A month ago, I received an e-mail from a fellow blogger, living in Central Israel. Here is a snippet,...taken out of context, yet the gist of the message is clear:
Why did the Israelis wear masks and throw stones at soldiers and cameramen on Friday? Do you condone this action? I found the image very frightening. Do you think these youths would use guns against the IDF in the future?My policy is to refrain from answering such e-mails until I receive confirmation of the identity of the sender. I recommend the adoption of this policy to my fellow bloggers. Initially, I thought this was to see if I was one of those "Hasbarah Fools," expressing love for all Jews (even the evil ones) and the desire that they love all of us in Yehudah & Shomron (Judea & Samaria) OR if I was one of those "violence-condoning extremists" OR somewhere in the middle.
I received what I considered to be valid confirmation, as well as enough information to indicate that the e-mail was not as provocative as I initially thought,...or at least not intentionally. It included the following sentence, which I simply could not leave without a response:
The image of masked Israelis throwing stones frightens me very much.This was my response:
What frightens ME are the following....
1. The IDF lying to soldiers about the intended operations. This is nothing new. It occurred seven years ago when IDF Rabbanuth certification was falsified to convince religious soldiers to board a bus on Shabbath, and remove Jews from Havath Gilad. No punishments resulted, as far as I know.
2. "Rabbis" telling their students to obey orders [anyway], even if it apparently contradicts the halachah.
3. "Rabbis" believing that there is NO contradiction between halachah and Israeli Law.
4. So-called "religious" Jews who stand by and tolerate a governmental regime which denigrates the Torah left and right.
5. A government which allows its secret police free reign on Torah-abiding Jews.
6. A [deMOCKractic] government which cares more about what the goyim think than what its constituents think, let alone what HaShem thinks.
7. A [deMOCKractic] government which allows leftists and anarchists to do whatever they want (including property damage to settlers, and violence against the police and IDF), yet settlers who think the wrong way can receive administrative detention.
These things scare me. God-fearing, Torah-abiding kids do not scare me in the least.
The only "threat" I believe you should be worried about is this one:
When and if we get removed from our homes (May God Forbid!), when are we going to live? Do you think we're "going quietly" to the Negev?
Nope. We're coming to Ramath Aviv, to K'far Shmaryahu, to Ramath HaSharon, and to Ra'ananah to live in your parks and on your street corners.
Frightened now?
*********
Tip credits:
Shiloh Musings for blogging on the "housing issue"
Jameel @ The Muqata for the information on Olmert's not-so-secret plan
Yeah - I thought that one of the yishuvim from Gush Katif should have been resettled at Havat Hashikmim.
ReplyDeleteIf we're all making sacrifices, shouldn't "King" Sharon have made sacrifices too?
...or Kokhav Yair, where Mofaz and Baraq live.
ReplyDeleteI didn't see Orlev or Yahalom {NRP} jump and tell the refugees to come live in Elqana either.
Shalom!
ReplyDeleteOrlev and Eitam, among others, came down to Gush Katif to convince us to leave quietly. I don't even want to get started with the list of rabbis who are still embarrassing any Jew with any national pride.
After the expulsion we were discouraged from going to YOSH by having certain compensation monies reduced for those choosing to live there. Netzer-Ariel has been consistently hassled by the government and there were other groups that didn't even get to YOSH because of the bureaucratic red-tape.
Not that YOSH really recruited us. A friend of mine now in Nitzan was not treated very nicely when she and her husband looked for a new home in YOSH and she said that she never saw anyone from YOSH recruiting in Nitzan. Months after the fact she heard that a representative from Kedumim had recruited in hotels in Jerusalem. I suspect that he or she went too early, when too many people were still in shock - as if it was hard to see what was coming. After a few months in a hotel, there would have been takers.
We're not refugees! We were expelled, evicted, kicked out, driven into internal exile. Refugees are people who flee a dangerous situation in hopes of finding a safe haven. Very few of us wanted to leave. Mortars and all, Gush Katif was and will be home sweet home!
Hadassa DeYoung, K'far Darom/Elon Moreh
Hadassah,
ReplyDelete1. Thanks for providing this additional information. I think it's important to have listed here.
2. Thanks for reminding me about the use of the term "refugees." Now, I remember the conversation you and I were both a part of a while ago. I'll try to remember this for next time.