staff of the IDF. During the Six-Day War (1967), he commanded the division that penetrated the Old City of Jerusalem and broadcast the famous words, "The Temple Mount is in our hands!" (Hebrew: הר הבית בידינו‎, Har HaBayit BeYadeinu).^[1] As Chief of Staff, he had responsibility for planning and executing Operation Entebbe (1976) to free Jewish hostages in Uganda. He later entered the Knesset and held various ministerial portfolios. He contracted terminal cancer and committed suicide at the age of 65.

Gur was born in Jerusalem and later joined the Palmach Haganah (the underground armed group of the Jews in the British Mandate of Palestine). He continued serving in a military capacity with the founding of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) during the Israeli War of Independence in 1948.

In the IDF, Gur served in the Paratroopers Brigade most of his career and became one of the symbols of the "red beret" brigade. During the 1950s he was a company commander under the command of Ariel Sharon. He was wounded during a counter-terror raid in Khan Yunis in 1955 and received a recommendation of honor from Chief of Staff Moshe Dayan. In 1957 he was appointed as adjutant to the brigade commander. After serving in this position Gur went to study at the École Militaire in Paris.

After he returned he was appointed as the commander of the Golani Brigade (1961–1963) and commanded the counter-terror raid in Nukiev. He brought over the traditions and attitude of the Paratroopers, raised morale, and helped instill an espirit de corps in Golani for which the brigade is still famous. In 1965 he was appointed as the head of the operations branch in the general staff of the IDF. He later also served as a commander of the IDF commanders' school.

In 1966 Gur was appointed as the commander of the 55th (Reserve) Paratroopers Brigade, which he led during the Six-Day War. Gur and his troops were part of the assault force which wrested Jerusalem from the Jordanians, and which were the first to visit the Western Wall and the Temple Mount. The pictures of paratroopers crying at the Wall and Gur's audio recording in the communication networks, "The Temple Mount is in our hands!" (Hebrew: !הר הבית בידינו‎, Har HaBayit BeYadeinu!), became one of the most touching symbols of the war to the Israeli public.

After the war he was promoted to Brigadier General's rank and was appointed as the IDF commander in the Gaza Strip and northern Sinai Peninsula. In 1969 he was promoted to Major General and was appointed as the commander of the northern front, where Palestinian terrorists from the PLO, backed by Syria, attacked Israel's northern settlements. Gur led several counter-attacks to reign in the terror attacks, conquering the Shebaa farms from Syria in order to establish a defensive position to prevent border attacks.

From August 1972 to December 1973 he served as the IDF military attache at Israel's Washington D.C., embassy. In January 1974 he was reappointed as the commander of the northern front. Following the retirement of General David Elazar due to the criticism of the Agranat Commission he was appointed in April 1974 as the 10th IDF Chief of Staff. He served in that position until 1978.

Jerusalem Day - Yom Yerushalayim, Gen. Uzi Narkis

                       

Uzi Narkiss (Hebrew: עוזי נרקיס; January 6, 1925 - December 17, 1997) was an Israeli general. Narkiss was commander of theIsrael Defense Forces units in the Central Region during the Six Day War. Narkiss appears in the famous photograph ofDefense Minister Moshe Dayan flanked by Chief of Staff Yitzhak Rabin and himself, taken in the Old City of Jerusalem shortly after its capture from Jordanian forces in the 1967 Six Day War.  Uzi Narkiss was born in Jerusalem to Polish Jewish parents. His first memory was of going into hiding during the 1929 Arab riots. Narkiss attended high school at Gymnasia Rehavia. He joined the Palmach at the age of 16^[2] and was involved in Haganah operations against British Mandatory forces in Palestine.

In April 1948, Narkiss headed the assault on Katamon, capturing the monastery at San Simon — a key strategic position. Following the final departure of the British and the Israeli Declaration of Independence, Narkiss was appointed to assist those besieged in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City. Narkiss' unit succeeded in penetrating Zion Gate, bringing in supplies and evacuating the wounded from those under siege. When military reinforcements failed to appear, however, Narkiss ordered his men to retreat, with the Old City falling to Jordanian forces shortly thereafter.

Narkiss spent several years in France during the formative years of Israel, seconded to study at the École de Guerre (the French Military Academy) and later in the capacity of Israeli military attaché, having been awarded the Légion d’honneur by the French government. Narkiss returned to Israel to continue his military career and in 1965 became the first director of the Israel National Defense College.

In June 1967, with seven brigades under his command, Narkiss was responsible for combating any

Rabin, Dayan and Narkiss

possible Jordanian offensive. Capturing the Old City was not part of the plan. Israeli units moved effectively to take key positions in east Jerusalem, where one key location was Ammunition Hill. Still, to Narkiss' dismay, the politicians would still not allow the Old City to be taken. But with a looming cease fire approaching after an emergency meeting of the UN, Moshe Dayan gave the order to Narkiss who quickly capitalised on the opportunity to reunite the city before any cease fire prevented this as an option. Under his direction, the Old City was taken over and Jerusalem reunified under Israeli control. From Narkiss' viewpoint, this liberation completed the campaign he had begun nineteen years earlier, and whose previous failure had haunted him.

Narkiss retired from the IDF in 1968, subsequently holding key positions in the Jewish Agency and the World Zionist Organization. In 1948 Uzi Narkiss found Palestinian commander Abdul Kader Husseini's Koran on the battlefield. In the 1980s he wanted to give it to Kader's son Faisal Husseini but Husseini refused to get it back from the hands of Israeli general.

He died in Jerusalem at the age of 72.

Liberated KOTEL

Six Day War - Israeli victory - Documentary

The Six-Day War (Hebrew: מלחמת ששת הימים, Milhemet Sheshet Ha Yamim; Arabic: النكسة, an-Naksah, "The Setback" or حرب ۱۹٦۷, Ḥarb 1967, "War of 1967"), also known as the June War, 1967 Arab–Israeli War, orThird Arab–Israeli War, was fought between June 5 and 10, 1967 by Israel and the neighboring states ofEgypt (known at the time as the United Arab Republic), Jordan, and Syria.

Dayan, Rabin and Narkiss

Relations between Israel and its neighbours had never fully normalized following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, and in the period leading up to June 1967 tensions became dangerously heightened. As a result, following themobilisation of Egyptian forces along the Israeli border in the Sinai Peninsula, Israel launched a series ofpreemptive airstrikes against Egyptian airfields on June 5. The Egyptians, whose defensive infrastructure was in a poor state, were caught by surprise and virtually the entire Egyptian air force was destroyed with few Israeli losses, giving the Israelis air superiority. Simultaneously, the Israelis launched a ground offensive into the Gaza strip and through the northern and central routes of the Sinai, which again caught the Egyptians by surprise. After some initial resistance, the Egyptian leader, Gamal Abdel Nasser, ordered the evacuation of the Sinai. On June 6 and 7, Israeli forces rushed westward in pursuit of the Egyptians whose retreat was disorganized and chaotic. The Israelis inflicted heavy losses on the retreating Egyptian forces. By June 7 the Israelis had reached the Suez canal and had taken Sharm el Sheikh in the south of the peninsula. Conquest of the Sinai was completed on June 8 when Israeli forces reached the peninsula's western coast.

Paratroopers at the KOTEL

On June 5, Nasser had induced Syria and Jordan to begin attacks on Israel by using the initially confused situation to claim that Egypt had defeated the Israeli air strike. In the afternoon of June 5, Israel retaliated against Jordan by launching an offensive to encircle East Jerusalem. Initially, Israeli forces held back from moving into the Old City for a number of reasons including potentially negative international reaction. However on June 7 the Israeli Minister of Defense, Moshe Dayan, gave the order to attack. After heavy fighting, the Israelis completed the conquest of the city later that day. Also on June 7, Israeli forces seized the West Bankcities of Nablus and Bethlehem from the Jordanians. When King Hussein ordered the Jordanian forces to retreat across the River Jordan, the Israeli forces occupied the rest of the West Bank unopposed. Israel's retaliation against Syria on June 5 took the form of an air strike in the evening which destroyed two-thirds of the Syrian air force, giving the Israelis air superiority over the Syrians. On June 9, Dayan ordered a ground invasion of the Golan Heights. Despite an extensive fortifications system and heavy fighting, the Israelis broke through the Syrian first line of defense. By June 10, Israeli forces had taken the Golan plateau and the Syrians had retreated eastward behind the ceasefire "purple line".

KOTEL LIBERATED

On June 11, a ceasefire was signed. Arab casualties were far heavier than that of Israel: less than a thousand Israelis had been killed compared to over 20,000 from the Arab forces. Israel's military success was attributable to the element of surprise, an innovative and well executed battle plan and the poor quality and leadership of the Arab forces. Israel seized control of the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula (from Egypt), the West Bank and East Jerusalem (from Jordan) and the Golan Heights (from Syria). The area under Israeli control tripled, significantly contributing to the country's defensibility, as would be shown in the subsequent Yom Kippur War. Although Israeli morale and international prestige was greatly increased by the outcome of the war, the resulting displacement of civilian populations would have long-term consequences. 300,000 Palestinians fled the West Bank and about 100,000 Syrians left the Golan to become refugees. Across the Arab world, Jewish minority communities were expelled. Israel made peace with Egypt following the Camp David Accords of 1978 and completeď a staged withdrawal from the Sinai in 1982. However, the position of the other occupied territories became a long-standing and bitter cause of conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, and the Arab world in general.

IF IT IS ALL ABOUT CEMENT...GUESS WHO GETS THE BLAME...

It Takes a Good Guy with a Gun to Defend Freedom of Speech

It Takes a Good Guy with a Gun to Defend Freedom of Speech

JERUSALEM DAY 5775...A DAY OF SUPREME JOY!!!

תנועת נאמני הר-הבית וארץ ישראל

TEMPLE MOUNT & LAND OF ISRAEL FAITHFUL MOVEMENT
P.O. Box 18325, 8 Aliash Street, Jerusalem, Israel

B'esrat HaShem
With the Help of G-D

A NEWSLETTER TO LOVERS OF ZION IN THE WORLD

MAY 17, 2015, 28 IYAR 5775
“JERUSALEM DAY” MARCH OF THE FAITHFUL MOVEMENT COMMEMORATING THE GREATEST MOMENT IN HISTORY!

On Sunday, May 17, 2015, 28 Iyar, 5775, the Temple Mount and Land of Israel Faithful Movement will conduct an historical event that will on one hand commemorate the greatest moment in the history of Israel and the entire world. It was the great victory that G-D gave to His people Israel in June 1967 when G-D, together with His brave Israeli soldiers, liberated the Holy Temple Mount and Biblical Jerusalem. The intention of the G-D of Israel was to complete the end-time redemption of His people Israel that began in the year 1948 and that would open a new end-time age in the history of Israel and the entire world exactly as the prophets of Israel prophesied. On the other hand, the Faithful Movement will call on Israel to immediately fulfill the expectation of G-D for His people Israel when He liberated and returned the Holy Temple Mount and Biblical Jerusalem to His people Israel: to immediately build the Holy Third Temple with no delay in order to fulfill the prophetic dream of G-D and His people Israel.

The march of the Faithful Movement will start from Jaffa Gate of Biblical Jerusalem. We shall march carrying the flags of Israel with the star of David through the historical streets of Biblical Jerusalem to the Holy Temple Mount. In front of the Holy Temple Mount we shall demonstrate. Gershon Salomon, the chairman of the Temple Mount and Land of Israel Faithful Movement will call the people of Israel and the government to not waste any more time. Forty-eight years since the greatest moment in history are quite enough. Let us immediately start the building of the Holy Third Temple that will change the face and image of mankind just as G-D planned since He created man. We shall walk up to the Holy Temple Mount with a prayer for the fulfillment of this call to Israel with no delay. This will be another major step of the Faithful Movement towards her campaign and holy work for the rebuilding of the Holy Third Temple in our lifetime and the fulfillment of the biblical call of G-D to His people Israel to be: '...a kingdom of priests, a holy nation and a light to the nations'. 

Israelis and visitors who are staying in Israel on this day are all invited to participate in our march. The march will start on Sunday, May 17th, 2015 at the front of Jaffa Gate in Biblical Jerusalem at 11:00 am. This will also be a day of thanksgiving to the G-D of Israel for the godly miracles of the Six Day War in 1967. 

IN THE ALMIGHTY G-D OF ISRAEL WE TRUST!!

Visit our website: www.templemountfaithful.org

IT IS TIME ONCE MORE....SHABBAT SHALOM

May the LORD bless you and guard you –

יְבָרֶכְךָ יהוה, וְיִשְׁמְרֶךָ

(Yevhārēkh-khā Adhōnāy veyishmerēkhā ...)

May the LORD make His face shed light upon you and be gracious unto you –

יָאֵר יהוה פָּנָיו אֵלֶיךָ, וִיחֻנֶּךָּ

("Yāʾēr Adhōnāy pānāw ēlekhā viḥunnékkā ...)

May the LORD lift up His face unto you and give you peace –

יִשָּׂא יהוה פָּנָיו אֵלֶיךָ, וְיָשֵׂם לְךָ שָׁלוֹם

("Yissā Adhōnāy pānāw ēlekhā viyāsēm lekhā shālōm.")

 

MAY 8, 1945-2015 / 70 YEARS LATER...

70 YEARS AGO THE NAZI STATE SIGNED A  DECLARATION OF SURRENDER AND THE WAR IN EUROPE ENDED.  MOST OF EUROPE WAS IN RUINS, MILLIONS OF PEOPLE WERE DEAD OR WOUNDED. 

AMERICAN GIs DOWN LES CHAMPS ELYSEE

MILLIONS WERE DISPLACED, NO WHERE TO GO.  COUNTRIES HAD CEASED TO EXIST WHILE OTHERS HAD BEEN OVERRUN IN VARIOUS DIRECTIONS BY CONQUERING AND/OR RETREATING ARMIES.  

THE HORRORS OF THE DESTRUCTION OF THE CITIES COULD NOT BE COMPARED TO THE MENTAL AS WELL AS THE PHYSICAL DESTRUCTION OF HUMAN BEINGS.  CITIES WOULD BE REPAIRED EVENTUALLY BUT HUMANS NOT...

THE HORRORS OF THE HOLOCAUST WERE JUST BEGINNING TO BE KNOWN BY THE WORLD.  EVEN THOUGH JEWISH LEADERS HAD BEEN ANNOUNCING THEM FOR MANY YEARS AND NOTHING WAS DONE.

BUT 5/5/45 WAS A HAPPY DAY AND AT LEAST FOR A BRIEF PERIOD MANY COULD CELEBRATE.

THE "LAST CRUSADE" WAS FINISHED IN EUROPE BUT AT THE OTHER END OF THE WORLD, THE EMPIRE OF JAPAN STILL WAS FIGHTING AND PEOPLE KEPT ON DYING.

Cartoonists are Controversial and Murderers are Moderate

Cartoonists are Controversial and Murderers are Moderate

What to Do About ISIL?

What to Do About ISIL?

The Fire Burns

The Fire Burns

Israel ‘Disappoints’ US with 900 New Homes for Jews in Jerusalem

Israel ‘Disappoints’ US with 900 New Homes for Jews in Jerusalem

Jerusalem gives final approval for the 900 homes that caused a storm when Biden visited Israel in 2010.

By: Tzvi Ben-Gedalyahu    Published: May 8, 2015

                           Arab workers at construction site in Jerusalem.

The U.S. State Dept. has expressed “disappointment” and “concern” over Jerusalem’s final approval for 900 new housing units for Jews in northeastern Jerusalem, near the Arab neighborhood of Shuafat.                         WHAT ELSE IS NEW?!

The homes for Ramat Shlomo have gone through several stages of bureaucratic approvals, giving the impression to foreign readers that seven approvals means 6,300 homes are being built instead of 900.  The 900 units are the same ones that caused a storm of protest in the Obama administration when the project passed another bureaucratic step just about the same minute Vice President Joe Biden landed at Ben Gurion Airport for a visit in 2010. The Obama administration still spouts the “peace process” and “two-state solution” but in effect has not taken any actions to punish Israel for building or the Palestinian Authority for inciting terror and ditching the “peace process” that President Barack Obama and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry espouse.  The policy of benign neglect made the job of State Dept. spokesman Jeff Rathke a bit difficult at Thursday’s briefing.

He went through the usual routine of saying:

 We strongly oppose steps by the Israeli authorities to advance construction in East Jerusalem. This is a disappointing development, and we’re concerned about it just as a new Israeli Government has been announced. Israel’s leaders have asserted that they remain committed to a two-state solution.

Let’s stop right there. None of the journalists at the daily State Dept. briefing, not even ace Associated Press reporter Matt Lee, has thought of asking why building homes for Jews (and in Jerusalem too) means the end of the concept of “two states.”  If they would stop and think about what the Palestinian Authority wants, they would realize that the “two states” would mean that no Jews can live in half of Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria but that Arabs can live in whatever is left of Israel.

If a Jew-free Palestinian Authority country is not racist, what is?

But let’s assume that for the sake of peace, the Obama administration really is not out of its mind and that two states will mean the lion and lamb can sleep side by side – if only Israel would stop building homes for Jews.  That is when things get sticky for the spokesmen became reporters start asking why Washington does not put a stop to Israel’s insistence that Jews have a right to live in all of Jerusalem.  Rathke said, “We need to see that commitment in the actions of Israeli” and that  “construction of housing units in East Jerusalem is damaging and inconsistent with that commitment. We continue to engage with the highest levels of the Israeli Government, and we continue to make our position clear that we view this as illegitimate.”

A couple of reporters wondered about action instead of words. One asked:

Well, then what is the point of saying we need to see that commitment? If it becomes the case that you don’t ever see that, or you don’t see the commitment and you don’t do anything about it, what good is saying that we need to see that commitment?

Rathke sang and danced like this:

Well, this is a longstanding U.S. policy. We’re reiterating that policy in relation to this specific development that Said asked about. This is our view and it hasn’t changed.

Every time Israel builds another home for Jews in areas that cause the Obama to express “disappointment” and “concern,” Obama and Kerry lose more credibility among the Arabs.  President Barack Obama has created for himself a trap that was born with his predecessors Carter, Reagan, Clinton and the junior Bush.  Instead of standing by his word that it is up to the Arabs and Israel to make war or peace as they see fit, he went against his own stated common sense that he would not set the conditions for a peace agreement. Once he adopted the Palestinian Authority agenda that Israel cannot build for Jews in half of Jerusalem and more than half of Israel, he lost all respect, as Obama always does when he thinks he can manipulate the world.

He “reached out to Muslims,” who presented him with terror and anarchy in country after country.  He and Kerry were totally deaf and blind to the will of Palestinian Authority to ditch the peace process and the will of Israel to survive and to build homes for Jews in all of Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria.

They have lost credibility even in the eyes of center-left Israel, which has seen the White House and Foggy Bottom ignore Palestinian Authority terror, incitement, human rights violations against their own Arabs, hate of Jews and Judaism, and redrawing of the map of Israel by totally erasing it with an Arab “Palestine.”

They have long lost credibility among State Dept. journalists.

About the Author: Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu is a graduate in journalism and economics from The George Washington University. He has worked as a cub reporter in rural Virginia and as senior copy editor for major Canadian metropolitan dailies. Tzvi wrote for Arutz Sheva for several years before joining the Jewish Press.