The Last Exile

I couldn’t resist scheduling one last post before the holiday starts since the item concerns the changing demographics of  Jewish Israel. In fact, it touching a subject I have tried to emphasize throughout my blogging years as the implications are wide spread and far-reaching for the whole ‘peace process’.  Ynet News:
 

The Central Bureau of Statistics report published Sunday reveals that 8% of Israel’s Jewish population defines itself as haredi, 12% as religious, 13% as traditional-religious, 25% as traditional and 42% as secular, on a descending scale of religiosity.   The data is from the annual general survey carried out for the CBS, which supplies information about living conditions for Israel’s population. As part of the survey, some 7,500 people above the age of 20 were interviewed from throughout the country.

 
Ynet News chose to emphasized the ‘42%’ of secular nature of Israelis in its head-line for this report but let me put it another way;  58% or the majority of Israeli-Jews consider themselves religious Jews. While I am of the belief that one can never have enough religious Jews there are a number of facts of life which the other 42% of Israelis need to accept. First, of which is that the latte sippers of Tel Aviv aren’t in the majority anymore and need to govern themselves accordingly and its time the pass to brush up on Jewish law. My point being that no resolution to any conflict in the future will be possible without a basis in Jewish law – this includes any agreement made to with the Palestinians.

This scenario is already playing itself in the IDF. Ha’aretz:

The Israel Defense Forces underwent a change.

The army plays a critical role in carrying out an agreement (in withdrawing from territory and evacuating settlers ), but also in ensuring security stability after the agreement is reached. The trouble is that the IDF of 1993 is not the IDF of 2010. Here is what happened in the officers’ course for the infantry corps, the spearhead of the combat units, during that period: In 1990, 2 percent of the cadets enrolled in the course were religious; by 2007, that figure had shot up to 30 percent. And this is how the intermediate generation of combat officers looks today: six out of seven lieutenant colonels in the Golani Brigade are religious and, beginning in the summer, the brigade commander will be as well. In the Kfir Brigade, three out of seven lieutenant colonels wear skullcaps, and in the Givati Brigade and the paratroopers, two out of six. In some of the infantry brigades, the number of religious company commanders has passed the 50 percent mark – more than three times the percentage of the national religious community in the overall population.
The implications (Ha’aretz)

The secular left-wing fell asleep on the job. The empty ranks it left in its wake have been filled by others. Even those who believe there is no choice other than a massive evacuation of the settlements should know that it will be extremely difficult to do this after the disengagement from Gush Katif.

In 2005, the evacuation was carried out because Ariel Sharon did not bat an eyelid and the military acted accordingly. The battalion commanders, for the most part, will obey orders next time as well, but it is hard to see how the company commanders who come from the settlements of Tapuah and Kedumim will answer the call to remove Jews from their homes. It is no surprise that the top IDF brass is so fearful of such a scenario.

Not only did the Israel left fall asleep, they forgot to breed but less any of you forget, even Sharon undertook a purge of the religious officers from the IDF prior to commencing his disengagement from Gaza which among other things saw incompetents parachuted in far above their grade level with disastrous results. Just think how Dan Halutz was vaulted into the upper echelon to become the IDF Chief of Staff over the heads of far more qualified commanders. Sharon was able to do so because the ranks were thinner and there still were alternatives. I suppose Sharon suffered from the hubris that he would always be around to guide them and keep them from making crucial mistakes…

A few months ago a blogging buddy (of the progressive bent) made reference in an email suggesting the so-called Israeli settlements in the disputed territories are strictly populated by Russians and Americans and not real ‘bonafided’ Israelis. I let his remarks pass unchallenged because much like the latte sippers of Tel Aviv, he has fallen to the fallacy that time passing is stagnant thing.

While certainly the early ‘80’s saw an influx of American Jews making Aliyah and residing pass the so-called ‘green-line’ and with the collapse of the former Soviet Union another wave of FSU migrated to the ‘settlements’, he overlooked something crucial. Those Americans and Russian born settlers all had children – and lots of them. Those children have all grown up, married and have had children and rather than migrate away have chosen to stay close to home. Its those grand-children who are now filling out the ranks of the IDF and voting in elections and they are cast in the mold of the religious rather than secular. Unlike in 2004-2005, no Israeli leader can afford to purge the IDF of its religious soldiers and still be able to field an armed force to defeat its enemies.

These two seemingly unrelated headlines grabbed my attention this morning. Arutz Sheva:

Rabbi Schmidt, 43, is the Rosh Yeshiva (head) of the Hesder Yeshiva in the community, and is also the Rabbi of the town of Shavei Shomron.
According to the rabbi’s wife, Ofra, some 200 policemen arrived at the community Monday with bulldozers to demolish four structures that were being built, allegedly in contravention of the current freeze order on construction by Jews in Judea and Samaria. The bulldozers drove through the yeshiva compound, which adjoins some of the property that was razed. The rabbi instructed some twenty yeshiva students who were present not to confront the police.

On their way back from the demolitions, she said, the destruction crews wanted to pass through the yeshiva grounds once again, although there was an alternate route. This time, the rabbi parked his vehicle in a way that blocked the bulldozers’ way and asked them not to pass through the yeshiva compound, which is private property.
Upon hearing this the police beat the rabbi, knocked him down and continued to beat him severely when he was on the ground. He did not require medical attention, she said, but expressed horror at the fact that Jewish police would beat a rabbi, even after being told that he was a rabbi. 

So the Yassam strike (literally) without an eye to the optics of attacking a rabbi on Yeshiva property. The days when this kind of incident would pass without anyone outside of the immediate circle are long gone with the internet but the fact that the Yassam continue to operate from an exaggerated sense of entitlement without regard for the laws of Israel speaks volumes to lack of accountability the Minister of Defense holds his department to as long as Jews are his chosen victims.

The second is announcement from Moshe Feiglin. Arutz Sheva:

Moshe Feiglin, head of the Manhigut Yehudit oppositional faction within the Likud party, has decided to leave the Likud along with his movement, Makor Rishon reported Friday.
Feiglin has called a meeting of the central activists in Manhigut Yehudit for Sunday, in which he intends to announce his decision. He will recommend that the movement seek its political home outside Likud. On the record, Feiglin would only tell Makor Rishon that “we are in a period of internal inquiries that will last about two weeks and we are involving the activists in the dilemmas.”

(…)Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu has seen Feiglin as his nemesis within Likud, and accused him of trying to effect a hostile takeover of the Likud with the aim of turning it into a religious party. “We are not an extremist messianic party; we are a national and liberal movement,” he said ahead of the latest confrontation with Feiglin.

That confrontation took place late April and centered on an internal Likud vote to change the party’s constitution in a way that would put off to 2011 the elections to its central committee. The move was seen as a bid to prevent Feiglin from gaining strength in the party’s grassroots leadership and to give Netanyahu time to add more moderate grassroots members to Likud, to offset the ones that Feiglin had brought in.
Feiglin said the showdown would ultimately determine the fate of Jerusalem. Netanyahu, he warned emotionally, wants to silence opposition in the Likud because he has made a secret pact with US President Barack Obama that involves partitioning Jerusalem. Several Likud Knesset members, including Danny Danon, Tzipi Hotovely and Yariv Levin, also opposed Netanyahu’s move – but Netanyahu succeeded in passing the resolution anyway. This last failure is what seems to have convinced Feiglin to leave the Likud and essentially abandon his decade-long project. 

While on first glance these two stories seemingly have nothing to do with each other; they both speak to the democratic deficit within Israeli politics. Feiglin would have been sitting in the Knesset if Netanyahu hadn’t given into subverting his own political party’s process – not once, but many times in pursuit of keeping Feiglin’s Jewish leadership out of power within the Likud. Feiglin’s fraction makes up at least 25-30% of the Likud membership base and has acted as a straw to draw away support from the national religious camp in general elections.

Netanyahu may think the Likud can make-up a 25-30% loss of membership by poaching from Kadima – and Bibi may be right but what he doesn’t seem to fully comprehend is the potential to harm Likud interests Feiglin’s membership represents; if Feiglin decides to do something fresh, creative and controversial…which just happens to be a Feiglin hallmark.

The natural fit for Feiglin’s fraction is to opt to join the National Union and I expect Bibi is counting on that as the impact on national elections wouldn’t be all that much to write back to the diaspora about but if Feiglin wants to keep to his strategy of joining the mainstream political process and influencing change his way; he would be far further ahead to keep his to his strategy and join forces with…Ysrael Beiteinu.

Not to mention the humongous entertainment value I would get watching such a merger but it could potentially mark Yisrael Beiteinu as a fraction too large to be denied no matter if Kadima or Likud took the most mandates. If Yisrael Beiteinu could successfully integrate its party platform with Feiglin’s Jewish Leadership fraction it could potentially lead Israel in the years to come when the country is set to undergo another demographic first – transitioning from a secular Jewish majority to a religious Jewish majority. If I was Lieberman, I’d be calling Moshe.

Can you imagine Lieberman and Moshe both sitting across the table from the Palestinian Authority in ‘direct’ negotiations? I almost (not quite)feel sorry for the Palestinian Authority but the one thing no Jew anywhere in the world would be worrying about is whether Lieberman or Feiglin dividing up Jerusalem.

Last month a West Bank Mosque was vandalism and torched and the news story was carried around the world. I have chosen Ynet New account owing to Ynet News well-known and defined anti-settler bias.

Fire was set to a large mosque in the West Bank Palestinian village of Yasuf, east of Salfit, Thursday night. Hebrew slurs were sprayed on the walls that said: “We will burn all of you.” The words “price tag” were also scrawled on the walls.
 
“Price tag” is the slogan adopted some months ago by extremist settlers who carry out reprisals against Palestinians in response to the evacuation of settlement structures by Israeli defense forces.
 
The Palestinians are pointing fingers at settlers in the area as the main culprits. Following a complaint, a joint investigation was launched that includes security forces in the area. The defense establishment said to Ynet that they view this as a serious offense and intend to bring the perpetrators to justice.

It outraged not only the Palestinians but the Israelis. It was automatically assumed to be the work of rogue settlers and the denunciations of the culprits came from a united Israeli front. The criminal act became a political issue so it was only logical for those who walk the corridors to power to arrest a political symbol and who better able to appease the political echelon of both the Israelis and Palestinians than the teenage grandson of the notorious Rabbi Meir Kahane? A teenager, who as a child, lost his own parents in a terrorist attack.

I am going to confess that I know very little about Rabbi Meir Kahane and ins and outs of his political philosophy. I do know he was elemental in the fight to free Soviet Jewry but most of what I know comes from second or third hand sources and much of which is very biased against him. I am not overtly familiar with the social culture of the Israelis at that time so its not easy for me to put him into context. Sure, I watched and listened to a few of his speeches and I have to admit to feeling a weird disconnect when doing so. He doesn’t quite seem to be the demon everyone makes him out to be. I can’t shake the feeling I am missing some piece of the big picture which everyone gets but me. I don’t fret over it and I am not particularly motivated to study the man and his philosophy – although, perhaps I should given how some of my critics liken me to a Kahanists. Anyhow, there is very few Israeli political figures which polarize the Israeli body politic like Kahane and the Israeli papers were ecstatic when the Shin Bet released the news of the arrest of the grandson of Rabbi Meir Kahane for the mosque attack, and again, the newspapers of the world carried the story.

Ynet News

A relative of former Kach Chairman, Rabbi Meir Kahane, was arrested Thursday on suspicion of torching a mosque in the West Bank village of Yasuf about three weeks ago. He was detained at around 12 pm by the Judea and Samaria Police at the Tapuach Junction. The suspect was taken in for questioning. Sources close to him told Ynet, “We hope the Shin Bet and police won’t treat him like settlers have been treated recently.”
(…)Attorney Yehuda Shushan, representing the suspect told Ynet that his client – a minor – adamantly denies all the allegations against him, adding that he was “traumatized by the arrest.” According to the Shushan, the youth was arrested while driving near the Tapuach Junction. He did not resist arrest and during the initial investigation, was told that he was suspected of arson.
 
“The investigators kept telling him that they know what they know based on intelligence, saying ‘we know you didn’t do it, but we know you know who did, so just tell us who did it,’” said Shushan. The youth denied any connection to the arson and according to his attorney provided an alibi, after which he invoked his right to remain silent. Shushan claimed his client was denied his rights as a minor in police custody, i.e. – having an adult family member present during questioning.  “The police would be better spending their time tracking down the real suspects, instead of arresting a minor who has nothing to do with this. I hope they right this wrong and release him before he is arraigned.”

But very few foreign news agencies carried the story of his release. In fact, I can’t think of one which did. Ynet News

The youth suspected of torching the mosque in the West Bank village of Yasuf was released on bail Thursday evening, after the police verified his alibi. Nevertheless, the minor’s involvement in the case is still investigated. The youth, who is a relative of Kach founder Rabbi Meir Kahane, was arrested in the morning hours and interrogated for several hours.

 Attorney Yehuda Shushan, representing the suspect told Ynet that his client has no criminal record and that he adamantly denies all the allegations against him, adding that he was “traumatized by the arrest.” The investigators kept telling him that they know what they know based on intelligence, saying ‘we know you didn’t do it, but we know you know who did, so just tell us who did it’,” said Shushan.

Now remember, the Israeli police have vertified his ‘alibi’ but they refuse to drop the charges against the minor. So the score is now one west bank mosque damaged and one false arrest. This brings us to events in the Mosque saga. Ynet News

The police and Shin Bet on Sunday night detained 10 people in the West Bank settlement of Yitzhar, on suspicion of being involved in the torching of a mosque in the Palestinian village of Yasuf last month and in other offenses.

The police reported that Zvi Sukkot of Yitzhar, Eliran Elgali of Yitzhar and Shlomo Gilbert of Elon Moreh, all 20 years old, are suspected of badly damaging Palestinian property. Two yeshiva students were also detained.
During the arrest, the police searched a yeshiva in the settlement and found violent measures, including spikes. Five other suspects, four of them minors, were arrested on suspicion of rioting in the Samaria area. The fifth is also suspected of demonstrating outside the home of a Civil Administration inspector.
 
According to local residents, more than 100 members of the security forces arrived at the community in order to carry out the arrests. One of the detainees was said to have lost his consciousness during the arrest. All the suspects were taken in for questioning.
 
An Yitzhar resident told Ynet, “Where have the human rights organizations gone? What happened tonight in Yitzhar was a pogrom. The police would not let themselves behave this way with any other population in the State of Israel. They beat us, damaged property and even confiscated cameras ocumenting their actions. Good morning, Iran.”
I suppose a detainee losing consciousness during an arrest is now an doublespeak for the police using excessive physical force. Got to love when the state grants legitimacy to thugs to carry out their politicking. The Yitzhar resident does bring up an interesting question; just why have the civil rights associations in Israel gone silent? And the answer; is why I routinely refer to the Associations for Human Rights in Israel – for everyone but Jews. But the mosque sage doesn’t end here but goes a few steps further down the road. Ynet News

The Petah Tikva Magistrate’s Court extended by seven days the remand of the four Yeshiva students from Yitzhar suspected of involvement in the arson of a mosque in the Palestinian village of Yasuf last month. The suspects are not cooperating with detectives, and deny all allegations against them.

Reading the article until the end leaves me with the nagging suspicion that the remanding of four out of the initial 10 Yeshiva students has more to do with their exercising of their legal rights, lack of airtight alibis for the time period for vandalism at the mosque, and the police using this opportunity to settle a few scores rather than the search for the culprits in the attack. And how convenient for the police to confiscate the cameras documenting their no doubt ‘righteous’ arrests.

Ha’aretz’s Gideon Levy penned this screed to the ’settler’. I really don’t know what to make of Gideon Levy. There is this kind of alternative reality to his writing which always leaves me going – ‘What? What, no…he didn’t just write that did he?!!?’ Usually I have to rub my eyes and then check back to see if anything changed between the time it took to rub my eyes and refocusing on the page…

What constitutes the life of a settler? A house on the cheap; a standard of living above the national average; a job usually subsidized by the government; a fierce religious, nationalist, uncompromising conviction on the justness of his cause; a supportive, heavy-handed social environment; a highway system; transportation arrangements; socially enriching activities; and, at times, a life that comes with the risk of danger.

The settler goes to and from his home without seeing anything. He does not see his neighbors, he does not see the danger he exposes his children to, he does not see the moral baggage he carries on his back. He does not want to see all this, and an entire system surrounds him that makes life easy for him despite his blindness.

Some of the highways on which he drives are cleansed of Palestinians; he has never visited the neighboring villages, not one of whose names he would know were it not for traffic signs pointing in their direction. His teachers, functionaries and rabbis sketch out the scenery that is his world, leaving him no shred of doubt: the Arabs are terrorists, all of them are suspicious packages, and the Jews are allowed to do as they wish, for they are the lords of the land, and there is no other but they.

You can read the rest or not (as you choose) but he goes on and on like this. The rather strange thing is how little this ‘prototype settler’ resembles the ’settlers’ I have known or met. While my experience is merely anecdotal; its strikes me as bizarre, with my wide circle of acquaintances, that I haven’t run across Levy’s Settler except in the writings of various of the hard left-types…

In fact, this characterization is so atypical that I have been mulling over how best to respond to this article before responding via the blog. Then I read this post at The Muqata, and I knew, that nothing I could write would greater illustrate the ‘alternative reality’ quality of Levy’s Settler than Jamal writing at The Muqata about attending a funeral where a 16 year old son, a ’settler’, gave the eulogy for his murdered father.

“AAAAABBBBBBA!!!” [father]

The word was yelled out by Eliyahu — the 16 year old teenage son of Rabbi Meir Chai, murdered in a Palestinian terrorist attack on the roads of the Shomron this past Thursday afternoon.

The first word of the eulogy was yelled out in pain, in sorrow, in mourning.

That first word of the eulogy, the hesped, “Abba”

The painful yell continued, lasting a lifetime, as it reverberated throughout the neighborhoods of Jerusalem, echoing in the hills around us.

I brought my oldest son to the funeral — as he went to school with Eliyahu Chai, is friends with him, and used to frequent our home as well. Before the funeral was about to start, my son asked me what to do. “Go over to your friend…give him a hug.”

And Eliyahu hugged my son, sobbing on his shoulder.

I was shocked by the power of the hesped which Eliyahu delivered.

“Hakol LeTova, HaKol MiShamayim”, Eliyahu sobbed into the microphone, repeating this over and over again. “It’s all for the best, it’s all from Heaven.”

Hearing a son eulogize his tragically murdered father — with such faith that he could repeat “HaKol LeTova” was shocking.

“To all the youth here – you are the best youth there is; I salute you, and I say the same to all our soldiers and to the entire army, to each and every one of you.”

“Continue Abba’s path: Abba wanted faith! Abba wanted Torah study! Abba wanted prayers! Abba couldn’t bear to see youth without tefillin… If we want to immortalize Abba, then we have to do things like that – not external things.

Eliyahu looks like the classic settler “hilltop” youth, lambasted by the media. Long paeyot, a large white knitted kippa. I don’t think the media was prepared for what he said next.

Do not look for revenge, not to beat up Arabs. This is not our solution. The difference between us and them is, that we are human beings! We won’t go to them and kill them just like that; if they come to us [to attack us], we will kill them and put a bullet in their heads, but we won’t go to them!

We are Jews.

May HaShem comfort the mourners of Zion and give them beauty for ashes.

The foreign funded wingnut group Peace Now established a hotline in Israel where you can anonymonously rat out your neighbours for building or construction during the so-called settlement freeze within the disputed territories and promoted it heavily. Well, it appears they got a lot more calls than they bargained for as Israeli nationalists have been burning up the lines. Arutz Sheva:

But instead, many of the calls are from Israeli nationalists – reporting on illegal Arab construction. The calls reporting the Arab violations – as well as “nonsense calls” – are taking up much of the tape on Peace Now’s answering machines, leaving little room for the messages the hotline was intended for. Responding to the onslaught of “incorrect” messages, Peace Now Director Yariv Oppenheimer said that the varied responses, consisting of reports on Arabs, curses, and even jokes, were “entertaining.”

So glad to provide the ‘entertainment’ and let us hope the patriots don’t let up.

A 60 year old farmer goes out to work his land, much like he has done most days for the last 25 years. When he arrives at his plot of land he sees a group tearing up his plants and tractors getting ready to plow under his plants. He confronts the group which is a mix of ‘locals’ and activists lead by a Rabbi. In the ensuing confrontation he is attacked and injured badly enough he has to be airlifted to a hospital. Just another day of Settlers and their Rabbis running a muck in the disputed territories….except it isn’t the ‘Settlers’ or their ‘Rabbis”. Ynet News:

One person was arrested on suspicion of assault, and activists of the B’Tselem human rights organization say soldiers confiscated one of their cameras. The clash erupted as Palestinians arrived to work their lands, which the settlers say belong to them, near Tel Shilo. The settlers claimed the Palestinians uprooted their plants, while the Palestinians said that the settlers stopped them from plowing the land with a tractor.
 
During the clash, one of the Palestinians attacked a 60-year-old settler, who fell down and hit his head. He was evacuated to the Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem.

One of the reasons I routinely refer to Rabbis for Human Rights ‘except for Jews’ or used the word ‘alleged’ human rights groups like B’Tselem is that so often they are in the thick of the conflict and appear utterly indifferent to the human cost their so-called confrontations incite and instigate. B’Tselem appears much more concerned that one of their member’s camera was confiscated rather than the fact a sixty year old man was attacked and injured seriously by an individual associated with their group. Back to the Ynet News report.

Army and police forces dispatched to the area declared it a “closed military zone.” They arrested the man suspected of assault and he was taken in for questioning by the police. A camera was confiscated from a B’Tselem activist documenting the incident. Residents of the Binyamin Regional Council say the land has been subject to a dispute for many years, but that the sides have so far managed to maintain a “status quo.”
 
The council’s security officer, Avigdor Shatz, told Ynet that “farmers from Shilo have been working this piece of land for 25 years. There has been a legal dispute over this land for a long time, but the status quo has been maintained. Those violating it are left-wing activists who come here with tractors in order to work the land.” Shatz says that the past two years have seen an escalation in the situation, as left-wing activists and Palestinians claim they are the sole owners of the land. “Last year, a Palestinian came here, presented documents and claimed that the land belonged to him, but a Civil Administration inquiry and legal advices revealed that this was not true,” he said.
 
Human rights organizations and residents claim, on the other hand, that the settlers have been forging their ownership of the land. Rabbi Arik Ascherman of the Rabbis for Human Rights organization told Ynet, “In the past year there has been a wave of interference with false claims. The settler claims the land belongs to him, but he has no documents while the Palestinians have documents.”

Do false documents trump no documents, and who to believe? Well, I cannot think much of the word of a so-called ‘rabbi’ who provoked a violent confrontation and let an elderly man be beaten by one of ‘followers’ and then fails to display the slightest concern for safety or well-being of injured party. And to add insult to injury – uses his 15 minutes of media hype to plea his ’cause of the day’ rather than express remorse for the part he played in the violence.

Batya adds her two cents at Shiloh Musings but I think she has been a little too kind.

Binyamin Netanyahu is a hard political figure for North Americans to view and understand in an Israeli context. He is eloquent and a masterful speaker in English and he knows all the right things to say which pulls at the Diaspora heart strings in North America. As such, its always a surprise to North Americans to learn just how little well regarded he is in Israel. I try to tell people but I get poop-poohed on a regular basis. My words mean little when measured against their perceptions from viewing Netanyahu on the regular Anglo television talk circuits.

Watching Bibi Netanyahu after the Israeli elections last winter I came away with the distinct impression that Bibi was stuck trying to correct his mistakes made during his last attempt at running the country rather than building on the new realities. While I still believe he is giving far too much weight to the issues which brought down his former government but I may seriously have to reconsider that I have misjudged Bibi’s learning curve.

Reading the daily news reports of the anti-settlement freeze I was kept asking myself; how could Netanyahu not know this would be the response to his self-imposed freeze on construction and what does he gain by it?

One of the major fall-outs from the Sharon Disengagements from the Gaza Strip, excluding the obvious escalation of rocket attacks, showed the Israeli public the very real and painful consequences to Israeli citizens when the government expels them. If anything this ensures that any future withdrawals will be met with great resistance. The continued plight of the Gush Katif refugees illustrates a daily painful lesson. No one would willingly chose to take on that mantle without a fight for their lives.

Reading the reports in the last few days I was suddenly struck the nagging idea that perhaps Netanyahu deliberately made the building freeze far more restrictive and far-ranging than any Israeli administration had before in order to provoke the current Israeli response. Of course, if the response was a little slow from the Israeli street Bibi knew he could count on the character of Ehud Barak who wouldn’t fail him. Barak and his far left politics are unable to resist an opportunity to lash out against Israeli settlers and thereby would guarantee a response from the Israeli street.

There is no doubt in my mind that the whole building freeze notion was born through the misguided and naive efforts of Obama Administration and pressure was brought to bear against Netanyahu. No doubt he protested that a building freeze would endanger his coalition and create civil strife on the Israeli street. The bubble the Obama Administration operates in probably discounted Netanyahu’s warnings as the ravings of a far-right policy hawk and not a realistic evaluation of the Israeli sentiment.

This morning I came across this update at Ynet News update in which Likud MK Danny Danon makes a rather remarkable statement about an encounter with Bibi which gives weight to my suspicious. Ynet News

Netanyahu said to the members of Knesset, “We are a in a continual struggle over the map of Israel.” He also said that he is impressed by the determination of some faction members to continue advocating for settlement in the West Bank. “You have to go out and protest against me. Then we’ll finish it early,” said Netanyahu to the MKs. (Attila Somfalvi)

Keep in mind this rather interesting statement Netanyahu made last Sunday. Ynet News

“Even if Abu Mazen (PA President Mahmoud Abbas) will come in another eight months with the message ‘Peace Now,’ we will start building as before. The cabinet’s decision has a deadline,” said Netanyahu in the weekly cabinet meeting.

This still leaves the question of what Bibi gains and I sincerely doubt he is gunning for the ‘good-will’ of the Obama administration. He is far too pragmatic a man and too seasoned an Israeli politician to have made a bargain without getting something solid in return. If my suspicious are correct than whatever Bibi bargained for should come to come to light within the next ten months.

This bit of Israeli legislation should be throwing the Obama administration into a full-panic mode for their Israeli-Palestinian policy. Jerusalem Post

The Knesset took a step closer toward requiring a referendum that could make territorial concessions in the capital and the Golan Heights more difficult, when it voted Wednesday to waive an initial reading of the Golan Heights and Jerusalem Referendum Bill.

The bill now goes for further processing in committee, after which it would need to pass second and third readings in the plenum, a procedure that could take several months. Polls have shown that, were such a referendum mandatory, there would be strong opposition to concessions in Jerusalem and the Golan.

The bill would require that any return of land under the administration and judicial authority of the State of Israel pass a national referendum, as well as a government decision and Knesset approval. The bill does, however, offer the government a way out – in the event that the concession passes the Knesset by a two-thirds majority, or if within 180 days after the Knesset okays the government decision, a general election is held.

Netanyahu and the Likud Coalition’s continued support of the Golan Heights and Jerusalem Bill will continue to allow – not only Bibi’s government but any future government of Israel to be able to resist any pressure brought to bear against any unilateral withdraws from either the Golan or Jerusalem by any outside party.

May the Lord answer you on a day of distress; may the Name of the G-d of Jacob fortify you. May He send your help from the Sanctuary, and support you from Zion. But for heaven’s sake; don’t get caught praying on the Temple Mound. Ynet News:

Jerusalem police detained a Jewish father and daughter in suspicion the two tried to pray in the Temple Mount complex in violation of the law. The two were taken in for investigation.

And if I have any Christian readers left – don’t get too smug as even a mouthed ‘Our Father’ could see you a stint in the Israeli hoosegow via the oh-so-politically-correct-secular Israeli police.

Update: It hardly seems possible but the incident grows more ridiculous – a father and a bride-to-be were not even openly praying but possibly only ‘mouthing’ silently words…..

A NY Times article touches on the contentious issue of Jewish ownership of land in Jerusalem.

JERUSALEM — Jewish nationalists and Palestinians clashed in an East Jerusalem neighborhood on Tuesday after the Israelis took over a house by court order in a predominantly Arab area. The house at the center of Tuesday’s flare-up is in Sheik Jarrah, a district just north of the Old City, where three Palestinian families have been evicted from other houses in the last year after losing a lengthy legal battle in the High Court and lower district and magistrates courts. A Jewish association won its claim to historical ownership of the land in question, and has plans to build a large Jewish housing complex there.

There are a number of reports from this ‘clash’ in Sheik Jarrah I could have chosen but I picked this one because its the most blatantly representative on how a complex issue is slanted under the guise of even-handedness. Now on to the heart of matter -

The latest Jewish residents to move into the area were escorted by the police and private security guards and immediately removed furniture from the property, which was built by a Palestinian family headed by Refka al-Kurd, 87. The small, one-story structure was built about 10 years ago as an extension of the Kurds’ original home, but it was unoccupied, having been sealed by the authorities after it was determined to have been constructed without the proper permits. “The authorities took our keys to the property because we built it without permits,” said Nabil al-Kurd, 66, who lives in the original house. “But it seems the settlers can live here without permits because they are the sons of God,” he said bitterly, referring to the Jewish newcomers. Shmulik Ben-Ruby, the spokesman for the Jerusalem police, said his force acted in line with the court decision that determined that the property “is owned by Jews.” Blood spattered the forecourt on Tuesday after a Jewish man was hit on the head by Palestinians who attacked the new residents with clubs and stones. Later, after a day of scuffles, a Palestinian woman, Nadia al-Kurd, was taken to the hospital with what was thought to be a heart attack.

Now what the NY Times glosses over is the actual court ruling wherein the land was found to be owned by Jews who were ethnically cleansed from their land during the illegal occupation by the Jordanian government and instead focuses on the ‘pitiful plight’ of the Palestinians being evicted.

In fact, the Palestinian family never did receive title by the Jordanian government for the land during their occupation and the Israeli court ruled this family could have kept occupation of this property providing they paid rent to the legal owners of the land which the family refused to do. The Jewish owners then moved to have the court evict the squatters from their property in order to move in paying tenants. The evictions have nothing to do with ‘illegal’ building permits but by interjecting it into the article it gives a nice aura of grievance and a sense of institutional discrimination to the Palestinian narrative under the Israeli court system.

And I would be remiss if I did not point your attention to the fact the NY Times piece only mentions the names of the Palestinians victims of the ‘clash’. How do I know all this? It’s easily cross referenced this with the Arutz Sheva report.

(IsraelNN.com) A “welcoming” committee of Arabs and foreign anti-Israel activists, including those from the United States and Sweden, attacked Jews with clubs and stones Tuesday as a new family moved into a home in eastern Jerusalem. Police stopped the attack but not before blood was streaming down the face of a Jewish guard at the site.

The Palestinian demand for East Jerusalem conveniently ignores that there is a long documented history of Jewish ownership of land in East Jerusalem. An ownership which was only terminated by the illegal occupation by the Jordanian government which cleaned the land of Jews from their ancient community in 1948-49. In order for the Palestinians to make East Jerusalem for the ‘capital’ again requires a significant second expulsion of Jewish property owners and their Jewish tenants.