Rick's Café American

Thursday, 4 June 2009

UNIVERSAL TORAH: BEHA'ALOSCHA

By Rabbi Avraham Greenbaum

Torah Reading: Numbers 8:1-12:16
Haftara: Zechariah 2:14-4:7

* * *

After the dedication of the Sanctuary -- the portable Temple and repository of the Torah -- the Children of Israel were almost ready to start the journey to the Land of Israel. The purpose was to fulfill the mission of Abraham, the founding father: to take the Ark of the Covenant up to Jerusalem so that the light of the Torah would shine from Mount Moriah to the entire world.

The opening sections of BEHA'ALOSCHA set forth some final details relating to the Sanctuary and its services (the lighting of the Menorah, the inauguration of the Levites and their service, the law of the Second Pesach). The Torah then relates the miraculous Divine providence visible in the encampment and journeyings of the Children of Israel in the wilderness. The sections dealing with the Sanctuary conclude with the command to Moses to make trumpets, after which the Torah relates the Children of Israel's momentous first journey from Sinai towards the Promised Land.

* * *

UNTIL THE FLAME GOES UP BY ITSELF

Rashi explains the thematic connection between the opening verses of BEHA'ALOSCHA, about the Menorah, and the concluding section of last week's parshah of NASO:

"When Aaron saw the dedication offering of the Princes of the Tribes, he became demoralized because neither he nor his tribe was with them. The Holy One blessed be He said to him: By your life, yours is greater than theirs, because you kindle and tend the lights" (Rashi on the opening verse of our Parshah).

The Consecration of the Sanctuary and the offerings of the Princes were events of cosmic significance containing the keys of creation -- but they were one-time events. The service of Aaron and his tribe were daily.

The service of the Priest (Aaron, Chessed) is to light the Menorah. Each one of us is the Priest in charge of the lighting of our own Candelabrum: allowing the light of DA'AS, the understanding of G-d, to shine out from its source, in the Sanctuary, before the Holy of Holies, into our souls, minds and hearts. But how can we attain DA'AS?: "An amazing wonder is DA'AS, it is exalted far above me, I cannot reach it" (Psalms 139:6). How can a human being possibly attain the light of DA'AS, knowledge of the Infinite G-d? This is the work of the priest, whose task is to tend the lights and kindle them.

Rabbi Nachman explains that the lights of the Candelabrum that each one of us, as priest, must tend, are the seven lamps of the face: the two eyes, two ears, two nostrils and the mouth. We tend the eyes by not looking on evil (i.e. by not gazing at and lingering over evil temptations, and by seeing not the bad everywhere but the good). We tend the ears by heeding the words of the wise and their reproof. We tend the nostrils by breathing into ourselves the fear and awe of G-d, knowing that our very lives depend upon Him. We tend the mouth by not speaking falsehood -- EVIL SPEECH.

The priest must light the lamps "until the flame goes up by itself". Rabbi Nachman explains that when we do our work of tending the lamps, as detailed above, DA'AS will come upon us of itself, and we will be able to understand things that we could not understand before. DA'AS is obviously a spiritual understanding which we may not even be able to put into words. Spiritual understanding is metaphorically called "light", and "shines" in the form of "Seven Clouds of Glory" (i.e. from all directions). These are a surrounding canopy of holiness. From this canopy -- dark in relation to its Infinite Source, but a protective cloud radiating light to the camp below) shines the light of DAAS. The way to attain this light is by tending the lamps of the Menorah, as above. (Likutey Moharan I:21).

* * *

THE LABOR OF THE LEVITES

After the account of the daily service of the Priest (CHESSED) in each one of us, we come to the inauguration of the Levites (GEVURAH) and their service: the guarding of the Sanctuary/Temple and singing during the sacrificial services.

In the Generation of the Wilderness, the Levites carried the parts of the portable Sanctuary on the journeys. The highest service was that of carrying the golden Ark of the Covenant through the wilderness until it would reach its place in the Holy of Holies in Jerusalem. From there the light of the Torah would shine to all the world.

It is said of the carrying of the Ark of the Covenant that, while its bearers were apparently carrying it, in truth it was carrying its bearers. However, this was a one-time service of the Levites in the Generation of Wilderness. After the entry into the Land of Israel, the essential service of the Levites that remained for all times was that of singing during the Temple services.

Why does this require GEVURAH? It may seem that singing is a simple, pleasant task that should be associated with CHESSED. Yet we see with our own eyes how hard it is to sing. It's not the singing itself that is so hard: in fact, once you start, like the Ark of the Covenant, which carried its bearers, the song carries you. What is hard is to START singing.

This is sadly apparent in today's MIKDASH ME'AT, the "portable Temple" that should be the Sanctuary of the Children of Israel in all their habitations, the BEIS HAKNESSES, the House of Gathering of the Children of Israel -- the SYNAGOGUE. There are some in which a good (or bad) Chazan is paid to sing, and occasionally a choir, and this may be inspiring. In many, however, there is an embarrassed prayer leader and a heavy congregation reluctant to get any form of SINGING.

It is this heavy, depressed reluctance to start singing (people start looking at their watches) that must be overcome with GEVURAH, forcing ourselves to sing. The act of "force" need not be brutish. Often all that is needed is just starting to lightly hum the NIGUN (melody), then keep going until the grace and beauty of the melody itself takes over, and the Ark of the Covenant carries its bearers.

The commandment of the Service of the Levites completes the account of the Sanctuary indicating the supreme importance of song in the Temple/Synagogue Service. Singing in prayer is a unique human ability that even the angels wait to hear. It is the crowning moment of the Service. We may want to hurry the prayers so we can get away from the Synagogue, but instead we "slaughter the animal", "sacrifice ourselves" and stand there singing instead. The song is made up of air, RU'ACH, spirit. The song is GEVURAH, sifting the animal RU'ACH, the side that wants to run away and occupy ourselves with the secular world, from the uniquely human RU'ACH -- the air of our songs. This air or RU'ACH is the vessel through which the even higher faculty of DA'AT is able to enter and dwell, and then everything is complete: the Meat is on the Table (the sacrifice), the Lights are kindled (the Menorah) and the Choir are singing.

* * *

THE SECOND PESACH

"The Second Pesach" has two senses in connection with our parshah. In the first sense, so far there had only been one Pesach: the night of the Exodus from Egypt. The celebration of the one-time Second Pesach, a year later, free in the Wilderness, recipients of the Torah, with the Sanctuary newly erected, was itself an event. It showed that the Exodus, as the foundational event of the People, was henceforth to be institutionalized as an annual experience with the slaughter of the lamb on Passover.

The sacrifice could only be offered by those in a state of ritual purity. So central to the attachment of the Individual to the Nation is this annual sacrifice (failure to bring the sacrifice makes one liable to excision) that some provision had to be made for those who were unable to bring it in its proper time on 14 Nissan. This might be because they were far away and unable to reach thTemple, or because of defilement for any one of a number of naturally recurrent reasons (contact with the dead, menstrual impurity, etc.) Accordingly they were given a "second chance" on the annual PESACH SHENI, Second Pesach (in the second sense of the term!) institutionalized now in Torah law.

The Torah narrates in our Parshah how this vital national law, integral to the annual functioning of the Temple as the central focus of the Children of Israel, came to be revealed because when G-d commanded them in the wilderness to observe the one-time "Second Pesach" on 14 Nissan, one year after the Exodus, a number of people in the camp were ritually impure.

Knowing there was no way they could participate in the celebration of this awesome one-time event -- institutionalizing for all time the annual celebration of the anniversary of the Exodus with the eating of the Paschal Lamb, they felt they had LOST OUT. They felt denied this central act of communion with fellows because of extraneous natural reasons: they had to attend to the dead.

"Why should we be worse off, not to be able to offer the sacrifice of HaShem in its appointed time among the Children of Israel" (Numbers 9:7). (The offering of the Paschal Lamb in the Sanctuary Temple was accompanied by the full Levitical choir and orchestra singing the Hallel, an awesome experience.)

"Why should we be worse off?" There was no way that they could offer the Sacrifice but they longed to be able to. It was their longing that elicited the commandment of Pesach Sheni, the annual "Second Pesach" that gave a SECOND CHANCE to those who lost out the first time -- a tremendous act of love and compassion.

Longing and yearning elicits love and compassion. It is our longing for the Second Pesach, the Pesach of GEULAH, when we too, now impure through contact with the dead etc., will have a SECOND CHANCE and won't have to feel we lost out because we didn't experience the Pesach in Jerusalem.

* * *

THE CLOUDS OF GLORY and MOSES' TRUMPETS

As indicated above, the Clouds of Glory constitute an exalted state of consciousness in which a high DA'AS, knowledge of G-d, dwells, because we seek to sanctify ourselves and order our lives in the proper order (the Israelite camp). With DA'AS one can understand that everything that happens is under G-d's control: there are times when you stay still for different periods, times when you have to venture and journey for different periods.

We may wonder when we will come to the end of the journey through the wilderness? When will we reach the Promised Land? We know when the Generation of the Wilderness reached the Promised Land, but when will OUR generation get there? When will we see the Ingathering of the Faithful to the Holy Temple on Mount Moriah, from which the Torah will shine to the world? When will WE sing the Hallel in Jerusalem?

The answer is given in our parshah, in the commandment given to Moses: "Make for yourself two trumpets of silver." (Numbers 10:2).

Moses is the central NESHAMAH, the root soul of all the Children of Israel. Moses, who brings the TORAH to Israel, must be in command. In his hand are the trumpets to summon the Children of Israel and their leaders together. In addition, in the Temple, the Priests had trumpets which were sounded.

One of the occasions for sounding these Trumpets of Moses -- Trumpeting the TORAH of Moses -- is in times of war. "When you come to war in your land against the enemy oppressing you [such as now], and you shall BLAST ON THE TRUMPETS [the trumpets of the Torah of Moses] and you will be remembered before the Lord your G-d and you will be saved from your enemies" (Numbers 10:9). The verse speaks of war in the land against THE enemy. Asks the Midrash: "Who is THE enemy? This is in the war of Gog and Magog, after which there will no longer be any enslavement to the nations" (Sifrey).

It is in this war against Gog and Magog that we will be remembered before G-d when we hear the blast of the Trumpet of Moses, making us remember the Torah of Sinai.

* * *

THE JOURNEY THROUGH THE WILDERNESS

The Torah account of the one-time journey of the Generation of the Wilderness is a paradigm of the entire history of the Children of Israel. Before we arrive at the trials and tribulations, the Torah sets forth the ideal form in which the Children of Israel advance through history, organized into tribes and families travelling in formation.

As the Children of Israel set off on their journey from their historical place of encampment at Sinai, where the Torah came into the world, Moses (root soul of the Children of Israel, HEVEL or ABEL) makes his eloquent appeal to Jethro, the archetypal GER TZEDEK, Righteous Proselyte (KAYIN or CAIN) to link and journey together (reconciled brothers: TIKUN).

Only when the Jew and the Righteous Gentile link together on this journey through time can the Torah dwell in the Promised Land and shine forth from Mount Moriah. [Yael, righteous proselyte wife of Hever HaKeini, Jethro's descendent, delivered Israel from Sisera; Ruth (same letters as Jethro) was the great grandmother of David, who made the Torah rule in Israel. Shmayah and Avtalion, Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Meir and many other important Israelites were from families of proselytes. Sometimes the proselytes shames the Israelite, because the proselyte exposes his weaknesses, having become tired after years on the road, while the proselyte is fresh with the clear vision of the beginning, the Exodus, which we have to re-experience each year at Pesach.

* * *

THE INVERTED NUNN'S

"And it was with the travelling of the Ark, and Moses said: Arise HaShem and let your enemies be scattered and those who hate you will flee from before you. And with its resting, he will say: Return HaShem to the tens of thousands of thousands of Israel" (Numbers 10:35-6).

In the Torah scroll, these two verses, the opening verses of the sixth Aliyah, are preceded and followed by an inverted letter NUNN. The two verses are thus set off apart, as a separate entity. (A scroll with 85 letters, corresponding to the number of letters in this parshah, halachically has the same status as a Torah scroll and must be treated with the proper respect.) The two verses are of central importance in the entire Torah. It is when Moses stands up, blasting forth the TORAH OF HASHEM, that G-d's providence is shown in scattering the enemies of Israel and returning His indwelling Presence to the longing and yearning thousands and thousands.

The rabbis taught that although we normally speak of the Five Books of Moses, there are really Seven, because these two verses constitute a separate book by themselves. The two verses divide the Book Numbers into all that came before and all that comes afterwards. What came before is one book. What will come afterwards is another. And these two verses are a book in themselves, making Seven Books of the Torah. These are the Seven Clouds of Glory that accompany us on all our journeys, shining the light of DA'AS to us at all times.

Why was it necessary to make a separation between all of the book of Numbers that came before these two verses and all that comes afterwards? With the census of the people, erection of the Sanctuary and the ordering of the Camp of the Israelites in its proper order, the entire Order of Creation in its ideal form was complete.

From now on, the task was to actually take the Torah up to Zion. To go on the journey. Actually implementing and adhering to the Torah day to day on the arduous journey of life, amidst all the trials of the wilderness is an entirely different story.

The two verses separate between the Ideal and the Actual. One of the two verses speaks about a state of war. The other speaks about a state of peace. In each case it is Moses who must speak, to bring the Divine Presence upon Israel. "And Moses said.. And he will say."

* * *

THE SCHOOLBOY RUNS AWAY

The rabbis said that they left Sinai like a schoolboy running from school (or like worshippers after the service). There is a side that simply rebels against the discipline of Torah and Mitzvos, the same dry diet of words and letters on a scroll, songs, prayers amore prayers, day after day. "MANNA". Spiritual sustenance. Great! But what about some Coke?

As soon as the real, actual hardship of the wilderness become apparent during the first three days of the journey, the first complaints began to be heard about FLESH. Man is made of two sides, the Spiritual and the Physical: that is his entire challenge in life. Dinning out the Trumpets of Moses, Trumpets of the Torah, are the cries of our appetites and desires for physical comforts and pleasures like in Egypt, where they come HINNOM, "free" (free of the burdens of Torah and mitzvos, see Rashi on Numbers 11:5).

The admixture of yeast in the dough, the ERUV RAV ("Mixed Multitude", the opposite of the Righteous Proselyte, the fallen HEVEL, Bilaam) raise their voices in LOSHON HORA, evil speech, about the dull, boring diet: the Manna. The source of all evil lies in evil speech. [Thus today, in the time of exile in the war of Gog and Magog, aspersions are cast upon the Diet of Moses, Manna, Torah, and upon Moses himself, in the form of the true Talmidey Chachamim, who are considered to smell putrid in the time of Mashiach. The aspersions are cast by the ERUV RAV, those who lust for the material world and those led astray by them.]

Moses could not take it. If his voice was not going to be heard, what was the point of living?

The only solution was to spread the spirit of Moses around among the people, kindling from Moses' MENORAH of Prophecy and lighting up 70 other Prophets, making a Sanhedrin of 70 Elders with Moses, the root of the Tree, at the Center: the King. These would bring the prophetic spirit back to the people.

When Moses is King, order is restored, DA'AS reigns, and we learn that material lust is from the side of death and must be buried. That first stop on the journey through the wilderness was named "The Graves of Lust" -- "for that is where they buried the people who had the lust" (Numbers 11:35). It is necessary to overthrow the ERUV RAV and to make Moses the king.

* * *

THE UNIQUENESS OF MOSES

Our parshah contains G-d's own testimony about the uniqueness of "My servant Moses, who is faithful in all My House." (Numbers 12:7). This too was occasioned by a one-time event, a nearly fatal sin of LASHON HARA that is to be inscribed daily in our memories: "Remember what the L-rd your G-d did to Miriam on the road when you went out of Egypt" (Deuteronomy 24:9). Miriam criticized Moses.

Even the saintliest are human. Sometimes even they may be tempted to cover over and disguise their own faint residue of pride under a veneer of piety. "Why is he any different?"

Only Moses is beyond all pride. "And the man Moses was very humble more than all man on the face of the earth" (Numbers 12:3).

Evil speech kills. The punishment is "death" -- leprosy, the withdrawal of life and vitality from the flesh.

Only Moses can bring healing. "G-d, please, heal -- please -- her". The voice of Moses must be heard.

Shabbat Shalom!!!

Avraham Yehoshua Greenbaum

--
AZAMRA INSTITUTE
PO Box 50037 Jerusalem 91500 Israel
Website: www.azamra.org

WELCOME TO SAUDI ARABIA, INFIDELS !!

Welcome to Saudi Arabia , infidels !!

I wonder which lane Mr Obama will be driving in ?!!.

(Thanks to Nikon-Man for posting this)

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The 'Palestinian' love affair with Obama

The Jerusalem Post's Khaled Abu Toameh reports that the 'Palestinian Authority' is just tickled pink with the Obama White House.

"For the first time in many years, we are hearing different voices coming out of the White House," said a senior aide to Abbas. "We hope that the US administration will follow up on its statements with deeds on the ground."

Asked what he meant by "deeds on the ground," the official explained: "Everyone knows that the US is the only country in the world that can impose its will on Israel. Obama has the means and power to force Israel to withdraw to the 1967 borders, including Jerusalem, and to dismantle all the Jewish settlements."
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WAGING WAR WITH CARE

Waging War With Care

Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal, the newly appointed commander of American forces in Afghanistan, has told senators his forces will have to be more careful so as to reduce the numbers of civilians being killed in American actions.

As I've said in the past, I'm mostly a supporter of the American war against the Islamists; however, I'm weary of the double standard whereby Israel is required to maintain a level of care towards non-combatants that no-one else would even dream of aiming at, and is routinely damned for not being successful enough, where others are either not noticed at all, or eventualy mildly tutt-tutted at.

In which context, it was interesting to watch this BBC interview from last January, during the Gaza operation. It's with Richard Kemp, a retired British army Colonel who commanded troops in Afghanistan a few years ago. Kemp notes that Israel is more careful than any army in the history of warfare; however, when he offers the BBC lady to elaborate, she declines to listen and instead explains how bad the Israelis are being.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WssrKJ3Iqcw
(For some reason I wasn't able to embed the interview. Anyway, thanx for the tip, Vic).

taken from : Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations

More on Settlements

Well, I certainly got an unusual amount of flak for yesterday's post, in comments and in e-mails. You need to remember, folks, that I'm an avowed centrist - which means that sooner or later I'll aggravate you on something, no matter where you're positioned. Remember, you can always cancel your subscription, much as this will grieve me.

To be honest, today's NYT even has an article that seems to bolster the reservations many of you have. It's title: Arab States Cool to Obama's Pleas for Peace Gesture. What, say the Arabs quoted in the article, us? Who could possibly expect us to budge an inch before Israel accepts and carries out all our non-negotiable demands? Why, the very fact we're willing to countenance some sort of State of Israel means we've already walked all the conceivable miles!

I stand by my position. Remember, I never said this Israeli action or that is blocking peace; the ongoing Palestinian refusal to accept Israel on remotely acceptable terms does that. Rather, I said that since peace isn't in the offing, Israel needs to manage the conflict as intelligently as possible, and this means maintaining the support of its core allies, in this order:
1. A large majority of Israelis
2. The President of the United States, no matter who he is, or she.
3. America's Jews
4. The general American public
5. Decision makers in Europe
6. The editorial board of the Guardian (oops).
Since Netanyahu's present line is undermining the support of every single group on the list, it's a bad idea. It's also not clear what he expects to gain.

There's a second major problem with allowing the focus to be on "the settlements", and that is the lumping together of them all as one monolithic "problem". A more nuanced approach would dissect the cliché into real components'.

1. The outposts. These have all been set up this decade, most are tiny (two shacks and a generator), and they're all outside the security barrier in areas a majority of Israelis have accepted will be Palestinian some day. They really should all be disbanded as soon as possible, since their sole justification is to aggravate. Including Migron, the largest of them, which is a real settlement, built apparently on someone else's private land.
2. The settlements outside the barrier. Some have been there for a long time, and some aren't so small. Personally, I'd have dismantled them long ago, too, because the cost of maintaining them is high, and what for? Everyone knows they'll eventually either be dismantled or will remain in Palestinian territory which will amount to the same thing. I recognize some of you really are considering cancelling your subscriptions at this stage, but I do think on your way out you ought to take note that my position is that of a solid majority of Israelis, and has been for many years, probably since the 1980s at latest.
3. The large settlements near the Green line; in some cases, within a mile or two of it. This is where something like 80% of the settlers live, and I don't see how anyone will ever uproot and move them. Assuming some future Palestinian government will be willing and able to deliver peace (not obvious), my preference would be to swap land for the territories these settlements sit on. Um el-Fahm and all the other Israeli Arab towns along the Green line would make sense (ah, I see some of you are coming back but others are now in an uproar. Heh). If peace is to be achieved by partitioning this tiny land sort of along ethnic lines, then let's really try to do that.
4. Jerusalem. The more Netanyahu insists all settlements are inviolate, the more Jerusalem will be lumped in with Tapuach; about as unintelligent a policy as I can imagine. Better to embrace the distinctions and emphasize them. Doing so would give Obama the parts we can easily afford to give, while allowing him to accept that construction in Jerusalem has nothing to do with construction in Migron. Why, managing the issue intelligently might even enable the Americans to explain to themselves why they have no problem with ongoing construction in, say Upper Modi'in (pop 70,000, right outside the Green line).

taken from : Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations

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UNIVERSAL TORAH: NASO

UNIVERSAL TORAH: NASO

By Rabbi Avraham Greenbaum

Torah Reading: Numbers 4:21-7:89
Haftara: Judges 13:2-25

THE LONGEST PARSHAH

Parshas NASO, with 176 verses, is the longest parshah in the whole Torah, and the Midrashic commentaries, particularly the aggadic Midrash Rabbah, are also exceptionally lengthy. It is fitting that this parshah is usually read on the Shabbos after the festival of Shavuos celebrating the Giving of the Torah, when our love of the Torah is renewed and we receive new vigor and energy to devote ourselves to our studies. We are now enjoying the longest days of the year, and the long Summer Shabbos should give us plenty of time to explore the beautiful mysteries of this Parshah.

* * *

NO "BEFORE" AND "AFTER" IN THE TORAH

As noted in a number of previous commentaries, the sequence of parshahs and sections in the Torah is not always chronological, and Parshas NASO is one of the prime cases.

The opening of our parshah, dealing with the census of the Levitical families, is a direct continuation of the previous parshah, BAMIDBAR, the closing section of which started the narrative of the Levitical census. The command to Moses to conduct the census of the people was given "on the first day of the SECOND month" of the year after the Exodus (Numbers 1:1) and Moses did so forthwith. After completion in parshas NASO of the account of the census, the Torah JUMPS BACK chronologically to the first day of the FIRST month of the year after the Exodus -- the day of the inauguration of the Sanctuary.

The chronological jump is not obvious immediately. However, the section after the Levitical census deals with commandments that relate to the newly inaugurated sanctuary: sending the ritually impure out of the camp, the sacrifices of the SOTAH (the wife suspected of infidelity), and the NAZIR (who vows not to drink wine, cut his/her hair or become defiled by the dead), the priestly blessing (which was given in the courtyard outside the Sanctuary, and was instituted by Aaron on the day of its inauguration). The lengthy closing section of NASO narrates in detail the dedications and sacrificial offerings of all the Princes of the Twelve Tribes of Israel on the twelve inaugural days of the Sanctuary, starting on the 1st Nissan. Although the date is not written explicitly in our parshah, it says: "It was on the day of the completion by Moses of the erection of the Sanctuary." (Numbers 7:1). We are already familiar with this most auspicious day from our studies in Exodus and Leviticus.

The Torah continues dwelling on 1st Nissan and associated themes into the following parshah, BEHA'ALOSCHA, and there the date is given explicitly: "And G-d spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai in the second year after their going out from the Land of Egypt IN THE FIRST MONTH" (Numbers 9:1). Rashi (ad loc.) tells us that this verse indeed is the written proof that there is no "before" and "after" in the Torah.

In other words, the various parshahs and sections of the Torah are not necessarily arranged in chronological sequence but thematically. This indicates that adjacent passages in the Torah whose subjects may not on the surface appear to be interconnected do in fact have profound interconnections. This gives rise to the rabbinic method of interpreting passages in the Torah according to their SEMICHUS, "proximity" to one another. Our parshah contains a case in point in the rabbinic comment on why the section about the NAZIR, who vows to abstain from wine, comes directly after that about the SOTAH, the unfaithful wife. "Everybody who sees the damage done by and to the Sotah will want to abstain from wine, which is what brings to fornication" (Rashi on Numbers 6:2).

* * *

THE GIVING OF THE TORAH AND INAUGURATION OF THE SANCTUARY

As noted earlier, NASO is always read on the Shabbos after Shavuos, anniversary of the Giving of the Torah. Clearly there is a deep link between the Giving of the Torah and the Inauguration of the Sanctuary/Temple and its associated commandments, which is the theme of the greater part of NASO. On this, one of the longest Shabboses at the height of summer, when the world is in full bloom around us, the Torah keeps our minds focussed on the 1st of Nissan, the "New Year", time of rebirth, the day of the Consecration of the Sanctuary.

On the day the Sanctuary was consecrated, the Torah descended from Sinai with its awe, thunder, lightning and earthquakes and was brought in the golden Ark of the Covenant, under the wings of the Cherubs, into the ultimate serene tranquillity of the Holy of Holies. This was the vision of Jacob, the founding father who built the House of Israel: that the Torah should come down from its lofty heights and dwell inside the Sanctuary -- not only in the actual, external Sanctuary, but in the home of every Israelite and the heart of every Israelite. When we bring the Torah into our homes and our hearts, it becomes the vessel of peace and blessing that radiates light all around us, just as the blessing of the priests radiates from the Sanctuary (and today, during the priestly blessing in the synagogue, from before the Ark, housing the Torah scrolls): "May the Lord bless you and keep you.". For the study of Torah itself confers blessing. For the entire Torah is woven of the names of G-d, and "in every place where I shall cause My name to be mentioned I will come to you and bless you" (Exodus 20:21).

* * *

IN THE HOME AND IN THE HEART

At the center of parshas NASO are two lengthy sections that bring the Torah of the Sanctuary directly into our very homes and hearts: these are the sections dealing with the laws of the SOTAH, the wife suspected of infidelity, and the NAZIR, who vows to abstain from wine, cutting his/her hair and defilement from the dead.

At the very center of the true Torah home is the love between husband and wife, which is the very foundation of the BINYAN -- the "building" or structure of the family. True love between husband and wife is very jealous: true love brooks no outsiders and third parties. The unity of husband and wife must be complete, face to face, without a trace of a shadow in between.

It is hard even to speak of the purity of love between husband and wife in a world in which third parties are accepted as a normal part of life. It is this rampant immorality that breeds broken homes, broken hearts, children who grow up between one home and another, knowing little or nothing of family, roots and kinship.

Completely opposite is the morality emanating from the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy Sanctuary: "This is the Torah of the Sotah." Strange as it may seem ithe context of contemporary (im)morality, the ceremony of the Sotah, the wife suspected of marital infidelity, one of the most awesome rituals of the Temple, is intended as a bulwark of family purity.

In normal everyday life husbands and wives are constantly coming into contact with all kinds of other people in various different contexts, and it is only natural that relationships can form even in societies that are sexually segregated (as in Temple times) let alone in contemporary mixed society.

The Sotah ritual -- administering the bitter waters to the wife even as she protests her innocence in the face of suspicions of infidelity -- was intentionally very frightening to the woman involved and to all who saw it. Here we see the Temple, where the ritual would take place, as a kind of theatre where a spectacle is held up to the entire nation in order to teach a deep lesson.

The bitter waters are the truth-tester of the Torah (quite different from lie-detectors). Mixed with the water was earth from the floor of the Sanctuary (archetype of the Israelite home as it should be) and the dissolved ink of the letters of Torah verses and curses written on the scroll of the Sotah, including the holy name of G-d. What is the truth? Did she or didn't she? Is she lying or is she telling the truth?

The actual Sotah test in Temple times only works when the husband himself is absolutely beyond reproach on any level in all of the commandments relating to sexuality -- the foundation of the Covenant. On such an ideal level of purity, love is fierce and love is jealous. Suspicions may arise. The holy waters of the Sotah can dispel them. For this it is worth dissolving and washing off even the holy name of G-d: to make peace between man and his wife, or to make them separate.

Today, in the absence of the Temple, the Sotah waters take on a different significance, more allegorical. In actual life, without ideal levels of purity, suspicions and strange thoughts do often creep into the best of relationships. It is not infrequently through the bitter waters of suffering that the truth really comes out, one way or the other. And when the bitter waters prove that there was never any disloyalty at all, the resulting rebirth of love and vigor brings new, stronger children into the world, strengthening the home with the joyous mother of children at its center.

[In the Midrash, the Sotah is the Jewish nation, suspected of infidelity to G-d because of their dalliance with the nations, tested by the bitter waters of suffering.]

* * *

THE NAZIRITE

The Hebrew word NAZIR is today used for a monk, but the Torah has no place for such celibacy, and only the prophet Moses and certain true Tzaddikim were permitted to separate themselves from "the way of the world". The Torah NAZIR was not one who separated himself from the world as a recluse from normal life. (On the contrary, the laws of NAZIR are bound up with family life: a man may make his son a NAZIR, he may invite his wife to take the vow of NAZIR, nullify her vow, etc.) The Nazirite vow is one that would in Temple times be taken on by a regular, normal person who did not want to separate himself from the entire world but did want to set extra limits on his own behavior over and above what the Torah requires of everyone.

Following on from the above-quoted Midrash -- "Everybody who sees the damage done by and to the Sotah will want to abstain from wine, which is what brings to fornication" -- the NAZIR living in the real world full of immorality wants to set for himself or herself extra personal boundaries against anything that may even lead to such immorality -- wine and anything connected with wine, and even fancy hairstyles! The Nazirite may not defile himself with the dead, for while death exposes the folly of worship of the body, fears of aging and death often drive people to seek out the pleasures of the body compulsively.

The section dealing with the NAZIR sets forth the detailed laws of the Nazirite vow, yet implies that taking on specific vows is not encouraged by the Torah. Among his sacrifices the Nazirite has to bring a sin-offering for abstaining from permitted pleasures, as if what the Torah itself prohibits is not enough. When we take on vows, sometimes the tests become overwhelming, and may cause us to break them unwittingly (like the Nazirite who becomes unwittingly defiled by contact with the dead.).

What the Torah wants from us is the true labor of the heart: commitment. A vow is an explicit verbal commitment that we make, creating a Torah of our own, something that goes beyond the letter of the law. It may be in the form of a personal boundary. It may be in the form of a specific commitment. Jacob, the founding father of Israel, builder of the home, was the first one to make a vow. At Mount Moriah, the Temple Mount where Jacob dreamed of the ladder (SULAM = SINAI = Giving of the Torah), he woke up and set up the Temple foundation and vowed to give a tithe of all he received to G-d. The Torah that came forth from the Sanctuary (Leviticus 1:1) begins with a vow -- that of a person who wants to offer a sacrifice in the Temple: "When a person would offer an offering" (Leviticus 1:2).

The Nazirite vow is much more demanding than a one-time sacrifice: it is a commitment to a very strict discipline -- complete abstinence from grapes and wine, no haircutting to emphasize the opposite of body-oriented immorality, etc. In the present day world in which we lead our lives, the actual Nazirite vow is not a practical possibility, but we certainly all know ways in which it is desirable to hedge ourselves in with personal boundaries that help separate ourselves from that which is negative and evil in this world of Good and Evil.

What is asked of us is to make our personal boundaries and adhere to them without expressing them in the form of specific vows. The danger of the vow is that during the initial enthusiasm in which in which it is made, we may not see prospective difficulties that could make it impossible to adhere to it. What is asked of us is not to tie ourselves up in verbal commitments that we cannot keep, but rather, to make an inner commitment -- the commitment of the heart -- to what we know to be good, and then do everything in our power to adhere to our commitment.

* * *

TWELVE STYLES

The concluding section of NASO deals with the sacrifices of the Twelve Princes on the twelve inaugural days of the Sanctuary. It is striking that these were one-time sacrifices, yet we read these portions of the Torah several times during the year: they are publicly read in the Synagogue during Chanukah, and in some Synagogues they are read from a Torah scroll on the first twelve days of Nissan.

In last week's commentary discussing the names of the Princes and numbers of the tribes of Israel in the Wilderness, I made reference to the fact that in the Hebrew Torah, all of these are ciphers, codes and letter-permutations that bring entire worlds upon worlds into being. The same is true of the portions dealing with the sacrifices of the Twelve Princes, each of whom brought identical offerings on twelve successive days.

One of the reasons why the Midrash Rabbah on NASO is so lengthy is because not only does it contain extensive drashos on the SOTAH and NAZIR, etc. It also contains very lengthy drashos showing that although each of the Twelve Princes brought identical offerings, in each case they had an entirely different meaning and intention, each wondrous, each amazing.

And so too each Israelite dons the same Tallis and Tefilin, abstains from the same forbidden labors on Shabbos, gives Tzedakah, does Chessed. But in each case the meaning and intention of each act is entirely different. The hidden intentions in the heart of each one. the hidden efforts.

And G-d has joy from them all. All are His children. All are members of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, the House of Jacob.

Shabbat Shalom!!! Chag Sameach!!!

Avraham Yehoshua Greenbaum

--
AZAMRA INSTITUTE
PO Box 50037 Jerusalem 91500 Israel
Website: www.azamra.org

Chesler Chronicles » The Arkansas Shooting as Islamic Jihad. How Will Obama Label the Attack?

According to my esteemed colleague Steven Emerson, (and as I noted yesterday), Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammed has been under investigation in an effort to understand his “possible contacts with extremists overseas.” Emerson believes that Muhammed probably attended “the (Al-Da’awah Center) madrassa in Dammaj, a tribal area of Yemen, run by a Salafi cleric named Yahya Hajuri.” Unbelievably, Hajuri is the designated heir to one Muqbil ibn Hadi, who once launched an attack on Mecca and a war against Christians in Indonesia.

Read All at :

Chesler Chronicles » The Arkansas Shooting as Islamic Jihad. How Will Obama Label the Attack?

DoubleTapper: IDF Music groups

DoubleTapper: Obama's Coming

Wednesday, 3 June 2009

Israel Matzav: Could Israel renege on the 'road map'?

Could Israel renege on the 'road map'?

President Obama dropped in on a meeting at the White House on Tuesday between Defense Minister Ehud Barak and National Security Adviser James Jones. Writing in the JPost, former far Left MK Naomi Chazan describes Obama's visit as 'particularly meaningful' coming just a few hours before Obama's departure to Riyadh. She believes that it was an attempt by Obama to show a 'balanced approach.' I believe it more likely that Obama dropped in to read Barak the riot act over Israel's defiance of his command to stop all building in the 'settlements,' including the eastern half of the City of Jerusalem. But Chazan's article raises an important point that deserves airing.

Read All at

Israel Matzav: Could Israel renege on the 'road map'?

Israel Matzav: American objections to Jerusalem hotel may deny 'Palestinians' economic opportunity

American objections to Jerusalem hotel may deny 'Palestinians' economic opportunity

Haaretz reported on Tuesday that the United States demanded that Israel stop construction (so said the headline) of a 200-room hotel and shopping center near the Rockefeller Museum (pictured) just outside the walls of Jerusalem's Old City.

Washington is furious over the Interior Ministry's anticipated approval of a plan to build a new hotel in East Jerusalem, just 100 meters from the Old City's walls. The plan, which would see the demolition of a wholesale market and kindergarten, is slated to be approved today.

In conversations with Israeli officials, senior American officials have made it clear that they want Israel to freeze all plans for expanding the Jewish presence in East Jerusalem, and especially in the Holy Basin - the area adjacent to the Old City
Read All at :

Israel Matzav: American objections to Jerusalem hotel may deny 'Palestinians' economic opportunity

THE AMERICAN MESSIAH TO THE MIDDLE EAST

The American Messiah to the Middle East...

Blogmaster's Opinion:

Regarding President Obama's Middle East Junket

by Bill Maniaci, 03 June 09

President Barack Hussein Obama, the American Messiah is on his way to the Middle East. He is likely to skip his traditional bow to his old friend, Saudi King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz, because of the bad press at home generated by his last ring-kissing episode.

Rest assured however, that his Muslim roots and prejudice will be abundantly clear as he throws Israel under the bus to impress his hosts and improve American relations with Arab countries. IMHO, his reception in Egypt may not be as enthusiastic as that in Saudi Arabia however as his visit will likely be met with violent demonstrations by hard-line radicals (a shower of shoes???…one can only hope).

In any event, pay attention to his hyperbole regarding his self-perceived influence over Israel. Now would be a good time for Israel to repugn this narcissistic interloping carpetbagger by publically denouncing his perfidious meddling in Israel’s internal affairs and the abrogation of previous understandings between Israel and the United States.

taken from :B'NAI ELIM (http://bnaielim.blogspot.com/)

OBAMA - NO YOU CAN'T

OBAMA - NO YOU CAN'T!

taken from : B'NAI ELIM (http://bnaielim.blogspot.com/)

Israel Matzav: Obama: 'If Hezbullah wins Lebanon's election, we might have to engage with them'

Israel Matzav: Likud hits back at Obama

Israel Matzav: Mitchell going to Syria?

Israel Matzav: Video: Obama don't tread on me

Israel Matzav: Obama: 'Iran has a right to nukes'

Obama: 'Iran has a right to nukes'

President Obama told the BBC on Tuesday that he believes that Iran has a 'right' to nuclear energy (Hat Tip: Gateway Pundit).

President Barack Obama suggested that Iran may have some right to nuclear energy _ provided it proves by the end of the year that its aspirations are peaceful.

In a BBC interview broadcast Tuesday, he also restated plans to pursue direct diplomacy with Tehran to encourage it set aside any ambitions for nuclear weapons it might harbor.
Read All at :

Israel Matzav: Obama: 'Iran has a right to nukes'

Israel Matzav: Obama's moral equivalence

Israel Matzav: What they mean by 'natural growth'

Israel Matzav: When 'trust me' isn't enough

Israel Matzav: Arabs feel the love from Obama except for... the 'Palestinians'?

Arabs feel the love from Obama except for... the 'Palestinians'?

President Obama's bowing to Arab leaders has had an effect on the Arab countries' perception of the US, according to a Gallup poll released on Monday. While the poll shows that the US is still perceived negatively in all Arab countries, there has been marked improvement in how negative that perception is. There are two places, however, where things have gotten worse. One is in Lebanon, where Hezbullah has already rejected President Obama's efforts to resolve the 'Palestinian problem.' The other - surprisingly - is among the 'Palestinians.'

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Israel Matzav: Arabs feel the love from Obama except for... the 'Palestinians'?

Israel Matzav: Hezbullah terrorist: 'We don't have wings"

Hezbullah terrorist: 'We don't have wings'

The BBC got an interview with a Hezbullah terrorist in Beirut. As part of the interview, the BBC discusses the British government policy of talking to Hezbullah's 'political wing' but not to its 'military wing' with the British ambassador to Lebanon.

Read All at :

Israel Matzav: Hezbullah terrorist: 'We don't have wings'

Life in Israel: Ready for Nuclear War

The Torah Revolution: Who started it? And how it can end?

The Torah Revolution: PA has money

DoubleTapper: Why IDF Servicemen love IDF Women

SETTLEMENTS ARE AN IMPEDIMENT TO CLARITY

Settlements Are an Impediment to Clarity

President Obama is scheduled to give an important speech in Cairo this week, outlining how his administration will bring peace to the Middle East. I'll comment on that once it happens, though regular readers won't be surprised to know that so far as I can tell, there is no theoretical speech that could be given by any American president, not even this one, which would herald peace in this region. But we'll talk about that once the speech has been made: who knows? Perhaps he'll surprise us.

What is clear already, however, is that the Netanyahu government has managed to position us all wrong for the event. See, for example, the NYT's report on an interview Obama just gave to NPR: the focus of the report, and apparently also of the interview itself, is on Israel's intransigence about building in settlements. True, there's a brief mention that the Arabs could do a thing or two, but it's brief, and not detailed. The drama is all about those pesky Israelis who are making peace unlikely. Isabel Kershner, also at the NYT, has all sorts of data about the matter, along with a quote from Netanyahu:

Mr. Netanyahu, of the conservative Likud Party, made his own wider position
clear on Monday. He said that while Israel would not allow new settlements and
that some small outposts would be removed, building within the confines of
established settlements should go on.
Israel “cannot freeze life in the settlements,” he said, describing the American call as an “unreasonable” demand.

Nonsense. Had the Palestinians accepted any of the three different peace proposals of July 2000-January 2001, Israel would have long since dismantled most of the settlements (certainly including Tapuach, described in Kersher's article), and perhaps might even have enjoyed a calmer decade since. Had Olmert not recklessly gone to war in Lebanon in July 2006, concentrating instead on the project he won the elections to do in March 2006, Israel would already have dismantled many of the settlements and retreated behind the barrier; this wouldn't have brought peace, of course, but would have made untenable the present narrative whereby Israel's settlements are the problem, not a side show. Had Livni been willing to pay Shas more money than she was willing, in September 2008, she'd be Prime Minister today, and her avowed support for a two-state resolution of the conflict, along with her willingness to disband settlements if only someone would offer something for them, would make for a dramatically different dynamic with the Obama administration. Peace would be no closer to happening, of course, and the Guardian would blame Israel no matter what, but the NYT would do so less, and Obama wouldn't have such an easy handle with which to apportion blame in all directions.

You don't have to accept my analysis, of course, but it's hard to argue, as Netanyahu and folks are doing these days, that the settlements are an existential need, and that slowing their growth or even removing them somehow constitutes an end to Zionism.

A large majority of Israelis knows that most of the settlements will someday be removed; a smaller majority, but still a majority, agrees that this isn't even particularly bad. What do we possibly have to gain from insisting otherwise? We do, however, have two things to lose.

First, by insisting on maintaining the entire settlement project, we lose the ability to explain and defend the more essential parts of it. A large majority of the settlers live in relatively few large settlements near the 1967 line, and it's far more likely that Israel will swap territories for them than dismantle them - a principle accepted by both previous American administrations, and even by the (unofficial) Palestinian participants in the Geneva Accords. Second, Jerusalem. The childish gesture politics of Netanyahu's government allows the Americans to lump together Tapuch and East Jerusalem as equally unacceptable - a position rejected by a large majority of Israelis, Right, Center, and Moderate Left.

As I noted at the beginning of this post: peace isn't going to happen anytime soon. Which means the important thing is to manage the conflict with as little violence, and as much intelligence as possible. That means ensuring that at any given moment the general public in Israel and in America, as well as the decision makers in Europe, recognize that Israel is the Western democracy yearning for peace and willing to take some risks to achieve it, surrounded by enemies who reject the principles of the Enlightenment and strive for Israel's demise. This is the fundamental truth, and allowing it to be obscured by unnecessary histrionics is the wrong way to go.

taken from:Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations

ISRAELS SURVIVAL INSTINCTS vs IRAN & THE BOMB

Israel's Survival Instincts and the Dangers of Nuclear Weapons in Iranian Hands

Richard L. Russell
Joint Force QuarterlyIssue 50, 3rd Quarter 2008

The Israeli body politic finds itself in a new and uncertain international security environment as it faces the prospect of an Iran armed with nuclear weapons. The American intelligence assessment that suggests Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 has not relieved Israeli fears. Tel Aviv probably worries that American intelligence on Iran's nuclear weapons program today is just as mistaken as it was on Iraq's suspected nuclear weapons program in the run-up to the 2003 war. The Israelis assess that Tehran is pressing ahead in its efforts to acquire nuclear weapons under the guise of a civilian nuclear power infrastructure.1
As Israelis grapple with policy options for dealing with the emerging Iranian threat, they do not like what they see. They find themselves "between a rock and a hard place," knowing that there is a large gap between Israel's declarative policy that it will not allow hostile states in the region to acquire nuclear weapons and their military capabilities, which have substantial shortcomings that could impact the ability to hold at risk Iran's large and widely dispersed nuclear infrastructure, all of which is located a long reach from Israel.
Meanwhile, in debates and discussions in Washington on the creeping crisis over Iran's suspected nuclear weapons aspirations, one periodically hears mention of Tel Aviv's worries about Tehran. But Israel's interests and threat perceptions are mentioned merely in passing and generally receive no sustained or deep analysis. The American media, moreover, with their increasingly thin foreign coverage, rarely cover the Israeli dimension of the Iran crisis. In contrast, the threat posed by an Iran armed with nuclear weapons receives heavy coverage in Israeli media and fills the in-boxes of Israeli security officials and diplomats already heavily burdened by terrorism and the conflict with the Palestinians.2
Clearly, a look at the Israeli dimension of the Iran nuclear crisis is in order. How do the Israelis view Iran? What dangers would Iranian nuclear weapons pose to the state of Israel? What are the Israelis doing today? What could they do tomorrow? And what would be the implications and consequences of Israeli security actions for American national security vis-Ã -vis Iran and the Gulf?
Israeli Worry about Iran
Few in the business of foreign affairs have missed the steady stream of bellicose rhetoric coming out of the very loud mouth of Iran's elected-to use the word extremely generously and loosely-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He shattered diplomatic decorum at the United Nations (UN) in his first major international address as a world leader in September 2005. As one commentator characterized the speech, "Ahmadinejad delivered what began as a sermon praising the prophets of Islam, Christianity and Judaism and then descended into anti-American vitriol, conspiracy theories and threats. He expressed doubt that the deadly attacks against the United States on September 11, 2001, were really carried out by terrorists."3
As if to belabor his ideological zeal, Ahmadinejad in an October 2005 speech to 4,000 students in Iran said that Israel "must be wiped off the map" and that attacks by Palestinians would destroy it. In that oratory, Ahmadinejad elaborated that the "establishment of a Zionist regime was a move by the world oppressor against the Islamic world" and that "skirmishes in the occupied land are part of the war of destiny. The outcome of hundreds of years of war will be defined in Palestinian land."4 For those who attributed Ahmadinejad's UN performance to a slip, they were corrected in December 2005 when he argued in a speech to a conference of Islamic countries in Saudi Arabia that if Europeans established Israel out of guilt over the Nazi reign, then Israel should be carved out of Europe. If that ignorance of history were not enough, Ahmadinejad in another December 2005 speech, this time back in Iran, called the Holocaust's extermination of 6 million Jews a "myth" that never happened.5
Reasonable people in the West end up scratching their heads pondering the purpose behind Ahmadinejad's bellicose and anti-Israeli outbursts. Some astute Iranian observers such as Karim Sadjadpour and Ray Takeyh suggest that the Iranian president's behavior is aimed at provoking a crisis and scuttling international negotiations over Iran's nuclear-related activities, especially enriching uranium, as well as asserting his control over Iran's state machinery and gaining political influence among the Iranian populace.6
All the while, a curious depiction has turned up in the Western press of Ahmadinejad's rival for the presidency, Ali Akhbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, whom many characterize as a moderate. Rafsanjani, contrary to the popular media view, has been in and around the halls of Tehran's political power more than anyone else for over 20 years, during which time Iran's clandestine nuclear activities were shielded from the International Atomic Energy Agency. He presumably has more than a fair share of vested interest in seeing that Iran eventually acquires nuclear weapons.7 A nuclear-armed Iran under a Rafsanjani presidency would give Israel, and the United States for that matter, little comfort. It was Rafsanjani who in 2001 "mused that a single nuclear weapon could obliterate Israel, whereas Israel could 'only damage' the world of Islam."8
To make matters worse, the Iranian public, which the Western press is all too eager to depict as a demographic youth bulge born after the 1979 Iranian revolution and eager for liberalization and democratization, is across-the-board supportive of the drive for nuclear power. As Ramita Navai reported from Tehran, "Iran's right to nuclear energy and defiance of the West over its nuclear ambitions is the first issue since the 1979 Islamic Revolution that has galvanized all political factions, classes and public opinion."9
With this Iranian internal political landscape, Ahmadinejad's statements fuel the fire of Israeli fears about Iran. Some dismiss Israeli fears as "overblown," but as the old quip has it, even paranoids have real enemies-and Iran is such an enemy. The Iranians have been extraordinarily consistent and patient in their sponsorship of Hizballah, which has long waged a guerrilla war against Israel. There can be no gainsaying that Iran has been Hizballah's godfather and staunchest foreign backer and that the organization has inflicted significant casualties and costs on Israel, not to mention the United States.
The mood in Israel is that Iran is no imaginary threat. To the contrary, as Ephraim Kam, a level-headed and insightful Israeli national security analyst, observes, "Many Israeli leaders regard the Iranian threat as the gravest strategic threat facing Israel, and some regard it as liable to endanger Israel's very existence in the future." Kam, peering ahead, adds that "Iran's possession of nuclear weapons is of major significance to Israel: a new situation would arise whereby for the first time since Israel's establishment an enemy state has the capability of fatally wounding it."10
The Israelis, moreover, are gravely concerned that their capabilities to deter regional adversaries are fraying. Their formidable conventional military capabilities have not secured a peace with the Palestinian Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip or a peace in the Fatah-controlled West Bank. And Israeli confidence in its military forces to secure its northern border was seriously threatened by Hizballah rockets fired from Lebanon during the summer 2006 war. The Israelis worry that Hizballah is a proxy for Iran's belligerent policies and that should Iran get nuclear weapons, Tehran would have license to escalate future cross-border surrogate guerrilla operations against Israel. Tehran would no longer fear Israeli military retaliation, which the Iranians could deter with their nuclear weapons.
The Iranians might further calculate that escalating Hizballah-as well as Hamas and Islamic Jihad-operations against Israel would play well politically in the Muslim and Arab worlds. Tehran's stance toward the Jewish state already wins political support at home and in the greater Middle East. This is true even among Iran's traditional Arab rivals such as Saudi Arabia, which, at least for now, has not vehemently protested Iran's cage-rattling performances against Israel because the Arab states are deeply frustrated by the Palestinian plight and resent Tel Aviv for its military prowess and for having acquired nuclear weapons before any Arab state.
The Israelis also have a deep insecurity due to geographic vulnerability, an aspect of their national security that should not be underestimated. Israel is only a narrow swath of territory along the sea, and its principal population and government centers are located in the Tel Aviv and Jerusalem areas. Americans need to remember their Cold War fears of the potential for only 30 minutes warning of the launching of Soviet nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles at the United States. That recollection would give Americans a mere whiff of the Israeli worry about the warning time of only minutes inside the Middle East.
Aggravating these acute security concerns is the collective memory of the Holocaust. Israeli society is rightly permeated with the determination to never again allow adversaries to threaten the existence of the Jewish community, which now is most prominently displayed in the state of Israel. The possession of nuclear weapons in the hands of Iranians, or its security policy surrogates in its guerrilla war against Israel, would present just such a concrete and existential threat. The Israelis will have to worry that someday, either by design or mishap, Iranian nuclear weapons might find their way from Iranian Revolutionary Guard arsenals into Hizballah, Hamas, or Islamic Jihad hands.
Preemptive Military Action
The Israelis frequently warn that they will not idly stand by as Iran marches toward a nuclear weapons arsenal. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in January 2008 told government officials that "Israel clearly will not reconcile itself to a nuclear Iran" and that "[a]ll options [preventing] Iran from gaining nuclear capabilities are legitimate within the context of how to grapple with this matter."11These words are echoes of the Begin Doctrine, initially articulated by former Prime Minister Menachem Begin, which holds that Israel will not wait and watch potentially hostile states acquire nuclear weapons and will opt for preventive military means to stop prospective threats from becoming realities.
The so-called Bush Doctrine of the United States, announced in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, shares with the Begin Doctrine a common national security philosophy. Just as the Bush Doctrine appeared to become a reality with the 2003 war against Iraq, the Begin Doctrine became a reality with the Israeli preventive strike on Iraq's nuclear power reactor, called Osiraq, in 1981. That bold Israeli move has come to epitomize preventive military action against an emerging nuclear threat. Unfortunately, the Israeli strike was only a tactical achievement. Afterward, the Iraqis dispersed their nuclear weapons- related activities to numerous locations to reduce their vulnerability to preemptive military strikes, moves that were uncovered by UN weapons inspections in the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf War.
Tel Aviv recently demonstrated the continued centrality of the Begin Doctrine in Israeli national security strategy by mounting an airstrike in September 2007 against a suspected Syrian nuclear facility. Neither Israel nor Syria has officially acknowledged the strike, but fragmentary and unofficial reporting suggests that Israeli aircraft destroyed a North Korea-supplied nuclear reactor in Syria. Commercial satellite images taken of the suspected site at Tibnah showed that the Syrians hastily dismantled facilities after the attack in a likely attempt to hide evidence of a partially built nuclear reactor similar to the design used by North Korea.12 The Israelis probably calculated that no official pronouncements would dampen international political tension that could have spun the limited attack into a broader regional crisis. No doubt, though, the Israelis also sought to send a veiled and credible threat to Tehran that Tel Aviv could do the same to Iran's nuclear facilities and infrastructure. For now, Tel Aviv is engaged in a diplomatic effort to keep world attention on Iran and its nuclear weapons aspirations. Former Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom in December 2005 told the cabinet that "in pursuing the diplomatic course of trying to get the issue moved to the Security Council, Israel must be careful to ensure that the problem remains an international-not an Israeli-one."13 Along a similar vein in portraying the Iran crisis as an international one, then-Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Dan Halutz asserted in January 2006 that "Israel is in no rush. The whole world condemns Iran's actions-it cannot be perceived as an exclusively Israeli problem and should not be treated as one."14 Israeli intelligence appears to judge that Iran could have a nuclear weapon by the end of 2009 at the earliest and more likely in the 2010-2011 timeframe.15 Israel still has some time to play in the diplomatic arena and to nudge Washington into taking military action against Iran's nuclear infrastructure to lift the burden from Israeli shoulders.
Daunting Challenges
The application of the Begin Doctrine against Iran-as a replay of Israeli preventive strikes against Syrian and Iraqi nuclear capabilities-would be a profoundly more difficult operational challenge. The Iranians are no one's fools, and they have no doubt learned from Iraq's experience in 1981 and Syria's experience in 2007. From what can be gleaned from public information, Iran's nuclear infrastructure components- from uranium mining, to enrichment, to research and development, to the Bushehr nuclear power plant-are all geographically dispersed in the large land mass that makes up Iran, making them extraordinarily difficult for Israel to strike with one large aircraft package as was done in Iraq and Syria. Iran too might have taken steps to maintain and keep hidden redundant infrastructure, especially for uranium enrichment, in light of the public disclosures, to compound the difficulty for any Israeli military campaign to decisively derail Iran's nuclear weapons program.
For all its military prowess, Israel would face enormous difficulties in attempting to destroy a large part of Iran's suspected nuclear weapons infrastructure. The air force must fly a long way to attack far removed Iranian targets. It would have to rely on its inventory of 25 F-15I aircraft, with a range of 4,450 kilometers, as the workhorses for an Iranian strike package.16 These aircraft would have to fly through potentially hostile airspace-possibly Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq, not to mention Iran itself-which could consume fuel for evasive maneuvers and reduce the ranges of Israeli airpower projection into Iran. The aircraft also would have to carry external fuel tanks, reducing the amount of ordnance carried. To possibly make matters worse from the Israeli military standpoint, much of the airspace the Israelis would have to fly through to get to Iranian territory-save Syria-is closely monitored and patrolled by American air and naval forces.
There is a chance that the Israelis would give the United States a heads-up on their military plans in order to reduce the chances of coming to air-to-air blows with American forces operating over Iraq and the Persian Gulf. Alternatively, the Israelis might opt not to give Washington advanced notice, fearing that the Americans would object or try to stall the action. As former Deputy National Security Advisor Chuck Freilich notes, Israel might "refrain from placing itself in a potential veto situation much as it did in 1981, when it did not consult or inform the United States prior to attacking the Iraqi reactor at Osiraq."17
Israel's security relations with Turkey over the years have given rise to speculation that Tel Aviv could use Turkish air bases, or airspace for air-to-air refueling, for easier and shorter access to Iranian targets. Ankara's political refusal to allow the United States to use Turkey as a staging ground for the 2003 war against Iraq, however, shows just how little an appetite the Turks have for hosting foreign forces for operations against their southern neighbors. Ankara has polite relations with Tehran and would not want to jeopardize them, especially if Iran is on the cusp of acquiring nuclear weapons. Nevertheless, the Israelis might go ahead and transit Turkish airspace for strikes against Iran without Ankara's permission and risk a major setback to security ties with Turkey, hoping the political backlash would be fleeting.
Even if the Israelis could overcome these substantial operational challenges and mount a large air assault on Iran's nuclear infrastructure, they would be even more hard pressed to follow up with the sustained campaigns needed to repeatedly bomb widespread and substantially heavier infrastructure than Iraq had in 1981 or Syria in 2007. As retired Israeli Brigadier General Shlomo Brom assesses, "Based on the past performance of the IAF [Israeli air force], its order of battle that includes only F-15I and F-16C/D aircraft capable of long range strike, and the deployment of its aircraft, it is possible to determine that at long ranges (more than 600 km), the IAF is capable of a few surgical strikes, but it is not capable of a sustained air campaign against a full array of targets."18 The Israelis mounted such a limited airstrike in 1985 against the Palestine Liberation Organization's headquarters in Tunis, Tunisia, which required aerial refueling of F-15 aircraft and travel of more than 4,000 kilometers.19 The Tunis strike, however, was a one-time event against sites specifically known and located.
The Israelis might complement aircraft operations with naval assets, but these options have limitations, too. The Israelis could employ their Dolphin-class submarines to launch cruise missiles at Iran from the Arabian Sea and also use special operations forces, but even these efforts would be shy of the payloads needed to level Iran's nuclear infrastructure.
The Israelis also could tap their sophisticated inventory of ballistic missiles to target Iran's nuclear weapons infrastructure in combination with fixed-wing aircraft operations. Public information on Israeli stores of Jericho I missiles, with an estimated payload of 450 to 650 kilograms and a range of up to 500 kilometers, and Jericho II missiles, with payloads of 750 to 1,500 kilograms and a range of more than 1,500 kilometers, is hard to come by.20 The Congressional Research Service estimates a modest Israeli inventory of about 50 Jericho I and 100 Jericho II missiles.21 In January 2008, Israel test fired a Jericho III missile, which caught Iran's attention.22 Tel Aviv no doubt hopes the display will help deter Tehran's use of ballistic missiles against Israel.
The use of Jericho ballistic missiles in preventive strikes against Iran's nuclear infrastructure would risk depleting delivery systems for Israel's nuclear weapons deterrent. But Tel Aviv could embark on a clandestine and sizable buildup of its Jericho missile inventories to be able to saturate Iranian targets with ballistic missiles armed with conventional warheads.
Brutal Logic of Deterrence
The Israelis might throw up their hands and conclude that any military options are simply too hard or risky and offer too limited prospects for success. Tel Aviv could ultimately and reluctantly calculate that the political costs coupled with the slim prospects for entirely eliminating Iran's nuclear weapons infrastructure rule out unilaterally moving with military means. The easiest and default policy-one that is not without risks but that perhaps has fewer risks and more rewards than a military showdown with Iran and political fallout with Israel's security partners-would be to rely on deterrence. The Israelis might calculate that no matter how ideologically motivated Iran's president and its Revolutionary Guard are, or how warped their perception of reality is, there will be no escaping the brutal logic of massive nuclear retaliation.
The Iranians would have to realize that, notwithstanding the geographic vulnerability of Israel, they would never be able to achieve a strategic surprise and launch barrages of nuclear weapons loaded on ballistic missiles to decapitate Israeli leadership in order to prevent Israel from launching its own nuclear-tipped Jericho missiles to wipe out Tehran. The Israelis could impress upon the Iranians this cold-blooded logic-informed by Cold War history-via thinly veiled public pronouncements that stop short of acknowledging Israel's nuclear weapons capabilities.
Tel Aviv also could use a variety of behind-the-scenes diplomatic and intelligence channels to privately, quietly, confidently, and authoritatively convey the same message to Iran's Foreign Ministry, intelligence services, Revolutionary Guard, and regime advisors to ensure that Israeli "red lines" for Iran's handling of ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons in a crisis, as well as the dangers should Tehran be tempted to transfer nuclear weapons to a transnational group such as Hizballah, are understood by Iranian leadership. The problem from the Israeli standpoint is that the regime in Tehran more nearly resembles a circus-like contest for political power than a unitary, contemplative, deliberate decisionmaking body.
Some strategists point to Saddam Hussein's restraint in not firing biological and chemical weapons-tipped ballistic missiles at Israel during the 1991 Gulf War as evidence that nuclear deterrence is robust. The late national security expert Ze'ev Schiff put the common Israeli lesson of the 1991 war this way: "The fact that Saddam did not use chemical weapons against Israel even when he was under great stress from attacking forces shows that he understood there are some things Israel simply could not tolerate, even if Washington was opposed to any Israeli response."23 But if Saddam simply withheld the use of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) against Israel during the 1991 war because coalition forces were not marching on Baghdad and directly threatening his regime, then any Israeli confidence in their ability to deter a nuclear-armed Iran would be misplaced.
The "Sadat" Military Option
Israel's military operations offer no panacea or easy solution to the Iranian nuclear threat, but that does not rule out the limited military options that the Israelis do have. Falling back onto the logic of deterrence would still leave Israelis insecure vis-Ã -vis an Iran moving closer and closer to a nuclear weapons stockpile. Security could be further undermined should Ahmadinejad or his successors grow in their bellicosity and recklessness as they approach their nuclear weapons goal. A more confident and aggressive Iranian foreign policy could jeopardize Tel Aviv's confidence in its ability to work out red lines and "rules of the road" for governing deterrence in a Israeli-Iranian nuclear rivalry.
In such desperate straits, the Israelis might reluctantly conclude that they need to resort to a military move-if only symbolically-to reawaken and force renewed political attention and pressure on Iran from the United States, Europe, and the world community. The Israelis, in coming to such a conclusion, might have as their model former Egyptian President Anwar Sadat's masterful use of the 1973 war for seizing political leverage. In ordering the Egyptian attack on Israel, Sadat harbored no illusion of militarily defeating Israel, but he aimed at profoundly changing the international political climate to negotiate a peace treaty with Israel on honorable terms for Egypt. The Israelis might find themselves with their backs against the wall and thrash out to destroy a piece of Iran's nuclear infrastructure and then settle back into a defensive crouch to watch international reactions and to guard against Iranian retaliation.
This is not a fanciful scenario if one remembers the great uncertainty about the prospects of preventively attacking Iraq's nuclear reactor in 1981. Israeli military planners were far from confident that the strike would be worth the risks, but they undertook the mission even though they lacked a clear picture of its impact, according to a leaked air force research paper.24 In the final analysis, Tel Aviv calculated that it needed to take the risks associated with its poor information picture of Iraq's program, given the grave threat emerging in Baghdad. If Tel Aviv was willing to run these military risks and uncertainties then, it could do it again against Iran, even if the mission is more demanding and risky.
The Israelis might calculate that the threats posed by Iranian retaliation would be manageable; they sustained numerous Iraqi ballistic missile strikes during the 1991 Gulf War and could bet on riding out some Iranian retaliatory strikes with their Shahab ballistic missiles armed with conventional warheads. They might also calculate that they could weather the international political opprobrium for attacking Iran. Israel has long been accustomed to suffering the slings and arrows of political and diplomatic blowback from controversial decisions such as the 1981 attack on Iraq, the 1982 invasion of Lebanon, the 2006 war in Lebanon, and daily regional criticisms that Tel Aviv, and not current and past failures of Palestinian leadership, is responsible for the tragic plight of the Palestinian people.
Bleak Diplomatic Prospects
Israeli diplomacy will press the Americans as well as the Europeans with all its strength for a diplomatic settlement to the Iranian crisis. The diplomatic threat and imposition of more international sanctions on Iran would be all well and good, but the Tehran regime probably would not feel the full bite of economic sanctions for a long time. The international community has already economically and politically isolated Tehran, and more of the same would have only marginal impact. In the short term, the regime would wear economic and political sanctions as badges of honor for standing in defiance of the international community, enhancing Iran's self-image and shoring up political support for Ahmadinejad's regime with Iranian nationalism. The economic sanction that would hurt Iran the most would be an economic embargo on the purchase of Iranian oil, but the economic and political blowback on the Europeans and Americans in a high petroleum demand environment would likely be too bitter a pill to swallow.
By the same token, the Israelis are well aware of the dangers of Iran using diplomacy to play for time as their clandestine work toward nuclear weapons proceeds. The Iranians, for their part, know well that the cocktail of public denials, avoidance of incontrovertible or "smoking gun" evidence of nuclear weapons aspirations, and diplomacy that plays along with the International Atomic Energy Agency all allowed North Korea to cross the nuclear weapons threshold. Tehran today is likely following in Pyongyang's footsteps. The Israelis will probably come to the conclusion, if they have not already, that a credible threat of American force is needed to backstop European-American diplomatic efforts and to prevent Tehran from going the North Korean route. The threat of American force is needed to put Tehran into a fix in which it cannot indefinitely stall while working to expand its uranium enrichment capabilities and its stocks of enriched uranium.
Some observers caution against an American or Israeli military option against Iran and point to the Libyan surrender of its WMD and ballistic programs as a case that shows economic sanctions can bring dramatic changes in regime calculus over the costs and benefits of having these programs. To be sure, the international political and economic isolation of Muammar Qadhafi's regime was a critical pressure that changed his calculus. But the straw that broke the camel's back probably was Qadhafi's fear in 2003 that after Iraq, the United States would be prepared to wield military force against Tripoli for its nuclear weapons program, which was internationally exposed by the interception of the BBC China cargo ship. The combination of political and economic isolation took a decade to hurt the Libyan regime, and the specter of military force against Tripoli tipped the balance toward a surrender of its WMD and ballistic missiles.
One way for the Israelis to slip out of their "rock and a hard place" predicament is to press the United States to shoulder the burden. Tel Aviv might even threaten exercising a "Sadat option" to induce the Americans to move militarily against Iran in lieu of Israeli military action. Washington would have to worry that an Israeli attack against Iran would risk a public opinion backlash in the Muslim world, including Arab capitals, which would threaten to reignite the Israel-Arab conflict and further reduce the already bleak prospects for an Israeli-Palestinian peace.
The Israelis could become frustrated with Tehran's diplomatic obfuscation and U.S. and European diplomatic passivity and unwillingness to threaten force. Thus, the Israelis could strike out militarily with no illusion of severely damaging Iran's nuclear infrastructure, but with every intention of shocking the international community via the Sadat option into substantially greater diplomatic, political, economic, and military pressure on Iran.
An Israeli military strike against Iran could also be precipitated by more bellicose threats and reckless actions from Ahmadinejad's regime. Tehran, for example, could encourage and operationally support fresh waves of Hizballah, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad attacks against Israeli interests. In Israeli eyes, escalated Iranian-sponsored attacks would "prove" that Iran is hostile and that its leadership lacks prudent restraint. They would also demonstrate the "undeterrable" nature of the Tehran regime. Such attacks might be reminiscent of, or even more spectacular than, Iran's sponsorship-according to former Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Louis Freeh-of the Saudi Hizballah attack against the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia in 1996 that killed 19 American Servicemen or the Iran-Hizballah bombings in the 1990s against the Israeli embassy and a Jewish community center in Argentina, which together killed 110 people.25
Whether or not the Israelis confer in advance with the Americans about military operations against Iran, Washington should be prepared for retaliation. The Iranians, along with much of the Muslim world, are going to believe that the Americans encouraged and approved the mission. Ahmadinejad blustered in January 2008 that that "Zionist regime . . . would not dare attack Iran. . . . It knows that any attack on Iranian territories would prompt a fierce response."26 The deputy commander of Iran's air force warned in September 2007 that "[we] have drawn up a plan to strike back at Israel with our bombers."27 Iran's air force, however, is in a sorry state, given poor maintenance and aging aircraft, and would be little match against Israeli aircraft in air-to-air combat.
Iran's more effective means of retaliation against Israel, as well as against the United States, would include a range of military and Revolutionary Guard operations, from ballistic missile firings against Israel and American Gulf state security partners; naval mining; special operations against Gulf shipping; more aggressive military, financial, and logistic support for Hizballah; and Iranian intelligence bombing operations against worldwide Israeli and American diplomatic and military positions. Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, warned in April 2006 that if "the U.S. ventured into any aggression on Iran, Iran will retaliate by damaging U.S. interests worldwide twice as much as the U.S. may inflict on Iran."28 The Iranians too could take American Soldiers, Sailors, Marines, and diplomats hostage, much as they did with 15 British sailors and marines in March 2007. Iran also could aid and abet al Qaeda operations against the United States. In short, the Israeli "Sadat" scenario is one for which American policymakers and military commanders need to plan in order to be ready for Iranian retaliatory measures, especially in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility.
NOTES:
1 Steven Erlanger, "Israelis Brief Top U.S. Official on Iran," The New York Times, December 11, 2007.
2 This observation is based on conversations the author had with a number of Israeli security officials during a January 2006 visit to Israel.
3 Dafna Linzer, "Iran's President Does What U.S. Diplomacy Could Not," The Washington Post, September 19, 2005, A12.
4 Quoted in Nazila Fathi, "Iran's New President Says Israel 'Must Be Wiped Off the Map,'" The New York Times, October 27, 2005.
5 Karl Vick, "Iran's President Calls Holocaust 'Myth' in Latest Assault on Jews," The Washington Post, December 15, 2005, A1.
6 Karim Sadjadpour and Ray Takeyh, "Behind Iran's Hard-Line on Israel," Boston Globe, December 23, 2005.
7 On this point, see George Perkovich, Dealing with Iran's Nuclear Challenge, Policy Outlook (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, April 28, 2003), 3.
8 Quoted in "Misreading Iran: It Wants More Than Reassurance," The Economist, January 14, 2006,
9 Ramita Navai, "A Divided Nation Puts Differences Aside on the Nuclear Road," London Times, August 11, 2005.
10 Ephraim Kam, "Curbing the Iranian Nuclear Threat: The Military Option," Strategic Assessment 7, no. 3 (Tel Aviv: Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies, Tel Aviv University, December 2004), 3.
11 Mark Lavie, "Olmert Hints That Strikes on Nuclear Facilities in Iran Are an Option," Boston Globe, January 15, 2008.
12 William J. Broad and Mark Mazzetti, "Photos Show Cleansing of Suspected Syrian Site," The New York Times, October 26, 2007.
13 Herb Keinon, "Shalom: Iran's Nuclear Confidence Grows as the World Fiddles," Jerusalem Post, January 9, 2006, 16.
14 Margot Dudkevitch, "Halutz: Iran's Going Nuclear Not Just Israel's Problem," Jerusalem Post, January 10, 2006, 3.
15 Erlanger.
16 "Is Nuclear Parity with Iran a Blessing in Disguise for Israel?" Jane's Intelligence Review, December 8, 2005.
17 Chuck Freilich, Speaking about the Unspeakable: U.S.-Israeli Dialogue on Iran's Nuclear Program, Policy Focus 77 (Washington, DC: Washington Institute for Near East Policy, December 2007), 11.
18 Shlomo Brom, "Is the Begin Doctrine Still a Viable Option for Israel?" in Getting Ready for a Nuclear-Ready Iran, ed. Henry Sokolski and Patrick Clawson (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, Army War College, 2005), 142-143.
19 Whitney Raas and Austin Long, "Osirak Redux? Assessing Israeli Capabilities to Destroy Iranian Nuclear Facilities," International Security 31, no. 4 (Spring 2007), 20.
20 Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, "Israel Missile Update," The Risk Report 11, no. 6 (November-December 2005), available at .
21 Andrew Feickert, Missile Survey: Ballistic Missiles and Cruise Missiles of Selected Countries (Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, July 26, 2005), 36.
22 "Israel Tests New Long-Range Missile," USA Today, January 17, 2008.
23 Ze'ev Schiff, "Israel after the War," Foreign Affairs 70, no. 2 (Spring 1991), 32.
24 Arieh O'Sullivan, "IAF: Osirak Attack Shows Partial Feasibility Enough for Iran Strike," Jerusalem Post, January 12, 2006, 7.
25 For background, see Louis J. Freeh, "Remember Khobar Towers," Wall Street Journal, May 20, 2003. By the former FBI director's account of the Khobar attack, "the entire operation was planned, funded and coordinated by Iran's security services . . . acting on orders from the highest levels of the regime in Tehran."
26 "Iran Scorns U.S. and Israel," BBC News, January 18, 2008.
27 Nazila Fathi, "General Says Iran Can Strike Back at Israel," The New York Times, September 19, 2007.
28 Molly Moore and Thomas E. Ricks, "Iranian Leader Warns U.S. of Reprisal,"

The Washington Post, April 27, 2006.

taken from : B'NAI ELIM (http://bnaielim.blogspot.com/)

Chesler Chronicles » Who Should Be Tried For Islamist Criminal Conspiracies In the West — The Lone Shooter, His Entire Family, the Country That Shelters the Jihadic Group That Trained Him?

Adbusters' Spurious Gaza - Warsaw Ghetto Comparison

A Canadian magazine abuses Holocaust imagery to attack Israel.

Following the recent 22-day conflict between Israel and Hamas, anti-Israel proponents - in politics, the UN, Hamas, trade unions, academia, and in the media - have drawn spurious comparisons of the situation of Palestinians in Gaza to that of Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II.

The reason the Warsaw Ghetto analogy is used is to trump up libelous claims that Jews who were once the victims of the Nazis during the Holocaust are now the victimizers carrying out the genocide of Palestinians. It should be noted that comparisons of Israeli policy and actions to Nazism fit the European Union's and U.S. State Department's working definition of anti-Semitism.

Read All at :

Adbusters' Spurious Gaza - Warsaw Ghetto Comparison

HUNGARY WAR ON JEWS

'Proud Hungarians must prepare for war against the Jews'

By Yehuda Lahav

Tags: Jewish World, anti-Semitism

"Given our current situation, anti-Semitism is not just our right, but it is the duty of every Hungarian homeland lover, and we must prepare for armed battle against the Jews."

This quote appeared in a newsletter published by an organization calling itself "The trade union of Hungarian police officers prepared for action".

Hungarian law allows police officers to organize in trade unions of their own. The union - by its own definition - aims to protect the professional interests of those unionized, and not to partake in political activity.

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However, the law does not prevent the union from distributing a newsletter, the content of which is at the discretion of its editor, and its editor alone.

The editor of the "prepared for action" union, Judit Szima (who also serves as the secretary-general of the union) didn't see anything wrong with the content of the article quoted above. It is little wonder, given the fact that the union has signed a cooperation agreement with the radical right wing Hungarian party "Jobbik" (Movement for better Hungary) which backs and operates the extremist paramilitary movement "Hungarian Guard" and warns against the "gypsy crime" - in effect trying to terrorize Hungary's gypsy community, as well as its Jewish community or anyone else they don't like.

Thursday, 4 June 2009

The 'Palestinian' love affair with Obama

Wednesday, 3 June 2009

Could Israel renege on the 'road map'?

American objections to Jerusalem hotel may deny 'Palestinians' economic opportunity

Obama: 'Iran has a right to nukes'

Arabs feel the love from Obama except for... the 'Palestinians'?

Hezbullah terrorist: 'We don't have wings'

I THINK THIS IS THE BEGINNING OF A BEAUTIFUL FRIENDSHIP

OBSERVÂNCIA DO SHABBAT

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