We Have Lived These Dangers Before

 

Long ago in Israel there were enemies in the areas which today we call Gaza and Syria and Lebanon. Gaza had the older enemy, the Philistines, an Egyptian offshoot community which arose from Egypt separating soon after the Israelites arrived and conquered Canaan or a remaining Canaanite tribe which survived the Israelite advances for quite some time. They were capable warriors who used variants of Egyptian fighting methods as the Canaanites had been vassals of Egypt and were often included in Egyptian campaigns against the Hittites who ruled much of the lands north of Canaan. Their units would include chariots with archers as well as spear and sword men as well as drivers. This required slightly larger and heavier chariots which were equally hearty and difficult to destroy in combat. They also used heavy and light infantry, standing archers and slingers and limited horse cavalry. This made them a very formidable enemy for the Israelites who relied heavily on infantry, mostly light infantry which would utilize geological landscapes to great advantage. During their series of wars the Philistines had the distinct advantage in the flatlands while the Israelites fared better in the Judean hills and mountains. These hills and mountains rendered the chariots unusable and limited the advantages for horse cavalry. Hills and mountains also would wear out heavy infantry rather quickly as their heavier armor, shields and weapons rendered then exhausted while the Israelite light cavalry moved well and was very familiar with these lands. Still, often the Israelites fared well even on open flatlands against the Philistines, especially when under the rule of King David and King Solomon. David had a particular knowledge of the Philistines having lived and fought amongst them with a group of close friends and followers while hiding from King Saul who wished him dead. In the end it was Saul who committed suicide after his son was felled in battle which was ill advised and proved disastrous for the Israelites. Following the death of King Saul, David rose to the crown amid great celebrations and fanfare. Initially David made peace with the Philistines but that peace fell apart and a great war ensued. Eventually mention of the Philistines vanished with little explanation and their tribe was subsumed by other tribes and the Philistines simply ceased to exist. The Philistines have absolutely no genetic or other ties to the Arabs claiming their heritage from this Biblical tribe. Another influence on the Philistines was our other group, the Phoenicians. This was thought due to their seafaring economy and types of ships. Either way, the animosities between the Philistines and the Israelites was obviously due to their both being very capable and strong tribal communities and being neighbors naturally led to incursions and their inevitable conflicts.

 

Empire of Kings David and Solomon
including the Philistines and Phoenicians

 

The others were the Phoenicians who too were one of the stronger Canaanite tribes with Egyptian ties. The Phoenicians were the great maritime and commercial traders sailing the eastern Mediterranean Sea (Great Sea). There were also found to be some Hittite influences and possible interbreeding between the two civilizations in the early periods in Phoenician history. One of the most lucrative trade items they dealt in was a deep purple, a royal purple, dye necessary for robes of royalty as well as the Israelite Priests and many garments of the Tabernacle and later the Temple. The Phoenicians were eventually pressed by the invading empires of Babylonian, Persia and Greece that they took to their ships and settled in Northern Africa, some claim they became Carthage, and traded with people as far as the British Isles. History lost the Phoenicians per se and if they became Carthage they were exterminated with the remnants strewn across northern Africa or enslaved by Rome after the Punic Wars. The Phoenicians also warred with the Israelites with varying results over the years just as the Philistines had done though they survived beyond the Greek conquest and enslavement of the Israelite Tribes.

 

Greek and Phoenician Civilizations 800 to 550 BCE

 

The Babylonians had conquered and took us from our lands while the Persians, Greeks, Assyrians and initially the Romans simply ruled over us in our lands. There was one consistent reason for our defeat each and every time, infighting between the different tribes, political divides, different sects or whatever divisions which kept us infighting when we needed to be united to save our homelands. The Persians also had a large number of Jews decide they preferred living remaining in the cities which had been Babylon, moving to the capital or other large Persian city, anywhere but under Torah and living as one people in one land. This may have been a contributing factor to subsequent losses and leading eventually to the great Roman dispersion spreading us to the far corners of the Roman Empire and everywhere between all in all as slaves with no rights and an expectation that our culture and people would perish. This was how the Romans destroyed the remnants of the Phoenician Empire when they destroyed Carthage and dispersed their survivors. That was the end of any mention of Carthage, Carthaginians or Phoenicians in the rest of history. The Romans not only dispersed the Israelites, by then the Judeans, resulting from the great division of the Israelite nation into Judea and Israel, of which Israel and its Ten Tribes were conquered by the Assyrians and disappeared from history until being found in tribes from the far corners of the globe, and the Romans took care of the remainder, or so they thought. The twelve distinct tribes were ruled separately with their sharing of the Priestly tribes amongst them as their common thread. They were finally unified under King David starting the Israelite “empire” and made a great power with King Solomon (see maps below). This divide resulted in two kingdoms, one took the name Israel and the other took the name of its predominant Tribe between Benyamin and Judah thus became Judea. The name Judea was eventually shortened until the remnants of the Tribes of Judah and Benyamin along with their priestly classes simply became Jew. After the Assyrians capture the ten tribes of Israel they disappeared from Biblical history and many feared they had assimilated completely into the peoples with whom they settled. This may explain why today we are finding tribes claiming to be Jewish who genetically have many of the marker genetic makeup which has historically been defined as being an Israelite descendant. Further explaining such was the Roman dispersion which went further than the far corners of the Roman Empire as Jews were also sold to neighboring countries and empires such as India, China, Mongols, Arabs, Egyptians, and even the European and African barbarians plus escaping enslaved Jews would immediately target the closest non-Roman tribes they could find. The miracle was that for the large part the Jews kept themselves fairly separate once there had risen a Jewish community. It is even assured that many a Jewish parent would send to distant relatives or known Jews who may have resided in proximity in order to have their children marry within the faith, within our peoples.

 

Eretz Yisroel as formed after the conquests by the Kingdoms of King David and King Solomon; both of whom allowed the Principalities of Edom, Moab and Ammon to be semi-autonomous as long as they and their armies supported Eretz Yisroel

 

The Assyrians and Romans as well as the Babylonians all conquered a divided people too stubborn to work together to resolve differences and agree on the best and strongest means of representing the entirety of the Jewish People. The divisions often were over trivial matters or vital matters where Torah interpretation was always a critical matter which often went unresolved while manner of worship, sacrifice, or other religious obligations were minor items which should have easily been resolved. The reality was that all too often in Jewish history, Israelite history, was that we allowed divisions in our family and this led to our destructions. Under Roman rule we could not have been a more divided people with groups proclaiming their leader was the Messiah and all of them proved to be wrong. Even Rabbi Hillel falsely believed that Bar Kokhba was the Messiah, something for which he paid a horrible price as did many others after that rebellion was squashed by Roman legions. We defeated ourselves throughout history yet when we were united we proved to be formidable. Just look above at the conquests by King David and then King Solomon who reached the Euphrates River in what is today northern Syria almost in Turkey. We suffered from such weakness being self-inflicted throughout three thousand years of history with only a few bright spots where it took a Moses or Joshua, it took King David and King Solomon and after each of these pairs we fell into fighting ourselves again.

 

One would think that as smart as we are presumed to be we might have finally learned. Nope, we have not learned anything. Sure we were kind of united in 1948 once the Haganah, the Irgun, the Sternists, Lehi and other splinter groups realized it was fight as one or die individually. Even then there was the wasteful and unnecessary destruction of the Altalena due to a struggle over power with David Ben-Gurion opposed and attempting to suppress Menachem Begin and, in absentia, Ze’ev Jabotinsky which resulted in the shelling of the ship the Altalena off the Tel Aviv beach (see image below). That was the second confrontation between Irgun and Haganah branches of the newly forming Israeli Defense Force during the 1948-9 Arab genocidal intended invasion where they conquered and illegally occupied Judea, Samaria (Jordan) and Gaza (Egypt). In future wars up through the June 1967 Six Day war, a response to overt moves and imminent invasion by Egypt and Syria under the orders from Egyptian President Nasser with assistance from Syrian Dictator Assad. When Jordan joined the fight the next day over pleading and warnings from Israel, the Israelis appeared surrounded but broke through and ended this attack rather rapidly liberating Judea, Samaria and Gaza and gaining the Sinai Peninsula and Golan Heights from Egypt and Syria respectively. Even though the October 1973 War caught Israel flatfooted and unprepared, the Yom Kippur War as it became known still resulted in an Israeli victory. As per usual, while Israel appeared to be being defeated the world was almost enveloped in an astounding silence but as soon as Israel was almost to Damascus and approaching Cairo the world found their voice and from the United Nations in New York, the White House in Washington D.C., the Kremlin in Moscow and any number of other capital cities, especially across Europe all demanded Israel cease all military activity and return immediately to the armistice lines from the Six Day War as Israel must not be permitted to actually defeat any of her enemies, that would upset the world’s balance.

 

Shelling and Sinking of the Ship the Altalena off the Tel Aviv Beach

 

So where do we sit today in Israel. Well, the Arabs have formulated a false flag operation called the Palestinians. Using the Arab Palestinian against Israel instead of the armies of Egypt, Syria (well, not so much Syria now), Jordan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Iran and whatever other Arab nation all attacking making Israel the underdog, they use the Arab Palestinians and place them as the poor, unarmed underdogs. With this ploy the Arabs continuously claim ownership of lands sometimes going back to Ottoman Empire deeds. When there is a set of conflicting deeds with one held by any Arab, even one living in America who never even walked this land and the other a Jew who has built a home and has a valid deed, the Arab is almost always considered the owner by the Israeli Supreme Court which leans so far left they may as well convene in Paris and rule as if they were a European Union Court. This has allowed the Arabs to watch as Israel slowly but inexorably eats itself to pieces throwing Jews from their homes, now from entire neighborhoods, all without any real court hearing the claim and ruling on actual ownership. More often than not, when the time comes for a court to actually hear a claimant, the Arab usually drops all claims and all paperwork which once was used to destroy a Jewish life of their home has disappeared into thin air. Does this lead to the Supreme Court reversing their decision, of course it does not. Any Jew thrown off the lands that the leftists on the Supreme Court still believes belongs to the Arabs and no Jew should be permitted to walk there, let alone build a home or community. The Arabs watch as Jews destroy Jewish homes and they riot in celebration. Then the circle starts again usually now with a “Jewish” leftist group such as Peace Now, B’Tselem, Jews for Justice in Palestine, Rabbis for Peace, J-Street and a plethora of other far left Jewish groups many of which are mostly if not completely funded by European governments, the European Union, George Soros, American Jews, and some like J-Street are largely made up of American Jews; all will file often singularly and sometimes in small groups as each time they succeed their funding is increased enriching the leaders of these groups. Once filed directly with the Supreme Court without any need for a court ruling on the properness or even legality of the claim, the Supreme Court jumps to force Jews from their communities. What the claim is these groups are helping the Arab Palestinians who are poor and kept down because Jews are living beyond the Green Line in areas almost devoid of any Arabs or others. The fact that these communities include businesses and manufacturers who employ many Arab Palestinians and when they are shuttered and must relocate within the Green Line the Arab Palestinians they employed lose their employment. These Jewish companies pay premium wages as far as any Palestinian not on the government take is concerned. Arab Palestinian companies pay less than half the going wage paid by the Israeli companies, but by removing these businesses they are helping the Arab Palestinians, especially the ones who were employed there, right?

 

Meanwhile there are often demonstrations within Israel where Zionists protest the destruction of Jewish homes without an actual court decision on who really owns these lands. As stated, most of these deeds are either falsely identified, forgeries or actually never existed.There is just some Arab these groups find and pay to tell the court that the identified lands belonged to their family back before the Jews stole the lands. Many of these were denoted as state lands and the Jewish communities went through every required search and received the blessings and even some funding from the government but as soon as an Arab says the magic word, “Mine,” then the Jews must be removed without any further considerations, after all, why would the poor man lie about such an easily proven true or false claim? Maybe because you never validate their claims before ruling the destruction of Jewish communities and even after there is proof from a lower court you still insist your original order be carried out and after the homes and businesses are destroyed you will talk about a review. That almost helps, doesn’t it? The current target is Amona, again. The Israeli government obeyed their Washington D.C. masters and did as President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice demanded, destroying over nine thousand Israeli lives and giving all of Gaza to the Arab Palestinian Authority (PA) so they could prove how capable they could be at running a state of their own, and they failed miserably. Never mind they have a semi-autonomous fiefdom around Shechem (Nablus) which they have been misallocating billions of dollars and euros over the years making first Yasser Arafat and his cronies overly wealthy and since his departure Mahmoud Abbas, his three sons and all of his cronies and security detail, without which he would be dead and add in the IDF and Shin Bet foiling a Hamas plot to murder Abbas about every four to six months, but they needed Gaza and it be made Jew-free before they could accept the land. Well, they received the lands around mid-August of 2005 and by June of 2007 after over a year of on again off again fighting Hamas, had finally secured all of Gaza and went about executing any Fatah person not convincing enough in their denial of being a part of the PA and pledging their undying loyalty to Hamas, assuming they lived out the week. Many PA leaders had departed ahead of this collapse and despite training by United States Special Forces under the supervision of General Dayton, all performed out of sight in Jordan, the PA Security Forces were unable to prevent a Hamas takeover of Gaza. The Arabs still only noticed that the Jews were removing Jews for the Arabs to take the land and use it to attack Israel with even more lethal arms including any rocket they get the knowhow to build. Iran has been very helpful in providing Hamas and Islamic Jihad with the plans and motors for even larger and heavier rockets until now they can strike Jerusalem and Tel Aviv from Gaza and possibly as far north as Haifa. Now the Arabs are watching the Jews remove Jews from area after area in Judea and Samaria and they are beginning to envision the total destruction of the Jew using the entirety of the Judean Hills overlooking the heart of Israel and her population and manufacturing and power generation centers. There are desalinization plants, natural gas powered electricity plants, refineries, homes, schools, kindergartens, nursery schools, synagogues and the docks of Haifa, Tel Aviv, Ashdod and Ashkelon all visible from and within easy range of the Judean Hills.

 

On the other side of the argument are the “settlers” themselves backed not only by the Zionists, as one would suspect, but also by a large majority of the people. One might query as to why if the majority, and a clear majority at that, favor annexing most if not all of Judea and Samaria does the elected government not act more forcefully to implement such a solution. Ah, now that is the question. Perhaps, as some of the most ardent Zionists have claimed, Israel just does not have the right government in place and Netanyahu has been so worn down by the friction and pressures that he is simply paralyzed and unable to act according to the desires of the people. That begs why has he been Prime Minister for such an extended period, longer than any other Israeli? This comes down to a single statement in our opinion and that comes from this past election. The last election had many varied and twisted variables. One was V 15 or V 2015 and was a foreign funded and based NGO from the United States at the direction of President Obama whose leader, Jeremy Bird, had been President Obama’s reelection campaign chairman and closely tied to One Voice which was funded by the usual suspects as well as George Soros and registered as if an Israeli based NGO just as so many European NGOs have done to interfere in Israeli day to day political decisions. V 2015 worked to elect the Labor Party ticket and had made some inroads, at least as far as the polls showed. The day before the election Netanyahu made a plea of seeming desperation and as the week or two before the person topping the closest right wing party which might challenge Netanyahu, Naftali Benet, had stated he was unsure if he truly was ready to be Prime Minister. This may have been a play at humility, but what it became was a landslide of Jewish Home voters to Likud in response to Netanyahu who then won with a comfortable margin but marginalized Jewish Home and their ability to affect government. With the United States with direct, though unprotested, White House interference in the Israeli election and to have the Zionist, nationalist, right wing parties still dominate the election, what more proof does it take to know the Israeli public favors annexation of Judea and Samaria and addressing the Arab Palestinian problem afterwards.

 

As near as we have been able to determine from our beachfront town of Nahariya, which is on the Mediterranean coast, we are as settled Israeli as Tel Aviv; but from our sense from people we cross, they are favoring a one state solution with the Arabs permitted limited autonomy or simply being bought out and encouraged to leave and settle elsewhere as wealthy people if that is what it would take. There is the feeling that any solution requires the removal of Mahmoud Abbas, his cohorts and henchmen, otherwise known as the PA Security Forces and particularly Force 17. Then there would need to be fair and open elections which Israel would need to monitor and, in order to satisfy a suspicious world, United Nations, European and United States and maybe Russia and China and who knows who else, but not the Arab League, to monitor the fairness and openness of the elections, something completely missing in any votes taken currently. It is possible that many Arab Palestinians would enjoy the freedom and opportunities for economic growth and freedom from oppressive governance that Fatah used in Judea and Samaria and Hamas oppresses in Gaza. Gaza, unfortunately, is beyond help unless Israel, the next time thousands of rockets rain down each week, possibly daily, out of Gaza simply cleanses Gaza of all terror related rocket and weapon factories, storehouses and the people involved in such activities once and for all and allows them an open and semi-autonomous region and assistance in economic recovery. Oddly enough, granting the Arab Palestinians the opportunity to become economically viable and independent from their dependence on charity from throughout the world and the graft that produces and the other sins soon attached, is something the United Nations, European Union, many European governments, the United States State Department, the Arab League, Iran, the Muslim Brotherhood and who knows who else, would fight against with all their might as they enjoy their power to attack Israel without any direct ties or involvement. The world will eventually have to realize, Israel has been reestablished and is going to remain against any and all odds.

 

But what are the world’s Jews doing about all of this? We are fighting one another and beating our heads together for no solution. Our stance explained in the following is favoring the Zionist arguments as that is where we place ourselves. The solution is for a single state owned and protected by the IDF with the Arab Palestinians enjoying their semi-autonomous rule within Areas A and B while Israel settles Area C and the Jordan Valley, period, end of discussion. There is a great need for revamping how Justices are chosen for the Supreme Court and after that every other court of civil law. There needs to be a drafting of a Constitution which iterates the make-up of the government, what powers are vested where, the procedures for making a law and limitations on adjudication such that there cannot be any legislating from the bench. Judges apply the law using the letter of the law and not some dreamed up insanity that no normal human being could dream came from some law. That is what is needed and with this the annexation of all of Judea and Samaria. Any Arabs desiring of leaving, there will be a buy out of your property and a generous benefit package to assist with your relocation along with finally a free airline first class trip to whatever nation is accepting you. We will wish you luck. From the semiautonomous region ruled by Arab Palestinians we only demand that you obey the Noahic Code and not pursue violence against Israeli citizens. Should this advisory not be heeded then we will assume you have decided to wage a war of separation which will result in a complete and total response by all of the forces short of nuclear weapons required to decimate all of the area, structures, homes, businesses, wells, charcoal mounds and people in a conflagration which will not soon be forgotten by those watching. We, on the other hand, will simply return to living happily either before such an episode and it not being required or afterwards safe in the knowledge that there is no longer even a hint of a threat from former members of the PA, period. All of the alternatives will be of your choosing and we have explained our responses, you decide. Thank you in advance for your participation.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Future Trip as a European Goes to Jerusalem

 

Somewhere down the road, we will imagine that the Palestinian Authority has acceded to accepting the 1949 Armistice Lines, the Green Line, as their border as the final agreements are ironed out setting the border inch by ever painful inch, or centimeter by ever painful centimeter. The borders will loom important for this Easter trip of a Church group from somewhere in leftist pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel, anti-Zionist but professing to love Jews and declare they should have their nation with safe and secure borders not too far from city center Tel Aviv and are supporting the Peace Process French denizens. The flight of this fifty younger Christians who are members of Christians for Palestine from the river to, well, some of the sea arrived on schedule at Ben Gurion International Airport. Of course their flight on an A 320 Airbus landed in Greece from which their group was broken up between two smaller and agile prop driven aircraft which once crossing from the Mediterranean to land flew just barely over the rooftops avoiding a couple of skyscrapers newly built with modern anti-missile technology built into the structure of the building. The ends of the rail-guns were evident on the east and southern faces of these new buildings. One of the members on the larger plane gave a summary of the technology, speed of the small but deadly projectile used and the radar that guided each shot. The secret to this weapon was the projective speed at close to ten times the speed of sound which meant that almost no calculations for trajectory were necessary as the ‘bullet’ reached its target within millionths of a second.

 

Many on that flight nodded almost in unison as if that would give it more of a feeling that they actually understood the need and all that went into requiring these buildings be so equipped. The truth is that at least two of these towers are being erected across Israel and are called the sentinel towers and each city has building restrictions for height no taller than twenty-five floors east of these towers and each is building a minimum of one tower per half million residents and workforce numbers combined. Their landing was more abrupt than the frequent flyers who did not fly into Ben Gurion are used to, as the aircraft no sooner landed than it sped towards the terminals and the protective wall erected east of the airport and reaching skyward almost a quarter of a mile, blocking any view of the Judean hilltops from the airfield, and the airfield from said hilltops.

 

Our imaginary group breezed through customs as their group had been all but tucked into bed by security before they even boarded their flight back in France. They met at the prearranged hotel where a lavish kosher lunch was served and all rested but were talking about how anxious they were to visit the holy sited in Jerusalem. Their Arab waiter advised them that they should be more careful and never refer to Jerusalem as it had an older and more venerated name of al-Quds. Their leader thanked the waiter for his unsolicited advice and after he had left the table continued discussing Jerusalem as the western part of the city would be the Israeli capital while the easternmost parts the Arab capital. Originally the religious areas such as the Temple Mount were protected for free access by baby-blue helmeted United Nations troops from Brazil and Peru, but they had fled after their first firefight with Palestinian Security forces who now ruled these areas where Israelis were only allowed limited access, usually to escort tourists on tours and even then were restricted to using only the Arab and Islamic names for the sites as listed by UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) in their list of World Heritage Sites. After lunch the French group boarded their two chartered buses and on each bus at least one person in complete puzzlement being unable to operate the windows yelled out in frustration, “How in the name of all the Saints do these widows open?” to which the bus driver calmly responded, “They don’t open, they’re bullet proof glass.” The French tourist just shook his head mumbling something about overly paranoid Jews. The trip out of Tel Aviv was pleasant and they started to climb the long ride cutting through the passes and canyons towards Jerusalem. The French tourists had settled down, run out of songs to half-heartedly sing along and were watching the trees pass by.

 

That was when their education on the realities of peace in the Middle East started as they heard the patter of objects striking the roof and sides of the bus. A number of the French got nervous and asked the driver, “That isn’t what I think it is, is it?” He queried back asking, “What do you think it is?” Frenchman, “Bullets?” Driver, you got it, now sit down and pray it remains only bullets, we can absorb them.” The French tourist was obviously unsettled about the implications of vulnerability but was unsure from what they need fear and was too horrified to even contemplate asking. That was when they turned a corner and at the side of the road was a bus that looked very much like the ones in which they road except the top was torn open as if by a large hunting knife skinning a large rodent and the insides were burned to ashes. One horrified French tourist asked, “When did, what did, are we safe?” The bus driver’s brow began to show beads of sweat and he went unnervingly quiet ignoring their questions and often surveying the hills and crags which overlooked the highway and rail line adjacent to the roadway.

 

Suddenly the road next to the second bus exploded into shrapnel, flames and chunks of road surface. The bus sped up painfully slowly as a second explosion rocked the first bus but it continued its struggle to speed faster along the road. Over the next mile five or six explosions struck, the closest right between the two buses. The roadway was littered with over a dozen burnt out shells of buses and near countless cars. Once through the stretch of road, the hills dropped away and there was a respite where the land was less stark. There ahead was an area of roadway with a huge cement wall on either side of the road with dirt piled for over a couple hundred yards on the sides of the walls away from the roadway. The road median widened and there was a rest stop where the two buses pulled in and announced there would be a fifteen minute stop and warned that they not go outside the safe areas and to never cross into the red striped areas or beyond as such was unsafe. The frightened almost out of their minds tourists numbly went through the motions of a normal rest stop except nobody talked and each group clung to each other as if safety could be found in sheer numbers.

 

The remainder of the drive to Jerusalem was uneventful and the tourists learned to accept the patter of bullets on the side and roof as being as normal as raindrops in a thunderstorm. One can never know if the experience changed their outlooks and shaped new thoughts though one’s best bet is within a few weeks the entirety of the bus rides to and from Jerusalem will have faded and they will join in the pro-Palestinian anti Jew rallies with their friends and never will the emotional and traumatic trip through the gauntlet between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem be mentioned or given a second thought. After all, was not Israel building a new highway and train track almost five-hundred yards underground linking Tel Aviv and Jerusalem making the trip as normal as possible. It was even planned to us fiber optic cables to project the scene as if one was driving on the surface making the trip more normal and exactly like the trip above without the bullets and RPGs (rocket propelled grenades aka anti-tank weapons). All will seem safe and secure as those Israelis manage to survive and even thrive no matter what danger is imposed by a hateful world, and isn’t survival what it is all about. So what if Israel needs to be on a war setting, they will cope and if they don’t, then the world will be rid of Israel and the Jews dispersed and roaming the world from one exile to the next always living at the kindness of their betters as it has always been and should be.

 

 

Eretz Yisroel from back in the time immediately after Exodus and before the additional conquest by King David and King Solomon with the original division of the lands between the Tribes covering both sides of the Jordan River. The Israelis and Jews in general could attempt to demand that Eretz Yisroel, the Land of Israel be made whole as was First Apportioned by Hashem.

 

 

As a Zionist and a Jew there is an answer to that last sentiment, Never Again! Israel will live, will never come to the situation as depicted aboveno matter how badly the United Nations, European Union or nations of the world desire her destruction and the chopping pieces off every fifty years or so, no, Never Again. Israel has been reborn, Israel lives and Israel will continue to live and face the entire world if necessary to make it so. Hashem gave us this land and Hashem will guard us in this land providing we take on that task first. The waters did not part until one Israelite jumped in and walked straight across allowing the water to reach his nostrils and as he submerged the waters parted. We must walk into the water until it reaches our nostrils and must take back our lands as described in the Torah and let the world do as they please. We are on a mission from Hashem and nobody should stand in the way of Hashem and the children of Israel. Am Yisroel Chai.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Western Governments Slowly Destroy Chance for Peace

 

Peace, peace, Western governments and leaders scream demanding peace, but there will be no peace. The recently elected government in Sweden in their first act voted to recognize the Arab state of Palestine. They made no demands that a treaty be reached between the Arabs and Israel, no requirement for the Arabs to recognize Israel, no requirement that the Arab violence and terror attacks against Israelis be ended. The Swedish government simply gave recognition to the Arabs to have formed a state named Palestine without defining borders or end to hostilities. Now the French government is preparing to also recognize an Arab state called Palestine. They are going to require that the Arabs negotiate with Israel for eighteen months and if they can manage not to reach an agreement with Israel then the French government will recognize Palestine with the 1949 Armistice Lines (also called the Green Line and the 1967 Lines which are the Armistice Lines marking the front lines at the termination of violence from the Arab World’s attempt to destroy Israel at its birth and by treaty demanded by the Arab League that the lines never be used or interpreted as being an actual border) marking their border with the possibility of exchanges of lands by mutual agreement, something the Arabs have already stated they will not accept any alteration demanding that every Jew be removed from the lands before they take control or they will remove them in whatever manner is required. So, with this news and the call from Israeli Prime Minister for a reinitiating of the negotiations starting with arranging equal land exchanges in order to facilitate Israel retaining the cities built beyond the Green Line in areas which had previously been agreed would remain within Israel. One might wonder what the reaction might be from the Arabs.

 

Well, we did not have to wait long so why make you do so. Allow me to quote Saeb Erekat, the Arab leading negotiator who stated that such an idea was “completely unacceptable” and explained “Netanyahu’s proposal to discuss the borders of settlement blocs is an attempt to legitimize the settlements. The borders that should be set are the borders of the internationally recognized state of Palestine based on 1967 borders. Settlements should be stopped instead of being legitimized.” His answer is exactly what one would expect as after all with the Swedish government recognizing the 1949 Armistice Lines as the borders despite International treaties delineating that they were never to be used in any way as borders nor were they to imply borders, terms as noted above were insisted upon by the Arab League. Add to the Swedish recognition there is the French government placing a mere stipulation that the Arabs negotiate in bad faith and refuse to even pretend to be interested in reaching any agreement in order to have the 1949 Armistice Lines recognized as their border. Why should the Arabs make any concessions when all the pressure is being placed on the Israelis to reach an agreement or else they will lose the cities in which nearly one million Israelis reside in actual cities some of which have been established for over forty years and are anything but mere settlements, they are as much a city as is Netanya, Ashod, Ashkelon or even Tel Aviv.

 

The Arabs are aware that they could cause Israel untold economic turmoil from which the Israeli economy would take at the very minimum a decade to recover. Many do not realize that of the Israelis who were forcibly removed from their communities as part of the Gaza disengagement under Prime Minister Sharon have yet to be resettled into permanent housing and many have yet to find employment. The last thing Israel would need is another situation where a large number of Israelis were immediately forced from their homes and possibly their employment due to overt demands, pressures and resultant disasters visited upon Israel even should United States President Barack Obama give assurances promising a declaration of intents that the United States is prepared to apply similar to the insane agreement received after responding to pressures from United States President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to disengage from Gaza where they also provided assurances in a letter written by President George W. Bush and taken as a guarantee of future actions by the United States. That illusion was immediately snapped back to reality when incoming United States President Barack Obama immediately let it be known that those promises were not binding on him and he would refuse to recognize the guarantees granted by now former President Bush. Sometimes one can only wonder what Israeli leaders are thinking and even more so what the world leaders are thinking.

 

Furthermore, the commentary by Saeb Erekat calling for an end to construction in the Israeli cities and communities beyond the Green Line when he stated, “Settlements should be stopped,” was completely fatuous as Netanyahu had enacted a silent building freeze since the last round of peace talks started in late 2013 which he has yet to rescind and thus there has been no building past the Green Line and Saeb Erekat is fully aware of this situation. His claim inferring maliciously that Israel was continuing to build beyond the Green Line knowing that such would enflame European leaders potentially pressing more governments to grant recognition for Palestine free of any encumbrances such as making peace, settling borders, ending violence or granting recognition of Israel, especially as the home of the Jewish People. Mahmoud Abbas has also promised to never ever grant recognition of Israel as the state for the Jewish People. Senior PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization) official Hanan Ashrawi joined in on the discarding any hope for actual peace negotiations stating Netanyahu was making “a disingenuous and manipulative exercise in political and legal deception.” She continued, “All settlements are illegal and in flagrant contravention of international law and consensus, and any efforts to annex and to legalize the settlements blocs is a blatant attempt to steal more Palestinian land.” Actually, truth be told, Israel has the most well defined claim to all the lands between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea with the following provisos that Israel must provide for any residents who are not Jewish (which was predominantly the Arab and Muslim population); provide religious rights; rights of property ownership; social rights to live, work, pray and play wherever they desire; and virtually any other human rights one might define with one specific exception, the non-Jewish population does not automatically have political rights. Non-Jews would have all the freedoms except they will not automatically be granted the vote, the right to run for public office or any other political act though their freedom of speech would allow them to campaign for candidates even if they would not be permitted to vote. This omission was specifically placed into the San Remo Conference Treaty and was further enforced by United Nations Charter Article 80 which reaffirmed the findings from the San Remo Conference Treaty. These facts may not be popular and the stipulations from the San Remo Conference and the ensuing language in the United Nations Charter Article 80 which form the legal basis for the claims recognized and permitted under the treaties which establish the International Laws governing every side, part and parcel of the Arab/Israeli Conflict. These nations recognizing a state of Palestine anywhere within the lands between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea is illegal and would be dissolved upon any challenge to such an establishment without gaining Israeli permission.

 

One person who has supported Israel is Hillary Clinton whose comments about the failings at the very beginning when hosting the renewed peace talks commenting, “In retrospect, our early, hard line on settlements didn’t work.” Hillary Clinton further went on to describe how President Obama and State Department coming down on Israel immediately out of the block was the actual demand ultimately served to harden Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s stance against Israel leading directly to the collapse of the efforts terminating the negotiations which could be better described as a waste of time as their failure was predetermined. The proof of that comes straight out of the horse’s mouth as Mahmoud Abbas stated, “It was Obama who suggested a full settlement freeze. I said OK, I accept. We both went up the tree. After that, he came down with a ladder and he removed the ladder and said to me, jump.” The end of the Abbas commentary was a well-articulated response describing the changing tactics and shifting positions of United States President Barack Obama conveyed most often by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The comments by Mahmoud Abbas was the perfect representation of the Arab view on negotiations with Israel and the advantage the Arabs have as all they would be required to perform would be to not agree with Israel in negotiations for a year and a half and refuse to compromise on anything simple waiting for the Europeans along with the United States and United Nations to simply grant them everything they could ever have negotiated for and they got it because the Europeans believe that the reason the Arab world is fighting and threatening Western nations is because of Israel. The European leadership joined by the American Administration and State Department in blaming Israel and Israel alone for the lack of progress in the peace negotiations. The elephant in the living room which is almost universally ignored has been the negotiations creep where the Arabs have steadily moved the goalposts from the initial point where Israel had initially been expected to retain all of Judea and Samaria which was the Jordanian view when they reached a peace with Israel surrendering all of Judea and Samaria just as Egypt had surrendered all of Gaza to Israel. In both of these situations the Arab states of Jordan and Egypt surrendered to Israel the parts of the lands they had occupied from 1949 through June of 1967 when Israeli troops liberated the occupied lands which were recognized as being legally belonging to Israel. When Israel returned the entirety of the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt when making peace and Jordan relented their illegal hold over Judea and Samaria many in the Western world figured that this was the end of the negotiations and that Israel would retain these areas which according to International Law were presumed to belong to Israel according to established treaty. This was not to be the end though as the Soviet Union’s KGB still had an ace up their sleeves which would place Israel in peril and threaten her very existence. The Soviet Union has fallen but their construct of the PLO is still being a thorn in the side of Israel.

 

That is the extent to which the worldview has changed where after the 1967 Six Day War it was expected that Israel would probably retain half of the Sinai Peninsula dividing it along the central mountains with Israel retaining the entirety of the lands bordering the Gulf of Aqaba thus safeguarding their southern port and its access to the Red Sea and on to all of Asia. The Israeli conceding the entirety of the Sinai Peninsula was seen as a surprise by most but was also seen as an opportunity to the KGB and its PLO terrorist entity. It was the ease with which the Israelis gave up the opportunity to rightfully claim part if not all of the Sinai Peninsula as necessary for strategic depth by extending their borders that led Yasser Arafat and his Soviet masters to believe they could steal Gaza and Judea and Samaria if they simply made Israel bleed sufficiently. This belief led to the first intifada which resulted in the Israelis taking full control over Judea and Samaria forcing the leadership of the PLO to flee into Jordan. When the PLO launched an attempted coup, Jordanian King Hussein unleashed the Jordanian Army on the PLO terrorists driving them into Lebanon where they were subsequently forced out taking refuge in Tunisia. This might have been the end of the foreign claims on Israeli lands and Israel was fully expected to retain all of Judea, Samaria and Gaza. And that was the case after the treaty with Jordan and Israel had annexed all of East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights which should have been the end of all claims against Israel. But that was not to be as the PLO had gained some traction and wrangled a deal for their return to the lands they now claim was stolen from them and was their possession and not Jordan’s to give away.

 

Groups working under complete silence negotiated a return for Arab governance permitting Yasser Arafat and his officers to return and setup their base of operations in Ramallah and legitimized Arafat as the Arab peace-maker with the Oslo Accords. The presumed negotiations which were to have reached a final settlement within the first five years did not live up to this hype and instead led to the storming out of the Paris talks when Israel agreed to the terms Arafat had set as his demand of Israel in meetings with United States President Clinton. This was followed by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak being backed by President Clinton and given several guarantees, finally met all of Yasser Arafat’s demands for all of Gaza and 95% of Judea and Samaria and all of Eastern Jerusalem. With no objections left on which to avoid actual statehood, Yasser Arafat had only one viable choice, he was cornered and had to escape the trap he had so carefully set backfired and now he was the one in a cage trapped by his own demands. This led to his hasty departure after which he returned to Ramallah and soon thereafter initiated the Oslo Wars, a series of deadly terror attacks upon Israel, terror attacks which would continue and reach such a level that Israel put in the Separation Barrier, a structure which was largely a fence with some cement walls used to separate the two sides in built up urban settings. The route of the fence was challenged in court where some of the time led to an alteration of the barrier such that farmers still had access to their fields. All of this has led to today where the Arab demand now is for all of Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem, all of the lands beyond the Green Line.

 

That leads us to where things stand currently. It became obvious when President Obama recognized and fully supported the Arab claims to all the lands beyond the Green Line early on in his administration and President Obama clearly stated that the borders were to be formed using the Green Line, 1967 boundaries, as the basis for the formation of Palestine, the Arab state. Well, Mahmoud Abbas, Yasser Arafat’s second in command who assumed command upon the death of Arafat, was in a trap which he reveled in as he could never be seen to be demanding less than the President of the United States or the leaders of several European nations as well as the European Union. When Israel did not immediately fall all over themselves giving away even more lands after the edict being stated by President Obama which completely ignored all previous agreements, both written and verbal, the United States State Department, a department which has been infiltrated by pro-Arab continents at the highest levels, came down blaming Israel for there being no peace agreement when the expected final borders are well recognized by everybody in the world and questioned why Israel was stalling and avoiding the obvious. Israel was complying with the obvious, just a different set of obvious facts. The first fact was that they knew that Abbas would not now settle just for a State with the Green Line as its border but would demand much more. Abbas proved the Israelis correct when he demanded to be permitted to hold military training with troops from other nations as well as starting to demand the Israeli cities built some forty years ago be vacated as well as any factories and government buildings. They were also demanding the right to import heavy weapons, continuing to refuse to recognize Israel as the Jewish State and refused to end the ‘struggle’ (read terrorist attacks) until all of Palestine has been liberated and the Jewish infestation disposed of. Abbas also has one ace he can always play though many of the Arab refugees have been dispossessed of their homes, their apartments due to the violence of the Syrian civil war, particularly the refugees who lived in the Yarmouk Refugee Camp near Damascus which once again is under assault by ISIS.

 

There are tactical and security reasons which prevent Israel simply handing over the lands of Judea and Samaria as they handed over Gaza which fell almost immediately into the hands of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. These terror entities have rained down an unbelievable number of rockets onto Israeli civilian targets and have attained better rockets which can reach almost all of Israel and carry larger payloads thanks to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). The fear used to be that Hamas would supplant Fatah and Mahmoud Abbas either by force or in any election but that fear has been superseded by the fear that Judea and Samaria would fall into the hands of ISIS. The clues are obvious as ISIS has been determined trying to defeat Hamas, Islamic Jihad and take control of Gaza. Such an eventuality would also present a clear and frightening new front for ISIS to threaten Jordan who is already facing ISIS on their eastern and northern borders and this would surround them by closing out the western border of Jordan which has only the smallest of southern facing borders. Israel would possibly be facing a similar threat should ISIS gain control of Gaza and then Judea and Samaria defeating Fatah. It is remarkable that just as one was getting used to the Arab threats on one’s borders and slowly being able to feel safer, then a new and far more radical Islamic entity with greater ferocity which is such a threat that the Arab Islamist groups which had been fighting simply folds up and flees surrendering everything usually without a fight. Even then, when ISIS forces finally catch up with these former terror threats, they give them a choice of joining ISIS or death and then test their purity and knowledge of the person if they choose to join ISIS. Should one prove to be of insufficient knowledge of Islam or lacking in the expected levels of fervor, one finds themselves on the wrong end of a beheading. There used to be the misconception that Israel was facing completely different terrorists than the Western world faced. The terrorists faced by Israel have proven more and more to be the same people, especially as ISIS and the al-Nusra Front gain more traction and possession of the lands near the Golan Heights where there have been a number of rounds fired often at the IDF positions some requiring return fire to silence the menacing threats posed by such rounds. One might have thought this would have been made obvious by the Hezballah bombing of the United States Marines billets in Lebanon by Hezballah as well as the assassination of the American Ambassador Cleo Allen Noel, Jr. and Chargé d’Affaires George Curtis Moore in the Sudan by the PLO with Yasser Arafat giving the go code to murder these men along with a Belgian, a Jordanian, and a Saudi. They then demanded the release of numerous terrorists held in Jordan including the Black September Commander Abu Daoud and assassin of Robert Kennedy, Sirhan Sirhan from the United States penal system along with the freeing of all Palestinian women in prison in Israel.

 

This ill-conceived concept is once again apparent with the Obama White House where Israel is depicted as fighting the bad war and the rest of those battling Islamic Jihadist are fighting the good fight. This misperception has led to much of the troubles, especially in Europe where even Hamas is welcomed in polite circles as they are seen as freedom fighters and not terrorists. The European elites have just as significant percentage of anti-Semites who have transferred their hatreds for the Jews and now spill their bile against Israel. Many European leaders would only approve of any act by Israel only if they slit their own throats, which is why they support the surrender of all of Judea and Samaria and continue the tired falsehood that Gaza is still occupied due to the legal and United Nations sanctioned blockade to prevent weapons smuggling into Gaza and treat Hamas as freedom fighters and treat Mahmoud Abbas as if he were the second coming while often heaping scorn and insult upon Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and other Israeli politicians. It is not an easy explanation for why it appears the world is transfixed on Israel and attempting to aid in resetting the borders to where they existed before the 1967 Six Day War thus allowing for the most advantageous borders to facilitate another war for the eradication of Israel. Additionally, what do the Europeans and Americans and United Nations and their assorted NGOs plan on doing should another Arab/Israeli war be initiated against Israel? Such an eventuality would require a little more than a postcard expressing your regrets over the resurgence of hostilities and carrying a warning that the IDF should not operate beyond the borders of Israel as doing so would be considered a war crime by the overly-cultured and ever-so-erudite and properly all-knowing leaders of world opinion and the makers of the rules of war especially constructed to prevent Israeli transgressions such as winning another war with her overtly-aggressive Arab neighbors. Such embarrassments must not be permitted to be visited once more on these proud and wonderful peoples. We the leaders of the politically correct, socially-permissive, world’s conscience have decided that the nation of Israel must be forced within indefensible borders for as many times as it may take for Israel to be overrun by Arab Muslim armies and the lands cleansed of the mistake made in a moment of actual justice due to the Mediterranean breezes and the good spirits such engenders.

 

Now the Europeans are returning to their default setting of leftist hatred for all things Jewish starting with the largest thing Jewish, Israel. In order to cripple Israel in a vengeful attempt to destroy her and all she offers and creates for the good of the world because she actually willingly gives comfort and perceptions of safety for any Jews in the world to make Aliyah and enjoy. Proof was the fact that almost no civilian died as a result of being struck by a Hamas fired rocket during Operation Protective Edge. The reason for such an accomplishment was the years and treasures put into designing and creating such a system as the Iron Dome which protected innocent Israeli peoples including Israeli Arabs both Muslim and Christian. Israel saw the spending of over a hundred-thousand Israeli Shekels to intercept a rocket costing possibly as much as a thousand dollars but most likely only fifty to a hundred dollars. Why would Israel put so much effort and treasure to save lives? They do because every single life is far more precious than any amount of money or riches. Israel treasures life while our enemies taunt us for what they see as wasteful as they claim to treasure death. That is why they casually throw away the lives of the Arabs who live under their oppressions as they see the death of a Gazan civilian as another accusatory headline in the New York Times and newsprint across the Western World as well as electronic media picking up their slanted stories on the deaths of their civilians which were due to their firing rockets from the roof of a shelter, but what matter of difficulty does that pose as the rocket was aimed at the accursed Israel. That is what is defined as capable of bringing joy to the European elites, the destruction of Israel simply because Israel is a productive and healthy society and that riles the elites and leaders of a Europe predictably descending.

 

Beyond the Cusp