ERETZ ISRAEL

Thursday, June 11, 2015

THE JERUSALEM COVENANT

THE JERUSALEM COVENANT

As presented to the Israeli government in 1992, upon the 25th anniversary of the reunification of Jerusalem

We have gathered together in Zion, national leaders and heads of our communities everywhere, to enter into a covenant with Jerusalem, as was done by the leaders of our nation and all the people of Israel upon Israel's return to its Land from the Babylonian exile; and the people and their leaders will dwell in Jerusalem, the Holy City.

Once again, 'our feet stand within your gates, O Jerusalem - Jerusalem built as a city joined together' which 'unites the people of Israel to one another', and 'links heavenly Jerusalem with earthly Jerusalem.'

We have returned to the place that the Lord vowed to bestow upon the descendants of Abraham, Father of our Nation; to the City of David, King of Israel; where Solomon, son of David, built a Holy Temple; a Capital City which became the Mother of all Israel; a metropolis for justice and righteousness and for the wisdom and insights of the ancient world; where a Second Temple was erected in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah. In this city the prophets of the Lord prophesied; in the City the Sages taught Torah; in this City the Sanhedrin convened in session in its stone chamber. 'For there were the seats of Justice, the Throne of the House of David', 'for out of Zion shall go forth Torah, and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem.'

Today, as of old, we hold fast to the truth of the words of the Prophets of Israel, that all the inhabitants of the world shall enter within the gates of Jerusalem: 'And it shall come to pass at the end of days, the mountain of the House of the Lord will be well established at the peak of the mountains and will tower above the hills, and all the nation shall stream towards it.' Each and every nation will live in it by its own faith: 'For all the nation will go forward, each with its own Divine Name; we shall go in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever.' And in this spirit the Knesset of the State of Israel has enacted a law: The places holy to the peoples of all religions shall be protected from any desecration and from any restriction of free access to them.

Jerusalem - peace and tranquility shall reign in the city: 'Pray for the peace of Jerusalem; may those who love you be tranquil. May there be peace within your walls, and tranquility within your palaces.' Out of Jerusalem, a message of peace went forth and shall yet go forth again to all the inhabitants of the earth: 'And they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation will not lift up sword against nation, nor shall they learn war anymore.' Our sages, peace be upon them, said. In the future, The Holy One, the Blessed, will comfort Jerusalem only with peace..

From this place, we once again take this vow: 'If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, may my right hand lose its strength; may my tongue cleave to my palate if I do not remember you, if I do not raise up Jerusalem at the very height of my rejoicing.'

And with all these understandings, we enter into this Covenant and write: 'We shall bind you to us forever; we shall bind you to us with faithfulness, with righteousness and justice, with steadfast love and compassion.' We love you, O Jerusalem, with eternal love, with unbounded love, under siege and when liberated from the yoke of oppressors. We have been martyred for you; we have yearned for you, we have clung to you. Our faithfulness to you we shall bequeath to our children after us. Forevermore our home shall be within you.

Jewish Battle Cry of Freedom

By: Rabbi Shmuley Boteach Published: June 11th, 2015 Latest update: June 10th, 2015

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach

(Adapted from remarks delivered at the third annual Champions of Jewish Values International Awards Gala in New York on May 28.)

In January 2014, on a visit to Auschwitz with the Knesset, I traveled alone to Warsaw to see the underground bunker where Mordechai Anielewicz and his fellow freedom fighters took their own lives rather fall into German hands — just like the Jews at Masada.

When the SS police chief personally detonated the Great Synagogue of Warsaw, he called it a “fantastic piece of theater.”

With that, he was sure he had destroyed the last bit of Jewish resistance, the last Jews who were prepared to fight.

What he could not see was that just five years later the Jews would assemble an army that would turn back five Arab nations bent on their total annihilation.

What he could not see was that 24 years later Israel would astonish the world with its lightning victory in the Six-Day War, a God-given triumph that reunited the ancient Jewish capital.

And what he could not see was that Jews and non-Jews would join together, seventy years after the liberation at Auschwitz, right here in New York City, to commemorate the survival of the Jews and the fall of their foes.

And here we proclaim loudly and boldly: Lo Omus Ki Echyeh! I shall not die. For I shall live! I am forever.

We Jews must refuse to be maligned. We must fight back.

The world cannot lecture us about peace. It was Judaism that taught the world that peace is the highest virtue. While troubadours sang of Alexander’s conquest of Persia, while minstrels crooned of Caesar’s conquest of Gaul, while ballads were written to Hannibal’s crossing of the Alps astride a giant elephant, Jewish prophets electrified the world with a vision of men beating their swords into ploughshares and no man ever again teaching his son the art of war.

But King Solomon in Ecclesiastes is clear: “There is a time for war and a time for peace.” Now is not the time to lay down our arms. Now is the time to fight back – against the demonization of Israel and against those who seek the destruction of our people.

Indeed, while I was sure that after the Holocaust the world had finally satisfied its Jewish bloodlust, I was wrong. After a 70-year respite, the appetite for Jewish blood is back.

A few months back on a lecture tour in Australia I became despondent that even in my wife’s beautiful country, the former foreign minister, Bob Carr, had savaged Israel.

I called Miriam Adelson, a trusted friend and adviser. “Miri,” I said, “we cannot combat this. They’re ganging up on us from all over the world.”

“Yes, Shmuley,” she said, quoting from the Haggadah, “ ‘In every generation they arise against us to annihilate us.’ But then a courageous few Maccabees – arise in our defense. Pick yourself up. Rise and become a Maccabee!”

For the victims of the Holocaust, there was often just one form resistance open to them: to hold their heads high and proud as Jews even as poison gas filled their lungs. Jewish defiance expressed in Jewish pride was the only form of resistance.

But with the miracle of the righteous and majestic state of Israel, a new form of Jewish defiance was born, one that sanctified God not through a willingness to die but through an insistence to live.

Every Israeli boy became a Mordechai Anielewicz – a noble Maccabee –prepared to fight fiercely so that the Jews could live freely.

Today, we Jews know that our protection must come from none but God and ourselves alone.

Some say the Jews are hated because of Israel’s “atrocities.” This is preposterous. For 2,000 years, Jews were powerless to hurt anyone.

Rather, it is because God entrusted to the Jews the teaching of the moral law. And ever since, a world that refuses to act morally – a world that murders 200,000 innocent Arabs in Syria, a government in Iran that stones women to death – hates Israel because it exposes its inhumanity.

Israel is hated not because it inflicts death but because it respects life. It has hated not because it whips women but because it treats them as equals. It is hated not because it practices Judaism, but because, unlike all its neighbors, it allows its citizens to worship God as they see fit.

If Israel can be a democracy then so can Lebanon, Qatar, the Palestinian Authority, and Iran – or those countries can simply choose to kill or demonize the messenger instead.

They tell us, “Oh, you Jews preach of not taking life but then drink the blood of Christian children in your matzahs.”

And now that blood-libel has metamorphosed into “You perpetrated a genocide against the Palestinians. You are a Nazi state.”

But just as hatred is contagious, so is courage.

Let us rise above our self-doubt, above any self-hatred, and become Maccabees.

When the spies told Moses the Land was unconquerable they said, “We appeared in our eyes like we were cockroaches, and so we appeared to them.”

When we see ourselves as pygmies, others see us that way as well.

Let us proclaim enough of Jewish self-loathing, and in its place proclaim the Fed Up Man of Faith.

We are fed up. Fed up with the attacks on Israel that hold the Jewish state to an impossible standard.

Fed up with the plaques to murdered Jews on cafes and pizza shops across Israel.

Fed up with a UN that condemns the Middle East’s only democracy while turning a blind eye to the indiscriminate slaughter throughout the Middle East.

Fed up with Jews dying in Paris to buy a loaf of bread.

Fed up with Jews dying in Copenhagen just to pray.

Fed up with Jews dying in Brussels to attend a museum.

Fed up with Jews dying in Toulouse to study at a Jewish school.

And we have every right to be fed up. No nation should have to live like this. No nation should have to die like this.

Come, let us give battle to the forces of cruelty. With faith and conviction let us declare: Am Yisrael Chai! The Jewish People Live! “Never Again” must and will mean just that – Never Ever Again.

About the Author: Shmuley Boteach, whom the Washington Post calls “the most famous rabbi in America,” is the founder of The World Values Network and the international bestselling author of 30 books, including “The Fed-up Man of Faith: Challenging God in the Face of Tragedy and Suffering.” Follow him on Twitter @RabbiShmuley.

Six-Day War Memories: Our First Minutes at the Western Wall

Six-Day War Memories:

Our First Minutes at the Western Wall

(Photo: AP/David Rudiger/GPO)

We finish our six-day commemoration of the 1967 Six-Day War with memories of Israelis approaching the Western Wall once Jerusalem was once again Israel’s. An IDF paratrooper and a veteran Zionist recall the joy felt upon entering the Holy City for the first time:

“We ran there, a group of panting soldiers, lost on the plaza of the Temple Mount, searching for a giant stone wall. We did not stop to look at the Mosque of Omar even though this was the first time we had seen it close up. Forward! Forward! Hurriedly, we pushed our way through the Magreb Gate and suddenly we stopped, thunderstruck. There it was before our eyes! Gray and massive, silent and restrained. The Western Wall!

“Slowly, slowly I began to approach the Wall in fear and trembling like a pious cantor going to the lectern to lead the prayers. I approached it as the messenger of my father and my grandfather, of my great-grandfather and of all the generations in all the exiles who had never merited seeing it – and so they had sent me to represent them. Somebody recited the festive blessing:“Blessed are You, O Lord our God, King of the Universe who has kept us alive, and maintained us and brought us to this time.” But I could not answer “Amen.” I put my hand on the stones and the tears that started to flow were not my tears. They were the tears of all Israel, tears of hope and prayer, tears of Chasidic tunes, tears of Jewish dances, tears which scorched and burned the heavy gray stone.”
- Moshe Amirav, IDF paratrooper

“Narrow alleys, filthy passageways, garbage at the entrances of shuttered shops, the stench of dead legionnaires – but we paid no attention. Our eyes were fixed on the golden dome which could be seen from a distance. There, more or less, it had to be! We marched faster to keep up with the beating of our hearts. We were almost running. We met a soldier from one of the forward units and asked him the way and hurried on. We went through a gate and down some steps. I looked to the right and stopped dead. There was the Wall in all its grandeur and glory! I had never seen it before, but it was an old friend, impossible to mistake. Then I thought that I should not be there because the Wall belongs in the world of dreams and legends and I am real.

“Reality and legend, dream and deed, all unite here. I went down and approached the Wall and stretched out my hand towards the huge, hewn stones. But my hand was afraid to touch and of itself returned to me. I closed my eyes, took a small, hesitant step forward, and brought my lips to the Wall. The touch of my lips opened the gates of my emotions and the tears burst forth. A Jewish soldier in the State of Israel is kissing history with his lips.

“Past, present and future all in one kiss. There will be no more destruction and the Wall will never again be deserted. It was taken with young Jewish blood and the worth of that blood is eternity. The body is coupled to the rows of stones, the face is pushed into the spaces between them and the hands try to reach its heart. A soldier near me mumbles in disbelief, ‘We are at the Wall, at the Wall…’ ”
- Avraham Duvdevani

Author: Stand For Israel | June 10, 2015

PRES HUSSEIN OBAMA AND THE US SUPREME COURT SAID...BIG DEAL!!!

In the Words of Ben-Gurion

(Photo: flickr/GPO)

Yesterday, Stand for Israel reported on the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling against allowing those Americans born in Jerusalem to list Israel as their birthplace. Summoning the first Prime Minister of Israel, David Ben-Gurion, Israel Hayom’s Nadav Shragai writes that Israel and her supporters must unite for Jerusalem:

Yiddish speech is peppered with the phrase “Hat er gazant.” David Ben-Gurion tended to use it, and later translated it into a somewhat weaker Hebrew version: “So, he said it!”

On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that American citizens who are born in Jerusalem cannot have Israel listed as their country of birth on their U.S. passports. We can and should revisit our birthright to Jerusalem; the historic Palestinian fraud; the hypocrisy of U.S. President Barack Obama (whose policy the Supreme Court upheld). We can prove that the ruling is ridiculous, but it looks like the most appropriate response in this case is actually the sarcastic, “So, he said it!”

Because Jerusalem is one of the cases in which the State of Israel has an obligation to do what is good for the Jews and think less about what the goyim say. To be committed to the dream and try a little harder to make it come true, and care less about the reality…

This is the vision that guided the State of Israel to stand up against the entire world to unite Jerusalem. Let the boycotters make threats, and the judges hand down worthless rulings — we will do our part and answer them once and for all in the words of Ben-Gurion: “Hat er gezant.”

Because Jerusalem is a special case, and we won’t let the diplomatic reality — however difficult — confuse us.

The Rockets of Summer

(Photo: Oren Nahshon)

In the past week, two terrorist rocket attacks have already been launched at Israel. At The Jerusalem Post, Fellowship Senior Vice President Yael Eckstein writes of the recent wars waged against Israel, most of which have occurred during the summer, and of the Israeli people’s resilience:

Last week, summer arrived in the Holy Land.

Unlike most places in the world, Israelis welcome summer somewhat reluctantly. Most of the recent wars waged against Israel have occurred in the summer, which has left many people associating warm weather with memories of sweating in a bomb shelter.

Yet, there is a divine resilience that the people of Israel possess, which enables us to move on with life.

So as the sun peaked out from behind the winter clouds, we left our fears in the secured rooms and headed for the beach.

When the summer flowers bloom and fill the air with a sweet perfume, the people of Israel go out to smell the roses. Two weeks ago the warm weather moved in, and you could practically feel the celebration and happiness in the air.

Children joyfully licked chocolate-banana popsicles, and laughed with excitement as it melted over their fingers.

Teenagers hit the beach with their iPods, and had picnics to celebrate the end of the school year.

Elderly people took the long-awaited journey outside to get some fresh air and defrost from the chilly winter.

And just as we all started to finally relax and feel confident in the carefree summer joy, the code red siren sounded and the rockets struck. When this happened, all Israelis – whether in southern Israel or Tel Aviv – were violently brought back into the fragile and sometimes terrifying reality we live with every day.

The sobering reality is that we can go to the beach, roam the malls, fly kites, and have summer picnics like the rest of the Western world. But we’re not like the rest of the Western world. Here in Israel we live from war to war. We have terrorists on every one of our borders. Our summers – just like the winters and springs – are unpredictable at best.

Yet, it’s specifically at times like this that the resilience, faith, hope, and beauty of my people shine the brightest. After millennia of suffering and hardship, the Jewish people has learned how to make lemonade out of lemons, and use hardship to build our hope and strength.

In the past 10 years of living in Israel, I have learned that everyone here lives a life of paradox – a balance of many emotions and realities. My experience last Thursday night at Comedy for Koby summed this up perfectly.

I was speechless, and yet so deeply inspired, as I watched Seth and Sheri Mandell stand on a stage – mourning parents in deep pain over the brutal killing of their beloved son Koby – and telling jokes rather than talking about politics or Israel’s many enemies. Their 13-year-old child was stoned to death by terrorists. But this holy family consciously chose to honor his memory through spreading positivity and laughter.

And the people of Sderot are just like Seth and Sheri, who refused to let the darkness win – refused to be defeated, but chose to produce light and hope from a devastating and incomprehensible situation.

When I visited Sderot last week I saw basketball courts under huge bomb shelter structures, rocket remnants transformed into the shape of flowers as a poetic prayer for peace, and playgrounds with bombproof tunnels decorated as colorful caterpillars.

Just one week after a rocket attack struck southern Israel, vibrant life filled the streets of Sderot. I saw exuberant children play ball in the street, with mobile shelters every couple hundreds of feet lingering in the backdrop – as if that were normal. Like all of the cities in Israel, Sderot has built the infrastructure needed to go on with life in midst of the threats. They have learned to live in the paradox of being both slave and free; slaves to the ongoing terrorism, and free in their decisions to continue on with life.

Turks Boast of Historic Slaughter and Rape of Christians

By Raymond Ibrahim June 10, 2015 , 9:30 am

Earlier this week a news report unwittingly demonstrated how Turkey—once deemed the most “secularized” Muslim nation—is returning to its Islamic heritage, complete with animosity for the infidel West and dreams of the glory days of jihadi conquests:

A group of devout Muslims from across Turkey prayed before the city’s historic Hagia Sophia on the 562nd anniversary of the Turkish conquest of Istanbul [Constantinople], demanding that the site be turned back into a mosque.

Men and women from across the country gathered before the Hagia Sophia museum early May 31, as part of an event organized by the Anatolian Youth Association (AGD) with the motto “Break the chains, Open Hagia Sophia,” and prayed the morning prayer with a call for the reconversion of the museum into a mosque.

In fact, this is an annual ritual. Thousands of Turks surround Hagia Sophia every May and call for it to become a mosque—often to Islam’s war-cry, “Allahu Akbar!”

This is not about a “minority of radicals.” In a survey conducted with 401 Turks, more than 97 percent wanted Hagia Sophia to be turned into a functioning mosque. Nor is this about Muslims needing a place to pray. As of 2010, there were 3,000 active mosques in Istanbul alone.

Rather, this is about Muslims wanting to revel in the glory days of Islamic jihad and conquest.

Unlike historically-challenged Westerners, Muslims fully understand the significance of Hagia Sophia. Hagia Sophia—Greek for “Holy Wisdom”—was, in fact, Christendom’s greatest cathedral for almost one thousand years. Built in Constantinople, the heart of the ancient Christian empire, it was also a stalwart symbol of defiance against an ever encroaching Islam from the east.

After parrying centuries of jihadi thrusts, Constantinople was finally sacked by the Turks under Sultan Mehmet II on May 29, 1453. Its crosses desecrated and icons defaced, Hagia Sophia—as well as thousands of other churches—was converted into a victory mosque, the tall minarets of Islam surrounding it in triumph.

Reading the primary historic texts from the period is not unlike reading current headlines concerning Islamic State atrocities—the massacres, beheadings, rapes, enslavement of Christian “infidels” and the defilement of their churches. Writes an eyewitness to the 1453 Turkish conquest of Constantinople:

The enraged Turkish soldiers . . . gave no quarter. When they had massacred and there was no longer any resistance, they were intent on pillage and roamed through the town stealing, disrobing, pillaging, killing, raping, taking captive men, women, children, old men, young men, monks, priests, people of all sorts and conditions… There were virgins who awoke from troubled sleep to find those brigands standing over them with bloody hands and faces full of abject fury… [The Turkish jihadis] dragged them, tore them, forced them, dishonored them, raped them at the cross-roads and made them submit to the most terrible outrages…

Tender children were brutally snatched from their mothers’ breasts and girls were pitilessly given up to strange and horrible unions, and a thousand other terrible things happened. . .

Temples [including Hagia Sophia] were desecrated, ransacked and pillaged . . . sacred objects were scornfully flung aside, the holy icons and the holy vessels were desecrated…. Immense numbers of sacred and profane books were flung on the fire or torn up and trampled under foot.

This is what Turkey’s Muslims are proud of. Salih Turhan, head of the Anatolian Youth Association, the group that annually organizes mass demonstrations around Hagia Sophia, boasts that, “As the grandchildren of Mehmet the Conqueror, seeking the re-opening Hagia Sophia as a mosque is our legitimate right.”

Turks know full well that Mehmet was the scourge of European Christendom; that his hordes seized and ravished Constantinople, forcibly turning it into Islamic Istanbul; that he had the fallen corpse of the Christian emperor, Constantine, who refused to forsake his besieged city, beheaded, mutilated, and mocked. Openly idolizing Mehmet and other sultans, as many Turks do, is tantamount to their saying, “We are proud of our ancestors who slaughtered, beheaded, enslaved and raped people and stole their lands simply because they were Christian ‘infidels.’”

More contemporarily, it’s tantamount to their saying “We are proud of our fellow Sunni Muslims of the Islamic State—who are currently slaughtering, beheading, enslaving, and raping people simply because they are Christian “infidels.”

Such pride in Islamic atrocities goes all the way to the top in Turkey, to President Erdogan, who claims that the jihadi conquest of Constantinople was the true “time of enlightenment.”

Still, none of this stops Turks from claiming victim status. The Anatolian Youth Association still manages to blame the West: “Keeping Hagia Sophia Mosque closed is an insult to our mostly Muslim population of 75 million. It symbolizes our ill-treatment by the West.”

So keeping a historically Christian/Western building—that was stolen by bloody jihad—as a museum is seen as “ill-treatment by the West.”

Similarly, last April, after Pope Francis accurately referred to the mass slaughter of Armenians by Ottoman Turks as “the first genocide of the 20thcentury,” Ankara’s highest Islamic authority responded by saying that the Pope’s remarks “will only accelerate the process for Hagia Sophia to be re-opened for [Muslim] worship.”

Such is the Islamic world’s double standards: when Muslims conquer non-Muslim territories, such as Constantinople and its churches—through fire and steel, with all the attendant human suffering and misery—the descendants of those conquered are not to expect any apologies or concessions—not even a building.

However, once the same Muslims who would never concede an inch of Islam’s conquests are on the short end of the stick—Palestinians vis-à-vis Israel, for example—then they resort to the United Nations and the court of public opinion, demanding “justice,” “restitution,” “human rights,” and so forth.

It’s a wonder that more people are not onto the Muslim game yet—a testimony to the blindness and historic ignorance of the West.

Reprinted with author’s permission from FrontPage Mag

Read more at http://www.breakingisraelnews.com/42792/turks-boast-of-historic-slaughter-and-rape-of-christians-opinion/#oAuRYTOogUQSvPAy.99

Shaked dives into foreign policy, pushes for alliance with Kurds

Shaked dives into foreign policy, pushes for alliance with Kurds

By YONAH JEREMY BOB \

06/09/2015 18:43

Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked

Diving into foreign policy with a splash, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked advocated an alliance between Israel and the Kurdish nation on Tuesday.

Speaking at the annual Herzliya Conference, Shaked headlined a session titled “Israel’s Law and Justice,” in which in addition to speaking on those topics she also referred to foreign affairs. Although Shaked sits in the all-important security cabinet, most justice ministers do not delve into the foreign policy arena.

Shaked said that as the Middle East drawn up by European powers under the century-old Sykes-Picot Agreement breaks apart and Iran further threatens countries throughout the region, Israel has many opportunities to ally itself with moderate Arab countries.

An alliance with these moderate Arab countries could tilt the balance of power toward Israel and make it “an active, initiating, strong and dominant player,” she said.

Of these allies, “the greatest opportunity that stands before us could come from strengthening the connections with the Kurdish nation, who I wish to speak to,” Shaked said.

Moreover, the justice minister said, “the Jewish and Kurdish nations share a history... of mutual respect, mutual interests,” including fighting Islamic State.

Asked why a justice minister would enter the foreign affairs arena, her spokeswoman said that despite the title of the specific session, the conference’s focus was on issues of state, that Shaked is part of the government, and that in her eyes the issue is of vast strategic importance in foreign policy.

Shaked also addressed the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign, saying she had ordered the international divisions of the Justice Ministry to not only defend against BDS efforts, but to go on the offensive against them.

Her spokeswoman clarified that actions would relate to preventing and deterring events such as the recent pro-BDS vote by student groups in England and the comments made by the CEO of Orange about wanting to pull business out of Israel.

On the topic of law and justice, Shaked returned to her recent themes of expressing respect for the legal system’s organs, but demanding that these organs focus their efforts on the goals and values that society and its democratic representatives set for them.

DID YOU KNOW WHY WE COVER OUR EYES FOR THE SHEMA????

Why do you cover your face when you say the Shema prayer?

The Shema is said with a hand held over the eyes, usually the right hand.

Have you ever noticed how when you’re trying really hard to concentrate, you sometimes close your eyes to help you focus? That’s the basic idea here, too. We cover our eyes to help us concentrate while saying the important words in the Shema, which express faith in God and God’s unity.

The Talmud (Berakhot 13b) is the original source for this custom. Here there is a mention of Rabbi Judah the Prince covering his eyes while he said the Shema to block out the distractions of the students around him. This behavior was codified in the Shulhan Arukh (OH 61:4-5).

There are, however, other explanations for the tradition. According to some commentators, such as Rabbi Ezekiel Landau (17th century Prague), and the contemporary Rabbi Yissocher Frand, we cover our eyes because it would be difficult to express complete faith in God while looking at the pain in the world around us.

Believe it or not, the use of the right hand has to do with the toilet facilities of ancient times. Left hands were used to wipe one’s behind, and so were not appropriate (or sanitary) for religious affirmations.

For many Jews, the impulse to cover one’s eyes while saying the Shema is difficult to suppress. There’s a famous story about Rabbi Yosef Kahaneman, a prominent Lithuanian rabbi (1886-1969): after the Holocaust, he tried to find Jewish children whose parents had hid them in convents and church orphanages during the war. Rabbi Kahaneman would walk through orphanages in Europe, reciting the beginning of the Shema. Instinctively, some of the children would cover their eyes, and cry out, “Mama, Mama!”

Having the correct kavanah, or intention, while saying any prayer is considered very important, but the message of the Shema–its simplicity and intensity–requires an extra level of concentration.

How Islam Got its American Privileges

How Islam Got its American Privileges

TRUER WORDS HAVE NEVER BEEN SAID...YOU MUST READ IT TWICE SO IT SINKS IN AND YOU MUST OPEN YOUR EYES AND BRAINS BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE...

WAKE UP AMERICA...!!!!!

Tuesday, June 9, 2015

RAND’s Ridiculous Assumptions on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

The RAND report's hypothetical scenarios are based on false assumptions, immoral considerations, failed concepts and impossible scenarios.

By: JoeSettler / Published: June 9th, 2015

The RAND corporation released a report that is making tremendous waves, particularly among those who lean leftward. The news reports say RAND claims that Israelis and Palestinians could be $174 billion dollars richer in 10 years, if only a Palestinian State were created.

But the report doesn’t actually say that.

(Note: I use the terms “Palestinians” and “West Bank” only as a reference back to the content of the report.)

Unfortunately, for all the noise, no one seems to have actually read the report (and admittedly, RAND saved their most truthful and important caveats to the very end), thus misunderstanding what basic premises and assumptions RAND relied on, what conditions were assumed, what they completely ignored and what objective the RAND report authors actually want to achieve.

The report is very specifically only talking about the economic benefits (primarily to the Palestinians) if a hypothetical, Utopian two-state solution at peace with Israel were achieved.

But the report is based on impossible assumptions and wishful thinking that doesn’t coincide with any reality we live in or any historical precedent we’ve experienced. In fact, the RAND report acknowledges many of the problems I will list below, only to ignore them as it presents the economic utopia that could be… if only… The report is a hypothetical case study based on impossible assumptions, that only at the end of the report do they essentially acknowledge are unattainable. Worse, despite their thrice repeated statement of only presenting scenarios that are “credible” and achievable within 10 years, their scenarios are simply not credible, and they notably left out other, far more reasonable and achievable scenario, though clearly not the scenarios they desire. If I were to actually spell out my perception of RAND’s goal for this report, it would solely be to convince the Palestinians that a two-state scenario is in their best interest to implement, even as it is not in their power to do so.

Towards the very end, the RAND report finally admits the impossibility of their hypothetical case studies:

11.8. No Change in Sight The economic benefits of peace and negative consequences of violence are clear. But many other less tangible considerations, including the ones discussed above, create a complex web of factors and imputed costs, making it exceedingly difficult for the parties to reach an understanding—even internally among various groups in each society, let alone externally to bridge the divide that the final status accord issues have always posed.

None of the scenarios we examined seems likely to change this situation in the short run.

Meaning, implementing a two-state solution won’t bring peace, and peace won’t happen, which is needed to bring about a two-state solution. I also played a bit with their Conflict Calculator, but again, the primary problem isn’t their math, it’s the underlying assumptions their math is based on. RAND’s primary required premise is that they must assume the Palestinians want peace and can build a peaceful society for this to work, and they would be satisfied if only they had a Palestinian State with Jerusalem as their capital, and along the 1967 line. Except, nothing in our experience shows that to be the case, particularly the Palestinian’s own actions and statements. The PLO was formed in 1964 to destroy Israel, when the Arabs controlled eastern Jerusalem and the West Bank and didn’t try to create a Palestinian state there. They killed the Jews of Hebron in 1929 when there wasn’t even a state of Israel. Gaza is now controlled by Hamas/Palestinians, and they’ve made it clear they still want to destroy Israel. Instead of building the Gazan Riviera they build terror tunnels and missiles. The PA continues to propagandize against Israel. The Palestinians refused offers by previous Israeli prime ministers who were prepared to give them everything they asked for – in exchange for an end to the conflict. But the Palestinians repeatedly turned it down.

RAND’s basic required premise #1 is unrealistic. A Palestinian State will not be one which is at peace with Israel, because that is not what the Palestinians want, as they have made clear. And the multiple wars and battles that follow will not be good for the GDP.
RAND assumes that evacuating Settlers, handing over Area C for Palestinian development, and bringing in 1.2 million Palestinians will increase the Palestinian GDP. RAND again requires assumption that the Palestinian are interested or capable of developing their own infrastructure, much less absorbing 1.2 million Arabs (perhaps they confused the Palestinians with Israel). Despite foreign investments and among the highest international donations in the world, the Palestinians have refused or been unable to develop the eastern aquifers, sewage treatment facilities, and even advanced hospitals, much less good government. The money was given to them, no one was obstructing them. They just didn’t/couldn’t do it.

So, RAND’s basic premise #2 is wrong. The Palestinians can not or will not develop their infrastructure properly if given the opportunity, as they’ve had the opportunity for the past 20 years and haven’t done so.
RAND believes the collapse of the Palestinian Authority will have a negative economic effect, but requires assuming that a Palestinian State will keep the Palestinian Authority healthy and functioning. The RAND study mentions and then ignores that the IDF is what is keeping Hamas at bay in the West Bank. The PA is incapable of fighting Hamas on its own. ISIS is also trying to make inroads (in Gaza too). If the IDF pulls out of the West Bank, the PA will collapse, guaranteed. Civil war will follow, as it did in Gaza. RAND’s calculator calculates the negative effect the dissolution of the PA will have on their GDP. Yet it is clear that an IDF pullout will lead to the PA’s dissolution. You can’t pull the IDF out from the West Bank, hand over Area C to the PA and expect the PA to survive what happens next.

RAND’s basic premise #3 is wrong, because it ignores that the PA will definitely collapse following an Israeli pullout.
The RAND calculator discusses “relocating” up to 600,000 “Settlers”. The report talks about a more realistic 100,000 settlers. RAND takes into account a number of variables. If Israel foots the bill, then the more Settlers Israel “relocates” the worse Israel’s GDP gets. If the international community foots the bill, the benefits to the GDP are incredibly marginal. Furthermore, to reach the number 600,000 (and even just 100,000), RAND has to include “Settlers” living in well established Jerusalem neighborhoods such as the Old City, Gilo, Har Homa and Pisgat Ze’ev. Regardless, their calculator shows that the benefits to Israel of “relocating” settlers is almost always negative for Israel.

RAND’s basic premise #4, that expelling the Jews from the West Bank and parts of Jerusalem would be a productive step, is directly contradicted by their own calculator, at least for Israel.
There are some other RAND assumptions that I simply found to be disgusting and immoral. RAND worked on the assumption that if Israel released Palestinian terrorists, then the Palestinian Authority would no longer need to provide financial support to the terrorists’ families, and their GDP would rise. As we already know from experience, Palestinian terrorist recidivism is quite high, so releasing Palestinian terrorists would increase Israel’s security costs (and Israeli deaths). But that’s not the only problem. The other major problem is that the Palestinian Authority is giving money to support the families of terrorists. The worse the act of terror, the more blood on their hands, the more money the family gets. The RAND report says that 6% of the PA’s annual budget or $200 million goes to paying the families of terrorists. The calculator should have discussed the Palestinian Authority ending payments to terrorists, not releasing the terrorists.

RAND’s basic premise #5 indicates a strong moral lapse on RAND’s part as well as ignoring the facts. They were thinking in terms of releasing terrorists as opposed to ending support for the terrorists. And their calculator ignores the increased security cost each released terrorist brings with it for Israel.
Moving on to BDS, the bottom line is that despite BDS attacks, Israel’s economy has been growing, and in fact, the attacks have forced Israel to open up new markets and do even better internationally. But RAND assumes that BDS will suddenly start becoming successful on a large scale, when there is no indication that this is the case.

RAND’s assumption #6 that BDS will suddenly be more successful is wishful thinking on RAND’s part.
On a final note, the RAND report only considered two basic scenarios and the degrees of violence and unilateralism between them – from the status quo to a Palestinian State. RAND is clearly stuck in a failed paradigm. It didn’t consider any other possibilities (and I don’t mean a one-state solution, which they deemed as undesirable, as do I). For instance, instead of relocating Settlers and determining who would pay for that, the report completely ignored the alternative–relocating the Palestinians. How much would it cost to relocate the Palestinians to Jordan? How would that affect Israel’s GDP?

If RAND believes importing 600,000 Palestinians into the West Bank would be amazing for Palestine’s economy, imagine what relocating 2 million Palestinians into Jordan would do for Jordan’s economy – and peace in the region.
It’s an equally fair question to ask and equally fair alternative scenario to consider – but RAND didn’t. The most RAND did say in passing (p. 179) is there exists a “federation” option, but it hasn’t been “extensively examined” or researched. Well, why not? Why did RAND put in all this effort into scenarios they ultimately admit are impossible, when they could have explored new ideas that might actually work?

RAND’s basic premise #7 is that their are only 2 basic solutions – from status quo to Palestinian State, but was incapable of considering other, actually credible, scenarios.
There are other errors in the report which I won’t go into. The bottom line is that the RAND report’s hypothetical scenarios are based on false assumptions, immoral considerations, failed concepts and impossible conditions. I’m sure someone else will invest their time successfully debunking RAND’s financial assumptions too. But I don’t believe there’s a need to waste more time on it, RAND presented us with a hypothetical case study based on impossible parameters.

End of story.

About the Author: JoeSettler blogs at The Muqata.blogspot.com and occasionally on his own blog at JoeSettler.blogspot.com.

10 Things Wrong with the RAND Report...only 10???

10 Things Wrong with the RAND Report

The RAND report on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a fatally flawed document that offers an unattainable utopian economic vision based on incorrect, impossible, undesirable and immoral assumptions.

By: JoeSettler / Published: June 9th, 2015

The RAND report on the costs of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict and the end-goal of a Palestinian state is rife with errors and false assumptions.

The report is very specifically only talking about hypothetical economic benefits (primarily to the Palestinians) if a utopian two-state solution, with a Palestinian state at peace with Israel were achieved. But the assumptions and facts the report is built on are flawed.

Here are ten things wrong with the RAND report:

10) RAND endorses a Palestinian Apartheid State.

9) US financial aid to Israel is given out of largesse.

8) There exist 600,000 Palestinian Refugees who will “return from abroad” to Palestine.

7) 600,000 Palestinian Refugees will “return from abroad” to Palestine.

6) The Palestinians will develop and maintain the infrastructure needed for a Palestinian state.

5) The IDF can pull out of the West Bank and the Palestinian Authority will survive.

4) RAND’s view on Palestinian prisoners (terrorists) is immoral and financially incorrect.

3) Israel is restricting and limiting water access to the Palestinians.

2) Expelling Jews is critical for a Palestinian state and the only credible solution.

1) RAND assumes a Palestinian state would not want to destroy Israel.

10 – RAND endorses a Palestinian Apartheid State. The report shows concern for Israel’s democracy and Palestinian rights within the Israeli state, but not only is RAND unperturbed by the lack of Jews in the Palestinian state, its recommended solution is expelling all the Jews from Palestinian controlled areas, implicitly endorsing a Palestinian Apartheid state.

9 – US financial aid to Israel is given out of largesse. US financial assistance to Israel has been undeniably important to Israel’s development. The report seems to imply that the US provides financial and military aid to Israel out of largesse and that all the money has been in the form of grants. In reality, much of the historical US financial assistance to Israel has actually been in the form of loans that Israel repaid in full. Furthermore, since 1979, much of the US military funding and aid to Israel was part and parcel with the Camp David Israel-Egypt Peace Accords. In exchange for Israel ceding the invaluable Sinai Peninsula, with its oil reserves, tourism capabilities, land resources and strategic depth, to Egypt, the US placed financial obligations on itself vis-à-vis Israel. While this information doesn’t change the report, it implies a certain mindset by the authors.

For more information on US aid to Israel:https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/US-Israel/foreign_aid.html

8 – There exist 600,000 Palestinian Refugees who will “return from abroad” to Palestine. The Palestinians are the only refugee group in the world that transfer their first-generation refugee status to their descendants (even to great-great-grandchildren), based on a unique definition established only for them by UNRWA. Refugee status is even awarded to those residing within the Palestinian Authority and Gaza (requiring a very flexible reading of “internally displaced persons”) as the Palestinian Authority keeps them in refugee camps. Using the original UNHCR’s definition, as it applies to refugees in the rest of the world, at best there are only 50,000 Palestinian refugees still alive today from 1948. And we haven’t even touched the issue of Jewish refugees from Arab countries, as well as “internally displaced” Jews from pre-1948 Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria.

7 – 600,000 Palestinian Refugees will “return from abroad” to Palestine. The RAND report arbitrarily decided 600,000 Palestinians will decide to immigrate to a Palestinian state. But that number could just as easily be 6 million, especially if the international community is giving money away to the refugees along with the instability of the Middle East driving Arab refugees elsewhere. The consequences for the Palestinian State are predictable. Whatever the final number, the Palestinians can not and will not develop the infrastructure to support any such mass immigration.

6 – The Palestinians will develop and maintain the infrastructure needed for a Palestinian state. Despite foreign investments and among the highest international donations per capita in the world, the Palestinians have refused or been unable to develop the eastern aquifers, sewage treatment facilities, and even advanced hospitals, much less good government. The money was given to them, the opportunity was given to them, no one was obstructing them. They just did not want to do it.

5 – The IDF can pull out of the West Bank and the Palestinian Authority will survive. Only the IDF is preventing a Hamas, and perhaps an ISIS, military takeover of the West Bank. The Palestinian Authority hasn’t run elections in a decade due to the realistic prediction that Hamas will win due to popular support. An IDF pullout will guarantee the worst terrorists take over the West Bank, just as they did in Gaza and Southern Lebanon. An IDF pullout is a guaranteed recipe for war, not peace.

4 – RAND’s view on Palestinian prisoners (terrorists) is immoral and financially incorrect. RAND believes the release of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails would free up money that is instead going to support the families of those jailed. The Palestinian Authority finances the prisoner’s families based on a sliding scale of how gruesome and successful the attacks on Israel were. With the worst terrorists receiving the most money. RAND’s call for releasing these terrorists is immoral, and would also result in a significant increase in Israeli expenditure on security due to the historically high rate of recidivism among freed terrorists. A moral position would have RAND calling for the Palestinian Authority to stop funding the jailed terrorists, potentially saving them over $200 million a year, or 6% of their annual budget.

3 – Israel is restricting and limiting water access to the Palestinians. The Palestinian Authority has purposely refused to develop the eastern aquifers that could provide them with tremendous water stock. The Palestinian Authority barely maintains the water system that Israel developed that currently supplies them with water, resulting in tremendous losses as high as 33% from negligence and Palestinian theft. Israel supplies the Palestinians more water than is required by the Oslo Accords. The Palestinians purposely do not treat most of their sewage which risks everyone’s water supply, denying themselves additional water for agriculture. This is an internal Palestinian problem they refuse to deal with.For more information on water report: http://mfa.gov.il/MFA_Graphics/MFA%20Gallery/Documents/IsraelPalestiniansWaterIssues.pdf

2 – Expelling Jews is critical for a Palestinian state and the only credible solution. RAND wants to expel (“relocate”) as many as 100,000 Jews (if not 600,000) to establish a Palestinian state. The economic benefits to Israel are actually negative for any relocation. The RAND report doesn’t consider the far cheaper, more effective and equally fair alternative–relocating Palestinians for peace. The cost per person would be markedly less, proving to be a better investment of international funding and aid. If RAND believes importing 600,000 Palestinians into the West Bank would be amazing for Palestine’s economy, imagine what relocating 2 million Palestinians into Jordan would do for Jordan’s economy – and for peace in the region.

1 – RAND must assume a Palestinian state would not want to destroy Israel. This is probably the reports most egregious error. Nothing in Palestinian history or actions indicates that the Palestinians want peace with Israel. To point out a few examples: The PLO was formed before 1967, before settlements, in order to destroy Israel. In Gaza, the Palestinians had the opportunity to build a Gazan Riviera and instead chose to build terror tunnels and rockets. Israeli prime ministers have repeatedly offered the Palestinians the maximalist positions the RAND report requires for a 2-state solution and Palestinian state, in exchange for an “end to the conflict” — only to be rebuffed. All indications are that a Palestinian state will continue to be at war with Israel as that is its raison d’être. In reality, there would be no financial benefits resulting from the creation of a Palestinian state.