China? Who's talking About China? An End of Days Scenario

All right, I'm going to take a different approach than I have in the past (for the sake of intellectual discussion). What if what we've always thought about the Middle East is wrong? What if we thought that the problem's centered around either America occupying some Arab country or that the fact that Israel exists the reason there's turmoil in the region.

It's funny, you can talk to some people and they'll tell you that the key to peace in the Middle East is for two things to happen.

1. America stops getting involved in the region
2. Israel gives the PA Arabs Yehuda & the Shomron.

If only those two things would happen then there would be peace in the Middle East.

But is that true?

Lets start with answer number 2, Israel giving up land. Let's say we forgot about all of the historical and religious significance that the Jews have to the land. Let's forget the security nightmare an act like that would cause. Let's just say that in the perfect world, Israel gave that land with the Arabs and the Arabs started to create a thriving functional society that didn't preach hate about non-Muslims, was productive in the world market and started some kind of export business or high-tech, and helped contribute to the world economy.

Let's imagine that.

OK, you can stop laughing. I'm going to show you why the solution to peace in the Middle East is actually the exact opposite what Westerners would think. Westerners think that the "conflict" is about land. Secular Israeli's think the conflict is about land. But even if the conflict was about land the solution is not to hand the land to them on a silver platter, in fact now that the Arabs have no sovereign control over the land it is going to be pretty much impossible to create a state for them there and for them to respect Israel.

One thing that most Westerners don't understand is that the Middle East is different from the countries that they live in. Namely being the different mentalities of the two ares.

I'll give you and example, an America tourist walks into an Arab shop anywhere in the Middle East, and picks up and item and asks the Arab shop keeper how much the item costs. The Arab says $50 even though the it really only costs $10. The Arab is not trying to swindle him, he's expecting the American to barter with him.

The tourist then say "OK" and pulls out the money and hands it to the Arab.

Imagine this happening in America, the shopkeeper would be thrilled!

The Arab however feels cheated.

This American turned him into a thief, and made him feel like he cheated the American. He doesn't want to have something handed to him, he wants to work for it.

And that is the underlining difference between America and the Middle East. America is all about equality and fairness (or at least claims to be) the Middle East is about respect. Even if acquiring that respect, causes him a monetary loss.

Success in America is usually defined by how much money a person has.

But someone who's bringing millions of dollars home every year, but also has a terrible marriage and troubled kids, would you define that as success.

It's kind of refreshing to not have to judged solely by how much money you make (one of the reasons I'm moving to Israel) and just by your actual worth as a person.

But I'm getting off topic, the point I want to make is that the solution to the Arab-Israel problem is not giving the Arabs land, it's doing what we did in 1967 and kicking there butts (but with love) and forcing them to grow up and stop whining like a two year and having everything handed to them on a silver platter. If they fire a rocket at us we firs 50 back at them, if they send a suicide bomber into a Jewish city, they will know that they will cause their families homes to be destroyed and their families imprisoned. They won't be going in with the knowledge that their families are going to receive $25,000 after they become a Shahid.

This then leads to another aspect of the conflict that would rock the world if it was revealed in the world media. The Muslims (not the extremists, but your normal everyday Muslim) believes that the Torah says that the Land of Israel belongs to the Jews. They just don't consider Israeli's the Jews of the Torah.

If there was a spiritual revolution in Israel (like there is now and what has the current government so terrified) this conflict would end and we would have the potential to uniting with the Arabs and making a very strong Middle East.

And we're going to need a very strong Middle East to protect us from the next war.

What's the next war? Well I'm no prophet, and this is all hypothetical but let's look at the first issue that I presented above. America.

America has some serious problems.

Part of it has to do with the media, but a lot of it has to do with the government.

But if you think about media for a minute, why would it make headline news out of Michael Jackson molesting 12 year old boys when Russia and China were signing major arms agreements? Wouldn't it be a little bit more pressing to give out the information from two possibly lethal enemies, who, most likely are going to use this new agreement against the interests of the US.

But let's imagine, just imagine, that the conflict in the Middle East was solved. Let's say all of the religious Jews of America moved to Israel and there was a spiritual revolution that took place in the state, a revolution that changed the very nature of the state to be a religious, Torah government. Add that to every single Arab in the Middle East knowing that if one rocket attack was taken against Israel, the location that the attack came from would be flattened. Add on top of that the US getting out of the Middle East and letting the area stabilize by itself.

Then imagine that what resulted from this was a real peace. Not a peace that involved "good will gestures" but a peace that fit into the mold of the Middle East, but would be different from any peace that had ever taken place in the region before. A region that has forever been at the control of a foreign entity whose main goal was to conquer as much land as possible, now under the influence, not from an land depleting occupier, but by the inhabitants the land was originally made for. Not by an entity with a goal ton conquer, but a nation that has the goal of being a light unto the nations, and being able to bring the true light of G-d into the world and really unite the people of this world.

Imagine that.

Now imagine that except the only people who will be effected are the people of the Middle East.

Not the people in the Far East.

The people of the far East are more powerful than the people of the West. They are more focused and determined and hate people of faith.

They want to dominate the world.

America is too weak. The European countries are too weak.

They will fall fast.

Now the question is the Middle East.

Imagine if the War of Gog and Magog has nothing to do with battle between people of faith. What if it's a battle of faith, the people of G-d vs the atheists.

What if instead of having a divided Middle East, the Jews and the Arabs could unite as cousins and fight a real threat and fight in the name of G-d.

All of this is highly hypothetical of course, but what if that's what it takes to bring the Jews of the world together, and end Arab hate?

Just a thought

Where the REAL Apartheid is

This from the Jerusalem Post:

This week the Bush Administration legitimized Arab anti-Semitism. In an effort to please the Saudis and their Arab brothers, the Bush administration agreed to physically separate the Jews from the Arabs at the Annapolis conference in a manner that aligns with the apartheid policies of the Arab world which prohibit Israelis from setting foot on Arab soil.

Evident everywhere, the discrimination against Israel received its starkest expression at the main assembly of the Annapolis conference on Tuesday. There, in accordance with Saudi demands, the Americans prohibited Israeli representatives from entering the hall through the same door as the Arabs.

At the meeting of foreign ministers on Wednesday, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni called her Arab counterparts to task for their discriminatory treatment. "Why doesn't anyone want to shake my hand? Why doesn't anyone want to be seen speaking to me?" she asked pointedly.

Israel's humiliated foreign minister did not receive support from her American counterpart. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who spent her childhood years in the segregated American South, sided with the Arabs. Although polite enough to note that she doesn't support the slaughter of Israelis, she made no bones about the fact that her true sympathies lie with the racist Arabs.

As she put it, "I know what it is like to hear that you cannot go on a road or through a checkpoint because you are a Palestinian. I understand the feeling of humiliation and powerlessness."

Rice's remarks make clear that for the Secretary of State there is no difference between Israelis trying to defend themselves from a jihadist Palestinian society which supports the destruction of the Jewish state and bigoted white Southerners who oppressed African Americans because of the color of their skin. It is true that Israel has security concerns, but as far as Rice is concerned, the Palestinians are the innocent victims. They are the ones who are discriminated against and humiliated, not Livni, who was forced - by Rice - to enter the conference through the service entrance.

The Bush administration's tolerance for discrimination against Israel was not merely ceremonial. Diplomatically, the conference was equally prejudicial. At Annapolis, the US joined the Arabs in placing the lion's share of blame for the absence of peace between Israel and the Palestinians on Israel. But you wouldn't know that from listening to Olmert, who is working steadily to hide what happened there.

Olmert obfuscates the truth because his political stability rests in the hands of his hawkish coalition partners Yisrael Beiteinu and Shas. Both warned before the summit that if Olmert made any concessions on either Jerusalem or the so-called outpost communities in Judea and Samaria they would bolt his coalition and so spur new elections.

Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu expressed satisfaction with the outcome of the summit. Both Shas leader Eli Yishai and Yisrael Beiteinu leader Avigdor Lieberman dismissed Annapolis as a pathetic joke and claimed that there is no reason for them to resign from the Olmert government. But these assertions are deliberately misleading.

The fact that the Israeli-PLO joint statement made no specific mention of Jerusalem, and that the government didn't announce a timetable for destroying the so-called outpost communities and expelling the hundreds of Israeli families who live in them, doesn't mean that Israel made no concessions on these issues. In fact, the Olmert government made massive concessions on these issues.

The Israel-PLO joint statement at Annapolis contains a joint pledge "to propagate a culture of peace and nonviolence; to confront terrorism and incitement, whether committed by Palestinians or Israelis."

Although Olmert, Lieberman and Yishai dismiss this Israeli acceptance of moral equivalence with Palestinian jihadists as a meaningless rhetorical concession, the government's move is rife with political and legal implications. US Ambassador Richard Jones's unprecedented meeting this week with Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch made clear that the US demands that Israeli courts interpret Israeli law in a prejudicial manner in order to demonize Israeli opponents of Palestinian statehood and the ethnic cleansing of the Jews from Judea and Samaria.

Their meeting also signaled that the US expects Israel to treat lawful building activities by Jews in Judea and Samaria and even in sections of Jerusalem as criminal acts. Since the Olmert government accepts that Israel is morally indistinguishable from the Palestinian Authority, it is hard to foresee it preventing the criminalization of its political opponents. From now on, Israelis who oppose the diplomatic moves of the Olmert government can expect to be treated as the moral equivalents of Palestinian terrorists.

At Annapolis the Americans accepted the role of sole arbiter of Israeli and Palestinian compliance with their commitments to the so-called 'Roadmap' and the peace process. They also committed themselves to reaching a comprehensive peace treaty by the end of 2008. But as former US Middle East mediator during the Clinton administration Dennis Ross has admitted, these goals are contradictory. It is impossible to both ensure Palestinian compliance and the achievement of a peace treaty in that timetable.

Writing in The Washington Post after the Oslo peace process collapsed at Camp David and the Palestinian jihad had begun, Ross explained, "The prudential issues of compliance were neglected and politicized by the Americans in favor of keeping the peace process afloat….Every time there was a behavior, or an incident, or an event that was inconsistent with what the peace process was about, the impulse was to rationalize it, finesse it, find a way around it, and not to allow it to break the process."

"What the peace process was about" for the Clinton administration was signing peace agreements. It was not about ensuring that the Palestinians were actually interested in living at peace with Israel. When Rice stated that "failure is not an option," in the coming peace process, she made clear that the same is the case for the Bush administration today. She wants an agreement. Whether the Palestinians are serious about peace or not is none of her business.

Although reporting on Palestinian non-compliance with their commitments to fight terror will harm prospects for speedy "progress," accusing Israel of filching on its commitments will actually speed things along. Alleging Israeli non-compliance will force the pliant Olmert government to make further concessions to the Palestinians.

In light of this, it is clear that contrary to Yishai and Lieberman's dismissive treatment of what happened at Annapolis, Olmert's acceptance of the Americans as both judge of compliance and guarantor of "progress" means that Israel already made massive concessions.

On Jerusalem, for instance, although Yishai is right that Jerusalem is not specifically mentioned in the joint statement, the fact is that Israel agreed to negotiate the status of its capital city by agreeing to discuss all outstanding issues. Since the Americans want a Palestinian state within a year and they know that Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas will not make any concessions on Jerusalem, they can be expected to pressure Israel to accept the Palestinian position. The thousands of Arab Jerusalemites now applying for Israeli citizenship are a clear sign that the Arabs understand that Israel has already made massive concessions on the city. And Yishai must know this.

The American status as arbiters of compliance has far reaching implications for Israel's ability to cope effectively with the security situation in Gaza and the Western Negev. Since Hamas seized control of Gaza in June, Abbas has opposed any wide-scale IDF counter-terror offensive on the area. Abbas has claimed - probably rightly - that an Israeli ground offensive in Gaza would weaken his position in Palestinian society since the Palestinians support Hamas's positions more than they support him. Given that the Americans are committed to strengthening Abbas, it is obvious that they will veto any Israeli plan to conduct an offensive in Gaza aimed at restoring security to the Western Negev.

Then there is Judea and Samaria. Lieberman claims that he can remain in the government because Olmert has yet to announce a timetable for throwing the Jews out of their homes in the so-called outpost communities. But that isn't Olmert's responsibility anymore. He ceded it to the Americans at Annapolis. They will set the timetable for expulsions, not Olmert. And it isn't only the Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria that are now at risk.

By anointing the State Department arbiter of Israeli compliance, the Olmert government gave the Americans the right to veto IDF operations in Judea and Samaria. As the guarantors of progress in the peace process, the Americans will tell the IDF where it can - or more precisely where it cannot - erect roadblocks. The Americans will tell the Israelis what cities and towns to transfer to Fatah control. They will tell Israel what guns and armor to transfer to the Palestinians, what to do with terror fugitives and when and how many terrorists it must release from its prisons.

Actually, the US has been constraining Israel's counter-terror operations in Judea and Samaria for months now. That these American efforts have harmed the effectiveness of the IDF's operations is something that Ido Zoldan's widow can attest to. Zoldan, after all, was murdered last week by Fatah terrorists who owed their ability to move about freely to Israel's decision to bow to American pressure and dismantle 24 roadblocks and curb its efforts to arrest Fatah terror bosses.

In essence, what we see in Olmert's and Livni's machinations is a repeat of Ariel Sharon's and Livni's political maneuvering in the period that preceded the withdrawal from Gaza. In both cases, Israel's senior leaders abide by the basic political understanding that a fight postponed is a fight won.

In 2004 Sharon lacked the political strength to announce openly that he was going to completely withdraw from Gaza and destroy all the Israeli communities in the area. So he allowed the Likud to hold a referendum on his plan to withdraw and authorized Livni to draft the so-called compromise plan according to which the destruction of Israeli communities would take place in four stages over several months and that each stage would require separate government approval.

By the time the Likud rejected his plan, Sharon was strong enough to ignore the will of his party. And when the withdrawal took place, far from taking place in four stages, it took place in four days. Livni and Sharon could ignore their previous commitments because when the time came to pay the piper, they had already destroyed their opponents.

Today, by pretending that the joint declaration at Annapolis was a big nothing, Olmert and Livni are repeating the maneuver. By the time they start throwing Jews out of their homes, they won't need Shas or Yisrael Beiteinu anymore.

Lieberman and Yishai are under no obligation to leave the government. They can stay for as long as they like. But they cannot pretend that by staying they are not full partners in the government's policies. As Annapolis made clear, those policies include dividing Jerusalem, destroying the Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria and compromising the security of the State of Israel.

Arabs are in a good mood, so what do they do? They Shoot Eachother!

This is an article from Al Jazeera, a fine news source that always spell checks it's articles before posting them to their website.

At least five people have been killed and about 100 are reported to have been wounded after gunfire broke out at a rally attended by Fatah supporters in Gaza.

The gunfire erupted as tens of thousands of people were attending the rally in Gaza City to mark the death of Yasser Arafat, the former Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) leader.

Nour Odeh, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Gaza City, said that people fled from the scene as gun battles between Fatah and Hamas fighters intensified.

She said doctors at local hospital had been "overwhelmed" by casualties and that the death toll could rise.

Fatah officials accused Hamas forces of opening fire from the nearby Islamic University, but Hamas said its men had come under attack from Fatah gunmen and shot back.

Organisers say that about 100,000 people had turned up at the commemoration event for the former Fatah leader.

Tense atmosphere

Hamas had broken up some smaller demonstrations organised by its rival on Sunday, the third anniversary of Arafat's death.

Speaking at Monday's rally before the gunfire broke out, Odeh called the atmosphere in Gaza City "quite tense".

"Fatah promised everyone a show of force and presence in Gaza and a show of force they certainly did show," she said.

"[The rally] has surpassed all expectations [of the number of people attending]."

Hamas had set up checkpoints on the main north-south road in Gaza to check vehicles going to the event, residents said.

Their security forces also deployed across Gaza City and fired in the air on Monday morning at one intersection after youths threw stones at them, witnesses said.

Odeh said that she had spoken to people who had walked to the rally from Beit Hanoun, which lies at the northernmost tip of the Gaza Strip.

"Four months after the Hamas takeover of Gaza, the occasion of the anniversary of Yasser Arafat's passing has basically brought all Fatah members together to show that they are here," she said.

She said the rally had galvanised Fatah supporters after previous attempts to hold public demonstrations in the Gaza Strip were put down by Hamas's police force.

Fatah has had only a marginal presence in Gaza since Hamas forces violently took control of the region in June and took over key institutions.

The Wafa news agecny, which is run by the office of Mahmoud Abbas, the leader of Fatah and the Palestinian president, said Hamas had confiscated pictures of Arafat and headdresses symbolising the late leader.

The items were seized "at a time when the Gaza Strip is being deprived of basic goods and medicine", a Hamas security offical was quoted as saying by a pro-Hamas website.

Israel recently imposed caps on fuel imports to the Gaza Strip, leading to transport restrictions and reductions in electricity output to the Palestinian territory.

PA Arabs Losing Interest in Independent State

This from Israel National News:

by Ezra HaLevi

Though the Annapolis Conference is widely seen in Israel as an effort to keep the Olmert government alive, there are indications it comes at the tail end of the movement for a PA state.

“It would not be a great exaggeration to conclude that the Palestinian national movement has ceased to exist in recent years,” writes political correspondent Danny Rubinstein for Haaretz. “The institutions of the PLO, which were to represent all groups among the Palestinian people, have become outdated and of little importance.”

Rubinstein, in fact a leading proponent of a Palestinian state, laments that many top PA officials have returned to their countries of origin and given up on carving from Israel another Arab state in the Middle East, for the Palestinians. “Nabil Shaath, a PLO veteran who was a minister in the Palestinian government after returning with Arafat and settling in Gaza, has return to his home in Cairo where he runs a thriving business,” Rubinstein notes. “Muhammad Dahlan and Hasan Asfor, who not long ago were ministers and powerful advisors in Gaza, now spend most of their time in Cairo with their families. In Ramallah, it is estimated that 50,000 residents have left the West Bank [Judea and Samaria] in recent years, most to return to their homes and property in Amman. They had come to Ramallah and Nablus to work in PA offices there.”

Though he does not mention it and presumably would not support it, Rubinstein seems to conclude that MK Benny Elon’s Israeli Initiative - to reengage Jordan and Egypt with regard to Judea, Samaria and Gaza – is the way of the future. “With the failure of the PA experiment, the Arab states have begun to return to the scene. The Jordanian government, with the encouragement of Israel, is establishing a renewed presence in the West Bank…King Abdullah II and government leaders in Amman are careful to publicly announce that they have no designs on the West Bank. While this may be true, there is no doubt that their interest in events there is growing. There is every reason to expect further cooperation between the West Bank and the East Bank in Jordan, which will also have political consequences.”

Another report bolsters Rubinstein’s assessment, with PA Arabs massively trying to obtain Israeli citizenship. Reportedly, thousands of PA Arabs living in the areas surrounding Jerusalem have submitted applications to become Israeli citizens, fearing the rise of a PA entity along the borders of the Partition Wall following the Annapolis conference.

Arabs in the surrounding neighborhoods listed as part of Jerusalem’s municipality were offered citizenship after the Six Day War, but many refused. Since then, according to officials, only a few dozen applications were received each year.

In Israel, Birthrate Up for Jews, Down for Muslims

This from the Jerusalem Post:

The country's fertility rate continues to rise; the average number of babies born to Muslim women is falling; having babies before the age of 20 is less common, and the average age when women have their first child is up. These are some of the findings of the report on Patterns of Fertility in 2006 released this week by the Central Bureau of Statistics.
A total of 148,170 babies came into the world last year: 71 percent of them were born to Jewish mothers and 23% to Muslims; 3% to women of undetermined religion; 2% to Druse; and 1% to Christians (81% of those Arabs). According to data from 2006, the average Israeli woman will have 2.9 children in her lifetime, compared to 2.8 based on 2005 figures. The average fertility rate among Jewish women rose from 2.7 in 2005 to 2.8 in 2006. Muslim women's fertility has declined to four children, compared to 4.7 in 2000. The lifetime fertility rate for Christian Arab women was 2.2 children in 2006, compared to 2.7 in 1996. The highest rates are in haredi towns such as Modi'in Illit (Kiryat Sefer) and Betar Illit, with an average of eight children per woman, and in Beduin towns such as Tel Sheva (6.8), Rahat and Arara. The least fertile cities were Ariel (1.7), Kiryat Yam, Tirat Carmel, Kiryat Bialik and Upper Nazareth. There were 3% more newborns than during the previous year, with the increase due largely to a higher birthrate among Jewish women. Baby boys - 51.3% - are more common than girls. In 2006, the average woman gave birth to her first child at 26.8 years, about a year and six months older than a decade earlier. Only 3,966 babies were born in 2006 to women under the age of 20. Nearly 5,900 single Jewish women gave birth that year; most had never been married; the rate was 6.6 births per 1,000 single women in 2006, compared to 4.3 a decade before. Most of the increase was among women in their late 30s. In 2005, 4.4% of all newborns were from multiple pregnancies. During the last decade, there has been a 12% increase in multiple births - putting Israel near the top in this category. Ninety-six percent of the multiple births were twins, and 3% triplets (compared to 10% triplets a decade before). Fully 99.6% of all deliveries are in a hospital. But 3.6% of Muslim women in the South give birth at home.

Hell yes! Aaron Klein!

Terrorists in search of 72 virgins

Blog Action Day 2007-The Environment

Today is a day that the good folks at Google are trying to change the world. This year they are trying to put some emphasis in the environment. As we know, it's very important to be environmentally conscious, and I have definitely been more environmentally aware since I started
taking my Environmental Science class, and a long the way I've found some very interesting things.

Well obviously, we here in these United States used the most energy of any other country in the planet. We also have the largest amount of energy that is used per capita. This is largely due to the low energy prices, if you go to countries like England, they also use, it would seem, the same amount of energy as us. They have light and heat in their homes, they still drive the car everywhere, but why is the per capita energy use so much lower in England compared to the United States?

Well, like I said before, energy prices. It's cheap to use inefficient cars, and home heating and electrical sources. I England the cost of a gallon of gas is in the $6-7 range. Therefore they have more of en incentive to drive a more economical car.

But anyways this blog isn't about England's energy use. It's about ISRAEL.

I posted a few weeks back a flyer I had made about the ecological footprint Americans and Jews in Israel make. If the every single person in the world lived like Americans do we would need the resources of 7 planet Earths to support everyone. If everyone lived like Jews in Israel, I said that we'd need 1. (It's actually 1.2, but that sounded awkward).

But look at all of the things that Israel has done, not just for itself in the world of conserving energy, but also at what it's done for the world.

Israel developed the drip irrigation method, a way to give each individual plant, even in a large field, the exact amount of water and fertilizer it needs. That means that there is little, if any, runoff into the environment.

Israel is one of two countries, the other being Spain, that requires all residential buildings to have a solar hot water heater to heat the houses water. It's hooked up to an electrically system for the cloudy days, but the majority of the year it's sunny and hot, the perfect weather for this type of system.

OK, so that wouldn't work here in Maryland (in which I've estimated that we have approx. 45 'nice' days a year. But what about areas of the US that have similar climates to Israel's. Texas for example.

Anyways, I think that I've made my point clear, but on a closing note, If the Jews of America made Aliyah, they would not only fulfill the commandment of settling and living in the Land of Israel, they would also make a huge difference in global warming.

That's Right, You Tell 'em!

What's going on in my head. You know, Israel, future of the Jewish people, stuff like that

No idea what this post is going to be about but I need to rant. I B"H had a very full day today, and as I was davening maariv I was thinking about where I had been throughout the course of my day.
First, I got up at 5:30am to go to a 5:55 selichos. After davening I went to school and had 6 hours of class. Then I drove home and had to drive another hour to a meeting across town to which I arrived late to and missed because of intense traffic on the beltway. Then I came back home, ate dinner and went out to night seder, where I eventually davened maariv.

I had a very uplifting experience during night seder, I had been listening to Rabbi Ken Spiro talk about Jewish history on the car ride back from college on the first kings of Israel, Saul through Shlomo. I sat down to night seder and heard a 13 year old kind learning the beginning of Samuel 2, the first chapter. He was studying for a test he has tomorrow and he was having trouble understanding the story of Saul's death, with him being killed by the son of an Amaleki, and then being killed by David for the murder of a Jewish King.
This kid who was in 7th grade in my old school, and I was very happy to hear that there was someone there who was teaching Tanach.

I'm really seeing how important knowing your history is, especially nowadays, with Olmert and Peres planning to split Jerusalem and give Judea & Samaria to the terrorists. They have no idea what they're history is, and if they do know, they don't see it as their history.
Or as Peres said put it (to paraphrase) "history is a waste of time and shouldn't be learned, instead we should be looking to the future and only then will we reach our potential." (End paraphrase)

But it's very interesting that we're going into the Sh'mitta year in Israel, to look back at 7 years ago what was going on? In 2000/5760 the Arabs started their war in Israel, the "Intifada." Seven years before that was Oslo. I hope this Sh'mitta year will break the trend and be a good year for the Jewish people.

Anyways these days, the Yomim Noraim (High Holidays) really make me feel that there's absolutely nothing little old me can do here in America besides pray to the General of this complicated battle field, G-d. I have no power, and these politicians have no power, but the problem is they think they do. Looking at the kings in the Bible, David and Shlomo, those guys knew how to be a leader. They knew that G-d was the real leader and they were simply conduits to run the Jewish people. Olmert doesn't think that, can you imagine if Olmert said to Abbas "Sorry, I have to drive you and all of the other Arabs from this land because you pose a threat to the future of the Jewish people. Oh and this isn't my decision, the G-d of Israel commanded me to do it, I'd rather not, be He commands, therefore I do."

As Rabbi Spiro put it very well, "Liberalism comes from Judaism, but Judaism isn't Liberalism."
Our problem is that we're too compassionate, even if it means doom for us. I have some liberal relatives who are pro-Israel, but they were trying to explain to me the reason that Sharon was throwing Jews out of Gush Katif was simply a demographic move, it wasn't because he wanted to throw Jews out of their homes, that was just an unfortunate side effect.
Why then, during the nights of davening at the Kotel, did Sharon make the statement that "they thing they're G-d can save them? Let him try"
Of course we see that he did get his punishment.

But the point is that there was a difference between the Jews if Gush Katif and the Jews of some secular kibbutz. I can't say that the same move would have been made if the the situation had been with the latter.

But that's why J & S are being offered, as well as Jerusalem, these are HOLY sites to the Jews, the secular leaders have no claim to these areas, these are the sites of those "crazy settlers." The world wants us to create and Arab terror state, so will create one, it's only the religious Jews that are being thrown out of their homes. No. Big. Deal.

I'm learning the Eim Habanim Semaicha right now, and Rabbi Teichtal was very supportive of the secular Jews who had left Europe to settle the land of Israel. But he told them that they need to make sure that any state that is established has to have a strong backing in Torah, if you're reason for settling the land is not based on Torah, then you have no claim to that land, and it won't be long before the nations of the world recognize that and demand you give it away.

I envy the people who lived in those times because a secular Israeli who, even if he didn't follow Torah, had a strong sense of nationality and that being a member of the Jewish people was something to be proud of.
Now, the kids of these secularists don't live in Israel, their parents see the Zionist dream as dead, who cares if we give away the country, our kids won't be around to settle it, it's only those religious people who still want to live here. Why no move to America where I don't have to serve in the army, and I can make more money and live the American Dream?

What was the Zionist dream? It was about after 2000 years, a people without access to their homeland returning home and building that home into a conduit to being a Light unto the Nations.
As Rabbi David Zeller said, quoting a Buddhist Monk, "You Jews have done a wonderful job developing the physical world, but you have to develop to spiritual world if you don't want the world to blow up!"

As we've seen Israel is great when it comes to physical aspects of the world, but they really need to develop the spiritual aspect of it, and that can be as simple as doing what I did on the post below and just mention G-d's name in the advertisements for tourism and Aliyah.

We have a job to do, another reason the secularists wanted a state was to be and Light unto the Nation, it was to be Like all the other Nations.

We can't be like the other nations, we have a job to do, and no matter how much we deny our mission it still stands, the only question is it going to be our generation that perfects the world or a generation after us?

We have a mission.

Deal with it.

Why the Jews are Loosing

A story on Ynet today reported that Iran has shut down numerous barber shops that are offering styles that are too 'western.' The story said these barbershops offered western hairstyles, tattoos and even eyebrow plucking for men.

But the fact that a Muslim country is so strict on things based on their religion is something Israel can really pick up on. I think one of the main reasons we have such a falling out of Judaism in western countries is because the modern culture influences Jews to throw off the yoke of their ancestors and 'live freely.'

There's a reason that the Torah made these guidelines, they weren't put in place only when they were convenient, they're supposed to be an 'everlasting covenant.'

We mock the crazy things that the Muslims do, but the fact is the average Muslim has much more fear of G-d than the average Jew does.
Even religious Jews are included in this, I wrote in my post yesterday about a shul I davened in where G-d wasn't taken seriously at all. I'm sure that not everyone was like that, but the truth of the matter is that these people don't view a shul as a place to serve G-d, they view it as a place to socialize.
I don't know if this is true in Israel, but I would imagine that davening is taken much more seriously because most people actually know what they're saying. But still non-religious Jews in Israel all want 'to be like Mike,' IE they want to be like westerners as much as possible.

Good luck trying to get a cab in New York city around 5 o'clock in the afternoon. There's a good chance that the cab you're driving in at 5 will stop and the driver will pull out his rug and start praying, openly without any shame. You see Jews, when daven in public in America, trying to duck away in a corner, and stay out of everyone's way.
That's why we're loosing.
The Arabs get that this war is a spiritual war, that's why Jerusalem, Hevron, Shechem, and Kever Rachel are all considered "Palestinian towns." They know that without our religious places we are weak (or at least they think that).

We are going to win, the only question is how and when, in the meantime the only thing we can do is continue learning, davening, and turning as many Jews onto G-d and Torah as possible

Shabbat Shalom

I Know Who I'm Voting for in 2008

This from Israel National News

Giuliani Says Palestinian State Would Support Terrorism

by Ezra HaLevi

(IsraelNN.com) American Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani has bucked the party line of successive US administrations and come out against the establishment of a Palestinian state.

"Too much emphasis has been placed on brokering negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians — negotiations that bring up the same issues again and again," the former New York City Mayor wrote in a paper published in Foreign Affairs magazine. "It is not in the interest of the United States, at a time when it is being threatened by Islamist terrorists, to assist the creation of another state that will support terrorism."

Giuliani did not rule out the eventual establishment of such a state, but warned against the push by President George W. Bush and embattled Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to quickly establish a state in Judea and Samaria ruled by Fatah. "Palestinian statehood will have to be earned through sustained good governance, a clear commitment to fighting terrorism, and a willingness to live in peace with Israel."

Giuliani also took a swipe at the United Nations, saying America should have "realistic" expectations about the effectiveness of an organization he says has made itself “irrelevant” to the resolution of the past half-century’s conflicts. "The organization can be useful for some humanitarian and peacekeeping functions, but we should not expect much more of it.”

Saying the war with “Islamic fascism” will be a lengthy one, Giuliani explained that: "The Terrorists' War on US was encouraged by unrealistic and inconsistent actions taken in response to terrorist attacks in the past. A realistic peace can only be achieved through strength.”

Bush, Olmert, Abbas, oh, this is going to be goooood!

George Bush is no longer a friend to Israel. Olmert is the Prime Minister of a country that doesn't want him leading. And both of these leaders of these great countries are trying to prop up another radical terrorist and portray him as 'moderate' and a 'partner for peace.'

Bush and Olmert are dedicated to giving a State to a group of people who have never shown that they are capable of running one. Not only that, they are trying to give these people a state, and the rallying cry from this group of people is that they want to destroy both Israel and the United States.

Really

Stupid

But Olmert is confused, and Bush is a suck up. All Olmert wants to do is fit in with all of the other nations. Why do we have to be different? Why can't we just do what all of the other countries in the world do, and just be like them?
Bush is simply doing what ever his advisor's tell him. Condshleeza Rice is always in the area, "Oh, we have to give the Palestinians a state, because for some reason they deserve one. So whenever Israel decides that they (Ha) want to defend themselves, I'll run to the region, get Olmert and Abbas to shake hands in front of the international media and Israel will sit back and do what ever I tell them, because I have Olmert eating out of my hand.


Now Olmert is really full of himself. He thinks that he'll be the first Prime Minister of Israel to finally achieve peace with the Arabs. So he's doing all of the things that, up until now, have been no-no's for all of Israel's PM's. Giving back land, evicting Jews from 'illegal' houses, while Arab's build illegally next door, and even offering a 'right of return' for the Arabs into Israel.

There's just one problem. Olmert has absolutely no one in Israel backing him! His is approval rating is hovering around 0 (that's like zero). He's backed by George Bush who also has a really bad approval rating. And Abbas in considered a collaberator to the Arabs! Here we have three losers, who are hated by the people they govern, and these people think that they're going to be the ones to finally get peace in the Middle East.

I laugh, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha,!!!!!!!!

YES!!!!! A REAL MAN!!!!!!!!!

For some reason this story makes me happy, from Al Jezeera:

Dutch MP Calls for ban on Quran

Dutch member of parliament has called for the Quran to be banned in the Netherlands, describing it as a "fascist book" which calls on people to kill non-believers and rape women.

Geert Wilders, leader of the far-right Freedom Party, called for the ban in a letter published in De Volkskrant newspaper.

In his letter, Wilders compares the Muslim holy book to Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler's autobiography, and said the Quran has "no place in our constitutional state".

"I have been saying this for years: there is no such thing as a moderate Islam," Wilders wrote.

Wilders' Freedom Party holds nine seats in the Netherlands' 150 seat parliament.

Call for ban

Wilders also said several chapters in the Quran "call on Muslims to oppress, persecute or kill Christians, Jews, dissidents and non-believers, to beat and rape women and to establish an Islamic state by force".

The publication of the letter comes after a weekend attack on Eshan Jami, a young Dutch politician, who established a group to support people who have renounced Islam.

Jami, who was not visibly injured in the attack, is now under police protection as is Wilders.

"Ban this wretched book like Mein Kampf is banned! Send a signal to Jami's attackers and other Islamic radicals that the Quran cannot be used in the Netherlands as an inspiration or an excuse for violence," Wilders said.

Wilders acknowledged that his plan would not receive majority support in the Dutch parliament.

"I am fed up with Islam in the Netherlands: no more Muslim immigrants allowed. I am fed up with the worship of Allah and Muhammad in the Netherlands: no more mosques," his letter concluded.

On the East Coast the Day's Hardly Started

It was quite a shock opening up Arutz Sheva this morning. The headline story was the NBN flight that landed on Tuesday in Israel welcoming 210 more Jews home.

Unfortunately, it also had the conclusion to the heroic efforts of the IDF. For those of you who don't know, the IDF was ordered to throw more Jews out of their homes yesterday, this time it wad two families in Hevron. I say heroic because that's what it was, 30 IDF soldiers refused to carry out their orders and throw Jews out of their homes. It was incredible to see how fast the government responded to this insubordination. By Monday night, they ha d already been tried and convicted. They are confined to their base for 28 days, are facing a monetary fine, and are restricted from serving in combat units.

The follow-up story was the government finishing their expulsion of the Jews from their homes without these soldiers help.

The next story was how Olmert is trying to speed up the creation of a Palestinian State. This guys insane. The creation of another Arab state will only result in a larger version of Gaza. Why do they think that it's going to work this time. The moment that happens, it's only a matter of time before Israel is destroyed. I just gotta remember that everything is in G-d's hands.

The next story was a sad/funny story. The story is sad, but the circumstances are funny. Sometimes rockets fired from Gaza into Israel fall short and land in Gaza. Two Arab children found the rocket and were killed while playing with it. It's sad that two children had to die, but sometimes justice has to be served, even if the government refuses to do so.

And they say that they're not Anti Semites

Harry Potter is a Zionist plot to "disrupt the minds of young children."

Duh.

This makes me sick

Please go to this page and look at the absolutely disgusting thing that is about to take place in Germany. 100 years ago the Jews of Berlin proclaimed that "Berlin is the new Jerusalem." More recently they have been actively DE-moting aliyah.

Now they've come up with a new thing to embarrass the Jewish people. They are spending over eight million dollars to create a replica of the Kotel in Berlin. Eight million that obviously could be used for more productive things, but it is their money. But that's not the worst part.

On Wedensday Rabbi Yehuda Teichtal told AP that the goal of creating this replica was "a symbolic part of making Berlin a central hub of Jewish life again."

Rabbi Teichtal is the grandson of HaRav Yissachar Shlomo Teichtal, author of Eim Habanim Smeicha, a sefer that talks about the importance of Aliyah to Berlin, whoops, I mean Israel. And here is his grandson who is trying to make Germany the "central hub of Jewish life again."

It's sick. Germany, like everyother place the Jews have ever been comfortable has of course done one of the worst crimes to the Jewish people in recent memory. Uh. . . does the Holocaust come to mind? And here are the Jews of Germany, who haven't got it yet. I understand if you want to live in Chutz L'Aretz, I understand if the tivah to make a good living is too strong, or if you don't have enough Bitachon to make the move. But don't replace Israel.

And of all things this announcment comes a day after Tisha B'Av, which is a time to mourn the loss of the Beit Hamikdash, and for some reason, watch movies about the Holocaust.

Hopefully the Jews of Germany will come to their senses, and won't have to wait for another Holocaust to happen before Mashiach comes.

Learn your *** ***** HISTORY!!

ch.I'm well aware that I make people here in America uncomfortable. I like to, as Rav Meir Kahana says, "Ask uncomfortable questions to comfortable Jews."
So I'm becoming a Jewish history obsessor, regarding the post I did last week, I've really started to wonder why no one learns history. The beginning of Judges makes it very clear that you have to know where you came from, that's the only way to know where you're going. Why is the first bracha in Shemone Esrei about our Patriarchs? Should the next one be first as it talks about the strength of G-d? I sat down with someone over Shabbos and we went through every single Bracha and asked ourselves if we, and other people around us really cared about what we were saying. History, G-d, Eretz Yisrael, how often are these things on our minds? Well I can say personally that E"Y is (and I'm not joking) always on my mind. In fact some people have told me to get some other interests (maybe because I'm making them uncomfortable).
I was talking with one of my Rebbeim back in February about my seder in Tanach. I asked him how it was possible to learn Tanach, and not want to make Aliyah.
He gave me his unique, crooked smile and told me that's probably the reason why most American Jews don't learn Tanach.
I was thinking about that this past week when I was reading an article in the Mishpacha, an interview with Rav Berel Wein. In the interview they asked him why Frum Jews didn't learn Jewish history, and particularly Tanach.
He said that it's very simple, these topics have been taken over by secularists, and since secularists have taken it over, the Frum community decided to ignore it. This allowed these very important subjects to be hijacked and distorted.
Case in point, the secular Zionists say that the Jews started coming to Israel in large numbers in the 1800's. The Hamodia has been doing stories now for the past few months, documenting large numbers of Frum Jews who were coming to Israel in large numbers from Europe, for the last 900 years. But because Frum Jews don't spend a good amount of time learning history, everyone, including the enemies of Israel, are using this as a proof that we have no claim to our land.
Learn your history! If you need a quick overview of the last 3000 years Rav Ken Spiro has a great series of articles on Aish, what they call a 'crash course,' and it gives a very good overview. I've been doing my shul newsletter for the past 7 months and I went a little overboard in my whole "Promote Israel" campaign. Putting lots of pictures of E"Y in the newsletter, and articles about Aliyah, and why Israel is so great. Anyways I pissed a lot of people off, so I scaled back and decided to go with the more subliminal way, and I've been publishing these articles for the past few weeks.
The biggest mistake we can make is to not think that we are allowed to be proud of being Jews. Spending so much time in the Exile has obviously taken its toll on us, but it's time to stand proud and understand who we are. Once you know who you are, you will get a great strength of your purpose and mission on this little world.

I wish we could Stop War-All the Way

I saw this sign while driving home today, and it got me thinking about this issue. I wrote a few months ago regarding this issue when we had a debate in English class about if violence is ever necessary or if it's never necessary.
I wish it wasn't. I wish that every country in the world would be able to dismantle it's military because there would be no need for them.
Unfortunately it still is necessary. My dad has this vision that the IDF will one day become irrelevant and that instead of 3 years of army service, the State of Israel required all boys when they reach the age of 18 to sit and learn for 3 years.
Because that's something that we all have to remember, G-d runs the world, and no matter how strong and great your military is, Hashem is the one who decides that outcome in all wars.

Hey! Aish Stole my Idea!

Well it's not like a good respectable organization like Aish to go around and steal ideas from poor innocent blogger's like myself. This video is hilarious, and hits the nail on the head regarding a post I did the other week You Want to Boycott Israel? Be My Guest, but be a Man About It
Enjoy!



Another great video that really sheds light on how blinded these people who want to boycott Israel are. I don't care if you boycott Israel! But if you do, boycott EVERYTHING THAT WAS MADE IN ISRAEL! Sheesh

What really happened in the Middle East?

An excellent video that was made from the works of David Horowitz. The Left and the Arabs seem to have seriously distorted history in the past 40 years. My theory is like this, since the end of World War Two, the Arabs have felt that it was their mission to finish what Hitler started. After the creation of the State of Israel they had a much easier target to eliminate instead of having to track down Jews all over the world. When they were defeated in the wars of '48, '56, '67. and '73 they realized that they weren't going to defeat us by launching a full fledged war against us. Instead they decided to create the "Palestinian Problem," and try to bring about the destruction of Israel from the academic and political realms.
Unfortunately this is working.
University campuses worldwide have large demonstrations protesting the "Occupation" and the United States and United Nations are both working hard to get Israel to forfeit the land in the West Bank.
This video brings us back to reality and reminds us that we're the victims. We're the ones who have been persecuted for thousands of years, and now that we finally have state, and an army, the enemies of Israel work nonstop to make us loose out credibility.
The world doesn't like the idea of a strong Jew. My response to that is, "I don't care." I've said it before and I'll say it again, Israel is here to stay, the Jewish people are here to stay, and if you decide that you want to oppose us, you're going to end up like every single other entity that has opposed us throughout history.
Romans? Gone.
Crusaders? Gone
Hitler? Gone
You want to oppose us, you're going to wind up just being another page in the history book while the Jews live on.
Am Yisrael Chai!