G-d isn’t nice

“Epidemics befall the world if courts fail to disburse capital punishments according to the Torah.” Talmud, Pirkei Avot 5:8
It is so soothing to imagine G-d as a caring, grandfatherly, Santa Claus-like figure. That’s not true.
The Almighty presided over unimaginable horrors. He watched indifferently as medieval Europeans burned entire Jewish communities, as Ukrainians hacked pregnant Jewish women into pieces in the seventeenth and twentieth centuries, and as Germans and their Croat accomplices herded naked Jews into gas chambers decorated with Torah curtains from ransacked synagogues. The G-d of the Deluge and the Second World War is indeed immutable. After the Deluge, he promised not to destroy humanity again, and seemingly prevented the final annihilation of the Jews in 1944 (Europe), 1953 (the USSR), and 1967 (Israel), as well as the nuclear exchange between the USSR and USA. But short of total annihilation, he remains indifferent to unimaginable brutalities.
Are they unimaginable? They are historically standard. We want to live in a nice world, but the world isn’t nice. People set idyllic expectations and are surprised when G-d conforms to reality rather than utopia.
The next time you celebrate Purim, read the Scroll of Esther. We don’t celebrate deliverance from annihilation; it took place eleven months before the holiday. On the date of Purim, we feast to celebrate having had killed 75,000 civilians the previous day, explicitly including women and children, whom we deemed our enemies: no court sentence, no proof, no Red Cross.
Jewish morality is not theoretical. We don’t subscribe to idyllic nonsense which led Petrarch to compose lofty poems for Laura—and then visit brothels. Our morality is whatever the Bible calls moral: if cleansing the Land of Israel of its natives, exterminating the Amalek or other anti-Semitic civilians (Purim) is praised in the Bible, it is moral by definition. There are no values but what G-d said is valuable.
Who of the liberal reformist “rabbis” would imagine personally slaughtering a bull, dipping his fingers into a bowl of its blood, sprinkling the blood around, burning its butcher-shop-like parts into ashes, then slaughtering a  goat and a sheep in the same manner, and so on? Yet, that is the holiest moment in the history of Jewish divine service, the consecration of the Tent of Meeting, really the first Temple. Why won’t they? Because they don’t believe in G-d and his commandments. In the framework of their Hellenistic ethics, our holiest sacrifices are barbaric cruelty. But that is the real Judaism; their sermons are not.
Mercy is the divine prerogative, and the Bible doesn’t even contain clear-cut examples of it. Jews are forbidden to forgive, as forgiveness encourages evildoers. In Jewish law, a witness must execute the offender, and capital sentences cannot be commuted. “When you go to war against your enemies…do not have pity upon them, just as they won’t have pity upon you.” And in Esther 9:5, Jews launched “slaughter and destruction” against local anti-Semites, punishing their hateful intent. Killing the enemy civilians down to babies is to be taken for granted in Judaism: Jewish lives are avenged to the fullest. There is no concept in the Bible of protecting enemy civilians during a war, except allowing them to flee.
The total disregard for enemy casualties is understandable; what’s more, Judaism has no qualms about mass killing of bad Jews. Pinchas killed a prominent Jew for intermarriage, and received eternal blessing for his descendants. Levites killed thousands of Jews after the golden calf incident, and received the divine blessing specifically for killing their brothers and neighbors. The Maccabees slaughtered liberal reform Jews who wanted to relax the orthodoxy and accept the benefits of Hellenic culture. On the other hand, nice liberal Jews did not want to upset their American neighbors during the Holocaust with violent protests over the US government’s refusal to bomb the death camps. And the nice liberal Dutch were so nice both to Jews and Germans that, contrary to the myth of salvation, three quarters of all Dutch Jews perished in the Holocaust.
The concept of pikuah nefesh prompted some ugly moral notions, such as the total prohibition of suicide. How does that square with Kiddush Hashem? Should the defenders of the Masada have allowed their wives and children to be sold into slavery instead of killing them? And if, as the enlightened rabbis of our time assert, cross-worshiping is not idol-worship, how come entire European Jewish communities risked their lives fighting the pogrom mobs and committed mass suicide when the fighting was futile—instead of just being baptized, as the Christian friars demanded of them?
Many Jews believe that the concept of pikuah nefesh, saving lives, is central to Judaism. Such a concept doesn’t even exist in Judaism; it is completely alien to our religion. Judaism is about sanctity, defined as divine service and observance of the commandments. Human life is simply irrelevant. Jews must, for example, violate the Sabbath when there is a danger to life not to save the life per se, but to continue living in order to observe many more Sabbaths. So we can break one Sabbath to observe many more Sabbaths. The permission—indeed the injunction—to break a Sabbath serves the purpose of Sabbath, not the purpose of life. If pikuah nefesh dictates that Jews can only give up their lives in order to abstain from idolatry, incest, and murder, how comes the Torah prescribes taking Jewish life for violating the Sabbath? Sabbath and many other commandments are valued above life.
Note how Judaism disburses capital punishments even for ostensibly trivial offenses such as homosexuality, Shabbat violations, or incest. Look at the greasy offerings in the Temple, where the priests acted like butchers in a slaughterhouse. Imagine the rivers of animal blood at the altar. That is Judaism, and that is how the rabbis understood it. They detailed capital punishments, specified the punishable offenses—increasing their number in the process—and prescribed horrible methods of execution. Commandments are not just above human life; human life is entirely irrelevant when we speak of the commandments.
Likewise, tikkun olam, repairing the world, has nothing to do with animal rights or the welfare state. It is the rabbinical idea of going an extra mile beyond the commandments, doing the commandments, and a bit more. It is about taking upon oneself still more obligations, making the strict commandments even stricter, not loosening them in favor of liberal notions. Tikkun Olam also means that the entire world will be forced to embrace Judaism.
There is no interfaith in Judaism. The sages prescribe burning and stoning for the interfaith. It is prohibited even to learn the Greek language, let alone the Hellenistic culture. Judaism proclaims havdala—isolation of Jews, “the people which dwells alone.” Stop screaming. It is not racism, but a desire to live in accordance with Jewish values. “You shall be holy as I am holy,” just as the Spirit of G-d hovered above the primordial waters and influenced them without touching them, so the Jews should influence the world without touching it.
Jews feel no respect toward other religions; in our prayers, we despise them, deride them, and thank G-d for being born different. Respect is only due to truthful things; Islam can only be respected if there is a truth in it. But if there is truth in Islam, we (Heaven forbid) should recognize that truth and become Muslims. Jews respect people of any decent beliefs for their merits as ethical people, good professionals, and so on—but we do not respect their beliefs.
Pagans were religiously tolerant; they just added another deity to their pantheon. Jews are different; that’s what the Maccabean war was about: we refused the religious pantheon of the ancient interfaith liberals. Jews believe we know the truth, which came down to us in unadulterated form as the divine word. It is a matter of Jewish belief that every other religion is false. Read what Shulhan Aruch says about Christianity; not a single rabbi—when they still were rabbis—spoke otherwise. There is a kernel of truth in geocentric astronomy; at least it recognizes that heavenly objects revolve. We do not, however, respect partially true hypotheses, but only true theories. Now, we do not seek to impose our views on anyone, but neither should anyone expect us to respect or study views that we consider false by default.
The above attitude applies not only to idolatry, but to avodah zara—any foreign worship. Islam, the most monotheistic non-Jewish religion, is not idolatry but a foreign worship, which is absolutely prohibited in the Land of Israel. G-d commanded us to slaughter foreign priests in our land even at their altars. We must break their altars, not allow them to deconstruct the Aqsa and re-assemble it in Jordan, which is also the Land of Israel.
There is no such thing as a mixed Jewish family. Intermarriage is the capital offense of apostasy, and Jews who intermarry are greeted with funeral prayer, not hupa ceremony. Note that taking a spouse of non-Jewish origin is not necessarily intermarriage. If such a spouse properly joins the Jewish people, and does not just receive a quickie conversion, he or she is as welcome as Onkelos or Ruth, the grandmother of King David. We want our children to be Jewish. We want the divine spark of Judaism for which the Jews ascended the stakes to continue until the Messiah comes. That is why intermarriage or any sexual relations between Jews and non-Jews is a crime.
That is not racism. Should the Jews say, “We would marry anyone but Slavs” that would be racism. But to say, “We will marry Jews only, no one else” is a question of isolating ourselves. Racism discriminates against particular nations; Jews don’t despise any people. The prohibition of intermarriage is a preference to Jews, not a discrimination against the entire world. When your wife cleans your house, but not your neighbor’s, that is not misanthropy. When you give charity to a Jewish cause, but not to an African cause, that’s not racism. When a girl wants to marry a black-haired rather than a blond boy, she is exercising her right of preference; she doesn’t discriminate against the blond. The refusal to marry anyone but a Jew is a religious issue, an obligation, and no rabbi would say otherwise.
This is Judaism, like it or not.

Obadiah Shoher
http://samsonblinded.com/blog/god-isnt-nice.htm

J Street Speech Reveals Hagel Will Push Saudi Peace Initiative

To even accept J-Street as anything but anti - Israel....

Hagel spoke at J-Street - Case Closed! Hagel is Meshuggener

Read More:

http://www.jewishpress.com/indepth/analysis/j-street-speech-reveals-hagel-will-push-saudi-peace-initiative/2013/01/30/?print

Modern Day Jewish Liberals Would Have Fallen to Maccabee Swords

Chanukah is not just about the miracle that a jar of oil to light the candelabra in the Jewish Temple lasted eight days instead of the one day it would normally last.

Chanukah is the commemoration of the courageous victory of the Maccabees over the Greeks that took not just eight days, but decades (it took over two decades before the Maccabees finally defeated the Greeks and the Hellenists and were victorious).

And it’s not just the miracle of the Maccabees defeating King Antiochus and his forces, it’s the spiritual fight that the Maccabees fought that left many Jews dead as well.

 Those Jews were the Hellenists who gave up traditional Judaism for something less spiritual, more material. And the Maccabees slaughtered many of them as well, as was their duty. Sadly, today, the Jewish people is dominated by Hellenism on steroids. Another phrase for them is “Obama voters.” These are JINOs–Jews In Name Only, who long ago gave up spiritual Judaism for liberalism and an “ethnic” or “cultural” Judaism that really isn’t historically or religiously Jewish, such as eating deli food, giving their lives for the rights of Blacks who hate them, and pandering to Muslims and hosting Israel-haters at synagogues. All of these Jews (Reform) would have been eliminated by the Maccabees, as they did then in order to reclaim Judaism from a virus of Hellenists.

 
Read the full article:

Modern Day Jewish Liberals Would Have Fallen to Maccabee Swords

British MP: Jews Didn't Learn the Lesson from the Holocaust

(Listen to this barbarian brainwashed English Monkey)

A Liberal Democrat MP in Britain faces expulsion from the party for saying Jews had not learned from the murder of six million in the Holocaust in their treatment of Palestinian Authority Arabs, the Daily Mail reports.

David Ward, MP for Bradford East, wrote on his own website that he was “saddened” that Jews “could within a few years of liberation from the death camps be inflicting atrocities on Palestinians…on a daily basis.”

“Having visited Auschwitz twice – once with my family and once with local schools – I am saddened that the Jews, who suffered unbelievable levels of persecution during the Holocaust, could within a few years of liberation from the death camps be inflicting atrocities on Palestinians in the new State of Israel and continue to do so on a daily basis in the West Bank and Gaza,” Ward wrote.
He later defended his comments in interviews, saying they were a “just a statement of fact”, and adding that “it appears that the suffering by the Jews has not transformed their views on how others should be treated.”

His remarks were made ahead of Holocaust Memorial Day on Sunday, reported the Daily Mail. He has been summoned to a meeting with party whips on Monday, but has insisted he stood by the statement and its timing and claimed it was “regrettable” he had been reprimanded.
A Liberal Democrat spokesman said, according to the report, “This is a matter we take extremely seriously. The Liberal Democrats deeply regret and condemn the statement issued by David Ward and his use of language which is unacceptable.”

Holocaust Memorial Day marks the 68th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp, where more than one million people, mostly Jews, were killed – many shot, starved or victims of the gas chambers.

Ward, who said he had attended a Holocaust memorial event in Bradford on Thursday which was “extremely moving”, said he hoped the chief whip would respect his views.
Karen Pollock, chief executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust, told the Daily Mail, “I am deeply saddened that at this somber time, when we remember those who were murdered by the Nazis, Ward has deliberately abused the memory of the Holocaust causing deep pain and offense - these comments are sickening and unacceptable and have no place in British politics.”

Jon Benjamin, chief executive of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, said, “We are outraged and shocked at these offensive comments about Jewish victims of the Holocaust and the suggestion that Jews should have learned a lesson from the experience.”

“For an MP to have made such comments on the eve of Holocaust Memorial Day is even more distasteful, and we welcome the fact that the Liberal Democrats have sought to disassociate the party from David Ward's comments,” added Benjamin.

According to the Daily Mail, Tory MP Robert Halfon said Ward’s comments were “a tragic trivialization of real evil.” He added, “It should be remembered that Israel withdrew from Gaza completely and yet has faced a barrage of 7000+ missiles from Hamas and been the victim of hundreds of terrorist suicide bombers and been attacked by all its neighbors in 1948, 1967 and 1973.”

Ward has previously described Israel as an “apartheid regime”, the report noted. Liberal Democrat Baroness Jenny Tonge has twice been fired from the frontbench for her anti-Israel comments.
In 2004, she claimed she might become a suicide bomber if she lived in Judea, Samaria, or Gaza, and was sacked as the party’s spokesman on children’s issues.

She was sacked as health spokesman in 2010 for accusing Israeli soldiers of harvesting body parts in Haiti while doing humanitarian work after the earthquake.

The same year, Tonge accused Israel of being the “cause of terrorism” and said that the West's treatment of Muslims was caused by what she called “Holocaust guilt” and the “power of the pro-Israel lobby”.

Last year she resigned as party whip after she said that “Israel is not going to be there forever.”
(Arutz Sheva’s North American Desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)

Divest from Arabs in Israeli schools

Four decades ago, the US Supreme Court approved one of the most harmful policies
in American history, the busing of schoolchildren. Twenty years before, a
liberal Supreme Court rejected a commonsense “separate but equal” approach
and required desegregation of schools in the South. Black children were allowed
in white schools, and white children were offered the heart-warming opportunity
to enroll in black schools.

Desegregation was a limited success because school districts were based on
residential districts; schools in white neighborhoods remained white, and in the
black ones, black. Unwilling to concede their defeat, the NAACP empire, backed
by heavyweight lawyers whose NAACP-related bills run into tens of millions
dollars, demanded integration. In a typical leftist manner, the qualitative leap
from desegregation to integration was presented as a logical step. Thankfully,
they didn’t demand that white girls marry black men to achieve a racially
balanced society.

Now there was a problem: how does one integrate schools when schoolchildren live
widely apart? A court found the answer in a massive busing program, which
brought pupils into other community’s schools. After much internal bickering,
the Supreme Court approved busing. Both white and black parents overwhelmingly
objected to busing because children were ripped out of their neighborhoods and
had to spend hours a day on a bus. Eventually, whites moved out of the cities
into more expensive suburbs where busing could not feasibly be implemented and
the schools remained all-white. The whites who remained in the cities fled
public education to the de facto segregated private schools. Chinese children
scored equally well in both segregated and integrated schools. Black children in
the forcibly integrated schools fared no better than before.

What does that have to do with Israel? Even the leftists won’t argue for
busing Jewish children into Arab neighborhoods for obvious security reasons. The
first similarity between the Israeli and American situations is the refusal to
recognize differences. Jews and Arabs, like whites and blacks, just don’t
score similarly. Acquiring a culture of education takes generations in which the
most enterprising and educated outperform the rest. In African and Arab
cultures, the strongest survived. Though it may change in a few centuries, right
now our civilizations are directed to two different goals. There are no Arab
scientists of note, nor will there be soon. Israel should stop wasting Jewish
money on Arabs. It is counterproductive to educate the next generation of Arab
nationalist leaders who would subvert our country. It is immoral to spend Jewish
money on Arabs who hate, or at the very least oppose Jews. It is senseless to
teach those who don’t absorb knowledge.

Regardless of these politically correct pronouncements about equality, people do
not accept it. Otherwise, American parents wouldn’t have taken their children
to private schools rather than mix them with blacks. Jews need not be more
politically correct than Americans.

The Education Ministry deliberately produces relatively low-end curricula so the
Arab students will not fail. Ashkenazi Jewish students could study much more
intensively than now, but the gap with Arabs in test results, large now, would
grow to politically incorrect proportions. The ministry, therefore, deliberately
simplifies the program. The problem is still more acute in universities.

Both Jews and Arabs are dissatisfied with common curricula. The Jewish program
is insufficiently nationalist, lest we offend the Arabs. The latter protest any
degree of Jewish nationalism in their schools.

Full privatization of the Israeli school system provides a solution. The
government would issue vouchers to parents, good for payment to any school of
their choice. That will eliminate the current inequality when children in
private schools receive no government funding, unlike those in public schools.
It will also eliminate an oddity whereby ultra-Orthodox Jewish pupils receive
half the per capita funding allocated to secular Arab pupils because government
spending for haredi schools is capped at 60 percent of what is allocated to the
secular ones.

Privatization of schools would eliminate the government’s monopoly over
curricula. In most schools, there will be no Rabin’s Day and peacenik
brainwashing. Given the radical leftist composition of the Education
Ministry’s staff, most schools would be more conservative and less atheistic
than today. The government’s grip on education is unrelated to paternalistic
concerns, but stems from the desire for an ideological monopoly on young minds.

Private education will be cheaper than public education because private
institutions are more efficient. Currently, private schools are a bit more
expensive because they lack the public schools' economy of scale and are geared
toward the higher-income population. Mass private schools will be inexpensive.
Israel can go a step further and stop subsidizing Arab children. Let’s
abrogate school subsidies or vouchers altogether and offset schooling costs
through parents’ tax credit. Arabs don’t pay taxes and won’t benefit from
tax credits. This move would affect unemployed haredim, too, but they don’t
want such extensive (and expensive) education for their children, anyway. Jewish
charities will cover the costs for poor parents. The government can act as a
lender of last resort and provide guarantees for schooling loans. Arabs won’t
qualify for the loans because many of them live in illegally built houses which
cannot be used as loan collateral.

When you want to free a Jewish country from Arabs, there are many ways of doing
so nicely.

Best regards,
Obadiah Shoher

Media and the end of time I’m not normally apocalyptic. On the contrary, I detest leftists who claim
that the blood-soaked laws of society, which have operated for thousands of
years, have now changed, and wolves may negotiate with sheep, and peace ensue.
There are, however, important and seemingly unprecedented changes happening.
Here we will not look into the mystical changes, such as assembling Jews from
four corners of the world into the Land of Israel.

Nuclear weapons have allegedly changed the face of war. Whether that is so is
far from clear. Roman legions with primitive swords proved no less devastating
in Judea than Pakistani nuclear bombs might be. Nukes are weapons of defense,
which includes revenge. They are meaningless for conquest because of
contamination. Nukes are also not tremendously effective: incendiary bombings of
Tokyo claimed twice the number of lives lost in Hiroshima. They are even less
effective against a dispersed population that lives in concrete low-rise houses.
Short of a multi-megaton tsar-bomb, a nuclear blast close to ground level in Tel
Aviv wouldn’t reach the proportions of the Holocaust.

The real changes are more subtle. Media have created a virtual world where
people receive gossip from news rather than neighbors. Internet chat has
replaced live communication and even phone conversation. Ever wondered why
media, so obviously manipulated, nevertheless persuades? Because it falls into
the cognitive mold of public opinion. Human minds subconsciously equate mass
media with mass opinion. Hearing it on TV is like hearing it from hundreds of
acquaintances. Media has the power of millions of gossiping tongues. Media
owners and governments that influence them have staggering control over minds.
They persuade the entire population by fooling every person that the entire
population already believes this or that, and he should follow. Never before has
mass opinion been so centralized and so easily manipulated.

Throughout history, public opinion has served as a filter for truth. Facts and
propositions, slowly permeating through society, were refused or accepted on a
personal level. Every person received a particular piece of news from his
neighbors, whom he knew to be fallible. He, therefore, took the news with a
degree of doubt. Even when he credulously accepted the facts, he still
interpreted them and formed his own opinion. Some crazy ideas did  overtake the
masses, but most facts were interpreted with common sense.

It is very different today, when consumers hear from TV screens what is
purported to be universally accepted opinion. The rational part of their minds
protests the obvious lies, but the subconscious part refuses to rebel against TV
opinions. The universal reach of TV broadcasts is equated with their universal
acceptance, and evolution taught human beings (except the leftists) that
universally accepted opinions are either true or that going against them is too
troublesome.
Theoretically, media also provide unprecedented access to opinions, including
truthful ones. Such variety is of no importance to most people, who are unable
to analyze and develop their own judgments. They can read truth on many sites on
the Internet, but would still believe the government line.

Another modern phenomenon is welfare. Ancient Rome briefly experimented with
such welfare programs as distribution of grain extorted from the provinces. This
ancient social security quickly made the Romans into a nation of parasites,
unable, and most of all, unwilling to withstand foreign invasions. Today’s
Rome includes Western Europe, America, Israel, and the oil sheikdoms. The West
fearfully guards its affluence; it wants no conflicts. Unwilling to confront
evil, it has accepted evil as a subjective norm. Unwilling to stand tall on any
issue whatsoever, the West succumbs to barbaric hordes peacefully through
immigration, and attempts to bribe the barbarians into compliance with mammoth
welfare programs.

For the first time in history, people need not work for living. Most people in
civilized countries work for a better house or a better car, but hardly for
food. Even a minimum-wage American works only an hour per day to pay for his
rations.

Quality minds are relatively few, but quality hands are in oversupply. China,
Bangladesh, India, and Mexico compete for low-skill outsourcing. The populations
of Africa, China, and India engage in subsistence farming and extremely
primitive manufacturing, but the increase of agricultural productivity pushes
most farmers away from their land. Like in the developed countries, agriculture
in Africa, China, and India would come to employ 3-5 percent of the population,
making the rest utterly unnecessary. Most of the world is not employable.

Robotics has a potential to change the labor market in unprecedented ways.
Developed countries outsource labor-intensive industries offshore, but what will
happen when steel mills, sewing, and electronics assembly become inexpensively
automated? When robots manufacture new robots? Though outsourcing might remain
feasible, the industries that were labor-intensive before, such as fashion, will
become capital-intensive, as they will require much equipment for automated
production. Manual laborers won’t be able to compete with machines by lowering
their wage requirements because machines allow better quality than manual
labor.

Developed countries experienced similar transitions when technology made manual
labor obsolete. But I harbor great doubts that, say, Africans can copy Europeans
in switching from manual to brain work; developing a culture of education takes
many generations. It is unrealistic to imagine Africans or lower-caste Indians
suddenly becoming engineers en masse.

Western well-wishers created an immense problem for undeveloped nations by
saving lives. The likes of Mother Theresa, who irresponsibly worked to increase
economically deficient populations, did a disservice for them. By urging Indians
to refrain from abortions and saving children in sub-Saharan regions, Westerners
doomed their pet populations. During the Industrial Revolution, Europeans had
the good luck of being relatively few, about 200 million. Now, the populations
of undeveloped countries have been artificially increased to economically
unsupportable levels through Western aid programs and Western medicines. Minimal
education for a billion Africans would cost more than the entire African GDP,
about a trillion dollars PPP, excluding the oil countries and South Africa.
Egypt, the most advanced African nation (in South Africa, the black majority is
less advanced than in Egypt), has not thoroughly developed despite 200 years of
civilizing European influence. Egypt’s rural population is as backward as
Kenya's. Africa, India, and probably China have no time to advance slowly as
Western Europe did; their population bubble grows every day faster than their
resources. In previous times of ruthless common sense, population excesses died
out. But today they receive free medicines, food, and water—and continue
growing. The Malthusian trend can be reversed by draconian birth-control
measures of the Chinese type, or by affluence, which is not likely for most of
Africa and India. In Europe, the Industrial Revolution handsomely increased per
capita GDP; in Africa, non-oil per capita GDP hardly breaks even on a
year-to-year basis. Except for accounting tricks, it probably diminishes. More
importantly, stagnating per capita GDP hides distribution difficulties:
government employees and a few successful farmers see their income rising, and
the overall stagnation implies that the majority becomes relatively poorer.
Africans have become more dependent on foreign aid. In terms of societal
evolution, we can expect Africans, lower-caste Indians, and possibly most rural
Chinese to fall perpetually behind the civilized world. Half the world’s
population is doomed to poverty which, when combined with socialist ideas, can
spell widespread terrorism.

The situation in the developed countries is also troubling. The West
artificially reduces the number of job-seekers by absurdly long education (12-26
years), short work weeks, welfare, and early retirement. The biggest threat
comes from the automation of routine services. The ATM displaced hundreds of
thousands of bank tellers, and the advent of Internet reservations put a similar
number of travel agents out of business. Automation and improved efficiency in
low-end service sectors threaten a large part of the population, which cannot
easily join the hi-tech sectors. Considerable discontent therefore grows in the
developed countries.

Throughout history, technological advances came by with sufficient slowness that
entire populations became proficient in their use. Today, technology changes so
fast that only the brainier part of society can keep up with the changes.
Governments try to bridge the gap with minimum wage and welfare programs, but
the gap will continue to increase as long as technological upgrades come out
rapidly.

Perpetual dependence on minimum-wage safeguards and welfare means dependence on
government. Like in Brave New World, unquestioning loyalty is purchased rather
than commanded. Here comes a vicious self-reinforcing arrangement. Lower classes
are largely defined through their intellectual inability to engage in the
post-technological informational economy; plainly, they are not bright. They
believe media and support government. They are the largest voting bloc with
fairly coherent views, and democratic governments pander to them. On the
positive side, the people of the lower classes are not brainwashed by
counter-intuitive liberal education; they are down-to-earth and full of common
sense. They resent illegal immigration (which threatens their jobs), appeasement
of enemies who claim their children (who serve in the army), and similar leftist
policies.

Media have created myriad values, from consumerist to populist, such as helping
whales. Their attention spans dissipated, people no longer defend the important
values, which have dissolved in the sea of myriad others. Consumerism defeated
patriotism, religion, and neighborhood values.

From the nineteen century, haredim have increasingly retreated from productive
labor, and depend on donations for living. During the same period, agricultural
revolutions have made food increasingly cheap. Theoretically, with food costs
per person per month running at $250, it would take only half a billion dollars
per year to feed the Israeli haredim, not a tremendous amount for religious
charities.

For the first time in history, the birth rate has become negative. Europeans,
whether divinely punished for the Holocaust or for an unrelated reason, are
dying out and succumbing to Islamic immigration. Even though the European
Muslims will eventually reduce their birth rate, the sheer influx of foreign
Muslims into Europe will continue, through family reunion schemes if by no other
means. The trend of Europe’s Islamization is irreversible: Europeans lack the
political will to counter it, are too lazy to fight, and cannot sustain their
welfare economies without Muslim immigrants. It’s Jacob against Esau,
religious Jews against the Muslims of Europe and the Middle East.

Best regards,
Obadiah Shoher

Chuck Hagel - It's the anti-Americanism, stupid by Caroline Glick

Chuck Hagel hates Jews. Or should I say, he hates Jews who think that
Jews have rights and that their rights should be defended, in Israel
by the government and the IDF, in America by Israel's supporters.

As I mentioned before, it is not at all surprising that Obama
appointed Hagel, and I see little  chance that the Senate will reject
his appointment. Israel and its American friends however can take
heart that Israel will not be Hagel's chief concern.

Hagel -- and Obama -- have bigger fish to fry than Israel. They are
looking to take on the US military. They will slash military budgets,
they will slash pensions and medical benefits for veterans in order to
save a couple dollars and demoralize the military. They will
unilaterally disarm the US to the point where America's antiquated
nuclear arsenal will become a complete joke. And I don't see the
military capable of stopping it. Anyone remember the F-22?

I find the whole Israel angle on Hagel irritating because of this.
Yes, Hagel will be bad to Israel. But we can minimize the damage by
diversifying our own arsenal and weaning ourselves off of US military
handouts that only serve as work subsidies for US military contractors
at the expense of Israeli ones.Moreover, for years that military aid
has been a corrupting force on Israel's general staff. I've been
advocating ending US military aid to Israel for more than a decade,
but better late than wait until we find ourselves at war and out of
spare parts because Hagel and Obama won't sign the requisition orders
to Boeing and Lockheed.

Unlike Israel, the US military cannot minimize the damage that Hagel
and Obama will cause. America's capabilities will suffer at the hands
of the duly reelected Commander in Chief and his duly appointed
Defense Secretary. The only chance to dodge that bullet was on
Election Day and the American people blew it.

By making this a story about Hagel the anti-Semite, nice senators like
Lindsey Graham and John McCain are obfuscating the main problem. The
main reason Hagel shouldn't be appointed is not because he hates
Israel. It is because he hates a strong America.

But then, that is why Obama appointed him. The American people in
their wisdom, reelected Obama despite the fact that he wants to cut
America down to size, strangle the economy in regulations and
unaffordable welfare handouts and then gut its military. By making
Hagel's appointment about Israel all his opponents are doing is giving
Hagel and his supporters new excuses for sticking it to Israel.

It was Obama and his supporters that started the myth that Netanyahu
was interfering in the elections, even though he did no such thing.
All Netanyahu did was welcome Romney to Israel during the campaign,
just as Olmert welcomed then senator Obama to Israel before the 2008
elections.

Obama, Hagel and their army of media outlets and operatives are
setting Israel up to take the blame for everything they do and in the
process seeking to demonize Israel's prime minister before the
American people. The campaign against Hagel the anti-Semite just plays
into that while hiding the real problem which is that he is
anti-American.

NOTABLY, AT the same time that the US electorate decided they'd had it
with being the indispensable nation and so reelected a man who said
the US is as exceptional as Greece, Israelis have decided we've had
enough with trying to pretend we're nothing special.

Next week we're going to vote and it is already clear that Israel is
in the midst of the Second Zionist Revolution. The first Zionist
revolution was a socialist revolution. The second Zionist revolution
is Jewish. Israel is coming into its own. Judaism is flourishing,
changing, living and breathing here like it never has anywhere since
the destruction of the Second Commonwealth. The secular Left has been
eclipsed by the Jewish Right. I don't call it the religious Right
because that is too limiting. What's happening isn't just about
religion, it's about everything and that is why non-observant hipsters
in Tel Aviv are voting for the Jewish Home party. Non-observant and
observant Jews are joining forces and the anti-religious are being
left behind.

As my content editor at Latma Avishai Ivri explained to me a couple
weeks ago, all the polling data we're seeing is largely worthless
because it is based on calls to landlines and most young Israelis
don't have landlines. Two thirds of the Jewish Home party's voters are
under 40 and the party is polling at 14-18 seats in polls that
under-represent their supporters. I don't pretend to know how the
election results are going to look but it is clear that a massive
change has occurred in the last few years and it will only become more
pronounced in the coming years. Next week's election will be the first
formal expression of this change.

Some fear that Netanyahu will take his electoral victory, throw it in
the garbage and replay Sharon's perfidy, by spitting on his voters and
his party and forming a narrow coalition with the far Left in order to
appease the anti-Semites in Washington. But I don't see that
happening. First, Netanyahu isn't as shameless as Sharon and he
doesn't seem to have the dictatorial impulses Sharon suffered from.

Second, I don't think he has the people in Likud that would let him go
that route. Sharon had Olmert and Livni who were happy to toss their
values out the window for job promotions. Netanyahu is the head of the
most right wing Likud list ever. The lefties he pushed into the
cabinet despite his party members' objections last time around - Dan
Meridor, Benny Begin and Michael Eitan -- were obliterated in the
primaries. Netanyahu can't bring them in this time, even if he wants
to. So that means he doesn't really have the ability to abandon his
base, even if he wanted to. And again, I don't think he'd want to.

What all of this means is that beginning next month, we are in all
likelihood going to see a post-American US government squaring off
against the first genuinely Jewish Israeli government ever. I don't
know what will happen when they meet. But I know it will be great
material for my column.

Oh, and for Latma. Here's a song we produced two weeks ago that I
believe gives voice to the public mood today. (Yes, I've been remiss
in posting our shows, sorry, I have been busy. But my next entry is
Latma's last two episodes.)
http://youtu.be/eqgpO_eOV2s

And a note to my loyal readers, I do apologize for taking a leave of
absence from the Jerusalem Post. I miss writing my columns as much as
you miss reading them.

But I hope when you buy (multiple copies of) my book later this year,
you will say that it was time well spent away from you.

Oh, and one last thing, if you are an American Jew and trying to
figure out who to contribute your money to, here's a good litmus test:
Hagel. Is organization X (say, for instance, AIPAC), voicing
opposition to Hagel or are they supporting him, or are they sitting on
the fence? If it's one of the latter two, tear up the check.

And no, this doesn't contradict my point about Israel not being the
problem with Hagel. He is an anti-Semite. And for American Jewish
groups to remain silent about his appointment is worse than
irresponsible. It is treacherous. My point about Hagel being
anti-American is that the groups that should be leading the campaign
against him are the American Legion and the Veterans' of Foreign Wars
not AIPAC and the ADL, not that AIPAC and the ADL should be silent.

Strangers in Their Own Land: By Moshe Feiglin (1/11/2013)

Evacuation/Compensation law for Jews was considered to be legitimate in Israel, but when this author proposes the application of the same principle – on a volunteer basis – for the Arabs, it is derided as unrealistic.

The reason for this seems clear: Money. There are many more Arabs in Judea and Samaria than Jews. Israel simply does not have the economic ability to create an "emigration package" for the Arabs of Yesha - Certainly not to the tune of half a million dollars per family. (By the way, I never proposed giving the Arabs half a million dollars to emigrate. What I did say was that instead of the money Israel spends per decade as a result of the Oslo Accords, we could invest half a million dollars per Arab family interested in emigration. Israel could invest in an emigration package that includes purchase of property, assistance with finding work abroad and also cash. We could offer less than half a million dollars and invest the rest of the money that we are pouring into the Oslo Accords into improving the quality of life for the elderly, for example).

For the sake of argument, we will stay with the proposal to pay half a million dollars to encourage the emigration of most of the Arab families in Yesha. Polls show that these Arabs are definitely interested in this option. We will not consider factors that are difficult to calculate, such as the expected decrease in the price of land and housing inside the Green Line after the application of this plan. These factors strengthen our premise, but are difficult to calculate.
Another small introduction: Our calculations will not use the true demographic data determined by Yoram Ettinger and his expert Israel-American team. Instead, we will use the inflated data provided by the Arabs of Yesha.

Being that I made the first calculations a number of years ago, and in addition, I am a concerned party, I asked my friend, Uri Noi – a meticulous, high-tech professional whose expertise is exact calculation, to examine this subject in depth. Uri enthusiastically researched this proposal and as he said, "At no stage of the preparation of this document did I peek at the results as they were forming. In other words, this document was written and examined thoroughly and impartially.
A week later, Uri presented the results of his research in a 12 page document. You can read the Hebrew version here. The following is a quote from his conclusion:

Cost to Israel of the Oslo Accords:
1. Money transfers to the Palestinian Authority: 86 billion NIS (since Oslo- M.F.) and an additional 4.53 billion NIS annually.

2. General Security Service: 2.85 NIS and an additional 1.5 billion NIS annually.

3. Border Police in Judea and Samaria: 13 billion NIS and an additional 0.7 billion NIS annually.

4. IDF in Judea and Samaria: 57 billion NIS and an additional 3 billion annually.

5. Security guards everywhere: 68 billion NIS and an additional 3.57 billion annually.

6. Bypass roads: 20 billion NIS and an additional 1 billion annually.

7. Separation Wall: 4.7 billion NIS, one time expense.

8. Murder victims: 3.5 billion NIS in loss of productivity.

9: Defensive Shield Operation: 14 billion NIS, one time expense.

10. Loss of revenue from tourism: 129 billion NIS and an additional 1 billion annually.

11. Decrease in price of land for housing. Zero in the meantime.

In all, the Oslo Accords cost the Israeli public 423 billion NIS for Judea and Samaria alone. In addition, they continue to cost the tax payers 15.3 billion NIS annually, with no end in sight.
The 423 billion that we have already paid is one and one half times more then the 284 billion NIS that Feiglin proposes.

Simply put, when people ask when Feiglin will be right, the answer is that the scenario that he outlined is already here.

Since the Oslo Accords were signed, instead of spending $500,000 on every Arab family that could be convinced to emigrate, we have spent $750,000. This sum is constantly increasing. It is a shame that we didn't listen to Feiglin earlier. He made this proposal years ago, and this week he simply repeated it."

If so, we remain with a question: Why is forced Evacuation/Compensation for Jews considered reasonable, while voluntary Evacuation/Compensation for Arabs is considered unrealistic?
This is where we touch upon the real price that we have paid for the Oslo Accords: An entire generation has come of age after Oslo and the recognition of the Arab claim to the Land of Israel – young people approximately 35 and under. These Israelis have grown up believing that the "salt of the earth" is the Arab, while the Jew is living here on borrowed time. An entire generation has grown up thinking it is a guest in its own land and that it has to pay and constantly bribe the "true sons" in order to justify its continued presence here.

All the solutions that spring up here on a daily basis surrender our essential claim to the Land of Israel as a land sanctified to Jews alone. "We have returned to our holiest of places, never to leave them again," said Moshe Dayan. The marriage vow, "You are sanctified to me," means to me, and no one else. There is no such thing as "you are sanctified to me - and also to the neighbor." There cannot be two states – two husbands – for one land.

The only relevant political party that has an explicit clause in its charter on sovereignty over all the Land of Israel in our hands is the Likud. This clause was written before Oslo. After Oslo and official Israel's ensuing estrangement toward the sanctity of the Land and its settlers, this clause could never have been written – not even in the Jewish Home party.

This is why the proposal to encourage emigration is considered unrealistic today. Not because it is not practical: it is the only practical plan. Not because there is no money to apply it: it saves money. Not because it is unethical: there is no plan more ethical. Not because the Arabs are not interested: they are very interested. Not because they have nowhere to go: they have a wide array of possible destinations.

It is considered unrealistic simply because we have stopped believing that this is our Land.
This is the real greatness of this plan. It is not the calculations and not the question if it will cost us half a million shekels or 300,000. It is the principle that dictates that when the movie ends, those who will be here will be the Jews. The greatness of this plan is that it gives the Oslo generation of "visitors" the political tools to once again develop their sense of belonging to their land.

Jan 2013 Israel Elections...

So what does this election result mean?

Does it mean the right is the same and the opposition is consolidating?

What type of coalition with Bibi make and does he think he can increase re-settlements and
attcak Iran and have a warmer relationship with the POTUS?
I think not. The POTUS will see this election result as weakness and that the population is not
as rightist as he feared.

We are at 5733 and no more than 267 years remain. Lets try to make it shorter by Davening more. Otherwise make Aliyah if you can, when you can and don't fool yourself that the US is safe....

5773 - USA is Safe For Jews?

The more Shomer Shabbas (nowhere near it) I try to become the more I understand the need for control of anger.  As I learn about anger I also see the leftist personality creep into me, not on political level but on a personal emotional level. 

With the control of anger and the attempt to follow more and more statutes, the more modest and non-combative one becomes. This would seem to turn a Hawk to a Dove. 

But the truth is as I realize I don't hate Arabs or Muslims in any organized fashion...I also understand: kill them before they kill me. I believe it is the proper mix of these that creates a clear thinking Jew.

A Jew that can decide what is needed for the right reasons. Remember that Hitler took the weapons away first and that it also takes a very small percentage of a population to "rebel" or attack Us.

The people we surround ourselves with are not the enemy and they unlikely to give birth to the enemy. But we can only judge the rest by the actions we see from the outside. I assure you antisemitism is widespread and it is in the US and it is not shrinking. 

We are at 5733 and no more than 267 years remain. Lets try to make it shorter by Davening more. Otherwise make Aliyah if you can, when you can and don't fool yourself that the US is safe....

Stay off the Slippery Slope

We are often warned about the dangers of the “extreme right” in Israel — as Thomas Friedman called them, those who “actually want to annex the West Bank.” I presume that Friedman was referring to people like Naftali Bennett, who has made a proposal to annex Area C— the parts of Judea and Samaria where almost all the Jewish residents and few Arabs live.

Even Daniel Gordis, who — unlike Friedman — actually cares about Israel’s future, has suggested that Israeli voters should beware of, er, excessive Zionism, because it could lead to the isolation and ultimate destruction of the Jewish state. In a recent article, Gordis presents a ‘good’ and a ‘bad’ scenario for the Israel of 2063. In the ‘bad’ one,

European hostility to Israel never subsided, and successive Israeli governments turned irritating both the EU and the US into a national sport. In response to repeated European and American demands that building projects cease, the government assured Israelis, “They’ll learn to live with it. We just have to show them we can’t be bullied.”

Germany changed the rules first. Lufthansa stopped flying to Israel, and a year later, Germany refused El Al landing rights. After subsequent dustups, Air France and France followed suit, as did British Airways and the UK. Soon, the only way to get to Europe was by sea. Israelis could still fly to Turkey, though.

Both Friedman and Gordis seem to be saying that Israel must not defy the Europeans and Obama Administration on the issue of Israel’s rights in Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem. By playing along — despite the fact that an excellent case can be made for the legality of Jewish settlement in these places — Israel can avoid potentially disastrous punishment.

There are two problems with this position, one philosophical and the other practical. The philosophical problem is that it represents an abdication of sovereignty, the sovereignty that Jews have been fighting and dying to preserve since the beginning of the Zionist enterprise. It represents a return to the ghetto mentality by which Jewish survival was dependent on the good will of the local gentile prince. Once we agree to the principle, where does it stop?

The practical problem is that the immediate objective of the EU and the Obama administration is the reduction of Israel to the 1949 armistice lines (the so-called “pre-67 borders” which actually were never considered borders by anyone). It is not for nothing that Abba Eban referred to these boundaries as “Auschwitz borders,” because they would be a strategic disaster. Whether you take Naftali Bennett seriously or not, you should look at the illustrations in his proposal. Here’s one of them:



Both the US and the EU do not accept Israeli sovereignty over any part of Jerusalem — the US State Department continues to insist that until there is an agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, Israel’s capital is not Jerusalem (they won’t say what it is). Many European countries (and the EU’s Foreign Minister Catherine Ashton) are prepared to talk with with a Palestinian ‘government’ that includes Hamas. The EU’s oft-stated position is that any Israeli settlements beyond the Green Line are “illegal under international law.” How can Israel play along with a policy that calls for the expulsion of half a million Jews from their homes?

And this is only the immediate objective. What can we expect next, that the EU will require Israel to grant a ‘right of return’ to 4.5 million descendants of Arab refugees before it will welcome what’s left of Israel into the family of nations?

The EU’s positions can only be expected to harden in the future, as its Muslim population grows. Although it’s harder to predict the behavior of the US in the long run, there are worrisome indications today — like Obama’s floating of a possible nomination for the anti-Israel Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense.

A policy of appeasing the US and EU can only aid the Arabs in their project to weaken Israel and slice away at it, bit by bit. A better plan is to stand firm and insist on Israel’s legitimate rights — to stay off the slippery slope.

Why Israel Has Shifted to the Right and Isn’t Coming Back

If liberal American Jews weren’t already dismayed by the fact that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu is a shoe-in to be reelected, the latest political news out of Israel may give them conniption fits.

The results of new polls show Netanyahu’s Likud and its coalition partners are set to exceed the strong governing majority they had in the current Knesset. But the really interesting numbers are those that show the main party to the right of the Likud – the Jewish Home Party – is on track to be the third largest in the next parliament with only Likud and Labor (set to finish a distant second) ahead of it.

This will give supporters of the settlement movement an even louder voice in the next Knesset than their already healthy contingent in the current one – a development that will be interpreted by some on the left as a sign of Israel’s depravity or indifference to peace.

But the reason for it is clear. Whereas in Israel’s past it could be asserted that the Likud represented Israel’s right-wing constituency, it has, to the shock and dismay of many in the left-wing Israeli media, become the center. That is not because more Israelis are supporters of increasing settlement throughout the West Bank. They are not. Rather it is due to the fact that the Israeli center as well as even many on what we used to call the Israeli left have given up on the Palestinians.

They know that neither Fatah in the West Bank nor Hamas in Gaza will ever recognize Israel’s legitimacy no matter where its borders are drawn. So they have abandoned those parties that hold onto the illusion of peace in favor of those with a more realistic vision while those on the right are now embracing parties like Jewish Home in order to hold Netanyahu’s feet to the fire and prevent him from making concessions that will neither entice the Palestinians to the negotiating table nor increase Israel’s popularity abroad.

Jewish Home is the beneficiary, in part, of the merger of the Likud with Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beitenu. The polls show that not only will Likud not win as many seats as the two parties combined got in the last election, but will probably lose several as some nationalist voters abandon the new conglomerate for its more ideological rival to the right.

Though the enlarged Likud will still gain several seats from the mark it won in the 2009 vote that brought Netanyahu back into power and make it by far the largest in the Knesset with 35, Jewish Home is set to get 12 with another pro-settlement party getting two more. That will double the number of seats those smaller parties won four years ago. Combined with the Orthodox religious parties, it will give Netanyahu nearly 70 seats out of 120 next year even before any of the centrist members join him, as some undoubtedly will do.

Jewish Home also has the advantage of a new leader in 40-year-old Naftali Bennett. He is the son of American immigrants who is a former chief of staff to Netanyahu and who earned great wealth through the sale of his Internet security firm. In him, Israel’s nationalist camp now has an articulate and savvy figure who can say things about the Palestinians that Netanyahu cannot for fear of worsening relations with the United States.

Bennett’s powerful position, which will be enhanced by a Cabinet portfolio that he will demand and get, will make the next Knesset harder for Netanyahu to manage. The absence of several Likud moderates who have been replaced by more nationalist and younger figures on the party’s Knesset list will also ensure that the prime minister will not be straying far from the wishes of his voters the way some of his predecessors have done.

This won’t necessarily mean that Netanyahu will move to build throughout the West Bank the way Bennett would like. But it will strengthen his resolve to continue to do so in Jerusalem and its suburbs as well as the major settlement blocs that Israel will hold onto even in the theoretical scenario where the Palestinians finally give in and accept a two-state solution.

That will lead to much gnashing of the teeth on the part of liberal Jews who are uncomfortable with Netanyahu, let alone those to his right. But those who lament this development should understand that the Israeli people are making this choice with their eyes wide open.

Even Labor, the party that is historically associated with the peace process, has more or less abandoned the issue of reconciliation with the Palestinians in this election and instead is concentrating on economic and social justice issues. Those lists that are still devoted to the peace process, including the new party led by former foreign minister Tzipi Livni, have been thoroughly marginalized.

Unlike most Israelis, many if not most American Jews and many non-Jewish friends of Israel haven’t drawn conclusions from the last twenty years of failed peace processing. They cling instead to the fables about the Palestinians that once fueled the post-Oslo euphoria in Israel but which have now been discarded there.

Our Neighbor Hitler Never Smiled, Jewish Survivor Complains

Edgar Feuchtwanger, 88, realizes that it seems weird to discuss the murderer of millions as nothing more than his next door neighbor, but that's how he remembers him.

"It all sounds so cozy when I talk about how I lived in the same road as Hitler, like it was not a big deal," he told the BBC. "But it's so difficult to think that people you saw almost on a daily basis were responsible for turning the world upside down."

He was only five years old when the fuehrer to be moved into his neighborhood. Feuchtwanger remembers his mother complaining that "we haven't got much milk today, because the milkman has left so many bottles" at the Hitler Munich residence.

Feuchtwanger who lives today in Aveyron, France, has co-authored a book describing his childhood brushes with the dictator, with French journalist Bertil Scali, "Hitler, Mon Voisin, Souvenirs d'un Enfant Juif" – "My Neighbor Hitler: Memories of a Jewish Child." The 320-page book is due out in French bookstores on Jan. 10, from Michel Lafon Publishing.

The book's jumping off point is the fact that Feuchtwanger and his family lived across the street from Prinzregentenplatz 16, Hitler's main residence in Munich from 1929 to 1933.

Later, as government sanctioned anti-Semitism made life increasingly dangerous, the family fled to England in 1939, after Edgar's father, Ludwig Feuchtwanger, was released from the Dachau concentration camp.

According to the Jewish Virtual Library, more than 10,000 Jewish men had been interned there for several weeks or months after the Kristallnacht pogrom of November 9-10, 1938. Edgar's uncle, the playwright Lion Feuchtwanger, had fled the country earlier.

"Hitler would come to Munich at weekends. You could tell he was at home because of the cars parked outside," Feuchtwanger says. Hitler's arrival was accompanied by the screeching of tires of a three-car motorcade carrying him and his bodyguards.

The sound of jackboots clattering on the pavement would fill the air. Passers-by would stop to cheer him. Young Edgar would also stop and stare.

Before his family left Germany, young Edgar Feuchtwanger had many opportunities to pass the Munich home of Hitler. He told the BBC that, as an 8-year-old on a walk with his governess, he saw Hitler come out onto the street from the Prinzregentenplatz apartment.

"He looked straight at me, I don't think he smiled," Feuchtwanger said.

"The whole Nazi stuff was being inculcated into us at school," he told the BBC. A teacher made the students draw a large swastika in pencil on the first page of their exercise books. On another page they wrote a list of Germany's enemies – Britain, Russia and the US.

According to the La Depeche online magazine, journalist Scali interviewed Feuchtwanger for an article in 1995. They stayed in contact over the years, and Scali eventually convinced Feuchtwanger to write the book. Scali said that his own father's family survived the war hidden by righteous gentiles in Graulhet, in southern France.

Hitler's former apartment is now a police station, and the Feuchtwangers' former apartment houses a law firm today, the report noted.

Does the Very Air in Israel Make One Wise?

"Charedim in Israel are street thugs who use murderous violence to settle issues among themselves!" That is the impression one would get after reading about recent events there.

Of course that is not true. I know many Israeli Charedim. I live among them when I visit Israel. The ones I know are extremely gentle people for whom the word violence does not even enter into their lexicon, let alone that it would ever be used to settle conflict. I have never met any Charedi in my entire over 60 years on this earth that was in the slightest way violent.

The Torah (Genesis 25:27) tells us “Yaakov Ish Tam Yoshev Ohalim,” Jacob (In contradistinction to his brother Esav who was a hunter) was a person who "sat in tents." If anyone can be called “The People of the Book” it is the Charedi world in Israel. Their biggest “sin” if you will - is that they spend as much time in study halls (tents) as they can. Their most “violent” acts are debating interpretations of Gemarah and Halacha with their study partners. I think that is true for the vast majority of Israeli Charedim of the Lithuanian variety. “Talmud Torah K’Neged Kulam” (1st Mishna in Peah) does not exactly inspire violence.

So what happened in Jerusalem last week was most definitely an exception to the rule. From Israel Hayom:

“Rabbis’ emissary cruelly attacked in Jerusalem by lawless men who tried to murder him,” the headline of the newspaper HaPeles screamed in red ink after the newspaper’s editor-in-chief, Nati Grossman, was attacked last Thursday by two haredi men who stabbed him in the head and fled.

Like I said, this is an exception. The problem is that there have been too may exceptions like this in Israel in the not too distant past. One may recall similar violence surrounding who would be Rav Shach’s successor as Rosh Yeshiva of Ponevitch Yeshiva in Bnei Brak.

To say that this is a Chilul HaShem is an understatement. Supporters of two of the Charedi world’s leading Rabbanim, 98 year old Rav Aharon Leib Steinman and Rav Shmuel Auerbach (son of Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, ZTL) are literally killing each other over who will become the head of Lithuanian Charedi Jewry in Israel. The undisputed head until his death was Rav Elyashiv. But now that leadership is in dispute.

The very idea that violence will solve this issue is so ridiculous that it makes those violent Charedi supporters of these rabbis look like imbeciles. Not to mention the obvious fact that it makes them look like common street thugs.

Can anyone imagine this ever happening in the counterpart Lithuanian Yeshiva type communities in America? When Rav Ahron Kotler died, did Rav Moshe Feinstein’s supporters go around sticking knives into people’s heads who had other candidates in mind? The very thought of something like that happening in the world of Amercian Charedi Judaism is so ridiculous that it is laughable.

There is no such thing as a “candidate” for being a Gadol. That status is earned and is a form of recognition by the masses. One becomes accepted as a Gadol by his works. He has either published major works in Torah, or by creating a new societal paradigm for Torah study as did Rav Aharon Kotler. Or by being a great leader and teacher of Torah who has attracted many thousands of followers as did the Rav. Or any number of ways in which Torah scholarship combined with leadership skills has transformed them into greatness recognized by many people.

There are no elections. There are no committees of rabbis who decide who is or isn’t a Gadol. There are no backroom political deals in smoke filled backrooms to choose a compromise candidate. And certainly they are not chosen by supporters who resort to violence against his competition. Greatness does not work that way. Not in Judaism.

But don’t tell that to supporters of great people in Israel. They think violence in pursuit of their candidate is a God given mandate for them. Kind of like the way their extremist counterparts in places like Meah Shearim act when they want to get their way. I guess they feel about their extremism on religious issues the way Barry Goldwater felt about liberty. Except that I don’t think Barry Goldwater ever supported violence against his political opponents.

The Gemarah (Bava Basra 168b) tells us that Avira D’Ara Machkim – the very air in the land (of Israel) makes one wise. Well, you could have fooled me. I don’t know what is in the air in Israel that makes some people think that they are doing the right thing by God in sticking knives into the heads of their opponents.

I can’t imagine what the rest of the world thinks when they see something like this reported in the media. Probably something along the lines of my opening sentence.

I realize that Rav Steinman is elderly. Perhaps he is unaware of the kind of thing that is going on – on his behalf. I do not know how old Rav Auerbach is but perhaps he too is unaware. Maybe he is sheltered by his close advisers about what is going on - on his behalf. I don't know.

But it would seem to me that if they do not have power or ability to do anything about the disgusting behavior of their supporters, neither of them should be leaders of anything.

This is not to say that they are not Gedolim with tremendous Torah knowledge and life experiences to draw upon for advice. But leadership should be about more than about Teaching Torah, Psak Halacha, or giving good advice. At the very least it ought to be about influencing your own supporters enough to prevent them from doing harm to others while making a huge Chilul HaShem in the process.

Judaism as the Meaning of the Jewish state

A state, especially one that is trying to be a nation-state, a national homeland for a people, needs an organizing principle, a set of ideals, an ideology, a purpose — whatever you think it is, some kind of philosophical reason for being. Otherwise there is no reason to live there if you can go somewhere else. And in the developed world, going somewhere else is more of an option than ever before.

Israel’s worst enemies have powerful ideologies — Islamism and Palestinian nationalism/irredentism.

Even the US, a secular state with a very diverse population has such principles, embodied in its Constitution and Declaration of Independence. They are one reason that the nation survived, in united form, its terrible Civil War, and why — one hopes — it will survive the forces trying to pull it apart today.

Despite being the nation-state of the Jewish people, the state of Israel does not have a set of basic unifying principles. There isn’t a single Zionism, and for some Israelis, any form of Zionism at all is looked at as a combination of ignorance and gullibility.

The early struggle to define the state was won by the secular left-wing Zionists of whom Ben-Gurion was an example. Unfortunately that segment was seduced by and ultimately subsumed in the peace movement, a movement based on a pathologically false view of reality, and encouraged by the worst enemies of the Jewish people. Its collision with the bitter truths of the real Middle East has left in their camp only those who have rejected Zionism, the academics and Ha’aretz columnists who are simply anti-state.

The remnants of political vitality are found today on the Right, especially the nationalistic-religious segment. For example, here is how Naftali Bennett explained it, in a fascinating interview with Ari Shavit of Ha’aretz:

Zionism arose thanks to secularism … The dogmatic religious establishment in the Diaspora was not capable of initiating Zionism without [Theodor] Herzl’s secular involvement. But secular Zionism was an existential Zionism that saw the state of the Jews as a refuge state.

A state that is 64 years old cannot continue to exist on the ethos of a refuge state, on security alone. After all, if this were the reason for our existence, there are many places that are safer for Jews – like Melbourne, Australia, or New Jersey. They don’t send children to the army there, and missiles aren’t flying there. Therefore, the time has come to move from the existential Zionism that you come from to a Jewish Zionism. It is necessary to base our national life on a Jewish basis, and it is necessary to give the state a Jewish coloration.

I don’t support religious coercion, but I do believe that Judaism is our ‘why’: Judaism is the reason for our existence and the justification for our existence, and the meaning of our existence.

This isn’t an easy sell to secular Israelis. For many of them, ‘Judaism’ is a corrupt functionary that tells them that they aren’t Jewish enough to get married in a Jewish state, or a haredi who maintains a large family on welfare, doesn’t do army service and spits at secular women.

The ideal is a tolerant Jewish state which is nevertheless fully Jewish. This will have to come from those, like Bennett, who see themselves as observant, and not from the liberal side of Judaism, which has embraced pluralism to the point of accepting a universalist ideology that does not “distinguish between Israel and the Nations.”

Is it possible? I am not sure, but I think it’s essential to our survival.

Hebron Chief Rabbi Pulls Support from Bennett’s Party

By: Yori Yanover

Published: January 4th, 2013

Rabbi Dov Lior and MK Michael Ben Ari at a press conference in Hebron, March 29, 2012.
Photo Credit: Miriam Alster/FLASH90

Rabbi Dov Lior, a leading figure in the Tekumah party that merged with Naftali Bennett's Jewish Home's Knesset list, has withdrawn his support from that same list. The website Srugim revealed that Rabbi Lior was furious when he saw his name appear in campaign ads for Jewish Home, as part of an extensive list of rabbis supporting the party.

Rabbi Lior, who founded Tekumah together with Arutz 7 owner Rabbi Zalman Melamed and Rabbi Chaim Steiner, is the chief rabbi of Hebron and Kiryat Arba, the dean of the Kiryat Arba Hesder Yeshiva, and heads the Council of Rabbis of Judea and Samaria.

Over the past few months, Rabbi Lior has been expressing his dissatisfaction with the way MK Michael Ben Ari, who now runs on the Power for Israel list, was pushed out of the united list by his colleagues. Initially, Rabbi Lior refused to take public measures against Jewish Home, partly because he is related to MK Uri Ariel—who, according to Ben Ari's camp was instrumental in his ousting, and to Orit Struck, who is a contender on the Jewish Home list.
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http://www.jewishpress.com/news/breaking-news/hebron-chief-rabbi-pulls-support-from-bennetts-party/2013/01/04/0/?print

How to Use American Influence

By: Shoshana Bryen

Published: January 2nd, 2013

U.S. Army Lt. Col. Mark Martin shakes hands and laughs with Mawlawi Guhlam M. Ruhaani, at the conclusion of a key leader engagement in Farah City, Afghanistan, Dec. 29.
Photo Credit: U.S. Navy photo by HMC Josh Ives/released

Colonial powers – France, Britain, Belgium and Russia, in particular – believed there was no substitute for their own armies and officials to ensure that their colonies stayed in line. Instead of colonial occupation forces, the US takes its money, arms, training and agenda abroad. It is a specifically American conceit that people in other countries and other societies want our social and governmental blueprint as well as our money, medicine and weapons.

As the Syrian civil war expands, a U.N. Commission of Inquiry finally determined that, "The conflict has been overtly sectarian... government forces and its militias, dominated by Alawites, have been attacking Sunnis -- who are "broadly (but not uniformly)" backing the armed groups opposing President Bashar al-Assad's government. And anti-government armed groups have been targeting Alawites."

This is not news. It has, however, prompted another spasm of the belief that US support for this side or that, this person or that, could have or would have produced in Syria a secular, moderate and tolerant revolution, led by those who would be America's friends. The estimable Barry Rubin blames "the deliberate decisions of President Barack Obama and other Western leaders. Even if one rationalizes the Islamist takeover in Egypt as due to internal events, this one is US-made."

It is hard to see the difference between the "internal events" in Egypt that made the Brotherhood victory "inevitable," and "internal events" in Syria that could have produced a different outcome. In both countries, the Brotherhood had been repressed and suppressed in the most brutal ways. Hafez Assad killed an estimated 20,000 people in the Brotherhood stronghold of Hama in just a few weeks in 1982; Junior has a long way to go. In neither country did the supporters of Muslim Brotherhood go away or lose their fervor – the opposite. And in both places, lifting the lid brought the Muslim Brotherhood back from underground.
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http://www.jewishpress.com/indepth/opinions/how-to-use-american-influence/2013/01/02/0/?print

Why Jews Are So Bad at PR

By: Rabbi Shmuley Boteach

Published: January 8th, 2013

Ron Dermer, Prime Minister Netanyahu’s senior adviser, may be Israel’s next Ambassador to the U.S.
Photo Credit: Miriam Alster/Flash90

The biggest question surrounding the State of Israel is why it is so hated. The conventional wisdom is that the world remains hopelessly anti-Semitic and is therefore deeply biased against the Jewish State. No doubt there is some truth to this assertion.

But to absolve Israel and the Jewish people of any involvement in this monumental failure to communicate strikes me as convenient and allows us to blame others for our shortcomings.

In truth, while the State of Israel was asleep the Arabs pulled off one of the great propaganda coups in global history. They somehow convinced the nations of the world that six million embattled Jews, with a deep commitment to democracy, human rights, and religious pluralism were the aggressors in a war with hundreds of millions of oil-rich Arabs, whose governmental commitment to women’s and religious rights is tenuous at best and appalling at worst. The Palestinians in particular demonstrated a black belt in PR by convincing the world that amid their rejection of every peace deal ever offered to them, including the 1947 UN Partition plan, that it is Israel that has no interest in peace.

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http://www.jewishpress.com/indepth/columns/america-rabbi-shmuley-boteach/why-jews-are-so-bad-at-pr/2013/01/08/0/?print

The Future of Judaism

By: Harry Maryles

Published: January 7th, 2013
Latest update: January 8th, 2013

From time to time, my views are challenged by both those to my right and those to my left. That happened recently in discussions about going ‘Off the Derech’(OTD).

The right constantly challenges me about why I do not discuss what they perceive to be a much larger instance of Going OTD among Modern Orthodox Jews. I am not prepared to concede the point. As many people have pointed out, there have been no studies (at least that I am aware of) that breaks the OTD phenomenon into percentages or numbers of individual groups. But I will concede that it is very possible that the MO community is the one that goes OTD is the larger of the two, at least in terms of percentages.

The Left keeps challenging my contention that I see Charedim to be the wave of the future. Again there are no studies that I am aware of that speaks to this issue.
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http://www.jewishpress.com/blogs/haemtza/the-future-of-judaism/2013/01/07/0/?print

Right-Leaning Pro-Israel Organizations Join Voices in D.C.

By: Lori Lowenthal Marcus

Published: January 7th, 2013

President and Founder of EMET Sarah Stern with Congressman Doug Lamborn (R-Co).
Photo Credit: Bob Stein

The Endowment for Middle East Truth (EMET) and the National Council of Young Israel announced on Friday, January 4, that EMET will serve as the NCYI's voice on Capitol Hill for purposes of addressing foreign policy.  Both organizations are right-of-center and resolutely pro-Israel.

EMET is a small Washington, D.C. think tank which conducts weekly one-on-one briefings with Congressional offices, and hosts frequent talks by leading policy experts which are attended by members of congress, staffers, and others interested in Middle East policy.

According to Sarah Stern, founder and president of EMET, the collaboration between the two organizations makes sense

because of the strong symmetry in foreign policy views shared by the two organizations.  EMET’s policy focus will remain, as always, preserving and defending the national security of the United States, and its ally Israel, in the joint struggle against the forces of radical Islam and emphasizing Israel’s unique role as the eastern outpost of Western democratic values.  EMET currently does this with the backing of over 25,000 Americans throughout the United States.

The issues that EMET focuses its attention on educating members of Congress about include the need for Jerusalem to remain undivided; the need to demand of Islamist regimes that unless they meet required policy thresholds, U.S. military and financial assistance will be curtailed or even terminated; the dangers of a nuclear Iran; the dangers of a failed "land for peace" policy in dealing with the Arab-Israeli conflict, and the recognition that the path to peace is blocked by Arab Palestinian intransigence; and the need for American leadership in obtaining the release of unjustly jailed Jews around the world, including Jonathan Pollard.

The NCYI is an organization that grew out of the needs of Torah observant Jews to meet the challenges of a non-accommodating diaspora world, especially during the early decades of the Twentieth Century. Young Israel has 146 branches throughout North America, and it currently focuses not only on Torah observance, but on the needs and aspirations of its community, including various kinds of focused political action.  Obtaining the release from prison of Jonathan Pollard is a particularly important issue for Young Israel.  Rabbi Pesach Lerner, the executive vice president of the organization until his recent retirement, was one of Pollard's most fervent advocates.

NCYI President Farley Weiss said in a joint press release about the arrangement between the two organizations, “NCYI is very excited to have EMET represent NCYI on it matters of foreign policy concerns.  I personally have admired for many years the tremendous job Sarah Stern and EMET has done and accomplished on Capitol Hill and their sterling reputation.  We are confident that partnering with EMET will be a win-win situation for both parties and will give the National Council of Young Israel a much stronger voice on issues of concern to our members.  We look forward to a great relationship with EMET.”

About the Author: Lori Lowenthal Marcus is the US correspondent for The Jewish Press.


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Rav Ovadia’s Son Prohibits Vote for Parties Pushing 2-State Solution

By: Yori Yanover

Published: January 7th, 2013

Rabbi Yaakov Yosef, eldest son of the Rishon Lezion, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef.

A group of 350 rabbis is calling on all the parties to submit pledges to resist returning any part of Eretz Israel.

An announcement currently being distributed by 350 Israeli rabbis, calling on all parties to commit to never giving up any portion of Eretz Israel could be influencing the future of Benjamin Netanyahu's coalition maneuvers, should he end up, as predicted, at the role of Israel's next prime minister.

Members of the Rabbinical Congress "Pikuach Nefesh" (a principle in Jewish law that the preservation of human life overrides almost all other considerations) have called on all the political parties taking part in the January 22 elections to sign a clear statement in which they pledge to oppose in the Knesset and in government any proposal that includes withdrawal from the territories of Eretz Israel, and to refuse to sit in the government and the coalition should they be leading such moves.

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http://www.jewishpress.com/news/rav-ovadias-son-prohibits-vote-for-parties-pushing-2-state-solution/2013/01/07/0/?print 

Jewifying the Opposition

By: Vic Rosenthal

Published: January 7th, 2013

The president is going to nominate Chuck Hagel for Secretary of Defense.

Over the last few weeks, just like when the plan was to appoint Arabist Chas Freeman to a sensitive intelligence post, the strategy for the appointment has been to leak the planned appointment, then respond to opposition by ‘Israelifying’ the objections, and ‘Jewifying’ the opponents.

In other words, administration surrogates are doing their best to make the public think that objections to Hagel are all related to his anti-Israel politics (don’t just ask me — ask Iranian Press TV), and that opponents to his nomination are doing the bidding of the ‘Jewish Lobby’ (as Hagel himself called it).

Freeman’s Saudi and Chinese connections did him in. He wasn’t a member of the Senate who could expect to receive many votes out of collegial courtesy. The administration saw the handwriting on the wall and didn’t push it.

But this time the calculations are that Hagel can make it. This is despite the fact that many Senators will vote against him because his positions on issues of national security and foreign policy are far to the left of the mainstream for that body. What can you say about someone who opposed economic sanctions on Iran and a resolution calling Hizballah a “terrorist organization,” and suggested that the US president negotiate with Hamas?

It’s not as though there aren’t other good candidates, including some who are much more experienced in the details of running the complicated defense establishment, such as the highly competent Michelle Flournoy.

Unfortunately, the administration has succeeded in making the issue of Hagel all about Israel and Jews, rather than about a potential Secretary of Defense with little practical experience who seems to think that a nuclear Iran is acceptable. One wonders if the president himself views it this way, and sees the nomination as a way to punish and humiliate Israel (and perhaps the “Jewish Lobby”).

That would be really, really stupid, a classic case of allowing the anti-Israeli tail to wag the dog of real American interests.