Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Ammunition Hill

Ammunition Hill

According to the Jewish calender, tomorrow will be the 43rd anniversary of the unification of Jerusalem. Which means that tonight is the 43rd anniversary of the battle on Givat Hatachmoshet, Ammunition Hill.

Between 1949 and 1967, while Jerusalem was divided between Israel and Jordan, there was an Israeli enclave about a mile to the east of the border, in the Jordanian part of town. This was Mount Scopus, with the campus of the Hebrew university and Haddassh hospital. There was an agreement whereby every two weeks 200 Israelis would cross Jordanian territory to the enclave, and sit there until the next group replaced them two weeks later.

Throughout the whole period everyone knew that sooner or later the war would resume, and that when that happened Israel would try to reconnect the mountain with the city. To prevent this the Jordanians built a series of fortifications in that mile, and its centerpiece was Amunition Hill, an apt name borrowed from the days after the British conquered the city in 1917 and General Allenby stored his army's ammunition there.

The picture shows the 1949 lines, to which I've marked Ammunition Hill in red, and just for the context, Shaikh Jarrah in green. From the one to the other would be a four minute walk if it weren't for the highway of route 1 which takes some time to cross.

On the night between June 5th and 6th 1967 the paratroopers, backed by a few tanks, made their attack, directly on the Jordanian fortifications. The section of the battle on Ammunition Hill raged from about 2am to 5:30, early next morning. It was face to face combat, between the best forces each side had. 71 Jordanians were killed, and 35 Israelis: most of the defenders died, as did a quarter of the attackers.

A story I heard not long afterward told that in the early morning the IDF troops gathered the fallen Jordanians into a pit and covered it, with a makeshift sign that read "Here lie 71 brave Jordanian soldiers".

A few hours later the paratroopers were at the Kotel.

In 1968 the military band of Central Command (Pikud Merkaz) recorded a song about the battle. It's not the best music we've got, and the lyrics are more dramatic than profound, but it has stuck in the communal memory and everyone can sing its refrain and snatches of the story. The final narrative line: "I don't know why I was given a medal, all I wanted to do was to get home in one piece" has acquired mythical stature, though often overlaid with irony and irreverence.

Hebrew lyrics
English translation
"It was then the morning of the second day of the war in Jerusalem. The horizon paled in the east. We were at the climax of the battle on Ammunition Hill. We'd been fighting there for three hours. A fierce battle was under way. Fatal. The Jordanians fought stubbornly. It was a position fortified in an exceptional manner. At a certain point in the fight there remained next to me only four soldiers. We went up there with a force of two platoons. I didn't know where the others were because the connection with Dudik, the platoon commander, was cut off still at the beginning of the battle. At that moment I thought that everyone had been killed."

At two, two-thirty
We entered through the stony terrain
To the field of fire and mines
Of Ammunition Hill

Against bunkers which were fortified
And 120mm mortars
A hundred and some boys
On Ammunition Hill

The pillar of dawn had not yet risen
Half a platoon lay in blood
But we were already there at least
On Ammunition Hill

Among the walls and the mines
We left only the medics
And we ran ahead without our senses
Towards Ammunition Hill

"At that same moment a grenade was thrown from outside. Miraculously we weren't hit. I was afraid the Jordanians would throw more grenades. Someone had to run from above and cover. I didn't have time to ask who would volunteer. I sent Eitan. Eitan didn't hesitate for a moment. He climbed up and began to fire his machine gun. Sometimes he would overtake me and I'd have to yell to him to remain in line with me. That's how we crossed some 30 meters. Eitan would cover from above and we would clear the bunkers from within, until he was hit in the head and fell inside."

We went down into the trenches
Into the pits and channels
And towards the death in the tunnels
Of Ammunition Hill

And no one asked where to
Whoever went first fell
One needed lots of luck
On Ammunition Hill

Whoever fell was dragged to the back
In order not to disrupt the movement forward
Until fell the next in line
On Ammunition Hill

Perhaps we were lions
But whoever wanted still to live
Should not have been
On Ammunition Hill

"We decided to try blowing up their bunker with a bazooka. The bazooka made a few scratches in the concrete. We decided to try with explosive material. I waited above them until the guy came back with the explosives. He would throw me package after package, and I would lay them one by one at the entrance of their bunker. They had a system of their own: first they threw a grenade, afterwards they fired a volley, and then they rested. Between volley and grenade, I would approach the entrance of their bunker and place the explosives. I triggered the explosives and moved away as far as I could. I had four meters in which to move because also behind me were [Arab] Legionnaires. I don't know why I received a commendation, I simply wanted to get home safely."

At seven, seven-twenty
To the police school
Were gathered all those who remained
From Ammunition Hill

Smoke arose from the hill
The sun in the east rose higher
We returned to the city, seven
From Ammunition Hill

We returned to the city, seven
Smoke arose from the hill
The sun in the east rose higher
On Ammunition Hill

On fortified bunkers
And on our brothers, men
Who remained there aged 20
On Ammunition Hill

The You Tube video I've embedded was taken on the hill, which stands still as it did that morning, a memorial to the soldiers who died taking Jerusalem.

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Ammunition Hill

Love of the Land: Is Manhigut Yehudit leaving the Likud?

Is Manhigut Yehudit leaving the Likud?

Moshe Feiglin
Manhigut Yehudit
26 Iyar, 5770
10 May '10

Translated from the article on Ma'ariv's NRG website

The media buzz surrounding Manhigut Yehudit's future in the Likud caught me by surprise. We had planned to keep the brainstorming process after last Thursday's Likud vote an internal affair - with only Manhigut Yehudit activists engaging in the debate. True, we knew that deliberations taking place among tens or hundreds of people would not be secret for long, but we did not estimate the great surge of public interest that the question of our future in the Likud would awaken. It seems that the stake that Manhigut Yehudit has planted in Israel's politics and collective consciousness is deeper than what we had assessed. When we move that stake just a bit, we create waves both inside and outside Israeli politics - surprising those in the eye of the storm.

Some people erroneously believe that our deliberations over Manhigut Yehudit's future in the Likud are the result of political failure, or because we failed in our attempt to prevent the Likud Central Committee from adopting Netanyahu's proposal, or because the Prime Minister has waged an all-out war against me. That is simply not true. If all that I was looking for was a place in the Knesset, I could have achieved my goal directly and with relative ease. It is not pleasant to be engaged in an ongoing political battle against forces larger and stronger than me; it is not pleasant when the chairman of my political home schemes with the High Court "judges" to remove me from the Knesset slot to which I was elected last year or to prevent elections altogether, as he has done now. I am way outside my comfort zone - but that is apparently the proof that we are on the right track.

As a result of last Thursday's vote, the Likud has redefined itself. It can no longer be considered the ruling party of the National Camp. Instead, it has become the ruling party of one man - in the service of the Left. The political alliance that has been formed between the chairman of the Likud (who also happens to be the Prime Minister of Israel) and the justice system allowed him to retroactively change the rules of the game to his advantage and to effectively sever the Likud from its members. From that point and on, nothing stands in the way of the Prime Minister as he charges ahead with his plans to partition Jerusalem.

Not one member of the small, rightist Knesset parties was anywhere near the arena on which the battle for Jerusalem took place last Thursday. Manhigut Yehudit, the movement that "always fails" made the prime minister sweat and deny the claims that the real story behind the Likud vote was Netanyahu's plans to divide Jerusalem.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: Is Manhigut Yehudit leaving the Likud?

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Hakotel

Hakotel

This week we'll be celebrating 43 years since the reunification of Jerusalem, on the 2nd day of the Six Day War. So I'll be posting some of the shirim of those days.

Ofra Chaza (1957-2000) was born in Tel Aviv to a family of Yemenite Jews. She was one of our most important singers, and straddled various genres. When I presented Shirim Mizrachi'im last week a number of readers admonished me for not presenting Ofra, since she was an important performer of them. Yet she didn't start there, nor was she ever only a singer of mizrachi music. Since I'm bringing songs about Jerusalem this week, I've chosen one she sang.

Hakotel - the Western Wall - was written in the flush of victory after June 1967. Given that an event had just transpired which had been fervently anticipated for 1897 years, it would have been forgivable if the shirim of those days had been triumphant songs of victory. They weren't, not in the simple meaning of the words. Here, judge for yourselves: the words in Hebrew, English and transliteration are all on the You Tube page; if you look carefully you'll see Teddy Kollek, mythological mayor of Jerusalem, in the final frames of the film; the recording was probably made sometime in the 1980s, and the venue is the open-air auditorium below the wall of the Old City.

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Hakotel

Love of the Land: J Street Arrives on Main Street

J Street Arrives on Main Street

Avi Davis
The Intermediate Zone
04 May '10

Last week, a full page advertisement appeared in seven major Jewish newspapers around the country. Placed by the self proclaimed Israeli advocacy institute J Street, it presented a letter from former leftist Meretz leader Yossi Sarid addressed to the Nobel Laureate, Elie Wiesel. Three weeks ago, Wiesel had published his own missive, in a number of major American newspapers, imploring President Barack Obama’s understanding of the Jewish attachment to Jerusalem and why another division of the city can never be contemplated.

“For Jerusalem, Jews, Christians and Muslims are able to build their homes anywhere in Jerusalem and that only under Israeli sovereignty has freedom of worship for all religions been assured in the city.”

Sarid counters that there is a tacit racism inherent in Israeli housing policy that allows Arab families to be evicted onto the street if it suits the occupying power. He also warns Wiesel, who is certainly no Jewish fundamentalist, to avoid placing too much emphasis on the Jewish people’s religious attachment to the city.

“ You, my dear friend, evoke the Jews’ biblical deed to Jerusalem, thereby imbuing our current conflict with messianic hues. As if our diplomatic quarrels weren’t enough, the worst of our enemies would be glad to dress this epic conflict in the garb of a holy war. We had better not join ranks with them, even if unintentionally.”

But Sarid goes much further than even this. In his admonition to Wiesel, he states baldly what no other Israeli leader has previously dared to plead:

“ Barack Obama appears well aware of his obligations to try to resolve the world’s ills, particularly ours here. Why then undercut him and tie his hands? On the contrary, let’s allow him to use his clout to save us from ourselves, to help both bruised and battered nations and free them from their prison. Then he can push both sides to divide the city into two capitals – to give Jewish areas to the Jews and Arab areas to the Arabs – and assign the Holy Basin to an agreed-on international authority.”

Here we have a frank admission – and condemnation – rolled into one.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: J Street Arrives on Main Street

Love of the Land: Jerusalem Really IS a Final Status Issue?

Jerusalem Really IS a Final Status Issue?

Jennifer Rubin
Contentions/Commentary
05 May '10

David Axelrod pronounces: “The president agrees that Jerusalem as an issue can’t be the first issue for negotiations.” What’s more, he wants us to know that “Jerusalem should ‘probably be the last’ issue negotiated, Axelrod said, echoing the position of Israel’s government, which is that the issue is too sensitive to discuss before other issues, including borders, are settled.”

So let’s review. The adviser who went on the Sunday talk shows to make clear how angry Obama was over a Jerusalem housing project and has personally counseled the president to go beserk with the Israelis over the issue and who presumably is aware of the threat to abstain rather than veto a UN resolution should that building proceed now says it’s the last issue we should talk about. If you’re confused, I’m sure the parties in the region are, too. There are several explanations.

Perhaps Axelrod and the rest of the Obama crew are simply telling every party what it wants to hear, raising Palestinian expectations and simultaneously giving Jews assurances on the Israeli capital. It is a recipe for disaster, of course, once negotiations begin and everyone has a different set of expectations and understanding of the U.S. position.

(Read full post)

Love of the Land: Jerusalem Really IS a Final Status Issue?

Love of the Land: How Akiva Eldar Twists The News

How Akiva Eldar Twists The News

Yirael Medad
My Right Word
04 May "10

Here is something from an attack by Ha-Ha-Haaretz's Akiva Eldar, on tours promoted by Im Tirzu at the Shimon HaTzaddik neighborhood:-

Last Friday the tour organizers were accorded a free public service announcement on the Reshet Bet radio excursions program "On the Way to Nature." Under the neutral heading "A tour on the trail of heritage sites in East Jerusalem," the editor of the program, Michael Miro, recommended a "tour in the Shimon Hatzadik neighborhood". He told listeners that in advance of Jerusalem Day, Im Tirtzu is organizing tours of the neighborhood established 120 years ago by Jews from inside the city walls.

"They led a full life with synagogues and Torah, Sabbath pittas and hamin (cholent), as well as unforgettable celebrations in honor of the holy man, Shimon Hatzadik.

(Read full post)

Love of the Land: How Akiva Eldar Twists The News

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Towers on a Hill

Towers on a Hill

We've got a major corruption story on our hands these past few weeks. If you believe the spin, a former prime minster, two former mayors of Jerusalem, lots of important civil servants and a gaggle of lawyers and investors will all eventually go to jail.

Earlier this afternoon I had a chat with one of our very top journalists. I won't name him, but he would be at or near the top of the list of any informed Israeli asked to name our important journalists (so: it's not Gideon Levy). I was asking him about the story, which has been rumbling along for a month or so, and he commented - correctly, but a bit surprisingly - that 100% of what we're getting these days is slanted information crafted by folks who may or may not know what they're talking about, but are primarily committed to getting their version out to the public, irrespective of its accuracy.

So that's comforting to know. Sounds like most of the news-cycle the world over.

The other day The Economist reported on the story. I read the Guardian to follow the themes of current antisemitism. The Economist, however, I read - a bit warily - in the hope of hearing what goes on in the world. So what, I ask myself, am I to make of this?

THE distinctiveness of Israel’s latest corruption scandal is that it almost literally hits you in the eye. Many Jerusalemites feel affronted each time they look up at the Holyland Project, a string of four high-rise buildings tearing through the skyline on the western hilltops edging the city. Five more towers are to rise up under plans inexplicably approved by the municipal and district authorities.

Here, have a look (source):

Does that look like four towers? I think it looks like eight, but maybe that's just me. For the life of me I can't see how it can be construed as four. Another four are planned, making a total of twelve (12).

How to explain the report of the Economist? I admit, it's not that crucial - but nor is it hard to get the true number. There are complex stories in the world, one or two even here in Jerusalem. But this is not one of them.

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Towers on a Hill

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Lots of Strands

Lots of Strands

Yesterday I introduced Zohar Argov, the hero of Shirim Mizrachi'im, the Sephardi wing of Shirim Ivri'im which has long since become one of the lanes of the main highway.

The Shirim Mizrachi'im tend to gravitate towards two types of content. Personal songs of love, anguish after love and regret about love, in a manner that might be called the Israeli version of American Country music (though that's where the similarity ends); and religious songs. Remember, the Sephardi Jews tend to be less fanatic at religion than some Ashkenazis, but also much less secular - or if, then a secularism deeply informed and living alongside religion. The songs I brought yesterday belonged to the first group; here's an example of the second.

Shabechi Yerushalayim (Jerusalem, Praise the Lord) is verses 12-13 of the 147th Psalm, so it's been around for a long time. Here's a possible translation of the Psalm, though Google will offer you many others. The two verses in Hebrew, as they've been adapted to the song are here, and the English song-structured version is

Jerusalem praise God
Tzion praise God
Jerusalem praise God
Tzion praise God

For He made your gates locks strong
For He made your gates locks strong

For blessed the sons that sit in your city
For blessed the sons that sit in your city
For blessed the sons that sit in your city

Praise God Tzion
Praise God Tzion

Tzion is of course Zion in English.

The fellow who rendered the ancient Pslam into a modern song is Avihu Medina, born 1948 in Tel Aviv, one of the most important creators and occasional singer of Shirim Mizrachi'im. Badad, for example, which we saw yesterday, was written by him for his friend and protege Zohar Argov. I've linked to three You Tube versions. The first is by Avihu Medina himself, a few years ago. It's quality isn't very good, but it demonstrates how such shirim are often performed: at some local event, in cramped quarters, with everyone singing along. This particular recording is poignant because 11-year-old Roy Ginat, a blind child, got on the stage and played the accompanying keyboard. So it gives that aspect.

The second is by Hadag Nachash, a modern loud-noise band whom I've already introduced. In this case, they were giving a loud-noise concert at a Washington DC synagogue, when they launched into Shabechi Yerushalayim. I expect the original psalmist was spinning in his grave, but then, after 3,000 years of decay maybe there isn't enough coherent skeleton left to spin, so who knows. This video is interesting because by now (2006?) the Jewish-American Ashkenazi teenagers and students in Washington DC all know this Mizrachi song, and sing along, unsuprised that it's being offered by a band that normally does stuff that is not recognizably music if you were born earlier than, say, 1985.

I keep on carping on the point that Jerusalem is an important place for the Jews; this gives a surprising perspective on how that works.

The third recording is even more surprising. It's by Glykeria.

Glykeria is one of a few Greek singers, non-Jews from Greece who don't speak Hebrew, who have reciprocated to the Israeli public's love for Greek music and its incorporation into Shirim Ivri'im, by joining, and recording their own versions of the Israeli songs. Glykeria, born in 1953, first reached prominence in Greece in the 1980s, about the time Shirim Mizrachi'im were breaking into the Israeli mainstream. I don't know enough about such matters to say what her homeland stature is these days, but she was recording there for at least 20 years, and still visits Israel to sing the common music. (A stance which has gained her some enemies at home, of course). So here you've got a Greek woman, singing what is obviously Greek music, except that the words were written centuries before the heyday of ancient Athens, and unfortunately stand at the very center of international disagreements of the highest degree till this very day. The world never ceases to amaze, does it.

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Lots of Strands

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Don't Divide Jerusalem: Abu Tor Preview

Don't Divide Jerusalem: Abu Tor Preview

I've been walking a lot along the suggested border through Jerusalem, making short videos of what it looks like. This evening I'm putting up a quick preview of Abu Tor:

This snapshot was taken from Mount Zion, near the cemetery where Oscar Schindler is buried, looking south. The neighborhood on the next hill is AbuTor, and the red line runs between Jewish residences on the right (Israel, according to the Clinton Diktat) and Arab ones on the left (Palestine, according to the same principle). The reality in Abu Tor is actually quite a bit worse than this snapshot makes it seem, but this is rather bad. Keep in mind: dividing the city might bring peace - but if not, that red line will be a hostile border.
Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Don't Divide Jerusalem: Abu Tor Preview

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Don't Divide Jerusalem: Context

Don't Divide Jerusalem: Context

Jerusalem cannot be divided without havoc and bloodletting. I hope to offer a series of posts to demonstrate why. Today's post looks at the geography and at borders.

I'm assuming anyone who knows how to read a blog also knows how to use Google Earth, so the images I've downloaded should be merely a guide to your own viewing. Let's start with a screen-shot of central Israel, an area smaller than Los Angeles.

You can see (sort of) that Jerusalem sits on the top of a north-south ridge of hills. Directly to its north is the town of Ramallah, directly to its south the town of Bethlehem. Directly to its east is the Judean Desert. Since Google has helpfully added the Green Line of 1949-1967 (in red), to the west of the city you can see the Jerusalem Corridor, a finger of territory that connects the city to the rest of Israel, while jutting into the West Bank. Before 1967 Jerusalem was not only divided, it was surrounded on three sides by hostile enemy territory. From its vantage points on the high peaks of Nabi Samuel to the north, and Beit Jallah to the south, the Jordanian army could see just about the entire city below.

Let's get closer to the city itself.
I've marked two significant points. To the north is the Atarot airstrip (circled in light blue), and down to the right, the Holy Basin. Each plays a different role in the story. First, the airstrip.

Between 1949 and 1967 West Jerusalem was the capital of Israel, and it grew significantly. East Jerusalem wasn't the capital of anything, and didn't grow. In June 1967 when Israel took over the entire town, the Jordanian "half" of it was a small area, almost completely inside the yellow frame. To the north, well outside town, was a small airstrip, near where there had been a Jewish village of Atarot until it was conquered by the Jordanians in 1948. In June 1967 a team of three Israeli generals - Uzi Narkis, Shlomo Lahat, and retired general Moshe Dayan - were told to draw a new municipal line. They felt the airstrip had to be inside it, and so they invented a new definition of the city which had no history and not very much logic.(Source for the map) This artificial town had a population of about 250,000, 70,000 of them Palestinians from the Jordanian side, many of whom did not know they were in Jerusalem until the Israelis told them. Had you asked them they'd have said they lived in Um Tuba, or Kfar Akeb, and so on. Israel then proceeded to annex the area inside the line, to offer citizenship to it's populace (they mostly didn't take it), and to "force" upon them the benefits of permanent residents such social security and later universal health care, when we all got it. (Those they did take).

Since 1967 the city has roughly trebled in size, to about 800,000, of them some 250,000 Palestinians. The Palestinians spread out from their villages, some of which connected to each other and to the center. The Jews spread out in the west, and added 10 new neighborhoods in the new areas beyond the old border. Nine of them appear on the above map, and one (Ramat Shlomo), the most recent, doesn't. They are, north to south: Neve Yaakov, Pisgat Zeev, Ramot, Ramat Shlomo, Ramat Eshkol (including Sanhedria), French Hill, the Jewish Qurter of the Old City, East Talpiot, Gilo, and Har Homa. There's also an industrial area of mostly Jewish-owned companies way to the north, next to the airstrip, but no-one lives there. The airstrip, by the way, is defunct. So much for that miscalculation.

The historical heart of Jerusalem is called the Holy Basin. It's a new name, which first entered the political discussion in the Camp David discussions of summer 2000: Ehud Barak was willing to consider handing over the outer Palestinian neighborhoods, the Um Tubas and the Kfar Akebs which probably should never have been defined as Jerusalem in the first place, but was loth to divide the truly historical heart of Jerusalem. There is no official definition of what precisely fits into the Holy Basin, but it's more or less the area between Mount Scopus to the north and the Hill of Evil Council to the south, or perhaps less, depending upon whom you ask. (The Hill of Evil Council, by the way, is a New Testament name, upon which the British built their government house, and the UN sits until this very day. I spoof you not).The center of the Holy Basin is the Old City, which actually isn't the oldest part of town. To it's north I've marked the Sheikh Jarrah area, and to its south I've marked the City of David-Silwan area - which is the oldest part of the city, predating the wrongly named Old City by about 2,000 years.
I've marked five sections of the Old City. Green for the Muslim Quarter, red for the Christian Quarter, blue for the Armenian Quarter, fuchsia for the Jewish Quarter, and yellow for the Temple Mount, called Haram el-Shariff by the Muslims. Jerusalem not being New York, the resolution offered by Google Earth becomes less helpful when you get closer than this altitude above the city, but maybe in a future post, when I try to show the silliness of dividing the city, I'll try none-the-less.

Proposed borders: Jerusalem hasn't been divided, nor has anyone ever officially agreed on how to divide it. Yet since 2000 there has been much discussion of such a division, and of course a total international consensus that it must happen (except for those who disagree). For the purpose of my future posts on the matter, in which I shall try to show why the city cannot feasibly be divided, I'm following the contours of this international consensus. Its principles were formulated by President Bill Clinton on Dec. 24th 2000, and they're very simple: areas where Jews live in will be in Israel, areas where Palestinians live in will be in Palestine. The Temple Mount-Haram elSharif will be in Palestine because the Palestinians really really want it and there are mosques on it. Where possible - open areas, for example - the border will be the Green line of 1949-67.

The folks who agreed on the Geneva Initiative have gone to a lot of effort to make detailed maps of the various sections of town and who they'll belong to; compare their polished output to my slap-dash ones and you'll be impressed, I assure you. The whole 10-piece series is here. Their lines are pretty much what Clinton had in mind, and I expect his wife and her boss agree. So my task in the coming posts will be to show what the reality will look like, and why you wouldn't want anyone you know to have to live in it.

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Don't Divide Jerusalem: Context

Love of the Land: Media-backed Violence and Twisted History

Media-backed Violence and Twisted History

Yisrael Medad
My Right Word
26 April '10

Isabel Kershner has a report in the New York Times on the Kach march through Ir David/Silwan:-

Israeli Rightists Stir Tensions in East Jerusalem

A small group of ultra-right-wing Israelis marched through a volatile neighborhood of East Jerusalem on Sunday, arousing passions over the future of the contested city as an American envoy wrapped up an inconclusive three-day visit aimed at getting peace talks under way.

I will return to that "arousing passions" in a moment but let me deal with another element in her story.

She writes (and the foreign desk editor approved for publication as we media monitors should know that many keyboards a story make) that the marchers proceeded:-

...through the Wadi Hilwe section of Silwan, a predominantly Arab neighborhood. Wadi Hilwe sits on what Jews believe to be the ruins of the biblical City of David, in the shadow of the Temple Mount, or the Noble Sanctuary, a site holy to both Muslims and Jews. In recent years a Jewish settler group has sponsored excavations in the area and acquired property that is now populated by hundreds of Jews.

Anyone who knows the area knows that Ms. Kershner (or Mrs. Hirsh Goodman) is really splitting geographical hairs on that. A "section" within a "neighborhood"? Sounds as if its another district of "Palestine".

But more importantly, many non-Jews also believe that the location is David's City and there are quite provable and firm scientific elements of evidence to that claim.

(Read full post)

Love of the Land: Media-backed Violence and Twisted History

Love of the Land: On Israel, Obama Playing the Mideast Game Wrong

On Israel, Obama Playing the Mideast Game Wrong

Mortimer B. Zuckerman
U.S. News and World
23 April '10

The Middle East peace process is stalled thanks to a second deadlock engineered by the United States government. President Obama began the process with his call for a settlement freeze in 2009 and escalates it now with a major change of American policy on Jerusalem.

The president seeks to prohibit Israel from any construction in its capital—in an exclusively Jewish suburb of East Jerusalem. This, despite the fact that all former administrations had unequivocally understood that the area in question would remain part of Israel in any final peace agreement. Objecting to this early phase of the planning process for housing in East Jerusalem is tantamount to getting the Israelis to agree to the division of Jerusalem in any settlement—even before the start of final status talks with the Palestinians. In 1995, it was by a substantial bipartisan majority that Congress adopted the Jerusalem Embassy Act calling for the movement of the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem—and equally importantly, stating that Jerusalem must remain united under Israeli sovereignty.

But Obama has undermined the confidence of the Israelis in the United States from the start of his presidency. He uses the same term, "settlements," ambiguously for both massive neighborhoods that are the homes to tens of thousands of Jews and for illegal outposts, raising the question for the Israelis about whether the U.S. administration really understands the issue. The Palestinian Authority followed the president's lead and refused to proceed with planned proximity talks until Israel stops all settlement activities, including in East Jerusalem.

The president's attitude toward Jerusalem betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of the history of the city. After Israel was recognized as a new state in 1948, it was immediately attacked by the combined armies of Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq. The attacks were repelled, but the Jordanians, who were asked not to join the Egyptian war effort, conquered East Jerusalem and separated it from its western half. In 1967, the Arab armies again sought to destroy Israel, but it prevailed in the famous Six-Day War and reconquered East Jerusalem, the West Bank, the Sinai Peninsula, and the Gaza Strip.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: On Israel, Obama Playing the Mideast Game Wrong

Love of the Land: Video: Is the Western Wall in Israel? - HR Interviews 'Confused' Tourists

Video: Is the Western Wall in Israel? - HR Interviews 'Confused' Tourists

Honest Reporting
Media Critiques
22 April '10

Not only have some tourists been stranded by a volcanic ash cloud in recent days but their trauma has been multiplied by the revelation that they weren't even holidaying in Israel, their destination of choice. According to the UK's Advertising Standards Authority, an Israeli tourism ad breached rules on truthfulness due to the misleading implication that sites such as the Western Wall could actually be in Israel.

How could so many have been misled for so long? After supplying HR's Yarden Frankl and Pesach Benson with maps and compasses, we sent them into Jerusalem's Old City, seeking out confused tourists to find out which country they thought they were in.



It's Not Too Late - Join the Campaign

We tracked hundreds of your e-mails to the ASA, which has, so far, refused to reconsider its ruling. Despite the obvious inversion of reality, the ASA has stated:

(Read full critique)

Love of the Land: Video: Is the Western Wall in Israel? - HR Interviews 'Confused' Tourists

Love of the Land: Does Obama Really Think He Can Micromanage American Jews?

Does Obama Really Think He Can Micromanage American Jews?

Marty Peretz
The New Republic
22 April '10

There are signs that he thinks he can. Barak Ravid reports in yesterday’s Ha’aretz that a high-level but unnamed U.S. official has complained about American Jews speaking up about how they feel and what they think about U.S. policy towards Jerusalem. I don’t particularly agree with what I’ve discerned as Ravid’s political views. But he is certainly a reliable journalist. He did not make this up.

It’s one thing, however unbecoming, for the Obami to lecture Israel about its capital. Still, truth be told, the U.S. not only is apoplectic about the 180-odd thousands of Jews who live (and have lived) in areas of the city beyond the temporary armistice lines of 1949, it has never recognized anything specifically Israeli in even western Jerusalem. If an American baby is born, for example, in Kiryat Yovel, an old Jewish neighborhood in the “new city” (or the “western sector,” as it used to be called), of Jerusalem, his or her place of birth will be registered by the American consulate not as “Jerusalem, Israel” but just as plain “Jerusalem.” How is that for the U.S. sticking its head in the sand? And, even though the Congress has legislated transferring the ambassadorial mission from shabby Hayarkon Street in Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, several presidents have simply refused.

Look up “U.S. Consulate, Jerusalem.” It is eerie how unresponsive and indifferent to historical realities the site is. It’s almost as if Israel does not exist there at all.

In any case, the churlish American factotum cited above was upset that prominent American Jews had made their views known about Obama’s obvious hostility to Jewish Jerusalem in general. In fact, the president has never, NEVER acknowledged the special role of Jerusalem in Jewish history, in Jewish religion, in the Jewish present. Believe me: this is not an oversight. I wrote about this twice during Passover.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: Does Obama Really Think He Can Micromanage American Jews?

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Naomi Shemer: the First Prophetic Song

Naomi Shemer: the First Prophetic Song

Noami Shemer (1930-2004) was the single most important writer of shirim ivri'im ever (lyrics and music). Her earliest ones were recorded in the late 1950s, and she kept on writing until shortly before her death. Many are at the center of the canon. Yet the uncanny thing about her was her ability to write shirim that defined pivotal historical events, and always in advance. There was something truly prophetic about her.

Her first prophetic moment was this very night, the night after Independence Day, in 1967.

In those days the final act of the holiday was a nationally live broadcast song festival, in which 12 new songs competed. They didn't have computers, iPhones, text messaging and all the other things we can't imagine life without, so the 12 songs would be preformed, then the audience in Binyanaei Haumah, Jerusalem's largest theater, would vote with old-fashioned slips of paper in envelopes, and it would take an hour to count the results. During that hour there'd be time filler of some sort. As the festival of 1967 was being prepared, the new mayor of Jerusalem, the extremely well connected Teddy Kollek, convinced the organizers that the time filler should relate to Jerusalem. So after the audience listened to the 12 contestants, voted, and went to the bathroom, they settled down to bide the time. Soon a young woman no-one had ever heard of climbed onto the stage with her guitar and sang. It was the first new song about Jerusalem written in the 19 years since independence and the partition of the city; it was a cry of pain that the city was divided.

The audience went wild. Never had a song caused so much excitement. By the next morning the entire county was singing Yerushalayim Shel Zahav, Jerusalem of Gold. It had struck some deep and unsuspected chord of regret: yes, we've got a state, but no, we're not back in Jerusalem. Not all is right.

What made the moment prophetic was that at the exact, precise moment that Shuly Natan was performing the song for the first time, Gamal Nasser, Egypt's president, was smashing the international agreements of 1956 by sending his divisions into the Sinai, in a move that within three weeks had precipitated the Six Day War. The song, which had mourned the fact that access to most of the holy sites of Jerusalem was banned by the Jordanians, was seen as the harbinger of the reunification of the city, and the ability of Jews to revisit their city. When the paratroopers reached the Kotel, the Western Wall, three weeks later, they sang Yerushalayim Shel Zahav with the full force of a prayer literally come true. Shemer quickly added a stanza about how we're back, and the song became the anthem of reunification.

Till this day Yerushalayim Shel Zahav stands above the canon of shirim ivri'im; it's the closest thing secular Israel has ever produced to a holy text.

Hebrew words
English translation

The mountain air is clear as wine
And the scent of pines
Is carried on the breeze of twilight
With the sound of bells.

And in the slumber of tree and stone
Captured in her dream
The city that sits solitary
And in its midst is a wall.

Chorus:
Jerusalem of gold
And of bronze, and of light
Behold I am a violin for all your songs.
x2

How the cisterns have dried
The market-place is empty
And no one frequents the Temple Mount
In the Old City.

And in the caves in the mountain
Winds are howling
And no one descends to the Dead Sea
By way of Jericho.

Chorus...

But as I come to sing to you today,
And to adorn crowns to you (i.e. to tell your praise)
I am the smallest of the youngest of your children (i.e. the least worthy of doing so)
And of the last poet (i.e. of all the poets born).

For your name scorches the lips
Like the kiss of a seraph
If I forget thee, Jerusalem,
Which is all gold...

Chorus...

We have returned to the cisterns
To the market and to the market-place
A ram's horn calls out on the Temple Mount
In the Old City.

And in the caves in the mountain
Thousands of suns shine -
We will once again descend to the Dead Sea
By way of Jericho!

Chorus...

Here's the original recording from May 1967, followed by a 2002 one of the full song. Both are sung by Shuly Natan. In the latter recording she is introduced by Ehud manor, whom I've already introduced.

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Naomi Shemer: the First Prophetic Song

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Mother of all Shirim

Mother of all Shirim

Naftali Herz Imber, a Romanian Jew, wrote Hatikva, The Hope, following a visit to Eretz Israel in 1878. It was popular among the early settlers of what eventually was called the first aliya, 1882-1904. Seen in historical perspective, it was an expression of the sea-change in Jewish history that was beginning at the time: the sentiments of Jewish aspirations to rebuild a national center in the historical homeland was not new - on the contrary, it was banal. Yet articulating it in a secular poem, putting it to music and singing it by people who took the concept as a practical guideline to be enacted by secular Jews, that was novel, and soon proved to be profoundly revolutionary.

Interestingly, Hatikva first took on the status of a quasi-anthem at the sixth Zionist Conference in 1903. Herzl had tabled a suggestion that the movement consider a British proposal to move European Jews to eastern Africa (the Uganda Plan), and the majority of delegates, who unlike him understood what Judaism was about, were horrified; they resoundingly sang Hatikva to make clear their point that their aspirations were about the national homeland, not some African backwater. Thereafter the song became the de-facto anthem of the Zionist movement, being officially adopted in 1933.

The melody derives from the same Romanian folksong which inspired Smetana when he composed Moldau.

Interestingly, while the song was always the national anthem of Israel, this was explicitly enacted only in 2004. The song in its present form is a slightly modified and shortened version of the original.

A German colleague who once happened to be visiting Israel during the week of Yom Hashoah-Yom Hazikaron-Independence Day pointed told me the Israeli national anthem is the only national anthem he's aware of which is a sad song: mostly they tend to be triumphant or martial or both.

כָּל עוֹד בַּלֵּבָב פְּנִימָה
נֶפֶשׁ יְהוּדִי הוֹמִיָּה
וּלְפַאֲתֵי מִזְרָח, קָדִימָה
עַיִן לְצִיּוֹן צוֹפִיָּה -

עוֹד לֹא אָבְדָה תִּקְוָתֵנוּ
הַתִּקְוָה בַּת שְׁנוֹת אַלְפַּיִם
לִהְיוֹת עַם חָפְשִׁי בְּאַרְצֵנוּ
אֶרֶץ צִיּוֹן וִירוּשָׁלַיִם

As long as deep within the heart
A Jewish soul stirs,
And forward, to the ends of the East
An eye looks out, towards Zion.

Our hope is not yet lost,
The hope of two thousand years,
To be a free people in our land
The land of Zion and Jerusalem

Here's a recording without words, and a recording sung by Rivka Zohar.

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Mother of all Shirim

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Elie Wiesel on Jerusalem

Elie Wiesel on Jerusalem

CiFWatch recently alerted me to this story, about some British officials who banned an advertisement encouraging tourists to visit Israel because it carried a picture of the Western Wall, which is apparently not in Israel. (Funny: I was there earlier this morning, and no-one asked me for a passport.)

(Of course, these days no-one can travel from the UK, so perhaps it's a good thing the ad isn't running).

Someday I ought to write about where the contortions of the Lawfare folks and their supporters are taking them. A publication in what used to be a Christian society denying Jews the right to identify themselves with the single most important place in their world: this actually isn't really a new phenomenon, is it now?

I mention this in the context of the full-page ad Elie Wiesel just published in various important American newspapers, calling on everyone (or mostly: on a specific few, powerful ones) to keep in mind that Jerusalem isn't just any old place:

Its presence In Jewish history is overwhelming. There is no more moving prayer in Jewish history than the one expressing our yearning to return to Jerusalem. To many theologians, it IS Jewish history, to many poets, a source of inspiration. It belongs to the Jewish people and is much more than a city, it is what binds one Jew to another in a way that remains hard to explain. When a Jew visits Jerusalem for the first time, it is not the first time it is a homecoming. The first song I heard was my mother's lullaby about and for Jerusalem. Its sadness and its its joy are part of our collective memory.

Simply saying it as it is has become something that calls for expensive ads in important newspapers. Elie Wiesel is probably the most important moral voice in American Jewry; it remains to be seen if saying the obvious will enhance his stature or reduce it. That will be a moral test for America's Jews.

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Elie Wiesel on Jerusalem

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Don't Divide Jerusalem

Don't Divide Jerusalem

Just about everyone who makes utterances on the topic assures everyone else that an essential part of reaching peace between Israel and Palestine must include the division of Jerusalem.

I am convinced a division of Jerusalem will lead to war, for reasons I have described elsewhere. Yet no matter how optimistic or starry eyed one chooses to be, decision makers have the responsibility to prepare for negative outcomes of their actions. Telling yourself everything will work out fine is OK for a story-teller, a rejected lover, or investment bankers. Political leaders must relate to the possibility their actions might not have the hoped-for result. Dividers of Jerusalem are welcome to hope for the best, but must also prepare for less than the best. They must explain what will happen if their rosier expectations prove misguided. Put more bluntly, they must explain what will happen if the line of division deteriorates into a hostile border.

In this new series of blogposts it is my intention to show pictures and short films from the city, demonstrating what it looks like right now, with a call to explain what will happen if that hostile border is inserted into it.

Here are two films from the area of the Jaffa Gate.

Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations: Don't Divide Jerusalem

Love of the Land: From Nataf to J'lem

From Nataf to J'lem

It's hypocritical that Jewish Sheikh Jarrah protesters retire to homes built on former Arab land.


Seth Frantzman
Terra Incognita/JPost
13 April '10

On January 22 the weekly leftist and Arab protesters in Sheikh Jarrah were joined by a number of Israeli Jewish notables, including former Knesset speaker Avraham Burg and one-time education minister Yossi Sarid.

They were protesting against Jewish settlers moving into Jewish houses whose residents had been forced to flee in 1948, when they ended up on the Jordanian side of the border.

On March 7, Burg explained his feelings in an op-ed, “Once justice dwelled here. Now the settlers do, murderers of the nation’s soul... We shall not be silent when Ahmed and Aysha are sleeping in the street outside their home.” For him the protesters were the “people of integrity.” Jews must “leave Sheikh Jarrah now!”

Another celebrity activist in the struggle in Sheikh Jarrah is Sahar Vardi, daughter of Dr. Amiel Vardi of the Hebrew University. Sahar, who refused to do her army service, claimed in an interview that it is “unconscionable for me to live in my home in the German Colony and study whatever I like” when Arabs are being evicted from homes in east Jerusalem.

In late March another Sheikh Jarrah Jewish activist named Michael Solsberry was arrested at his home in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Pisgat Ze’ev.

There is a common stream that runs through those who are active against the occupation. Many are from leading families, come from a wealthy background and live in the most expensive neighborhoods. Nothing in itself is wrong with this, except when one considers what they demand of others. While they claim to be at the forefront of human rights, their activism obscures a darker truth. They believe it is acceptable to live where they want without being protested against, but deny that others might live in certain areas they deem to be off limits.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: From Nataf to J'lem

Love of the Land: A Dangerous Silence

A Dangerous Silence

Edward I. Koch
Yonkers Tribune
12 April '10

I weep as I witness outrageous verbal attacks on Israel. What makes these verbal assaults and distortions all the more painful is that they are being orchestrated by President Obama.

For me, the situation today recalls what occurred in 70 AD when the Roman emperor Vespasian launched a military campaign against the Jewish nation and its ancient capital of Jerusalem. Ultimately, Masada, a rock plateau in the Judean desert became the last refuge of the Jewish people against the Roman onslaught. I have been to Jerusalem and Masada. From the top of Masada, you can still see the remains of the Roman fortifications and garrisons, and the stones and earth of the Roman siege ramp that was used to reach Masada. The Jews of Masada committed suicide rather than let themselves be taken captive by the Romans.

In Rome itself, I have seen the Arch of Titus with the sculpture showing enslaved Jews and the treasures of the Jewish Temple of Solomon with the Menorah, the symbol of the Jewish state, being carted away as booty during the sacking of Jerusalem.

Oh, you may say, that is a far fetched analogy. Please hear me out.

The most recent sacking of the old city of Jerusalem – its Jewish quarter – took place under the Jordanians in 1948 in the first war between the Jews and the Arabs, with at least five Muslim states – Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Iraq – seeking to destroy the Jewish state. At that time, Jordan conquered East Jerusalem and the West Bank and expelled every Jew living in the Jewish quarter of the old city, destroying every building, including the synagogues in the old quarter and expelling from every part of Judea and Samaria every Jew living there so that for the first time in thousands of years, the old walled city of Jerusalem and the adjacent West Bank were "Judenrein" -- a term used by the Nazis to indicate the forced removal or murder of all Jews..

Jews had lived for centuries in Hebron, the city where Abraham, the first Jew, pitched his tent and where he now lies buried, it is believed, in a tomb with his wife, Sarah, as well as other ancient Jewish patriarchs and matriarchs. I have visited that tomb and at the time asked an Israeli soldier guarding it – so that it was open to all pilgrims, Christians, Muslims and Jews -- “where is the seventh step leading to the tomb of Abraham and Sarah,” which was the furthest entry for Jews when the Muslims were the authority controlling the holy place? He replied, “When we retook and reunited the whole city of Jerusalem and conquered the West Bank in 1967, we removed the steps, so now everyone can enter,” whereas when Muslims were in charge of the tomb, no Jew could enter it. And I did.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: A Dangerous Silence