Jews Back To Germany

י"ג לחודש הראשון תשע"ד

YNET: Tragic past, rebirth in Berlin's Jewish community
Upsurge in Jewish population in German capital has spurred tourism to an array of monuments, synagogues, museums related to Jewish history.

Associated Press, April 8, 2014

Rykestraße Synagogue
East Berlin, Renovated, 2007

The epicenter of the Holocaust, the city where Hitler signed the death warrants of 6 million Jews, seems an unlikely candidate for the world's fastest growing Jewish community.

But despite this stigma of Nazism, Berlin's dynamic, prosperous present and its rich, pre-World War II Jewish past initially attracted an influx of Jews from the former Soviet Union. The community has kept growing with the arrival of thousands of Israelis and smaller numbers of often young immigrants from Australia, France, the United States and elsewhere.

And this upsurge in the Jewish population - believed to be more than 40,000 - has also spurred tourism to an array of monuments, synagogues, museums and workaday places related to Jewish history and present life in Germany's capital.

Orantienburgerstraße Synagogue
Controlled by misguided "liberals"
Re-established, 1998

In fact you can literally trip over this history while walking the streets and looking down on some of the 2,800 shiny brass tiles embedded in sidewalks by artist Gunter Demnig. These palm-sized "Stolpersteine," or stumbling stones, bear the names of those murdered by the Nazis, and are placed in front of their onetime homes.

Like these stones, Berlin's most prominent Jewish sites are connected to the tragic past, but a healthy antidote and probably the best way to begin a tour is a visit to the Jewish Museum, a multi-layered panorama of 1,000 years of Jewish culture, lore and history in Germany. And it's housed in one of the city's most striking contemporary buildings, a jagged structure coated with silvery zinc plates and punctured by slanted windows slits. (cont.)

Esser Agaroth (2¢):

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Israeli PM Binyamin Netanyahu
"A picture is worth a thousand words."

Now, the above piece does not exactly suggest that we forget the Holocaust, nor Germany's part in it. However, it most certainly seems to praise the rebirth and growth of the Jewish Community in Germany.

For a Jew to go back to Germany, and re-settle it is like going back to visit Egypt during Passover, even more so for a Jew who has already been residing in his only true Homeland of Israel.

Originating from the Associated Press, and scooped up by Erev Rav controlled YNET, both parties want to see the de-Judaizing and eventual de-Jewification of Eretz Yisra'el (Land of Israel). So, this piece, and its praise, really do not surprise.

Various goyshe countries and groups desire Eretz Yisra'el for their own, while the Erev Rav continues its battle against the Torah, doing everything in its power to prevent the arrival of Ge'ulah (Redemption).

True, the Erev Rav will eventually fail. However, we simply cannot wait around for the the final results, without doing anything at all. Those of us who can learn Torah, must learn. The rest of us should learn what we can, but also take additional actions. And, of course, we should all pray.

Otherwise, the process leading up to Ge'ulah will be much more painful than it has to be.