ISRAEL UPDATE:

Do the Original People (Cana'nites ) have a right to Gaza?

Cana'nites established the city and called it Gaza around the year 3000 BC. The Arab Minions who resided in Gaza, gave it the same name. They helped in reviving the city and had strong ties with Gaza citizens as Ma'an merchants were married to Gazans. The Pharaohs, during the reign of the Pharaoh III, 1447-1501 BC., gave it the name Gazatwa which is related to the treasures said to be buried by Cambayses during the Persian rule.

Do the People who LAST concurred Gaza, have the right to Gaza?

Tension began developing between Israel and Arab countries in the 1960s. Israel began to implement its National Water Carrier plan, which pumps water from the Sea of Galilee to irrigate south and central Israel. The project was in accordance with a plan proposed by US envoy Eric Johnston in 1955, and agreed to by Arab engineers. Arab governments refused to participate however. In several summit conferences beginning in 1964, Arab leaders decided on establishment of the PLO, declared their resolve to destroy Israel, and decided to divert the sources of the Jordan river that feed the Sea of Galilee, to prevent Israel from implementing the water carrier plan. The Syrians and Lebanese began to implement the diversions. Israel responded by firing on the tractors and equipment doing the work in Syria. This was followed by Israeli attempts to cultivate the demilitarized zones (DMZ) as provided in the armistice agreements. Israel was within its rights according to the armistice agreements, but Moshe Dayan claimed many years later that 80% of the incidents were deliberately provoked. The Syrians responded by firing in the DMZs (Click here for a map of the demilitarized zones). When Israelis responded in force, Syria began shelling Israeli towns in the north, and the conflict escalated into air strikes. The USSR was intent on protecting the new Ba'athist pro-Soviet government of Syria, and represented to the Syrians and Egyptians that Israel was preparing to attack Syria. As tension rose, Syria appealed to Egypt, believing the claim of the USSR that Israel was massing troops on the Syrian border. The claim was false and was denied by the UN.
Against this background, in Mid-May, 1967, Egyptian President Gamal Nasser again closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping and dismissed the UN peace force from the Sinai Peninsula. The United States failed to live up to its guarantees of freedom of the waterways to Israel. A torrent of bellicose rhetoric issued from Arab capitals and in the UN. At the UN, PLO Chairman Ahmed Shukhairy announced that "if it will be our privilege to strike the first blow" the PLO would expel from Palestine all Zionists who had arrived after 1917 and eliminate the state of Israel. Nasser said on May 27, "Our basic objective will be the destruction of Israel. The Arab people want to fight." On May 28, he added: "We will not accept any...coexistence with Israel...Today the issue is not the establishment of peace between the Arab states and Israel....The war with Israel is in effect since 1948."
US and Israel assessments were that Israel would win any war handily, despite the huge superiority in armor, aircraft, and troops favoring the combined forces of the Arab countries. On paper, Israel had almost as many aircraft as the Egyptians, but the Israeli aircraft were mostly old, and even the Super-Mirages were no match for the Mig-21 fighters acquired by Egypt from the USSR. On paper, the IDF had a huge number of "tanks." However, while Syrians and Egyptians were equipped with late model Soviet heavy tanks, most of the Israeli "tanks" were in fact tiny French AMX anti-tank vehicles, and the heavy tanks were refurbished WWII Sherman tanks fitted with diesel engines. The Israeli and Jewish public, and some in the government, believed that there was a mortal threat to Israel.
Israel certainly did not want war. Ben Gurion berated Chief of Staff Itzhak Rabin for making aggressive moves that had, according to him, escalated the conflict and gotten Israel into trouble. At first, President Johnson promised an international flotilla, and warned Israel not to attack on its own. However, the US was unable to initiate any international action, and reversed its position, hinting broadly that Israel would have to handle the problem itself.
Israel attacked the Egyptians beginning on June 5, 1967. In the first hours of the war, Israel destroyed over 400 enemy aircraft to achieve total air superiority. Israeli troops quickly conquered the Sinai Peninsula and Gaza. Jordanian artillery began firing at Jerusalem on the first day of the war, and then the Jordan Legion advanced and took over the headquarters of the UN (Governor's house - Armon Hanatziv ) in Jerusalem. After warning King Hussein repeatedly to cease fire, Israel conquered the West Bank and Jerusalem. During the first days of the war, Syrian artillery based in the Golan Heights pounded civilian targets in northern Israel. After dealing with Egypt, Israel decided to conquer the Golan heights, despite opposition and doubts of some in the government, including Moshe Dayan, who had been appointed defense minister. Israel agreed to a cease fire on June 11, 1967. UN Resolution 242 called for negotiations of a permanent peace between the parties, and for Israeli withdrawal from lands occupied in 1967. The map at right shows the territories conquered in 1967.
Ami Isseroff

Do people who call themselves Palestinians, which are not the Philistines or indigenous to Gaza deserve to be given this land of Gaza, Jew-Free?

Palestine has never existed . . . as an autonomous entity. There is no language known as Palestinian. There is no distinct Palestinian culture. There has never been a land known as Palestine governed by Palestinians. Palestinians are Arabs, indistinguishable from Jordanians (another recent invention), Syrians, Lebanese, Iraqis, etc.
Keep in mind that the Arabs control 99.9 percent of the Middle East lands. Israel represents one-tenth of one percent of the landmass. But that's too much for the Arabs. They want it all. And that is ultimately what the fighting in Israel is about today . . . No matter how many land concessions the Israelis make, it will never be enough. — from "Myths of the Middle East", Joseph Farah, Arab-American editor and journalist, WorldNetDaily, 11 October 2000
From the end of the Jewish state in antiquity to the beginning of British rule, the area now designated by the name Palestine was not a country and had no frontiers, only administrative boundaries . . . . — Professor Bernard Lewis, Commentary Magazine, January 1975
"There is no such thing as a Palestinian Arab nation . . . Palestine is a name the Romans gave to Eretz Yisrael with the express purpose of infuriating the Jews . . . . Why should we use the spiteful name meant to humiliate us?
The British chose to call the land they mandated Palestine, and the Arabs picked it up as their nation's supposed ancient name, though they couldn't even pronounce it correctly and turned it into Falastin a fictional entity." — Golda Meir quoted by Sarah Honig, Jerusalem Post, 25 November 1995
"Palestine . . . is a PR Fiction"It is also worth mentioning here, that much earlier, in 1936, Auni Bey Abdul Hadi, a noted Arab leader addressed the British Peel Commission on the subject of Palestine. One must remember that it was the Jewish immigrants who were calling the area Palestine in 1936. Abdul Hadi told the Commission who were still in charge of the Mandate over the area, "There is no such country as Palestine! Palestine is a term the Zionists invented! There is no Palestine in the Bible. Palestine is alien to us; it is the Zionists who introduced it. Even Bibles that have labeled the land of Israel as Palestine are in error." It is ironic that an Italian Muslim cleric bearing Abdul Hadi's name, Sheik Professor Abdul Hadi Palazzi, told the press only a few years ago, "There is no such thing as a Palestinian; there never was. It is a PR fiction, a Madison Avenue fantasy."
** This is the beginning of the end of Sharon's plan. According to both the Vilna Gaon and Mekuballim in Sefad, every verse of the Torah corresponds to a year. The 5765th verse says: "Ki chelek Hashem amo, Ya'akov CHEVEL nachalato." - Hashem's portion is His people, Jacob is the REGION of His inheritance." The region of the Gaza Strip in Hebrew is called 'CHEVEL AZA'! No other region in Israel, as far as I know, uses the word CHEVEL. We have here a remez (a hint) that Gaza will remain under the inheritance of Ya'akov and not Yishmael!!!



The History and Meaning of Palestine and Palestinians
Talk and writing about Israel and the Middle East feature the nouns "Palestine" and Palestinian", and the phrases "Palestinian territory" and even "Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory". All too often, these terms are used with regard to their historical or geographical meaning, so that the usage creates illusions rather than clarifies reality.
What Does "Palestine" Mean?
It has never been the name of a nation or state. It is a geographical term, used to designate the region at those times in history when there is no nation or state there.
The word itself derives from "Peleshet", a name that appears frequently in the Bible and has come into English as "Philistine". The name began to be used in the Thirteenth Century BCE, for a wave of migrant "Sea Peoples" who came from the area of the Aegean Sea and the Greek Islands and settled on the southern coast of the land of Canaan. There they established five independent city-states (including Gaza) on a narrow strip of land known as Philistia. The Greeks and Romans called it "Palastina".
The Philistines were not Arabs, they were not Semites. They had no connection, ethnic, linguistic or historical with Arabia or Arabs. The name "Falastin" that Arabs today use for "Palestine" is not an Arabic name. It is the Arab pronunciation of the Greco-Roman "Palastina" derived from the Peleshet.

How Did the Land of Israel Become "Palestine"?
In the First Century CE, the Romans crushed the independent kingdom of Judea. After the failed rebellion of Bar Kokhba in the Second Century CE, the Roman Emperor Hadrian determined to wipe out the identity of Israel-Judah-Judea. Therefore, he took the name Palastina and imposed it on all the Land of Israel. At the same time, he changed the name of Jerusalem to Aelia Capitolina.
The Romans killed many Jews and sold many more in slavery. Some of those who survived still alive and free left the devastated country, but there was never a complete abandonment of the Land. There was never a time when there were not Jews and Jewish communities, though the size and conditions of those communities fluctuated greatly.

The History of Palestine
Thousands of years before the Romans invented "Palastina" the land had been known as "Canaan". The Canaanites had many tiny city-states, each one at times independent and at times a vassal of an Egyptian or Hittite king. The Canaanites never united into a state.
After the Exodus from Egypt — probably in the Thirteenth Century BCE but perhaps earlier — the Children of Israel settled in the land of Canaan. There they formed first a tribal confederation, and then the Biblical kingdoms of Israel and Judah, and the post-Biblical kingdom of Judea.
From the beginning of history to this day, Israel-Judah-Judea has the only united, independent, sovereign nation-state that ever existed in "Palestine" west of the Jordan River. (In Biblical times, Ammon, Moab and Edom as well as Israel had land east of the Jordan, but they disappeared in antiquity and no other nation took their place until the British invented Trans-Jordan in the 1920s.)
After the Roman conquest of Judea, "Palastina" became a province of the pagan Roman Empire and then of the Christian Byzantine Empire, and very briefly of the Zoroastrian Persian Empire. In 638 CE, an Arab-Muslim Caliph took Palastina away from the Byzantine Empire and made it part of an Arab-Muslim Empire. The Arabs, who had no name of their own for this region, adopted the Greco-Roman name Palastina, that they pronounced "Falastin".
In that period, much of the mixed population of Palastina converted to Islam and adopted the Arabic language. They were subjects of a distant Caliph who ruled them from his capital, that was first in Damascus and later in Baghdad. They did not become a nation or an independent state, or develop a distinct society or culture.
In 1099, Christian Crusaders from Europe conquered Palestina-Falastin. After 1099, it was never again under Arab rule. The Christian Crusader kingdom was politically independent, but never developed a national identity. It remained a military outpost of Christian Europe, and lasted less than 100 years. Thereafter, Palestine was joined to Syria as a subject province first of the Mameluks, ethnically mixed slave-warriors whose center was in Egypt, and then of the Ottoman Turks, whose capital was in Istanbul.
During the First World War, the British took Palestine from the Ottoman Turks. At the end of the war, the Ottoman Empire collapsed and among its subject provinces "Palestine" was assigned to the British, to govern temporarily as a mandate from the League of Nations.

The Jewish National Home
Travellers to Palestine from the Western world left records of what they saw there. The theme throughout their reports is dismal: The land was empty, neglected, abandoned, desolate, fallen into ruins
Nothing there [Jerusalem] to be seen but a little of the old walls which is yet remaining and all the rest is grass, moss and weeds. — English pilgrim in 1590
The country is in a considerable degree empty of inhabitants and therefore its greatest need is of a body of population — British consul in 1857
There is not a solitary village throughout its whole extent [valley of Jezreel] — not for 30 miles in either direction. . . . One may ride 10 miles hereabouts and not see 10 human beings. For the sort of solitude to make one dreary, come to Galilee . . . Nazareth is forlorn . . . Jericho lies a moldering ruin . . . Bethlehem and Bethany, in their poverty and humiliation . . . untenanted by any living creature . . . . A desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds . . a silent, mournful expanse . . . a desolation . . . . We never saw a human being on the whole route . . . . Hardly a tree or shrub anywhere. Even the olive tree and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, had almost deserted the country . . . . Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes . . . desolate and unlovely . . . . — Mark Twain, The Innocents Abroad, 1867
The restoration of the "desolate and unlovely" land began in the latter half of the Nineteenth Century with the first Jewish pioneers. Their labors created newer and better conditions and opportunities, which in turn attracted migrants from many parts of the Middle East, both Arabs and others.
The Balfour Declaration of 1917, confirmed by the League of Nations Mandate, commited the British Government to the principle that "His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a Jewish National Home, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object. . . . " It was specified both that this area be open to "close Jewish settlement" and that the rights of all inhabitants already in the country be preserved and protected.
Mandate Palestine originally included all of what is now Jordan, as well as all of what is now Israel, and the territories between them. However, when Great Britain's protégé Emir Abdullah was forced to leave the ancestral Hashemite domain in Arabia, the British created a realm for him that included all of Manfate Palestine east of the Jordan River. There was no traditional or historic Arab name for this land, so it was called after the river: first Trans-Jordan and later Jordan.
By this political act, that violated the conditions of the Balfour Declaration and the Mandate, the British cut more than 75 percent out of the Jewish National Home. No Jew has ever been permitted to reside in Trans-Jordan/Jordan.
Less than 25 percent then remained of Mandate Palestine, and even in this remnant, the British violated the Balfour and Mandate requirements for a "Jewish National Home" and for "close Jewish settlement". They progressively restricted where Jews could buy land, where they could live, build, farm or work.
After the Six-Day War in 1967, Israel was finally able to settle some small part of those lands from which the Jews had been debarred by the British. Successive British governments regularly condemn their settlement as "illegal". In truth, it was the British who had acted illegally in banning Jews from these parts of the Jewish National Home.

Who Is A Palestinian?
During the period of the Mandate, it was the Jewish population that was known as "Palestinians" including those who served in the British Army in World War II.
British policy was to curtail their numbers and progressively limit Jewish immigration. By 1939, the White Paper virtually put an end to admission of Jews to Palestine. This policy was imposed the most stringently at the very time this Home was most desperately needed — after the rise of Nazi power in Europe. Jews who might have developed the empty lands of Palestine and left progeny there, instead died in the gas chambers of Europe or in the seas they were trying to cross to the Promised Land.
At the same time that the British slammed the gates on Jews, they permitted or ignored massive illegal immigration into Western Palestine from Arab countries Jordan, Syria, Egypt, North Africa. In 1939, Winston Churchill noted that "So far from being persecuted, the Arabs have crowded into the country and multiplied . . . ." Exact population statistics may be problematic, but it seems that by 1947 the number of Arabs west of the Jordan River was approximately triple of what it had been in 1900.
The current myth is that these Arabs were long established in Palestine, until the Jews came and "displaced" them. The fact is, that recent Arab immigration into Palestine "displaced" the Jews. That the massive increase in Arab population was very recent is attested by the ruling of the United Nations: That any Arab who had lived in Palestine for two years and then left in 1948 qualifies as a "Palestinian refugees".
Casual use of population statistics for Jews and Arabs in Palestine rarely consider how the proportions came to be. One factor was the British policy of keeping out Jews while bringing in Arabs. Another factor was the violence used to kill or drive out Jews even where they had been long established.
For one example: The Jewish connection with Hebron goes back to Abraham, and there has been an Israelite/Jewish community there since Joshua long before it was King David's first capital. In 1929, Arab rioters with the passive consent of the British — killed or drove out virtually the entire Jewish community.
For another example: In 1948, Trans-Jordan seized much of Judea and Samaria (which they called The West Bank) and East Jerusalem and the Old City. They killed or drove out every Jew.
It is now often proposed as a principle of international law and morality that all places that the British and the Arabs rendered Judenrein must forever remain so. In contrast, Israel eventually allotted 17 percent of Mandate Palestine has a large and growing population of Arab citizens.
From Palestine To Israel

What was to become of "Palestine" after the Mandate?
This question was taken up by various British and international commissions and other bodies, culminating with the United Nations in 1947. During the various deliberations, Arab officials, spokesmen and writers expressed their views on "Palestine".
"There is no such country as Palestine. 'Palestine' is a term the Zionists invented. . . . Our country was for centuries part of Syria. 'Palestine' is alien to us. It is the Zionists who introduced it." — Local Arab leader to British Peel Commission, 1937
"There is no such thing as Palestine in history, absolutely not" — Professor Philip Hitti, Arab historian to Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry, 1946
"It is common knowledge that Palestine is nothing but southern Syria." — Ahmed Shukairy, United Nations Security Council, 1956
By 1948, the Arabs had still not yet discovered their ancient nation of Falastin. When they were offered half of Palestine west of the Jordan River for a state, the offer was violently rejected. Six Arab states launched a war of annihilation against the nascent State of Israel. Their purpose was not to establish an independent Falastin. Their aim was to partition western Palestine amongst themselves.
They did not succeed in killing Israel, but Trans-Jordan succeeded in taking Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and East Jerusalem, killing or driving out all the Jews who had lived in those places, and banning Jews of all nations from Jewish holy places. Egypt succeeded in taking the Gaza Strip. These two Arab states held these lands until 1967. Then they launched another war of annihilation against Israel, and in consequence lost the lands they had taken by war in 1948.
During those 19 years, 1948-1967, Jordan and Egypt never offered to surrendar those lands to make up an independent state of Falastin. The "Palestinians" never sought it. Nobody in the world ever suggested it, much less demanded it.
Finally, in 1964, the Palestine Liberation Movement was founded. Ahmed Shukairy, who less than 10 years earlier had denied the existence of Palestine, was its first chairman. Its charter proclaimed its sole purpose to be the destruction of Israel. To that end it helped to precipitate the Arab attack on Israel in 1967.
The outcome of that attack then inspired an alteration in public rhetoric. As propaganda, it sounds better to speak of the liberation of Falastin than of the destruction of Israel. Much of the world, governments and media and public opinion, accept virtually without question of serious analysis the new-sprung myth of an Arab nation of Falastin, whose territory is unlawfully occupied by the Jews.
Since the end of World War I, the Arabs of the Middle East and North Africa have been given independent states in 99.5 percent of the land they claimed. Lord Balfour once expressed his hope that when the Arabs had been given so much, they would "not begrudge" the Jews the "little notch" promised to them.
[Note: Some of the material cited above is drawn from the book From Time Immemorial by Joan Peters.]


What is God’s Promise to Abraham?

The Bible On Jewish Links To The Holy Land
By Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
The Jews' link with the land of Israel and their love for it date back almost four thousand years. It began when God told Abraham to leave his homeland, Ur Kasdim, and go "to a land that I will show thee." Abraham had such great faith and trust in God that he left his home and community. He was reassured by the divine promise, "I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who curses you I will curse; and by you all the families of the earth shall bless themselves" (Genesis 12:2-3).
Israel is known by a number of names, including Canaan, Eretz Yisrael, Zion, or simply as ha-aretz, meaning "the land," a sign of its belovedness and significance. It is the Holy Land, par excellence. God promised Abraham that he and his descendants would inherit the land of Israel as an eternal possession.
In the words of the Bible, "On the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying: 'To your descendants I have given this land..."' (Genesis 15:18). It is interesting to note that the Hebrew verb used in the Scriptures is natati, meaning "I have given" (past tense). This passage implies that God had already given the land to the Jews at some earlier time, though this is the first record of such a promise. Rabbinic commentators suggest, however, that God had set aside the land of Israel for His people already at the time of Creation.
In other words, the Jewish rights to the land were always part of the very fabric of Creation. They are eternal and unconditional. God promised Abraham, "I will give to you, and to your descendants after you, the land of your sojourning, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession." God also covenanted with Ishmael, regarded as the father of the Arab people. However, that promise was for nationhood, not land. But the land of Israel was not just a Divine promise. It was also the home of our forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and their wives, Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel and Leah.
For the past 3,000 years there was always a Jewish presence in the Holy Land. Israel is at the core of Jewish identity and peoplehood; the land shapes the Jews' self image and character as a community covenanted with God. Indeed, to repudiate the link between the Jews and the land of Israel is to repudiate the Bible itself. To denigrate the centrality of Israel for God's people is to distort God's Word.

How Did The Jews Maintain Their Attachment To Zion (Israel) Throughout The Centuries Of Exile?
To fulfill their vow never to forget the Holy Land during their exile, the Jews introduced the theme of Israel into virtually every aspect of daily life and routine. To this day, Jews everywhere face toward Israel when reciting their daily prayers. A prayer for return to Zion is part of the standard Jewish blessing over meals. The Passover Seder meal, as well as the High Holy Days services, are concluded with the fervent hope and promise of, "next year in Jerusalem!"
Indeed, the restoration of Israel and the ingathering of the exiles are at the heart of all Jewish prayers for redemption and for the coming of the Messiah. It is customary for the groom to break a glass at a Jewish wedding, reminding the celebrants of Jerusalem during the happiest moment of life. Jews commemorate the destruction of the First and Second Temples and the exile from Jerusalem with an annual day of fasting and mourning. Through these customs and rituals, Jews demonstrate their trust in God's faithfulness.
Jews believe that those who cast their lot with Israel, praying for the peace of Jerusalem and the welfare of its inhabitants, will be rewarded by God's abundant blessing and countenance.
Israel is more than just the lifeblood of the Jewish people. It is God's land, the place where Divine providence is especially manifest. "The eyes of the Lord... are always upon it, from the beginning of the year to the end of the year" (Deuteronomy 11:12). It is a "Very, very good land" (Nu. 14:7); "a blessed land" (Deut. 33:13); "the beauty of all lands" (Ezek 20:6).
The Jewish mystical tradition claims that the very air of Israel makes one wiser. The land will, it is said, stubbornly "refuse" to bear fruit unless the Jews, its natural caretakers and the inhabitants for whom it was created, dwell on and cultivate it. History bears out this notion. Modern Israel was a land of desert and swamp for centuries until waves of emigrating Jewish Zionists in the mid-nineteenth century began tilling its soil. Only then did the land blossom and give forth its produce: "For the Lord will comfort Zion; He will comfort her waste places, and will make her wilderness like Eden..." (Isaiah 51:3).
God's promise to Abraham created an inexorable bond between the Jewish people and the land of Israel. The fulfillment of God's promises resulted in the miracle of a Jewish return to their land after nearly two millennia of dispersion. Never during the long intervening centuries did the Jews waver in their passionate yearning to return home to the land God had given them. Never did their love for Israel wane.

What Does The Existence Of The State Of Israel Mean For Jews Today?
There is something ineffable about our feelings toward Israel—they can never be fully captured or articulated. For more than we grasp Israel, it grips us. Only the person who experiences this love and attachment can understand it. You see, Eretz Yisrael or Israel is not just the land God promised to Abraham and his descendants. It is not only the "holy land" at the very center and core of all Jewish beliefs and practices—it is so much more.
Israel, for the Jew today, is God comforting His people. "Comfort ye, My people." It is that miracle which gives us hope for our future after enduring such a long and dark past. As the prophets say, "For there is hope for thy future, and the children shall return to their borders."
After the Holocaust, we Jews gazed dumbfounded at what had occurred. Was it possible to go on believing in a God of love after losing 6 million individuals, one third of the Jewish people, almost 2 million of whom were children? Was it possible to go on believing in God's covenant with Israel and their election? Was it possible to go on believing? In God? In man? Indeed, was it possible to go on?
Like Ezekiel before us, we Jews stood amidst the ashes of Auschwitz, Buchenwald, and Treblinka and we looked down in the valley of Sheol we asked, "Can these dry dead bones again live?" Can we Jews possibly recover from this devastation? And behold, a miracle—God breathed life into those dry bones and they came together, sinew to sinew, bone to bone. They took on flesh and spirit. They arose and were reborn in Jerusalem. "For the Lord has comforted His people, He has redeemed Zion."
What does Israel mean to the contemporary Jew?
It means that God has not abandoned His people. It means that He is true to His Word! Israel's existence gives us our very will and determination to continue living... as Jews. "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem and for the welfare of all its inhabitants. They shall prosper that love thee." (Psalm 122:6)

Do Jews Believe That The Birth Of The State Of Israel Is A Miracle?
People view life and events in two different ways. Some see them as they are on the surface, i.e. the "natural" order of things. Others see them on a much deeper and more penetrating level. This is what the Psalmist meant when he said, "A fool will not comprehend this." What seems obvious and revealed to the person of faith is viewed entirely differently by the one without faith.
Certainly, there are those Jews who view the birth and continued existence of the State of Israel as an "amazing" occurrence, one that came about because of the courage, training and initiative of the Israeli army. And this is, of course, correct. But what this perspective fails to take into account are the words of Moses in Deuteronomy, reminding the victorious Israelis never to forget who gave them that courage, that power, that ability to win the battle.
Yes, the birth of Israel and its continued survival in the face of many attempts to destroy it is a miracle. Indeed, I would go farther—the very continued existence of the Jewish people after having endured centuries of persecution, bears witness to a God Who is involved in human history, Who is concerned about its direction, and Who cares deeply about the welfare of His children.
It is impossible for me to look at the unfolding events in Jewish history, particularly those in recent years, to see Jews coming from all four corners of the earth to Israel—from the former Soviet Union, Yemen, America, black Jews from Ethiopia, and not see God's hand in these events. God is gathering His children back as He promised to do. He is settling them on their land as the prophets foretold. And He is redeeming the world as the Bible said He would.
The exciting part of all this is that the drama is still unfolding—God continues to be true to Israel and His Word. It is happening right in front of our eyes. It is so obvious and clear to see. Yes, yes, yes, Israel is a miracle. "From the Lord this has come about, it is wondrous in our eyes." And yet, the fool who does not look deeper, below life's surface, will never comprehend these truths.

The Jewish Gaza and its History.
08/07The Jewish Community in the Gaza District:
The Jewish Community in the Gaza District:
The Gaza Strip as mentioned in the Tanach as part of the Land of IsraelCompiled by Sara Bedein
Every school child learns that "the river of Egypt" (Genesis 15:18), i.e., the eastern tributary of the Nile, is the border of Eretz Yisrael. (Even if someone claims that this is Wadi El Arish, it is still west of Gaza.) Whoever has learned a bit of history knows that the Patriarchs, the Hasmoneans and the sages of the Mishnah and Talmud were there, and that Rabbi Obadiah of Bartenura and Rabbi Meshulam of Volterra described Jewish communities there. Moreover, Rabbi Yisrael Najara, while serving as Rabbi of Gaza, wrote the "Ka Ribon Olam" liturgical melody sung on Sabbaths. Only in the 1929 riots were the Jews removed from there. Since the Six Day War, Jews have begun to return to the area. Today, some 7,500 Jewish men, women andchildren are living there - and once more, Jews face the threat of expulsion - this time from a Jewish government in the Jewish National Homeland of Israel.
The earliest mention of Gaza in the Bible occurs in Gen. 10:19, where it is described as the southern terminus of the land of Canaan. The Philistines, a sea-faring people from Crete, had begun to settle in the area during the time of Abraham and, in later centuries, developed a powerful confederacy which was dominated by their five principal cities that included not only Gaza, but also Ashkelon, Gat, Ekron, andAshdod. These kingdoms lasted until the reign of David and Solomon.
The land, like the rest of the Land of Israel, was promised, by G-d to our forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Abraham and Isaac lived in the Gaza Strip region. In Genesis Chapter 26 when Isaac, due to a famine in the land, goes to the city of Gerar, located in the Gaza Strip, where Avimelech, king of the Philistines resided, it is written: (26:2-4): The L-rd then appeared to him and said: "Do not go down to Egypt; settle in the land which I shall point out to you. Reside as a stranger in this land and I will be with you and bless you; for you and your descendants I will give all these regions, and so fulfill the oath which I made to your father Abraham. . . I will give your descendants this whole country.". Then in 26:6: "So Isaac settled in Gerar".
At the time of Joshua, Gaza with her towns and villages unto the River of Egypt and the Great Sea (located today around el Arish) (Josh. 15:47) was allotted to the tribe of Judah. It was the scene of Samson slaying the Philistines in the Temple of Dagon.Solomon conquered Gaza, which by then contained a mixed gentile population, making it part of the southern limits of the Kingdom of Israel. Centuries later, it would trade in slaves with Edom, a practice which the Prophet Amos fiercely condemned.
In the Talmudic period, it was a pagan city, but the local Jews made it into a center of Talmud. Soon, other communities sprang up in the surrounding area until Talmud centers were established in towns and villages stretching from Rafah to Yavneh. In 508, a synagogue was built in Gaza attracting pilgrims from all over Israel and the Diaspora. Remnants of that synagogue can be still found today in Gaza City. According to the 10th century Karaite scholar Sahl ben Matzliah, Gaza was one the three cities in the Land of Israel that served as a place of pilgrimage (the others being Tiberias and Zoar). Yonatan the Hashmonite (the brother of Judah the Maccabi), succeeded in conquering Gaza and settling there in 145 B.C.E. and his brother Shimon who developed the Jewish settlement there states (The Book of Maccabees: 1:15): "Not a strange land we have conquered, and not over the possessions of strangers we have ruled, but of the inheritance of our Fathers that was in the hands of the enemy for some time and was conquered unlawfully, and as for us, when we had the chance - we returned on to ourselves the inheritance of our Fathers."
Byzantine rule, which began shortly after the beginning of the Talmudic period, was very harsh toward the Jews, but the communities of Gaza and Rafah flourished. With the Arab invasion in the 7th century, the Jews of Gaza actually fought alongside the Byzantines. However, the Arabs took it in 634 and, as the first Arab settlers began to migrate to Palestine as a whole, so did they settle in Gaza. Gaza and Rafah continued to thrive under Arab rule although the surrounding communities began to decline. Gaza became a center of Masorah under a certain Rav Moshe. The Spanish linguist Dunash ben Labrat lived there for a time and during the 11th century, Rabbi Ephraim went from Gaza to the important rabbinical community of Fostat in Egypt.
The Crusader invasion in 1099, under their King Baldwin III, destroyed the community in Gaza (although visitors still described one there) and most of thesurrounding area. The mixed gentile populations were also driven out with the exception of the Christians. But those in Rafah managed to survive the onslaughtsand even served as a place of refuge for Jews fleeing Crusader atrocities elsewhere. But during the later Crusader period, even Rafah was abandoned.
The Mamelukes of Egypt conquered Israel in 1291, and in the 14th century, the Jewish community of Gaza revived. Arabs also came to settle in the town whichsoon contained an Arab majority. This was a comparatively peaceful period. Gaza grew and achieved some level of prosperity. The cultivating of wine andraising of cereals were occupations that the local Jews engaged in. The city also became one of the important centers for the Samaritan community alongwith Jaffa, Tulkarm, and certainly Shechem. Over the years, they migrated to other parts of Israel and the Levant, dwindling the community.
In the 15th century, the Mameluke authorities in Palestine began to oppress the Jews with a heavy burden of taxes as well as other types of social restrictions. Sometimes, the Arabs joined in the oppression. Jerusalem was hit harder than any other city in the country. This began the custom of Gaza, and sometimes Hebron, serving as a place of refuge for Jews fleeing from the oppression of the authorities. What was Jerusalem's loss was Gaza's gain and by the 1480s, the community prospered under its Chief Rabbi Moses of Prague.
The Ottoman conquest in 1516 benefited the Jews of Gaza, and even Rafah briefly revived. For centuries, the rabbis of Jerusalem debated whether Gaza and thesurrounding area was part of the Land of Israel according to halacha. This same debate also centered around Jaffa, Haifa, and Acre. However, the rabbis must have ruled in Gaza's favor as the local farm owners were obligated to observe the Biblical laws of agriculture - laws which could only be applied within the borders of Israel.

Among the many Jewish individuals who have visited, or lived in, Gaza since the Ottoman conquest:
· David Reubeni, false messiah who claimed to be a representative of a Jewish kingdom in Arabia. In 1523, he visited Jerusalem and also preached the coming redemption to the Gazan Jews.
· Najara, prominent rabbinic family from Damascus, settled in Gaza in the 16th century and contributed to the local rabbinate. Yisrael ben Moshe Najara, author of "Zmirot Yisrael", was Gaza's Chief Rabbi and president of the tribunal in the middle of the 17th century. He was buried in Gaza and was succeeded by the son MosheNajara II.
· Rabbi Abraham Eliakim, respected Gazan rabbi, lived around 1601. In 1619, a plague had broken out in Hebron forcing many Jews to seek refuge in Gaza as well as Jerusalem.
· Eliezer Arha, one of the Hebron refugees, was so revered by the community, that he became Gaza's Chief Rabbi.
· Rabbi Abraham Azulai of Fez, also from Hebron, cabalistic author and commentator, wrote his cabalistic work "Hesed l'Avraham". He later returned to Hebron where he died.
· Samuel ben David, Karaite scholar who, during his pilgrimage to Palestine in 1641, visited Gaza and described the community in detail.
· Nathan Ghazzati, mystic. He was a native of Jerusalem and son-in-law of a rich and pious German Jew, Elisha Halevi haAshkenazi. A fanatical cabalist, he convincedthe mystic Shavtai Zvi that he was the messiah, thus starting a movement later to become known, as the Shabbateanism. Gaza was the center of this movement, which Nathan proclaimed to be the new capital of Israel. He died in Sofia.
· Rav Tzedakah, 17th century rabbinic scholar.
· Castel, prominent rabbinic family who settled in Palestine shortly after the expulsion from Spain in 1492. They soon settled in Gaza and, like the Najaras,the Castels became the ruling rabbinical family in Gaza throughout the 18th century. They were also skilled craftsmen. Abraham Castel was Gaza's Chief Rabbi during Napoleon's invasion of the country in 1799. In contemporary history, the artist Moshe Castel was a descendant of this family.
With Napoleon's invasion, Gaza was the first to fall. Napoleon had been known to be a friend to the Jews and invaded Palestine in order to reestablish the Jewish state. But the Jews weren't convinced of his actions, and reports from Gaza noted the terrible abuse the local Jews were suffering at the hands of the French soldiers, at times joined by the local Arabs who had, long ago, become more fanatical. They, therefore, fled in numbers, mostly to Hebron. Some Jews remained in Gaza for several more years afterwards, however, but owing to continued Arab persecutions, even they fled, settling in Jerusalem. By the first decade of the 19th century, the old Jewish community had vanished. Several years later, the Arabs expelled the small Samaritan community. From that time until the late 1870s, no Jew or Samaritan would dare live in the city. The area from the River of Egypt to Jaffa was given over to swamps, and Arab marauders and bandits.
At the close of the 1870s, a group of Jews managed to settle in Gaza. They were, in the main, barley merchants who traded with the bedouin for barley which they then sold to the breweries in Europe. But the presence of a reestablished Jewish community bothered the Arabs and in 1890, the Jews of Gaza became victims of a blood libel. In that year, a couple of local Jews had employed an Arab boy as a servant. One day, the boy was playing with another boy who owned a camel. Unfortunately, they both had guns, a custom in Arab society, and tragically, the servant accidentally killed his playmate. Almost immediately, the victim's next-of-kin killed the servant. Shortly afterwards, the Jews informed a Turkish judicial tribunal inJerusalem of the incident. But due to intense propaganda from the local Arabs, the authorities became convinced of the age-old belief that Jews needed gentile blood for Passover and that they, instead, had killed the boy. The Jews were arrestedand thrown in jail. This caused an international incident as these people were under foreign protection, as so many other Palestinian Jews were at that time. To ease the situation, the authorities promptly set them free prompting the Arabs to then force the Turks to restrict Jewish immigration to any part of Israel. Arab immigration continued unhindered.An attempt to revive the Jewish community of Rafah occurred between 1905 and 1913, when Jewish leaders and institutions tried to purchase land in and around the town. (Likewise for Khan Yunis in the 30s which, then, had a Jewish population of 3.) All had failed due to legal considerations and Arab hostility. In 1920 and 1921, many Jews fled Gaza after anti-Jewish rioting by Arabs. In the 1929 riots, the rest were driven from their homes and the Arabs, thereafter, banned Jews from living there. The ancient synagogue was used as part of a mosque and the cemetery was usedas a garbage dump. This is the situation to this day. The community was now dispersed throughout Palestine but they made their contributions to Israeli society. Marcel Liebowitz, a native of Gaza, became a successful film distributor in the 30s, working with local and international film companies.
Due to the British military presence and the accompanying opportunities of employment, Arab immigrants poured into the area as they did the restof Palestine, without any hindrance from anyone. Such immigration continued until the War of Independence.

By 1946, a Jewish group succeeded in renewing the Jewish presence in the area, and outside the Arab populated areas, purchased a plot of land that becamethe kibbutz of Kfar Darom, built on top of the ancient Jewish town of Darom which flourished in the Talmudic era. After the 7th century Arab conquest, this site was renamed Deir, later lengthened to Deir el Balah.

Rafah had a sinister revival at this time. With the struggle against the British after World War II, many Jews were arrested and along with Acre, Rafah servedas prison camp for Jewish leaders as well as for soldiers of the Haganah, the Irgun, and Lehi. During the War of Independence, the Jews of Kfar Darom were expelled as were the few Jews who lived in Khan Yunis. A story was told of one Abu Ish, Mukhtar of a neighboring Arab village who had gone to Gaza City on business. An Arab Muslim, he was a descendant of 7th century Jewish refugees from Arabia. Because of his ancestry, and because of his village's good relations with the Jews, he was accused of being a Zionist spy and, without any trial or investigation, was promptly hanged in the public square.

Toward the end of the war, the entire area was conquered by Egypt and it soon became known as the Gaza Strip. Arab refugees, of which Israel was not thecause (that's the subject of a different article), swelled its population. Indeed, Israel was busy fighting for survival and at the same time, caring for the Jewish refugees from Palestine as well as from the neighboring Arab countries. Between the end of the war and the beginning of the Six Day War, Jews were banned from entering the Gaza Strip. Instead, the place was used as a springboard for raids by the fedayeen. TheSuez Campaign of 1956, in spite of its international condemnation, stopped all that with Israel's recapture of the Strip. The international community forced Israel to relinquish the Strip the next year – a mistake that would come back to haunt it 10 years later. In 1967, due to a massive Arab build-up on its borders, Israel made a preemptive strike, thus saving itself from annihilation. All historic Jewish land wasback in Israel's hands within a week, after a 19 year separation. Gaza City was still off-limits to Jews (a ban that exists to this day), but three years after the War, Kfar Darom was reestablished. Kfar Darom is named for a Jewish settlement in the area from the time of the Mishna. Kfar Darom is located in the area called the River of Gerar - where our forefathers Abraham, Issac, and Yaakov resided. The place isreferred to in the Talmud as a Jewish settlement. About 70 years ago, a Jewish citrus grower by the name of Tuvia Miller purchased 260 dunams of land in thearea. In 1945, The National Jewish Fund purchased the land from Miller and settled a group of Jews there in 1946. During the War of Independence, a brave battlewas waged between the Kfar Darom Jews and the Arabs. The local Jews were able to fend off the Egyptian army for three months, thus affording precious time for thefledgling Israeli army to get organized to protect the heart of the country. " . . . We knew that if Kfar Darom would not be able to fend off the enemy, and theenemy would reach Yad Mordechai, then Tel Aviv would be under immediate danger . . . and only history will know to appreciate properly the tremendouscontribution and sacrifice made by the residents of Kfar Darom in the War of Independence . . ."(Moshe Netzer, commander of the second regiment of the Palmach).This time, the Jews were determined to keep their long and historic presence in the area and by the end of the 70s, 3 more communities were established - NetzerHazai, Atzmona, and Ganei Tal.
Today, the Jewish presence has not only been renewed, but has grown to 25 communities centered around the bloc of communities of Gush Katif (without harming the local Arabs, G-d forbid). Before the first intifada in 1987, Jews and Arabs in the area mixed more or less freely, security permitting. Jews often went into the Arab cities for visits and the Arabs were often employed by the local Jewish communities. When the intifada broke out, all that changed, although many Arabs were still employed by the Jews. After the signing of the Oslo Accords in 1993, the Gazan Jews were threatened, once again, with expulsion. When the second intifada broke out in 2000, all contact between Arabs and Jews was cut off completely. Since then, the local Jews had to put up with gunfire and bombs directed at them as well as 4000+ Kassam rocket attacks on their communities.In addition, the threat of expulsion was renewed by the Sharon government which, as it turned out, was more concerned with expelling Jews than protecting its citizens. The term the government uses is "disengagement", as if disengagement from the Arabs means to disengage from an entire region of the country.

The rising toll of Israeli battle deaths in the Strip is a tragedy beyond words. Just like it is along the Lebanese border. But there's a right way and a wrongway to defend people short of expelling them. At present, the Israeli government chooses to defend the Gazan Jews the wrong way so that they can be sure toget the majority of the Israeli people to back expulsion. If expulsion goes through, the Jews would have been expelled a fourth time from the area since 1920.

Demographics is another problem. The Strip is burgeoning with an Arab population. Arab refugees make up, probably, the majority of the local population - refugees of whom Israel was not the cause - and they account for much of the Arab growth rate. They are counted in every census along with the non-refugee Arabs in annual population censuses. It is as though Israel is concerning itself over a problem it didn'tcreate. In spite of everything, the Gazan communities have the will and motivation, not to mention thousands of years of local Jewish history, to continue to grow andflourish. Since the start of the present intifada, the community has grown to over 8000, and the largest of the communities, Gan Or and Neve Dekalim, haveexpanded. The Gazan communities consider themselves to be the breadbasket of Israel, contributing around $40 million to the Israeli economy. If the governmentallows them, their contributions could be even more in the future.

Are the people for the Disengagement?
Knesset VS The People - Referendum Now!
Now that the Knesset has shown again that they will totally disregard the will and the needs of the majority of Jews living in Israel, the only way for the people of Israel to voice their opinion is through an independent referendum. The Knesset voted against a bill to postpone the disengagement, 12 Tamuz 5765. Sharon told reporters that the Knesset and the people of Israel have spoken their support for the disengagement.
Voice of Judea Commentary:
Nonsense. Yes, the Knesset has spoken, however the people of Israel do not support the disengagement. If Sharon would allow a referendum to be held, he would be ousted in 20 seconds. This is why he is so frightened to hold a national referendum on the issue of disengaging. And this is why the program to hold an independent grass-roots referendum is so vital. To vote, visit http://www.mishal.org/

Is "Disengagement" The Answer?by Dr. Alex Grobman
That Jews need to be "disengaged" from the Arabs is not a new idea. In July 1937 the British issued the Palestine Royal Peel Commission that concluded: "An irrepressible conflict has arisen between two national communities within the narrow bounds of one small country. There is no common ground between them. Their national aspirations are incompatible. The Arabs desire to revive the traditions of the Arab golden age. The Jews desire to show what they can achieve when restored to the land in which the Jewish nation was born. Neither of the two national ideals permits of combination in the service of a single State."
Expelling Jews from their homes in any part of Israel or in the disputed territories will not solve the Arab/Israeli conflict. How do we know? The Arabs have been quite explicit in explaining why the conflict persists. PLO spokesman Bassam-Abu-Sharif and other leaders claim, "The struggle with the Zionist enemy is not a matter of borders, but touches on the very existence of the Zionist entity." In other words, it does not matter whether Israel retreats to her 1967 borders, those mandated by the UN in 1948 or the 1949 cease fire lines. As long as the Jewish State exists, the Arabs are determined to bring about her demise.
Deporting Jews from their homes is also illegal. Writing in The New Republic on October 21, 1991, Professor Eugene V. Rostow made this clear when he declared, "[UN] Resolution 242, which as undersecretary of state for political affairs between 1966 and 1969 I helped produce, calls on the parties to make peace and allows Israel to administer the territories it occupied in 1967 until 'a just and lasting peace in the Middle East' is achieved. When such a peace is made, Israel is required to withdraw its armed forces 'from territories' it occupied during the Six-Day War--not from 'the' territories nor from 'all' the territories, but from some of the territories, which included the Sinai Desert, the West Bank, the Golan Heights, East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip."
In another essay in which he investigates the Arab claim for self-determination based on law, Professor Rostow concludes, "the [British] mandate implicitly denies Arab claims to national political rights in the area in favor of the Jews; the mandated territory was in effect reserved to the Jewish people for their self- determination and political development, in acknowledgment of the historic connection of the Jewish people to the land. Lord Curzon, who was then the British Foreign Minister, made this reading of the mandate explicit. There remains simply the theory that the Arab inhabitants of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip have an inherent 'natural law' claim to the area."
"Neither customary international law nor the United Nations Charter acknowledges that every group of people claiming to be a nation has the right to a state of its own. International law rests on the altogether different principle."
In the absence of a peace agreement, how can one legally or morally justify forcing Jews to leave their homes? What did the Jews do to warrant this treatment? They were encouraged by Israeli administrations to establish residences and business in the area. Isn't expulsion penalizing the victim, while rewarding the aggressor? And when peace negotiations do begin, wouldn't it be better to have a presence in the area as a bargaining chip?
Another concern must be that expulsion clearly demonstrates that the Arab Intifada was not fought in vain. If the Israelis retreat under fire as they did in south Lebanon, the Arabs will once again see that terrorism is the most effective means to ensure acknowledgment for themselves, their goals, and to achieve their objectives. According to a joint Israeli-Palestinian Public Opinion Poll in June 2005 conducted by The Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PSR) in Ramallah and the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 45% of the Israelis and 72% of the Palestinians believe that Ariel Sharon's decision to remove Israeli settlements from Gaza is a triumph for the Palestinian armed struggle against Israel, compared to 52% among Israelis and 26% among Palestinians.
Furthermore, 51% of the Israelis and 66% of the Palestinians believe that the Intifada and armed confrontation has helped Palestinians achieve national and political objectives that negotiations could not have achieved. Israeli settlers share these perceptions with the Palestinians. 72% of the settlers think the disengagement is a victory for the Palestinians and 77% believe the Intifada has helped them achieve political goals.
As to the long term possibility for a political solution to the Israel/ Palestinian conflict, 46% of the Palestinians and 36% of the Israelis believe that there never will be a political settlement, 29% of the Palestinians and 31% of the Israelis think that this goal can only be realized either in future generations or in the next generation, 19% of the Palestinians and 27% of the Israelis expect it will be achieved in the next decade or within the next few years.
In a recent interview, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, who presided over the retreat from south Lebanon and the failed Camp David 2000 Summit, said that Sharon surrendered to terror after realizing that his attempts to curb the violence had failed. Barak believes that the disengagement policy is flawed because even after the Israelis evacuate their armed forces and civilians from Gaza, international law dictates that Israel will be held accountable for everything that occurs there.
Barak further claims that president George Bush did not promise Sharon that Israelis will be allowed to remain in Gush Etzion, Givat Zev, Ariel, and Maaleh Adumim. Israel will not be allowed to remain in this as a reward for leaving Gaza. Behind closed doors, Barak says, Americans will tell you that this in not true. "The public is being deceived," he asserts. Why? Because "Sharon is not strong enough to tell the Israeli public the truth." Sharon and Israeli defense minister Shaul Mofaz have replaced the former Mossad chief, the head of the security service, IDF Chief of Staff, and the National Security Advisor, and appointed people who support disengagement.
Sharon is not being honest about the security fence either, according to Barak. The communities behind the fence will be abandoned. Several areas of the fence have been left open allowing terrorists access to Hadera, Afula, Be'er Sheva and Tel Aviv. Sharon has also lost the city of Ariel, and soon Maaleh Adumim.
Equally disturbing is the admission by Moshe Ya'alon, former Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff that the IDF did not participate in most of the discussions that formulated the expulsion plan. Only after the Americans and Egyptians were informed of the arrangement did he learn about it.
After his recent meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, Sharon once again called upon the Arabs to adhere to their agreement to stop the terrorism, violence and provocation, dismantle the terrorist organizations, collect their weapons and carry out organizational changes as a prerequisite to resuming the diplomatic process. Unless the threats are backed up with action, the Arabs will be even more encouraged to continue flaunting their agreements, if there are no consequences.
Another problem not openly discussed is that once Jews have been transferred out of the area, other Jewish communities will be exposed to Qassam rocket fire and terrorist infiltration. In January of this year, Colonel Uzi Buchbinder, head of the Home Front Command's civil defense department, warned that 46 western Negev communities would be within range of enemy rockets and terrorist attacks after the retreat.
That the Arabs will not be swayed in any way by Israeli withdrawal should not come as a surprise. As political scientist Shlomo Avineri observes, the Arabs see themselves as the only "legitimate repository of national self-determination" in the region. They do not accept that national groups in the Middle East have the same right to self-determination that they have properly demanded for themselves. This exclusivity "borders on political racism," and should not be tolerated in the Middle East any more than it is Europe."
A few examples he points out will illustrate the problems Arabs have with minorities. The Kurds have a different language, culture and customs than the Arabs, and the Iraqi and Syrian governments (and the non-Arab Muslims in Turkey and the Persians in Iran) have oppressed them for decades. Yet no Arabs have ever asked that the Kurds be given the right to self-determination. In 2005, when the international community supports the establishment of a state for the Palestinian people, no Arab moderate or academic has requested comparable rights for the Kurds.
The Berbers in Algeria and the Christian Maronites in Lebanon are similar situations, he continues. The Darfur region of Sudan can be added to this group. Arab militias, with the support of the Arab dominated government in Khartoum, have committed what UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has called "ethnic cleansing" against the indigenous black population.
The refusal by the Sharon government to explain adequately the reasons for giving up land and transferring Jews in response to repeated terror attacks against its citizens, the failure to engage the Israeli public and politicians in an open dialogue about the implications of this policy, and its unfortunate success at fomenting distrust, alienation and hatred among various segments of the population does immeasurable damage to the Jewish people and weakens the Israeli and the American war on terrorism.
Before Israel "disengages," there should be legal and moral justifications for uprooting Jews who have not violated any Israeli or international statue. When the Arabs are willing to accept the existence of the Jewish State and live in peace with her, then negotiations about future borders should be discussed. As long the Arabs want to destroy Israel, concessions only convince them that terrorism, rather than negotiation, is the best method to achieve their goal.
It appears that we have not progressed much since 1994, when Aharon Megged, the respected writer and supporter of the Labor Party, complained: "Since the Six Day War, and at an increasing pace, we have witnessed a phenomenon which probably has no parallel in history: an emotional and moral identification by the majority of Israel's intelligentsia with people openly committed to our annihilation." He also saw a trend by them "to regard religious, cultural, and emotional affinity to the land . . . with sheer contempt." "You make peace with your enemies," they incessantly proclaim, yet as Professor Edward Alexander observed, "it is clear that they can far sooner make peace with enemies wearing keffiyehs than with enemies wearing yarmulkes and tefillin."
Dr. Grobman's most recent book is Battling for Souls: The Vaad Hatzala Rescue Committee in Post War Europe [KTAV]. He is also co-author of Denying History: Who Says The Holocaust Never Happened? (University of California Press, 2000) His next book Zionism=Racism: The New War Against The Jews will be published in 2005.

Where Does It End?by Steve FeldmanAug 08, '05 / 3 Av 5765
In a process that has already begun, but that will reach a crescendo in one week, 10,000 of our co-religionists will be forcibly removed from their homes – not to build a highway; not because their homes were built on a hazardous-waste site; and not for some other reason that would benefit a greater good.They are being told by their government that they must move for one reason only: they are Jewish (and therefore, the Arabs don't want them there).Muslims are not being told to move. Christians are not being told to move. Druze are not being told to move.The only reason the people who have called N'vei Dekalim or Netzarim or 19 other communities in the Gaza Strip, or Sa-Nur and three other communities in Samaria home for more than three decades can no longer stay there is because of their religion.Well, you may think, the Israeli government is making 10,000 Jews move in the name of peace or even compromise. But the facts indicate that nothing could be further from the truth. In what surely may be a first, some of Israel's top military strategists agree with many of Arabdom's most vicious anti-Jewish extremists: the withdrawal/expulsion/disengagement will only bring more terrorism, more bloodshed and more death to more Jews, as the Arabs press for even more territorial capitulation by Israel.Therefore, what is scheduled to happen in a week will be an experiment, or a test-case, if you will. Israel's enemies and their supporters and facilitators have gotten an area ethnically cleansed of 10,000 Jews and nobody seems to care, least of all the Jews. How many more areas where Jews have a right to live – according to international law, history and God – can be rid of what was once described as "the Jewish problem"?This expulsion/withdrawal/disengagement is an action that is unprecedented in the lives of most Jews who are alive today, and one that those who survived the Holocaust or were alive during that period thought they would never witness again. The fact that it is being done by a Jewish government does not excuse it, nor should that make it more palatable. On the contrary, it makes it more disgraceful.Well, you may think, Israel is a democracy and this is what it has decided. But the facts contradict such a notion. The Sharon administration was overwhelmingly elected on the basis that it would not expel Jews from their homes, nor reward terrorists with territory. And when it changed its mind, Ariel Sharon fired those cabinet members he could not bend to his will and strong-armed Knesset members who would otherwise have voted against such a maneuver.Polls indicate that, at most, a slim majority of Israelis support the plan, but it is likely such numbers are inflated by the opinions of Israeli Arabs. Other polls indicate that the plan does not have the backing of most Israelis.Nevertheless, "disengagement" moves forward, full-speed ahead.So, it looks as though the Arabs are going to win this round with a victory handed to them by their Israeli foes, delivered on a platter hand-selected by the Bush administration, the Europeans and a variety of other smaller players, who are going out of their way – quite literally in some cases – to make sure nothing delays or derails it.10,000 Jews will be forced to leave their homes, farms, schools and businesses, and their synagogues and cemeteries will be obliterated as though they were never there, with the outcry and opposition of a relatively few people. Now what?And what is the next sacrifice that Israel will be forced to make? Might it be all of Judea and Samaria, with the hundreds of thousands of Jews who have made lives there for multiple generations told to "get out" and start over someplace else – again, just because they are Jewish?What about eastern Jerusalem and the Kotel? Will we draw the line there, or will we let our holiest city, the center of Judaism, be re-divided and its precious sites be placed beyond our reach again? Where does it end? At what point will Israel's enemies and the anti-Semites be satisfied? Is there even such a limit?Put aside all the arguments that demonstrate that disengagement is unwise, unjust and uncalled for. Aren't you the least bit upset that, despite the fact that you vowed "Never Again", it is happening again? Isn't it time to speak up? To at least put the facts out there and let people know what is going on, without the spin?If not now, when?

Is this Disengagement going to save lives or lead to Real Peace?
What does the bible say about saving life?
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan for an Israeli pullout of Gaza and a few more settlements in the Shomron has found initially extensive approval among Jews in the Diaspora.

At first glance, this is understandable. The absence of a credible Palestinian negotiating partner, combined with Israel's vigorous desire to create a more peaceful atmosphere in the Middle East, has made a partial segregation from the Palestinian Arabs appear to be a step in the right direction.

But before we leap, let's look. Let's pay attention to the serious voices of dissent that have become stronger in the last weeks. Avi Dichter, outgoing head of Intelligence, declared a few months ago in front of the Knesset Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee that the evacuation of the northern Shomron would reproduce the earlier situation in the south of Lebanon, because the firing of mortar shells can be stopped only by Israeli forces on the ground. Israel's former Foreign Minister Shlomo Ben-Ami, a member of the Labor party, as well as Shabtai Shavit, former head of Intelligence, stated in unison that the unilateral abandonment of the Gaza Strip under prevailing conditions would destabilize the region to a frightening degree.

"The plan does not create the necessary minimum of balance that would enable long-term co-existence," said Shavit.

The objections these men and others raise fall under two general headings. One is leadership. Many in Israel and abroad see Abu Mazen, the current Palestinian Authority president, as representing a basic change in the strategic goals of the Palestinians. However, Abu Mazen's past activities as a close confidante of the late Yasser Arafat and his alarmingly militant statements about the future status of Jerusalem and the "right of return" cast doubts on this.

"Abu Mazen is not Arafat," Zalman Shoval, Israel's previous Ambassador in Washington, stated last month, "but his objectives ? not only according to intelligence assessments, but according to his own statements, as well ? are no different from those of his predecessor."

Still, the Gaza pullout offers an appropriate opportunity to verify Abu Mazen's support for peace, and to test his influence for pursuing peace within the Palestinian Authority. This giant endeavor ? the compulsory evacuation of some 10,000 Israeli citizens ? could be set up in complete agreement and coordination with the Palestinian authorities. Lacking such agreement, the Disengagement may cause a devastating aftermath.

In the absence of clear-cut accords with Abu Mazen, the security situation in Israel will decisively degrade. Outgoing Chief of General Staff Moshe Yalon said recently that in addition to Sderot, many other places will be surprised with missiles from the Gaza Strip. Terrorist groups would proclaim Israel's unilateral step as their own victory, and this is likely to aggravate future negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.

"Retreat without getting anything in return is liable to be interpreted by some as surrender and likely to strengthen extremist forces," former general security chief Ami Ayalon stated.

The political situation will become much more complicated, and the pressure on Israel to continue making unilateral steps will ? also according to the Israeli foreign minister ? be enormously intensified. The pullout from Gaza now is considered as a step within the "Road Map" and no longer as a unilateral act in the absence of a Palestinian interlocutor. After the withdrawal, the United Nations, the European Union and even the United States will most probably force Israel to make additional, far-reaching, one-sided concessions.

The inner discord in Israel could become huge and almost unbridgeable, especially as Israelis are getting nothing from Palestinians in return. We should not forget that the large majority who in the last elections voted for Sharon and the Likud did so because he and the party were strictly against any unilateral abandonment of territories ? which is exactly the policy Sharon advocates now. He defied the will of his party that opposed the Gaza pullout and refused to conduct a referendum, even though the Israelis of Gaza confirmed that they would have accepted the results of a referendum.
The Jewish ethos would be strongly tarnished. Images of dozens of synagogues and Torah centers, built with the full backing of the Israeli government, violently destroyed by the Jews themselves, will be satellite-transmitted all over the world. What terrible negative impression will such devastating pictures leave with all viewers, Jews and non-Jews alike! It is and remains incomprehensible that such a traumatic action should happen without a binding accord with the Palestinians.

Finally, the Zionist ethos would be substantially enfeebled by a unilateral pullout from Gaza. A big, impressive settlement in the desert, explicitly subsidized by the government, in which barren land was made fertile in a miraculous way and in the style of Zionist pioneering spirit, is on the verge of being devastated by Israel itself. A large swath of land that had been settled by Jews in the days before the 1948 War of Independence now shall become "free of Jews" without any quid pro quo. By contrast, an orderly turnover of the Gaza Strip would allow many practical problems to be solved, such as the "fate" of the Israeli houses, farms and orchards there. On the condition that the Palestinians deliver real tradeoffs, the Disengagement could become a meaningful step towards a potential co-existence between Israel and its Palestinian neighbors.

A relinquishing of the Gaza Strip to the Palestinians is not to be rejected principally. An abandonment of the Gaza Strip ? if done in the scope of a bilateral peace process involving Abu Mazen - would certainly weaken the strong opposition against Disengagement. The settlers' great sacrifice then would make more sense.

One-sided concessions under the given circumstances are dangerously counter-productive. In this, former Minister Nathan Sharansky stands by his political credo consistently, unflinchingly, and in remarkable openness, without consideration of any potential damage his political career might suffer in Israel. Sharansky's thesis is that democracies do not war with each other, and that a peace with the Palestinians therefore can only be achieved when their authorities have implemented democratic reforms. According to him, Israel gives up far too much when it pulls out of Gaza before the Palestinian government has fulfilled its promises for democratisation and other reforms, which must include forswearing all future terrorism.

It is not surprising that the backing for Sharon's disengagement program has fallen below 50 percent (the exact figure of 48 percent includes Israeli Arabs). People fail to understand why Israel does not require from the new Palestinian leaders meaningful bilateral negotiations for peace, especially as Israel prepares to do something so remarkable and unprecedented for the sake of peace.

[Reprinted from the Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles.]

What is This Retreat For?by Steven ShamrakAug 07, '05 / 2 Av 5765
In order to achieve any goal it is necessary to have one in the first place. Any minute act in our life is preceded by intention to realize a goal. What is the goal of the planned Israeli withdrawal from Gaza? It would be reasonable to assume that it is objective is peace. But we have not heard of any negotiations with the Palestinian Authority. There was not even a promise of a hudna, the Arab promise of tactical ceasefire. Since the withdrawal plan was announced, we have witnessed the escalation of demands made by the PA and an increase of terror acts. We are led to believe that the evacuation of 8,500 Jews from Gaza will 'reduce' Arab terrorism and will save money and Jewish lives. Let's examine these justifications closely. Withdrawal will reduce terror acts committed by Arab Palestinians. Unfortunately, most of the reputable political, intelligence and military experts and analysts, including from the General Security Services (GSS/Shin Bet) and the IDF, predict an increase of terrorism and anarchy in Gaza after withdrawal.It will save Jewish lives. The uncontrollable supply of weapons through the border with Egypt and the flow of deadly cargo through the proposed Gaza port will bring a more deadly and sophisticated arsenal into the hands of Arab terrorists. There will be rocket-propelled grenades, artillery, Katyushas and high-grade explosives for suicide belts. It will save money. Israel is already wasting millions on additional security and construction of the new security roads. Just a new fence upgrade will cost up to $220 million dollars. Add to that compensations to those who have been stripped of their property and businesses, the loss of revenue from border taxes, the loss of the $100-million-dollar economy of 21 Jewish communities. What are the negative consequences of the Gaza-Samaria withdrawal?1. The withdrawal will create the precedent of ethnic cleansing of Jews by Jews, and the abandonment of Jewish ancestral land. 2. It is a public relation disaster, which creates a shocking image of Israel.3. It is already undermining Jewish national unity.4. It is encouraging the enemies of the Jewish people, not only Arabs, to persist with their anti-Israel campaign, aimed at the destruction or weakening of the Jewish state. 5. It is possible that the deportation of Jews from Gaza contradicts the Fourth Geneva convention and can be qualified as a crime against humanity.6. Deployment of the Egyptian army at the border with Gaza endangers the demilitarization of Sinai agreed upon in the Camp David Accords.History teaches us that when Jews give something up, it is almost impossible to get it back. It took us 2,000 years to come back to Palestine, but still we are not allowed to be in charge of our land. Some are trying to justify withdrawal by saying that it is the first step toward the "two states, one land" solution. But even supporters of withdrawal realize the impossibility of the idea of life next to the Arabs without checkpoints. Let us be generous and assume that it will work. That does not explain why it is necessary to transfer Jews from "Arab-controlled" land. At the same time, why should Arabs remain on "Jewish-controlled land"? The withdrawal contradicts and undermines the idyllic picture of the happy co-existence of two nations - Arabs and Jews – living in harmony and love, next to each other. I do want peace in Israel, but with all my vivid imagination, I am not able to visualize it as long as Arab hate dwells next to and inside of the Jewish state. By repeating the same actions, one will get the same results. Why would the same misguided and impotent plans already pursued bring peace to Israel? The question still remains: what are we sacrificing the Jewish national dream, Jewish unity and Jewish lives for?

Should we leave Gaza?
Clueless in Jerusalem by Paula R. SternAug 04, '05 / 28 Tammuz 5765
Rarely have I seen a government so successfully bungle something that should be so simple. The government, read here "Ariel Sharon", believed Israel must disengage from the Palestinians unilaterally because, after years of violence, it was clear to one and all that there was no partner on the other side with whom we can negotiate. Up to this point, Sharon's assessment was logical, well intentioned and might well have had the support of the nation. If you can't live with them... After more than 50 years of warfare, it is becoming evident that they aren't willing to live with us, and disengagement might well be the only way to end this conflict. So the conclusion Sharon reached might have been logical, that we must separate Jew and Arab, that the experiment has failed and there can be no resolution given the severity of the outstanding issues. Years ago, Rabbi Meir Kahane was assailed as a racist for suggesting this very theory, and yet today, it is widely accepted – Jews must separate from Palestinians. Message received and accepted. What becomes more and more clear each day, however, is that Ariel Sharon's Disengagement Plan is neither a disengagement nor a plan. Sharon will not disengage the populations. His only plan involves destroying the lives and livelihoods of 9,000 Jews. Beyond this, he has no real goal of separating from the Palestinians. No new hospitals will be built in the Gaza Strip to enable Palestinians to have all their medical needs met there. They will continue to come to Israel, even if they do occasionally try to come to our hospitals to blow them up, as 21-year-old Wafa Al-Biri planned to do just last month. We will still supply Gaza with electricity, water and phone service, and they will continue to send in workers, even though this arrangement is often used to try to mask planned terror attacks.It isn't much of a plan either. Where are the dunams of land required to enable the farmers of Gush Katif to continue to plant and grow, as they have been doing for 30 years? Where will we rebury those who are buried in Gaza now? Where will the children go to school? How will you move 9,000 people from their homes to waiting stations several kilometers away, when you can't even protect them from the Kassam rockets and mortars the Palestinians launch at them daily? What message are you sending to the Palestinians when no matter how much they attack, we still plow forward to reward them with land and riches?Clueless politicians are what we elected. The government might have had the cooperation of the people if they were receiving something in return for the tremendous sacrifices. We will not get security. We will not get peace. We will not get disengagement and we don't even have a plan.Clueless politicians are what we have. The government is on the run, unable to cope with the determination and dedication of those who feel its "plan" is morally and ethically wrong. Sharon has manipulated his cabinet to get a majority, betrayed the only referendum he initiated and refused a general referendum because he fears hearing the true opinion of the majority of Israelis. To implement his expulsion plan, he has twisted and warped laws and concepts for his personal interest. Few in Israel doubt that Sharon is using the Disengagement Plan to deflect attention from his lack of leadership, his inability to deliver his campaign promises of peace and security, and, even worse, to manage his delinquent and corrupt family relations and actions. Clueless politicians. Our appeasement could well put Neville Chamberlain to shame. One minute the government is closing Gush Katif, and then they are rescinding the order. We will pull out in July; no, make it in August; no, do it now. Family members can enter; no they can't. The rally is permitted; no it is not. We are going into Gaza to stop the Kassam rockets that have killed and wounded yet again; well, maybe in 24 hours. We won't retreat under fire; we will retreat no matter what. We won't negotiate with terrorists; we'll be meeting next week with Abu Mazen and anyone else willing to meet with us. Terror attacks will not be tolerated; the Netanya attack will not stop the implementation of the plan. The army orders vast numbers of soldiers to take leave, then orders them back to their units. We will destroy the homes; no, we won't. We will destroy the homes, but not remove the rubble. We'll destroy the homes and remove the rubble, if we can't find someone else to foot the bill.Inevitably, the one consistency here is Sharon's inability to grasp the very basics of the situation. He still does not understand the importance of a referendum. Had he agreed, and had a national referendum shown that a majority of Israelis wanted to pull out of Gaza, the residents would have listened to the voice of the people. They are, above all else, Israelis. Had Israel been allowed to speak, these Israelis would have abandoned what they built there and obeyed the will of the people.Sharon fails to understand that the Palestinians are not ready for peace. For generations, they have been raised with hatred and a promise that terror will succeed. And, apparently, they are correct. Although the Palestinians have been incited to violence and betrayed and cheated by their leaders, Israelis will pay the price, thanks to the short-sightedness of Ariel Sharon. Handled correctly, Sharon might have been able to work with Abu Mazen to bring peace. But, having rammed the Disengagement Plan down the throats of his own people, Sharon has convinced the Arabs that they will achieve victory simply by sitting on the side and watching us make fools of ourselves. If they have no desire to sit quietly, continued shelling, shooting and bombing is optional, but truly not needed to bring Israel to its knees. Ariel Sharon has succeeded in doing this, while 50 years of Arab warfare has failed.Sharon's plan may succeed in expelling 9,000 people from their homes, but those same politicians who cannot successfully plan this disengagement also fail in understanding the cost of such actions. For decades to come, we will be paying for Sharon's Disengagement Plan in the disillusionment of our youth, the shame of how our government betrayed the Jewish residents of Gaza, and the weak and clueless policies we have shown to the Arabs.

Do Not Let Jewish History Be Erased
by Ruth Matar
[Ruth Matar is co-chairwoman of the grass-roots activist organization Women for Israel?s Tomorrow (Women in Green).]
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/article.php3?id=3964

The other day I turned on the radio and I heard Ariel Sharon say in his heavily accented English, "The Disengagement Plan is the most important item on our agenda, and with G-d's help we shall succeed."

What incredible chutzpah! Sharon well knows that the Almighty promised His Holy Land to the Jewish People. This Promise certainly includes Judea, Samaria and Gaza! He can't really seriously be calling for G-d's help. Does he not realize that G-d does not change his Word? Sharon might be justified in calling on his newly found godless cronies - Shimon Peres, Yossi Sarid, Tommy Lapid, et al - to come and help him. As it is, Sharon's statement is the height of attempted obfuscation, bordering on blasphemy.

Okay, let's again make this clear once and for all - Gaza is Jewish land promised by Hashem in the Bible as an everlasting inheritance; it was, in fact, apportioned to the Tribe of Judah (Joshua 15:47 and Judges 1:18) as part of Israel's eternal patrimony.

A few examples of evidence of a Jewish presence in Gaza since Biblical times:

* A beautiful remnant of the mosaic floor, dated 508/509 CE, of a Gaza synagogue. It pictured King David playing the harp. King David's name was rendered in Hebrew letters.

* One of the big mosques in Gaza has a pillar that had the name Chananya Bar-Yaakov (an important figure from the days of the Hasmoneans) engraved on it. Above his name was a picture of a Menorah with a Shofar on one side, and an etrog on the other.

* There is an old neighborhood in Gaza that is called by the Arabs, to this day, Harat Al-Yahud - "neighborhood of the Jews".

* Israel Ben Moses Najara (1555-1625) was a prominent rabbi in Gaza. Throughout the years after his death, many Jews came to pray at his grave.

Most physical evidence of the Jewish presence in Gaza since Biblical times has been deliberately erased by the Arabs, especially at the time of the first Intifada (1987-1993). The Arabs feel that if they erase such physical evidence, they will be able to convince the world of their Big Lie, that they are the original inhabitants of the Holy Land.

Rabbi Najara was not only the rabbi of Gaza, but he was also a famous poet. The following is a translation of one of his most well-known poems "Yoh Ribbon Olam ve-Allemayya", a poem that appears in the Jewish prayer book, to be sung every Sabbath:

"Lord of all worlds! All Your creatures praise You. Even if we lived a thousand years, we could not recount the extent of Your greatness. God, save Your people from their exile and rebuild the Temple, and there, in Jerusalem, we will really be able to sing to You!"

The poetry of Rabbi Najara is beautiful, inspiring and a tribute to Hashem. But poetry can also be vile, inciting and a call to terror and violence. One of the most famous Arab poets today is Mahmoud Darwish, whose poems deal with the Arab-Jewish conflict. (By the way, Yossi Sarid, who was Minister of Education under Prime Minister Ehud Barak, made the incredible demand that the poetry of Darwish become part of the curriculum for Jewish children.)

The following is from one of Darwish's most popular poems: "Dig up your dead! / Take their bones with you / and leave our land."

Desecration of Jewish graves occurred already while Ehud Barak was Prime Minister. Barak allowed the burning and vandalizing of graves such as the tombs of Joseph and Joshua in Samaria, and Jewish graves in Hebron.

Now, shamefully, Prime Minister Sharon is planning to make Mahmoud Darwish's poem even more of a reality. Shame on you, Ariel Sharon! Would you even contemplate digging up the bones of your beloved wife Lilly? Or of your son who died at a young age?

The widely accepted and most important code of Jewish law, the Shulchan Aruch, states as follows (Yoreh De'ah, 363:1):

"You are not allowed to remove the dead and the bones, not from a respectful grave to a respectful grave, not from a disrespectful grave to a disrespectful grave, and not from a disrespectful grave to a respectful one. (It goes without saying that it is not allowed to remove from a respectful grave to a disrespectful one.) The only cases where transfer of the dead would be allowed are if it was the will of the deceased, or if the remains are being transferred to Israel."

Member of Knesset Gila Finkelstein of the National Religious Party delivered a speech in the Knesset on July 7, 2004, which dealt with the human suffering of Sharon's Disengagement Plan:
"Who will lift up the three Cohen family children - those heroic youngsters from Kfar Darom who lost legs [in a murderous Palestinian terror attack on a school bus - ed.] - and take them out of their house, the house to which they returned after the attack when they made a courageous decision to show that terrorism had not won?

"Who will knock on the door of Chana Bart - that gentle but determined woman who defeated terrorism, who managed to give birth even after she was so seriously wounded - and ask her to wheel herself over in her wheelchair to the special bus waiting for her outside?

"Who will help David Hatuel [whose pregnant wife and four children were murdered by Arab terrorists] to fold up all his memories into his suitcases? And who will pile on to the evacuation trucks all those men, women and children, our brothers and sisters, the flesh of our flesh? This will be an impossible psychological burden, one that is liable, Heaven forbid, to be the lot of both the evacuees and the evacuators!

"I shake as I imagine the unit that will come to remove the dead from their graves, including the victims of murderous Arab terrorism. On whom is it possible to place such a terrible mission, accompanied by its psychological tensions and eternal scars?"

The Jews of Gaza have been targeted by more than 4,200 Palestinian rockets and mortar shells in the past four years. They have been demonized and delegitimized by the media, disparaged by the Left, and threatened with expulsion by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

Despite the threat of withdrawal hanging over their heads, it turns out that in the first six months of 2004, the number of Jews living in Gaza actually soared, growing at a rate three times faster than last year. (By the way, Sharon has made it clear that anybody who moves to Gaza now, will not be compensated.)

I firmly believe that, as long as we remain confident in Hashem and in the justness of our cause, no power in the world can dislodge us from our Land, our Biblical patrimony.

As Menachem Begin noted in his book The Revolt, "Faith is perhaps stronger than reality, for faith itself creates reality."


Who is the Real lawbreaker and what does Israeli Law say about Sharon’s Plans ?
The Real Lawbreakers
by Boris ShusteffJuly 20, 2005 Speaking to the Jewish Agency Assembly in Jerusalem on June 28th, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said, "I am very wary of attempts by a small minority of lawbreakers... who wish to use force against the IDF and other security forces." Meeting later on the same day with leaders of Chabad, he brought up the issue of the lawbreaking again when said that, "There is a small group of extremists here that is trying to force its will on the nation."It appears that the counter-positions of law-abiding and law-breaking citizens has become the leitmotif of current Israeli life. Those who support Sharon's efforts to make Gaza Judenrein are convinced that since the Israeli government passed the Jewish transfer law, it is every citizen's duty to follow it. The supporters of the national camp, on the other hand, claim that this law was forced upon the Knesset and the country through lies, arm-twisting, and anti-democratic methods. Therefore, every conscientious citizen should oppose the implementation of this injustice.In short, the main controversy in Israeli society today revolves around the importance of obeying the law, in particular the Jewish expulsion law. Honestly speaking, this shady law is completely incompatible with the fundamental laws on whose basis the Jews restored their national life in Eretz Yisrael. One should expect these laws to be obeyed much more religiously. However, it is exactly in contradiction to these laws that Sharon's efforts to turn Gaza into a Jew-free enclave stand. Ironically, the Israeli Penal Code defines such efforts to be treason, with all the consequences deriving from it.Howard Grief, a prominent Israeli lawyer, writes in the March issue of Nativ (by-monthly periodical of the Ariel Center for Policy Research) that Sharon's actions fall into the category of actions "that constitute the crime of treason under Section 97(a) of the Penal Code. In fact, the mere intention to withdraw from any area under the sovereignty of the State of Israel is enough to constitute the crime of treason under sections 97(b) and 100 of the Penal Code."(1)In order to preempt so-called "experts" and skeptics who are perhaps starting to feel sorry for the poor ignorant Israeli nationalists, who are not aware that the lands of Judea, Samaria and Gaza were never officially annexed by Israel and cannot be considered to be under Israel's sovereignty, let us go directly to the primary source.Article 1 of the Jewish State Law #29, titled "Area of Jurisdiction and Power Ordinance", passed in the Knesset on September 22, 1948, states: "Any law applying to the whole of the State of Israel shall be deemed to apply to the whole of the area including both the area of the State of Israel and any part of Palestine which the Minister of Defense has defined by proclamation as being held by the Defense Army of Israel."(2)Article 3 of the Law makes it retroactive and effective from the day of the reestablishment of the Jewish state – the 6th of Iyar, 5708 (15th May, 1948).In plain language, according to this law, any part of Palestine that falls under the control of the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) by default becomes an inalienable part of the Jewish State, and the sovereignty of the state automatically extends to this territory. Meaning that it must be treated exactly as any other part of Israel, and that Israel's Penal Code, including articles 97(a), 97(b), and 100, applies to it as it applies to any other part of Israel.The mention of Palestine in the "Area of Jurisdiction and Power Ordinance" Law was not accidental, because the terms "Palestine" and "Eretz Yisrael" were always equivalent for both Jews and non-Jews. This is why, until the middle of the last century, it is the Jews in Palestine who were routinely referred to as Palestinians and vice-versa - when speaking of Palestinians, one always meant Palestinian Jews.In sports terminology, one might say that this Israeli jurisdiction law received the relay baton from the preceding law-enforcing document, which was the League of Nations resolution of April 25th 1920 at the San Remo Conference. Article 6 of the British Mandate for Palestine declared the right of the Jews to settle anywhere in Palestine, including, of course, Judea, Samaria and Gaza.Despite the fact that the British Mandate to Palestine was terminated in 1948, the rights that it gave to the Jews to build settlements in Palestine remain intact. Howard Grief explains: "Under the principle of acquired legal rights, though the international instrument upon which those rights were founded did indeed expire, the rights themselves conferred on the Jewish People remained in force. This principle of international law is now codified in Article 70(1)(b) of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties."(1)It must be crystal clear that the decision of the Israeli government to automatically extend its sovereignty to any patch and parcel of Palestine as soon as it falls under the IDF's controls was absolutely intentional. The Israeli Declaration of Independence explicitly mentions the entirety of Eretz Yisrael as the Homeland of the Jewish people. Therefore, it is not surprising that the most important law of the Jewish state - the Law of Return - gives to the Jews the opportunity to exercise their right of return to any place in Eretz Yisrael.Howard Grief brilliantly notes that the Law of Return speaks not about the return of the Jews to the State of Israel, but about the return to the Land of Israel; i.e., Eretz Yisrael, not Medinat Yisrael. He emphasizes the point that instead of using the word "medina" (the state) it uses the word "artza", which has one and only one meaning in Hebrew. It is derived from the word "eretz", which means the Land of Israel - Eretz Yisrael.It is interesting to compare the text of the Law in its original Hebrew (3) with its English translation (4). Anyone who is fluent in both languages can easily notice the substantial discrepancy between the original and the translation. While the first paragraph of the Law of Return states: "Any Jew has a right to perform aliyah to Eretz Yisrael," the English version lacks a proper translation of the word "artza". It uses, instead of the correct wording "Eretz Yisrael", the term "this country."The fourth paragraph of the Law of Return makes it abundantly clear that the word "artza" was used deliberately. The paragraph explains that any Jew who lives or was born in Eretz Yisrael before the emergence of this law is considered to have made aliyah. We stress again that it is in Eretz Yisrael and not only in the territory that became the State of Israel.In summary, there are three major laws that are the three pillars upholding the reinstated Jewish statehood. These are the international law regarding Jewish settlement rights, accepted in San Remo and still enforceable, Israeli Law #29, the "Area of Jurisdiction and Power Ordinance", and the Law of Return. All of them unequivocally confirm the inalienable rights of Jews to settle in any part of Eretz Yisrael. That means that with his actions directed towards expelling the Jews from Gaza and northern Samaria, Sharon blatantly violates the fundamental laws of the Jewish state.Thus, it becomes clear that Sharon pronounced his words about lawbreakers in reference to "a small group of extremists... trying to force its will on the nation" while looking into the mirror. It is exactly he and the ruling Israeli political and judicial elite who constitute the small group of extremists. It is they who want to force their will on the nation. They are striving to deprive the Jewish people of its eternal inheritance - the lands of Judea, Samaria and Gaza.Evil should not be allowed to prevail. Every time we hear somebody accusing patriotic Jews of violating the law of the state, we must loudly speak up. It is not the patriotic Jews, but Sharon who twists the most fundamental laws of Israel. It is Sharon who is the lawbreaker. And the Israeli judicial system classifies this kind of lawbreaking as treason.Sharon can boast that the expulsion of Jews will happen on schedule, but he should know that there is nothing new under the sun. When the patience of a long-suffering and stiff-necked people runs out, he will have to answer for the breaking of the law. And then, he will be remembered not as a hero, but as a traitor. Disengagement will bring warBy Ted Belman August 10, 2005The strongest argument in favor of disengagement is that it will end the occupation of Gaza. But will it? "Occupation" is more then just a derogatory label. It imposes on the occupier onerous responsibilities in international law to maintain law and order and to protect the inhabitants and the land. For this and other reasons, Sharon wants desperately to end the occupation. Easier said then done. At the same time I would argue that we have all been affected by the propaganda emanating from the PA and totally supported by old Europe and leftists around the world including in Israel, to the effect that the occupation is a crime against humanity, is degrading for Palestinians and Israelis alike and is costly to Israel in lives and shekels. The truth is that the occupation was brought about due to the aggressive actions of the Arab states and is necessary to save Israeli lives and to protect Israel. Security Council Resolution 242 authorized Israel to remain in occupation until she could withdraw to secure and recognized borders. The PA makes the occupation more onerous by attacking Israel. They are the authors of their own misfortune. Last year, I wrote What Will Disengagement Accomplish in which I argued that disengagement would not end the occupation. This article refers to a brilliant report by the PLO Negotiations Affairs Department, which makes the case that the occupation will continue because of Israel’s intended control of the access to Gaza. Sharon agrees and therefore is bending over backwards to divest himself of control. It is for this reason he is to allow a deep sea port, a land link to the West Bank and an airport. He is also negotiating to permit more Egyptian troops into the Sinai to manage the border; all this in the hope of getting the Security Council to declare the occupation of Gaza over. On August 7th, DEBKA put the question, How Much Will Sharon Fork out for a Favorable Security Council Resolution? Subsequently Aluf Benn, in Haaretz, raises these issues in No letup to the occupation. No rational man would ever concede on any of these issues yet Sharon is in negotiations concerning all of them. The consequences of having the free flow of arms and terrorists in and out of Gaza and the West Bank are so obvious, so certain and so frightening that no one would contemplate it much less permit it. Yet Sharon is doing just that. In effect, Sharon is saying that no price is too high to end the occupation. Perhaps Sharon is under enormous pressure. Israel's biggest trading partner, the EU, may be threatening economic boycotts and sanctions. The US could be threatening a military boycott. Both have already instituted boycotts of one form or another. Don't forget the US is desperate for some achievement in the ME to take the pressure off for their failure in Iraq and Iran. The EU is likewise desperate for Israel to return to the Green Line in the hope of lessening the terror they are subject to. If Bush came to shove, how far would he push Israel? Whatever happened to his pledge that he would never jeopardize the security of Israel? Furthermore, if Israel were to give in to all these demands resulting in a huge terror offensive and Al Qaeda entering Gaza etc, what would be the Quartet's response? Somebody would have to occupy Gaza just as the US occupied Afghanistan and Iraq. But the US is now looking for an exit strategy and isn't prepared to touch another occupation with a ten foot pole. Instead it is placing it all eggs in the PA's basket hoping to train them and get them to bring peace where there is no peace and there is no will to peace. The US is demanding that they be given an army with heavy equipment and ammunition to take on Hamas. It boggles the mind. Talk about going for broke. The end result of all this myopia, malevolence and quixotic thinking will be war.

Former Chief Rabbi Shapira Issues Ruling Against Expulsion 18:12 Aug 09, '05 / 4 Av 5765By Ezra HaLevi and Yishai Fleisher
In response to requests from students, and public confusion on the status of the Disengagement Plan according to Jewish Law, former Chief Rabbi Avraham Shapira has issued a ruling.

Rabbi Shapira, former Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of the State of Israel and the head of the Merkaz HaRav yeshiva, has written a complete Halakhic responsa (legal ruling) regarding "the expulsion of Jews from Gush Katif, in order to hand a part of the land to non-Jews." The Jewish legal ruling reads as follows: Paragraph after lengthy paragraph on the way of the Torah in these important matter can be written, but at this time I will give you as an answer the brief, practical, halakhic verdict - so that the house of Israel will know the way of the Torah and go in the way of its commandments. A) According to Torah law, it is completely forbidden to give land in Israel to a non-Jew, due to the prohibition of Lo Techanem ('Do not give them a foothold in the Land') and due to the nullification of the commandment to settle the Land of Israel that is incumbent upon every individual of Israel. This prohibition applies to every Jew, soldier and civilian alike. An order to take part in the evacuation of Jews from their homes in order to give over the land to non-Jews is an order that is against the religion of our holy Torah and forbidden to fulfill. Every order that is contrary to Jewish law and compels one to violate the words of the Torah holds no validity, is forbidden to fulfill and no person has the authority to deliver it. About such instances the Rambam (Maimonides) wrote, "It goes without saying that if an order of the king nullifies a commandment, then it is not listened to (Laws of Kings)." Anyone who violates this prohibition will not be exonerated, not in this world and not in the world to come. B) In general the prohibition of handing land over to non-Jews includes helping those engaged in the transgression. Therefore, one must not participate in blocking the entrances to Gush Katif or assist, in any other manner, the expulsion of Jews from their homes. Similarly, it is upon every soldier called for reserve duty to refrain from showing up if his service is designated to enable other soldiers to take part in the transgression. C) A soldier or police officer that harms the holy items of Israel and, G-d forbid, destroys heavenly articles and holy accoutrements such as Torah scrolls, phylacteries, mezuzas - whether it is done within the context of the evacuation transgression or not - he is desecrating the holy of Israel and violates the command Lo ta'asun ken l'HaShem Elokeichem (Do not treat G-dly things as we are commanded to treat idolatry). D) One who destroys an object in a synagogue, he is like someone who destroys a stone in the Sanctuary [of the Holy Temple]. (Mordechai, chapter Bnei Ha'Ir, in the Magen Avraham, 152:6). There is an absolute prohibition for every soldier and every policeman to take part in the destruction of a synagogue and a study hall. And within that prohibition is the prohibition of destroying vessels belonging to the synagogue, for they are like the synagogue itself (Biur Halachah, siman 152). Woe to him and woe to the soul of a soldier or policeman who takes part in this sin. E) A soldier or policeman who damages the property of the residents of the region is committing robbery. There is no "Law of the Kingdom" [the concept in Jewish law which gives deference to the actions of a king even over certain ethical values]. In this case rather, the "violent theft of a kingdom," is contrary to Torah law. (Shach, Choshen Mishpat 73:39) It is the right of every person to defend his property from harm or damage that are done through acts that are contrary to Torah law. F) It is incumbent upon every Jew to do all he can to stop transgression. Moreover, every single Jew is required to protest. Of course, it is not allowed to use violent means against soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces, or the Israeli police. G) Only great sages of the generation whose decisions are widely accepted in Israel are allowed to adjudicate difficult questions in all parts of the Torah, and are allowed to render such decisions that affect all of Israel. All those who have not reached this level should abstain from rendering decisions on these issues. If he does render decisions on this matter, the Rambam has already called him (Laws of Talmud Torah, chapter 5:4), "An evil person, a fool, and haughty," and it is furthermore said about him, "Many corpses she has made to fall, etc." and it says about him "and many are its dead." These are the small students which have not studied Torah sufficiently; and they wish to aggrandize themselves before the ignoramuses and the people of their city; and they leap and sit at the head to instruct Israel; and it is they who increase conflict; and they are the destroyers of the world who put out the light of Torah and who ruin the vineyard of the G-d of Legions. It is about them that Solomon has said in his wisdom, "Small foxes have taken hold of us, small foxes destroying the vineyards." H) Those who follow the rulings of rabbis who have not reached the level of rendering decisions in these matters (as was addressed above), are not categorized as inadvertent transgressors, and they too will be judged. (See Pitchei Teshuva, Even haEzer 17:140 and Yoreah Deah 99:5, in the name of the Tzemach Tzedek haKadmon) I) From the straits, in the 'days between the straits' [the three weeks of increasing mourning culminating with the 9th of Av], G-d will hear the voice of His nation, and will answer us bountifully, and out of suffering and tribulation He will find for us salvation and well-being and He will take away the shame of His nation from the whole earth, because G-d has spoken. (signed), Rabbi Avraham Kahane Shapira Rabbi Shapira also sent a sharply-worded letter to IDF Chief Rabbi Brig.-Gen. Yisrael Weiss, regarding the latter's ruling bidding soldiers to fulfill military orders connected with the expulsion of Jews from Gush Katif and northern Shomron. Rabbi Shapira wrote, "If, as you claim, you are my student, I request of you, please listen to my opinion, and do not rule contrary to what I rule. And if you are not my student, please do not use my name to fulfill your missions."

EXTRA-Biblical References to Gaza
Jews in Gaza?
Comment by Beth Goodtree
DEMONS OF THE WILDERNESS
Isralert.com source: Isralert subscriber/commentator Beth Goodtree
As anyone who truly studies religion knows, The Bible is not the be-all and end-all of Hebraic thought; it is merely the primer. Judaism is much, much more than The Bible, some of it written down for thousands of years, some of it preserved in ‘the oral tradition’ until written down some time later. But all of it is part of Judaism. It is from all these sources that we get our knowledge of demons and a wilderness.
Demons are often described as belonging to the wilderness and we even have prayers and rituals surrounding them. The term “scapegoat” comes from a very ancient and holy Jewish ritual. During Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, the sins of the people are symbolically placed upon the goat’s head, after which the goat is sent into the wilderness.
The wilderness itself is a designation that is surrounded by ancient Jewish teachings. And this whole concept of wilderness, as well as demons, may be an undercurrent of what we see happening today.
For various reasons, some being political, not all Jewish teachings and writings were included in the portion of The Bible that comes after the Torah (the first five books, also known as the Pentateuch). And yet, it is from some of these teachings and writings that we get our deeper knowledge of Judaism.
The Book of Enoch is one such work and some of its teachings are echoed in The Midrashim and other places. (1, 2) The Book of Enoch, parts of which were found with the Dead Sea scrolls, goes into much greater detail regarding the story surrounding the fallen angels, who are mentioned in Genesis. According to the book of Enoch, there were two main fallen angels: Shemhazai (aka Semjaza aka Samiaza aka Shamhazi) and Azazel (aka Aziel aka Aza’el, aka Azael aka Asa'el). Shemhazai was the leader of the fallen angels and Azazel taught humans how to make war and weapons. (1, 2, 3)
Curiously, both have been referred to by the nickname “Aza” at various times and places. (3) Perhaps even more curiously, what we English-speakers designate as the area known as “Gaza” is called “Aza” by the Israelis and people who live in the Middle East.
Back in ancient times, there were thriving cities, usually with wildernesses between them. There were no paved roads or urban/suburban sprawl. This scenario held true for that area we know as Gaza/Aza, although the original specific site for it is still uncertain, it is known to have been in the general area. (4)
In the Book of Enoch, we are told that as punishment for his sins, the fallen angel of war, Azazel, was thrown into a pit in the ‘Wilderness of Dudael,’ and left there to await Final Judgment. Although no one knows to where the name ‘Dudael’ refers, ‘Dudael’ also means ‘Great Desert’ and ‘Fiery Caldron.’ Furthermore, there is one place in Israel that fits that description: the Negev, which has one of its borders on…Gaza/Aza.
So how do places come by their names? Oftentimes, they are given names either relating to important people, events, history and the like. Is it mere coincidence that Gaza/Aza has the same name as one of the leaders of the fallen angels?
But there is more.
Sometimes these ‘demons of the wilderness,’ to whom the scapegoat is sent, are referred to as earth-bound evil spirits, having the warlike attributes of their progenitors -- the abominations created by the fallen angels, while also taking human form. (5) Either way, original demons or earth-bound spirits, these embodiments of evil have certain characteristics, bizarrely echoed by the inhabitants of Gaza/Aza today.
The current occupiers of most of Gaza/Aza today are the Arabs/Muslims. But they are not the descendants of the original inhabitants. Gaza/Aza is mentioned 18 times in The Bible as part of the Jewish homeland. The Israelites had been in Gaza before the time of Samson (Judges, 16:1) and were still in possession of it in the time of Solomon (Kings I:4:1). (6) However, just as what happened in Judea and Samaria, Gaza/Aza had its Jews expelled, and has been occupied by numerous invaders and foreign civilizations.
Gaza/Aza was part of the Jewish homeland long before Islam sprang into being. Archeologists have documented remains of a Roman-period synagogue in Gaza which includes Judaic inscriptions on a column located today in the major mosque of Gaza/Aza. This writing is a Hebrew-Greek inscription complete with Jewish motifs that mention Hananiah, the son of Jacob. It has been dated to the second or third centuries -- long before Mohammed lived. And as late as 1839 the Ottoman census of Jerusalem demonstrated that Jews were still living in Gaza/Aza. (6)
Therefore, it is obvious by the historic and archaeological evidence, that the Arabs/Muslims are invaders who took the land by conquest and war. And war is one of the characteristics of that fallen angel Azazel and his demons or evil spirit followers.
Then come some of the other characteristics of demons. They are known to be the embodiment of evil, perpetrating lies, manipulating mankind and causing pain, strife, terror and destruction. With this in mind, let us look at the behaviors of the current Arab/Muslim occupiers of Gaza/Aza.
Do they lie about who they are? Yes. There has never been a country known as Palestine, nor an Arab/Muslim people known as ‘Palestinians’ until Yasser Arafat and his supporters stole that designation from the Jews in the early 1960’s. One of their own leaders bragged about this in an interview with the Dutch newspaper Trouw. Zahir Muhsein, Executive Committee Member of the PLO, stated the following:
“The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct "Palestinian people" to oppose Zionism.
For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan." (7)
Then, as true to demonic characteristics, there are the unrelenting lies meant to foment hatred and genocide. The official government of these Arab/Muslim occupiers promotes The Protocols of the Elders of Zion as factual, claims that Jews poison their (Arab/Muslim) food, water and candy, and puts bombs in their children’s toys.
Next are the traits attributed to Azazel: those of war, violence and terror. The Arabs/Muslims occupying Jewish Gaza/Aza have perfected the homicide/genocide bombing, specifically targeting women, children and the elderly to spread horror, fear and death, and to destroy future generations of Jews.
Coupled with these warlike traits of Azazel are the demonic traits of the utter disregard for life, even of their own offspring. They have camps for young children to brainwash them into aspiring homicide/genocide bombers. (8) And like ravening beasts, they will literally tear apart, from limb to limb, any Jew who ventures into their area, passing around the body parts as in some Satanic ritual of cannibalism. (9)
The incidents of unrelenting violence and war, often including the bizarre and perverse, are much too numerous to detail except to say that they number in the 10’s of thousands in the past five years alone.
Regarding the wilderness aspect of these current Arab/Muslim occupiers of historical Jewish Gaza/Aza, here too is truth. They have been the recipients of billions upon billions of aid dollars and yet choose to remain in a wilderness of their own making. They use their world record-setting welfare dollars for anything except improving their lives and living conditions. Whatever is given to them they systematically destroy, including ancient and historical buildings and sites. Recently, they even drove out the free medical services provided to them by the Red Cross.
So when The Bible and other teachings tell of ‘demons of the wilderness,’ it has become obvious that they aren't speaking in parables, but truths for today and warnings for the future of Israel and all humankind.

Right now, we are in the midst of a very public struggle to hold on to a principle: that Jews have a right to settle in Israel, that land honestly bought by the Jewish National Fund belongs to us, that homes and businesses built on barren wastelands belong to those who built them. The only true foundation for the Arab claim to Gaza is that they want it, and they want it ethnically cleansed. Clearly, if our rights to Gush Katif can be revoked, so can our rights to any other real estate in Israel.

Is Real peace possible with these terrorists?
Islamic Jihad Threatens Increased Terror 11:04 Aug 11, '05 / 6 Av 5765By Hillel Fendel Ramadan Shalah, Islamic Jihad terrorist organization chief, says Israel's withdrawal from Gaza stems directly from Palestinian terrorism - and that more of the same can be expected all over Israel.

"We will intensify the attacks even within the Green Line," Shalah told Al Manar Television last night. He said, however, that the attacks would resume only after Israel had completed destroying all the Jewish communities in Gaza and north Shomron.Shalah said that terrorism is the only way to "liberate Palestinian land" from Israel.At a rally in Gaza yesterday, another leading Islamic Jihad terrorist said, "The Israelis understand only force. Because of our force, Israel ran away from Lebanon, and because of our force, we are succeeding in getting rid of Israel from the Gaza Strip... There is no room here for the State of Israel. We are continuing forward until our dream is fulfilled."Shalah's remarks confirm that which other terrorist leaders told Palestinian Authority chief Abu Mazen earlier this week. Abu Mazen delivered a speech, broadcast over the PA media, calling upon his local terrorist groups to refrain from attacks during the disengagement process. He explained that they could thus prove to the world that "the Palestinians are a cultured nation." In response, however, the terrorists said that they would not cease terrorism, because Ariel Sharon's retreat plan proves the value of terrorism to the Arab cause. "Without the Kassams, Israel would not have thought of leaving Israel," they told Abu Mazen.Signs at the Gaza rally repeated the theme mentioned last week by PA bigwig Abu Ala: "Today - Gaza, tomorrow - the West Bank and Jerusalem."

NOTE*
Emboldened by success, PA Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia makes no attempt to disguise his new-found assurance that the Quartet responsible for the Road Map plan will eventually force Israel to make yet another concession - and relinquish Jerusalem to the PA.
Qureia said, "We are telling the entire world, today Gaza and tomorrow Jerusalem. Today Gaza and tomorrow an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital." And he's not kidding!
Prime Minister Qureia is adamant that hostilities towards the Jews will never end until Jerusalem is in Palestinian hands. "Without Jerusalem, there will be no peace," he says.

One of the best-written articles:
The Fate of Gush Katif is the Fate of New Yorkby Rabbi Ben Tzion KrasnianskiAug 11, '05 / 6 Av 5765

The Jewish people were the first ones to introduce to the world the idea of embracing conflict as a way of life, and seeing conflict as something positive and wholesome. Life is a battle royale between good and evil, material and spiritual, potential and actual, truth and lies, darkness and light. The belief in one G-d ultimately means that man has the potential to reflect that unity by living a life that's unified, consistent, connected and wholesome. The only way to achieve this breakthrough is through great effort and struggle to overcome our inner tensions and conflicts that result from our external ego disconnect, which distorts our genuine Divine nature.Those who don't believe in G-d loath conflict. Peace at any price is their motto in life, even at the expense of losing one's soul. The Torah (Job 5:7), however, states: Man was created for hard work. It is what distinguishes men from brutes. It is our connection to eternity and the sure path towards a meaningful life.In the millennium-long struggle between good and evil, for the first time ever, evil is on the run. We have personally experienced and witnessed the miraculous collapse of communism and despotism throughout the world, and the consequent freeing of billions of people. In G-d's world, everything needs a holy spark of truth and goodness in order to survive. Pure, absolute and undiluted evil self-destructs. Witness the generation of the flood or Hitler's Thousand Year Reich, which self-destructed. Today, we are facing new strata of evil, a brash declaration of war against life itself and against G-d's desire for existence by terrorists who are plumbing new depths of depravity. Even the Nazis didn't kill themselves. The good news is, if this is evil's best shot: total nihilism, absolute destruction for destruction's sake, then evil must be scraping the bottom of the barrel. It's all over and evil knows it. This is evil's last act of desperado, its last hurrah. It's suicidal in every sense of the word. One could even detect an ever-so-slight backlash developing even amongst Muslims against the mindless, blood-curling head-sawing and random evil being perpetrated against Arab civilians and children. How tragic that, at this critical moment, with the smell of victory in the air, Jews who have courageously led the battle against evil for 3,800 years have totally abandoned the good fight and have deserted the front lines. It's surreal; while Americans are fighting, Jew are surrendering. The Jew courageously led the world in the battle against terrorism in 1967, in Entebbe, and in 1981, when Israel took out Iraq's atomic reactor. For the first time in Jewish history, however, Jews are running for the hills. In an astounding feat, beginning with Oslo and continuing with the Jewish expulsion from Gaza, Israel has snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Instead of holding out for genuine peace with democracies founded on righteousness, human dignity and respect for human life, Israel has surrendered to the status quo. Why Israel has chosen a moment of triumph to send a defeatist message, projecting weakness, while our wildest dreams are materializing before our very eyes, is truly puzzling. During the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, a thousand Jews, fighting practically with their bare hands, managed to hold off the Germans for close to a month, while Israel, which boasts one of the mightiest military machines in the world, can't deal with a few thousand murderers. Israel has just called up its reserves in the largest peacetime mobilization ever not to fight against the daily rocket assaults and terror attacks, but to fight the settlers and their supporters. It's All the Settlers' FaultWhy should 8,000 Jews insist on living amongst 1.4 million Arabs? Of all arguments, this one by far is the most objectionable. It proves the power of propaganda; people will repeat nonsense not realizing how foolish they sound. There are 20,000 Jews living in Berlin amongst 3.6 million Germans. No one would dare suggest that we should expel the Jews from Berlin because they may be a provocation to 3.6 million Germans. So, let's get this straight. A Jew is allowed to live in Berlin, a Jew is allowed in Moscow. The only place in the world he is not allowed to live is in Israel. Why? Because some Arab Nazi doesn't want to see a single Jew before his eyes. It is unconscionable that Israel is going to accommodate Arab Nazis. Israel is planning to evacuate the dead as well, because Arab savages barbarically burned the grave of the Biblical figure Joseph, so Israel doesn't trust them that they will not desecrate the dead. People drip with disdain when they use the word 'settlers', as if it's some dirty word. What is their crime? That they settled on their own land, insisting on a Jew's right to live anywhere in the world, especially in Israel. The 'settlers' of Gaza took sand dunes that were never inhabited by the Arabs and, through the sweat of their brow, turned them into a paradise and a financial powerhouse. Every moral person must be appalled by the illegal act of racism and apartheid of forcing Jews out of their homes to accommodate the murderous tendencies of Jew-haters. One searches in vain through the annals of human history to find a single example where a nation shamefully exiled itself from its own land and so shamelessly capitulated to terrorism.By this logic, Israel should close up shop. Is it practical to have five million Jews in a sea of hundreds of millions of Arabs and billions of Muslims? Demographics don't frighten us. The Torah promises us that we will always be the smallest of all nations. Abraham and Sara stood alone against the whole world. Our power is not in our might, but in our right. The Jew is a sheep surrounded by seventy wolves. Pretending to be a wolf won't guarantee our safety. A Jew recognizes that it's only the shepherd and our relationship to the shepherd that could guarantee our safety and security.Israel is a DemocracyHow can we double guess the decision of the democratically elected government of Israel?In the democratically elected government of America in the 1950s, it was legal to racially discriminate against Blacks. It doesn't mean that it was moral, legal or just. Good people refused to accept the inherently evil notion of judging a person by his skin color. The expulsion of Jews is inherently an immoral act, and even if it were a democratic and majority decision, it wouldn't make it right or just.The only excuse for liberal democracy, why individuals agree to give up their inalienable G-d-given rights to liberty, is because of the government promise to protect them. Democracy is a trade-off, freedom for security. A government that for political expediency places its own citizens' lives in harm's way, placing 144 Jewish communities on the firing lines of Kassam rockets and worse, loses its legitimacy and is nothing more then a Mafia with guns, which will use brute force to force people out of their homes and beat them into submission.In the last elections, the choice couldn't have been clearer. Amram Mitzna for expulsion and Ariel Sharon vehemently opposed, stating that the fate of Gush Katif is the fate of Tel Aviv. Sharon won in the biggest landslide in Israeli history. When he abruptly made a 180% about-face, Sharon promised that he would abide by his party's vote. When he lost the Likud vote, he promptly proceeded to ignore that vote and promised to abide by his cabinet's vote. When he was about to lose the cabinet vote as well, he used a very 'democratic' ploy and took the unprecedented step of firing two ministers to create an artificial majority. When he was urged to allow the people to vote in a referendum, he refused, knowing full well that he would have lost the referendum. To the great merit of the Jewish people, it must be stated for the record that every time Oslo was put to a vote they voted against it. Even today, if you count out the Arab vote in the Knesset, it is doubtful that Sharon has a majority of Jewish votes in favor of the expulsion. We're Sitting Comfortably in New YorkWhat rights do we, New York Jews, have to get involved in Israel's business whether they disengage or not?The real question is do we dare not get involved. The imminent expulsion of Jews from Gaza is a clear and present danger to our safety and security, and the safety and well-being of our wives and children, and the safety of all Americans.Terrorism is like a cancer and you never make peace with cancer. Certain battles you don't have the luxury to grow tired of. Terrorism is a malignant tumor and you don't make peace with a tumor. If you play nice with cancer, it will kill you. Show mercy to a tumor and it will metastasize and mercilessly kill you and kill itself in the process. The only merciful thing to do is to eradicate, destroy and pulverize the tumor into oblivion. Instead, Israel, which was always on the forefront in the war against terrorism, is about to deliver, on a silver platter, terrorism's greatest reward. The biggest harbor of terrorism today is neither Afghanistan nor Iraq, but Israel, which is about to get out of the way of the terrorists so that Hamas, Hizbullah, Fatah and now Al-Qaeda will have a safe haven to train and develop thousands of new terrorists in total freedom, right at its doorsteps. Ideas have consequences. This mindless surrender to terrorism has exploded in our face in Iraq. Today, London, tomorrow...? The cancer of terrorism has metastasized out of control. If the expulsion will go through in Gaza, it will guarantee the next 9/11 and we will have no one to blame but ourselves.At this point, the US president's war against terrorism is in full retreat. The president's proclaimed support for a Palestinian State was the first major victory for the terrorists. America spent 300 billion dollars taking out one terrorist state in the Middle East in order to establish another one. The disengagement is another major, huge victory for the terrorists and will only serve the purpose of emboldening Terrorism International. The expulsion means that three hundred billion dollars spent in Iraq was for naught, and it will betray the heroic sacrifice of our young soldiers and render them in vain. Israel is the heart of the world. When the heart is healthy, the whole organism is healthy. When the heart is ill and loses its vigor, the whole organism becomes critically ill. The world is a global village and what happens in Israel today will happen to the rest of the world tomorrow. At the end of the day, the fate of Gush Katif is the fate of New York.Peace Through StrengthPeace through strength holds out the only hope for this troubled region. By standing firm, Israel could deliver the coup de grace to terrorism around the world. By helping to hasten the inevitable collapse of dictatorship and totalitarianism in the Middle East, Israel could become part of the solution instead of becoming part of the problem, and earn its honorable place in history.A wise man once quipped: While it's easy to take the Jew out of exile, it's difficult to take the exile out of the Jew. Instead of exiling themselves from Gaza, it's high time that the Jewish people removed the deep, dark and corrosive exile from within.