Tonight, the last day of 5766
I cried for Jerusalem and cried for our sin
G-d, the DJ, stands over Jerusalem like a sound table
He spins the Temple like a record
The Holy of Holies its hub
Music and songs emanate out to the streets
To the dancing people
To the world
This record spins forever
His fingerprints pressed into its fibers
Dust the scene
I want to stand in them
He never removes the record
Never changes the song
He never places upon it a shimmering golden record
One which calls out foreign songs five times daily
I would like to scratch it
Like a pimple
On the face of the earth
A blemish safegaurds all the blemishes
A mesquito landed on the earth's skin
Stuck its sword in
Drew blood
And the mesquito bite has risen
Itchin
The mosque-ito bite has risen
It has no yeast
But it is an infection
Who will the king
To pull out this thing?
Waxed with the blood of Jews
The golden dome is shimmering
Our King will shock
Grab the sword from the rock
Shines like a vomitous poison
Glimmers like a Hollywood attraction
Sparkling like an actor's face
Beautiful to the eye's vanity
Ugly to my soul
Shining like the cherub's sword
Like the sword, it will be used to behead
Like the sword, it will be shed
Like the sword, do you?
It attempts to reflect the sun's light
To stand next to G-d in partnership
Its mission is
To steal my submission
It's light is a moon to the sun of the city
It is night and the city is day
The dense rocks of the wall
Outshine its gold plates
The rocks are bright to my eyes and my eyes
Return the favor
They have lit up my life
The dome darkens them drearily
Glancing at our city
The dome draws my dark eyes first
It is a tear in every Jew’s eye
An arrow in every Jew’s heart
Puts a chip in every Jew’s tooth
And puts a prayer in every Jew’s mouth
The dome
Towering into the air
Like an evil cherub with its sword
Blockin my entrance into the Garden
It is the Philistine Goliath
Over the Israelite David
The rocks of the Wall
Will be the rocks of the sling
My weapons will be
The words that I sing
Then I will cup
The Wall's rocky bulges
Away will he be
The one who indulges
When the shofar is blown
And the people are gathered
He will fall like Jericho's wall
His strength will be shattered
King David said,
"What will be done for the man who slays this Philistine
and removes disgrace from Israel?
For who is this uncircumcised Philistine,
that he disgraces the battalions of
the Living G-d?"
It wears a golden kippah
Yet has no awe of G-d

G-d, Noah, Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, G-d

Christians grow impatient with us Jews because of what they explain is our unwillingness to “share” G-d with them. Their grievance is that they also want to be in the Covenant with us and that their belief in G-d and Jesus is their sharing with us in the G-d of Israel. However, it is a faulty charge that we do want not to share G-d with them, because if they only looked in the Torah they would see that G-d makes Himself readily available to the Gentiles throughout the entire Tanakh – and this is central to the Jewish canon. How does G-d make Himself available to the Gentile nations? Through their own Law; Judaism explains that the Gentile covenant and obligations to G-d were forged in an agreement pre-existent to the deliverance of the Torah to the Jewish nation – through Noah. Therefore, there is One G-d and two Laws, one for the Jewish nation and one for the Gentile nations. The Gentile Law, or the Seven Laws of Noah, also known as the “Noahide Laws,” exists alongside the Jews’ Mosaic Law; the difference is that the Mosaic Laws are more specific than the Noahide Laws.

The nature of the charge is that we (Jews) are being “greedy” with G-d because we absolutely reject the divinity of Jesus. If you think about the nature of this charge, it is truly childish; the Jewish rejection of a theology insisting that the Trinity is equal to the Unity of G-d is not greed, it is the rejection of polytheism/paganism – G-d does not “belong” exclusively to the Jewish people, humanity belongs exclusively to G-d! Since Jesus is not G-d, the belief in him, as a god, must be rejected; this not the same as giving some consideration to his thoughts. In rejecting Jesus (and therefore not sharing in faith with Christians) Jews are saying that Christians are not worshipping G-d. Perhaps the same/similar anger that Christians have towards Jews is the same/similar anger that pagans had towards the Jews when we would not bow down to their gods and goddesses. A very concrete example is the anger spurned in King Nimrod of Babylon when Abraham would not bow to his idol – Abraham absolutely and outright rejected the abomination to truth which was the idol and this angered Nimrod; can we not imagine that Nimrod was insulted? Perhaps he reasoned, “Why is my faith so repulsive to Abraham?” Abraham, whose primary characteristic was kindness, was not moved by compassion to soothe Nimrod by bowing to his idol because to do so would be to sacrifice truth.

The Muslim response to Christianity is similar to that of Judaism. However, the Muslim theology rejects that there is the One G-d but two Laws; they reason, in a fashion sound with monotheism, that if there is the One G-d then there must be one Law. To the religion of Islam, that one Law is the Law of the Qur’an. In most situations this logic would be sound, and I am not a Muslim scholar, but Islam, like Judaism, in a matter of speaking does actually believe that there are two forms of Law. Judaism believes in the existence of a Law prior to its own – the Noahide Laws, and Islam believes in the existence of a purely monotheistic faith prior to its own as well; Judaism, Christianity, and a religion belonging to a group of people known as “the Sabians.” The relationship between the Law of Torah and the Law of Noah is equal to the relationship between the Law of the Qur’an and the Law of the Torah. This “duality of Law” is expressed in the Qur’an as “there is no compulsion in religion,” and if this is true and if Muslims hold it to be true, then to what other religion can the Qur’an be referring other than Judaism, Christianity, and the Sabian religion? That the world needs to accept Islam and that the Qur’an says that “there is no compulsion in religion” are two contradictory concepts, and if there can indeed be only one truth, then either one or the other of these is Islam while the other is not.

However, the relationship is converse; while Judaism insists that the majority of the world has to follow the Noahide Laws and that only the minority population which is Jewish needs to follow the Torah, Islam insists that the majority, the entirety actually, of the world’s population needs to follow Islam and that nobody needs to follow Judaism or Christianity. To explain this in Jewish terms it would be as if, once Moshe delivered the six hundred and thirteen commandments to the Jewish nation through G-d, that the entire population of the world had to observe them, or in essence, to become Jews. Minus a few “isolated incidents” in Jewish history, the insistence that the nations of the world and their members follow all of the Mosaic commandments was not an occurrence; “conversion” consisted of shifting from polytheism to monotheism and the application of the Seven Laws of Noah – this was a time in human history when religions, including Judaism, were relegated to the (non)truths that they expressed and were therefore nameless. We see that Noahides never had to (and do not have to) leave their Seven Laws for their Mosaic counterpart. The way Islam explains it (or actually, the way Muslims have explained it to me) is that there is no compulsion in religion (coverting to Islam) but that people should do it on their own. The difference is that Judaism does not say that Gentiles should accept Judaism and therefore the yoke of Torah but rather that they should not. What they need to is accept the yoke of the Seven Noahide Laws, which are eternally binding on them in the same manner that the Mosaic Laws are eternally binding on the Jews. Islam uses the nomenclature “Islam” when referring to the faith of the faithful preceding the literal advent Islam (in the 7th Century) and in doing that retroactively, to use a politically incorrect term but one which I think accurately explains the phenomenon, “invades” history and claims it for itself, stifling it and making no room for others. It is no wonder that this is the connection between religion/theology and “political Islam’s” attitude towards politics; be it physical, temporal, or spiritual, all belongs to Islam. The way Islam seizes time is the way it seizes land. This is not the way monotheism was intended to be, i.e., it is perfectly in line with monotheism to have two sets of Laws and harmony with its neighbors.

To conclude, Islam creates an unique type of stress and pressure on the world; the stress not only to accept monotheism (which is the type of stress that Judaism places on the world), but the pressure to, once having done that, accept the practices and specific religion of Islam. By uniting the specifics of the religion of Islam (the particulars) with the cosmic, moral, and absolute truths of existence (the universals) in one category, Islam transforms from a religion of peace into a religion and cause of war. There is no way at its current progression that Islam will deliver anything remotely resembling peace to the world - it wants to shock humanity into faith rather than hold its hand and lead it into truth. The solution to all the problems in the Middle East (which affect the entire world) lies in the realization that there is no peace with one whom rejects not just the right of another to exist, but rejects their actual existence.

All Israel Has A Place...

This is how you respond to a Christian who wants your forgiveness for the atrocities committed by Christians towards Jews.

______, I'm only speaking for myself here, but I don't want any apology from Christians about what they did to Jews in the past. If Christians want peace with Jews then all I ask is that Christians leave us alone with their religion in the present; we know what we believe and we know what G-d wants us to do, and it's Torah and mitzvahs, that's it. You know, it's not like we just don't get this whole "G-d thing," we know what G-d wants us to do. Christians killed us in the past, I don't care, and the more I realized that being a Jew meant observance the less I cared about the death of our bodies (in the past). Christians let out their vengeance on us for rejecting their lord; I don't care. They burned us at the stake and only took us off when we "repented," I don't care - those Christians all have been served their justice and all those innocent Jews that they murdered are in Heaven - that is why I can forgive you. But as if killing our bodies wasn't enough, Christians began to target our souls through conversion tactics and missionary work and other things, like telling us that they love us, and in the 21st Century. That's funny, trying to steal away someone's identity doesn't seem like an act of love to me, it seems like an act of hate. I much rather that my body die than my soul; kill my body, I don't care, touch my soul with something that I find detestable and there cannot be peace between you and I and for that I cannot and will not forgive. _____, the soul of the Jewish people is off limits to any two-legged (or more) being walking, swimming, or flying on this planet - the soul of the Jewish people belongs to G-d Himself. That's why there is a war between Jews and Christians because you want our souls, but I'm sorry, they've already been taken and He will never give them up - if you can pry open His fingers then you can have them. I understood your little cartoon, and I understood by the look in your eyes when I recited your little prose that you realized the mistake that you made - not you nor any other being formed from dust can ever tell me, or any other human being, that they are going to Hell, and that is what you told me in your e-mail and I understand that very clearly. Perhaps the next time you think of telling another one of G-d's Holy Creatures, be it a Gentile or a Jew that their final resting place is Hell, you will think of your own final destination. If you want my apology you will never say a word about Christianity to me again.

*This is an e-mail that I sent to my ex-manager after she sent me an e-mail alluding that if I did not accept Jesus that I was going to Hell.

This is what she told me (pictures were part of the original e-mail) in her e-mail, and accused me of seeing too far into things when I told her that it was wrong of her to allude that I was going to Hell:

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
_____ said, "If you leave this realm, with your sins still "clinging" to you, you have only the fearful expectation of being consumed by His Holiness."

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Oy, I have such an over-active imagination!

Just know that they want our forgiveness so they can go on prosletyzing to us guilt-free; most Christians understand that we have a right to be hostile towards Christianity and by getting our forgiveness they can put the past behind them. By denying them the peace of mind that comes with forgiveness they will never feel fully comfortable talking to us about Christianity - so by all means, don't tell a Christian that you forgive him. Your lack of forgiveness will cause him to think of you as a stubborn, hateful, and vengeful person that can never be happy, but let him think what he wants because you know that he's wrong and you are defending your people and your faith. If you tell him that you forgive him he will assume that you have now "opened your heart" and "are ready to be saved': by "not forgiving" Christians we will have erected an invisible and impenetrable wall around our faith from the conversion attempts of Christianity. And even if they know that they can't convince you, at least they might think twice before targeting a Jew who is less resolute than you. This is a battle for our souls and we have to defend them.

Have an excellent Rosh Hashanah and an easy fast this Yom Kippur and may the Holy One, Blessed is He transcribe you in the Book of Life.

Hello Alan, how are you? We had a nice talk the last time we spoke, and I don't like to talk about negative things when there is no need, but a friend of mine sent this to me and I just wanted to see what you thought. I don't necessarily feel a need for alarm by this but what's your take, an Englishman and a local who understands a bit more about England than I do?
----


http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/759754.html

Report: British Jews facing more anti-Semitic sentiment than ever
By Assaf Uni, Haaretz Correspondent

LONDON - Britain's Jewish community faces an unprecedented level of anti-Semitism and feels more threatened than ever, according to the report of the all-party parliamentary inquiry into anti-Semitism, which is to be released Thursday.

The panel found an increase in "anti-Semitic discourse," particularly among leftist groupings, and recommends a series of actions to prevent the situation from deteriorating further. Panel chairman Denis MacShane, who will present the report's conclusions to Prime Minister Tony Blair Thursday, told Haaretz Wednesday that the report rings the "alarm bells" for Britain.

The committee was created about a year ago in order "to investigate the current problem, identify the sources of contemporary anti-Semitism and make recommendations that we believe will improve the current situation."

Over 100 written statements were submitted to the 14 committee members, who span the political spectrum. Experts, politicians and public figures testified before the panel in four separate hearings.

The panel was initiated by members of Parliament and not intended to be an official inquiry.

According to the report, the number of anti-Semitic incidents reported in Britain has risen since 2000, accompanied by a decline in public support for Jews.

The panel attributed the escalation to flare-ups in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict (but did not specify a direct connection), as well as the "anti-Semitic discourse" being held openly among Muslims, the extreme left and, to a lesser extent, the extreme right. "

It is this phenomenon that has contributed to an atmosphere where Jews have become more anxious and more vulnerable to abuse and attack than at any other time for a generation or longer," the report said."

We are ringing the alarm bells for Britain," MacShane told Haaretz, to tell the people that the country's Jews are unable to live lives free of fear and to enjoy cultural, community and religious life without the constant fear of being attacked.

He said that one of the most important findings of the panel is that most Britons are simply unaware of the serious problem of anti-Semitism in their country.

Great Britain is home to 300,000 Jews, two-thirds of whom live in the Greater London area. The recommendations in the 66-page report include better reporting of anti-Semitic incidents on the part of the police and an investigation of why only ten percent of such incidents result in a suspect being accused.

"The Panel recommends that the Home Office require police forces nationwide to record such incidents using the current Metropolitan police model of categorizing such incidents as both racist and anti-Semitic."

It "calls on the Department for Communities and Local Government to commission an annual survey of attitudes and tensions between Britain's communities to be monitored by the Commission for Racial Equality," and places great emphasis on combating anti-Semitism on university campuses and on limiting "traditional broadcast and internet access to racist, including anti-Semitic, material."

One of the more interesting chapters of the report deals with the public mood in Britain, which, according to the authors, changes markedly "when Jews are discussed, whether in print or broadcast, at universities, or in public or social settings."

The report warns against the growth of a "new anti-Semitism" that transfers the traditional stereotypes about Jews to Israel, as a Zionist state. "We heard evidence that contemporary anti-Semitism in Britain is now more commonly found on the left of the political spectrum than on the right."

MacShane believes that the academic boycott of Israel by the Association of University Teachers (which was later reversed) and the decision by the Anglican Church to re-examine its investments in companies with ties to the Israel Defense Forces contribute to anti- Semitism.

He said the decision to focus on Israel while ignoring all the non-democratic regimes in the world is hypocritical and contributes to the Jews' feeling like "second-class citizens" who are spurned by certain elements in the country.

The publication of the report coincides with the celebration this month of the 350th anniversary of the Jewish presence in Britain. "I've been here for 11 years and I never thought it would get so bad," said Linda Cohen, an Israeli who was assaulted about two weeks ago in an anti-Semitic incident in the largely Jewish London neighborhood of Golders Green.

Cohen, the owner of a Jewish-Israeli cafe, said, "I didn't know there was anti-Semitism in Britain until two young men assaulted me verbally and physically after asking whether this was a Jewish cafe."

According to the report, anti-Semitism in contemporary Britain is a complex issue. "Anti-Semitism is not one-dimensional. It is perpetrated in different ways by different groups within society and for this reason it is hard to identify."

MacShane hopes the report will draw a lot of attention to the situation of Britain's Jewish community. He says another MP on the committee told him that his constituents are completely unaware of the things heard by the panel over the last year.
----


Hey Yaniv,

I have written to you about this before, about a year ago I think. The truth is that there anti-Semites in my country, as there in every country, but they are a tiny, tiny, minority. What there is, and I'm sorry to say I believe increasingly so, are a sizeable number of people who are angry and bitter toward the state of Israel. Attacks on Jewish sites, like graveyards, are reportedly increasing, though they are still very rare, and rarer still are they the actions of 'real' anti-Semites - rather they are the actions of those with a grudge against Israel, and see their attacks as a means to punish it.

I'm not defending these people in any way, they are criminals who need to be caught and prosecuted; I'm just trying to offer you an explanation. Israel's month of madness in Lebanon was the most horrendous demonstration of how to create resentment and make enemies; And I'm not just talking about the pictures of mutilated and dead children which filled our papers and TV screens; Israel's decision to leave behind 100,000 unexploded cluster bomblets as it withdrew, for example, was something which deeply angered many people in Europe, and even promoted the UN's humanitarian chief to describe the action as "completely immoral". What on Earth was Israel thinking? She seems to have completely lost sight of need to resolve her problems with her neighbours - not give them more reasons to hate her.

I'm not sure whether or not this is the kind of response you were expecting, but either way, please accept my comments in the spirit of honesty which I wrote them in.

Take care mate,

Alan.

----
The only thing the Israeli government has in common with the people in those graves is that they are both Jews; is that enough of an association to violate them?

In my opinion, yes.

Wow, well that certainly is an interesting opinion. So are you saying were a British Jew to mark up the grave site of a British Arab because he did not approve of Palestinian suicide bombing or Hezba-llah attack that you would approve on the same basis? Maybe I'm wrong in that you did not approve of the violation but said that you think it is enough of an association. I disagree entirely. In fact, were I a British Jew and saw or heard that another Jew (or Jews) had violated the grave of a British Arab because he (they) was (were) angry at something that Arabs in Lebanon did, I would take a stand against it - there is absolutely no association, just bigotry there. It's just wrong, plain and simple.

I think I understand. You are a pacifist, which is a person who subscribes to the ideology of pacifism, which I believe shares a linguistic and therefore conceptual root with "passive." Most pacifists are anti-war, and there is not one thing wrong with being anti-war. However, their being anti-war stems from the fact that they are usually anti-aggression. This is both a blessing and a curse - a blessing because people who are anti-war don't start wars. It's a curse because were someone to attack an anti-war ideologue, or specifically, a pacifist, if the pacifist were honest to his/her ideology he would have to allow the attack to continue, i.e., he would not resort to aggression of any kind as a means to ward off or end the attack (see Ghandi and Martin Luther King). That is, pacifists don't start wars but they also don't end or prevent them, which is also usually tragic. The problem, and it occurs in the real world, is that there are people out there who do believe in aggression and they are not hesitant to use it. Pacifists, whom practice pacifism, allow for "aggrecifists" to go on rampages; it seems that if pacifism does not create it, then it at least empowers and emboldens "aggrecifism," which can also be called fascism or militarism. Sometimes there is a good use for aggression and/or power. An aggressive person (or society or military) will take over another or at least disrupt and dominate the way of life of another by way of total invasion if nothing stops them; Nazi Germany constantly serves as a good example of this but there are tons of others in human history.
----

Whether or not you agree, I do think that there is a psychological connection between certain brands of anti-Israelism and real anti-Semitism.

I think that, to a limited extent, you are right. Most of those who are angry at Israel do understand the difference between being Jewish and being Israeli, (so they must understand the difference between being anti-Jewish and anti-Israeli) but for some the difference is unimportant (sadly, you might be right). And let's be realistic, any mindless moron who is prepared to attack a Jewish graveyard is unlikely to be particularly high up the intellectual scale.

I think that the psychological connection I referred to means that people don't realize that there is a difference between a Jew and an Israeli, even intelligent people. It would be easy on our conscious to say that the culprit is a backwards primitive form of ignorance, but we can't whitewash the fact that anti-Semitism, like all types of hatred, has traditionally been caught up in all forms of intellectualism and intellectual justification. Nevertheless, assuming that you are right, those who understand the difference need to do what they can to obstruct those who do not understand the difference.
----

Most of those who are angry at Israel do understand the difference between being Jewish and being Israeli, but for some the difference is unimportant.

I don't believe that only stupid people find the difference unimportant. Again, hatred of all forms, in this case anti-Semitism, has always existed in the circles of elitists and intellectuals as well as among the naive and uneducated/uninformed peasantry. I don't want to be rude, but check the history of your own continent and its social institutions, both religious and secular - lots of brilliant anti-Semites in its past (see Enlightenment).
----

Do you realize that this war was started by Hassan Nasra-llah when he kidnapped those soldiers (and hasn't returned them) in a time of relative peace with Israel?

Yes I do realise that, but invading another sovereign state was disproportionate and made a bad situation immeasurably worse. Israel's actions served only to portray herself to the world as the aggressor in this conflict, and by default portray Hezba-llah as fighting to defend Lebanon - and ultimately being victorious in repelling Israel (without her two soldiers).

So I pose the question to you; what would you have done if you were the Prime Minister of Israel? What could Israel had done that would have been both acceptable to the international community and actually making some progress in defending itself?

I for one know that the situation would have become immeasurably worst had Israel not done what it did - the attacks would have continued precisely as they have in the past when Israel has not attempted to destroy terrorist infrastructures. You should try to realize that the fighting would have lasted longer on a whole had Israel not gone in, because Hezba-llah would not have backed down until Israel had reacted and no diplomacy would have stopped them (their words, not mine). Now, a "critic" of Israel might patronizingly suggest that in one of those cases where the terrorist attacks continued despite Israeli non-violence, or relative non-violence, that there was some other "hidden" factor to blame for the violence and then would charge that Israel is actually not doing all within its power to create a just and lasting peace. This, by the way, has been said, and quite a bit. For example, even when Israel was negotiating with the Palestinian Authority and literally handing it over pieces of land and sovereignty in order to administer a Palestinian state, the terrorist attacks continued As a result, "critics" concluded that Israel was not doing enough to end the violence, which is bizarre.

A very interesting psychological phenomenon that often happens in situations where one party is aggressive and another is being debased and/or attacked is that the attackees and surrounding bystanders are pushed into a state of empathy for the aggressor; usually it is caused by a) the desire not to be attacked themselves, and empathy is (supposedly) a way to ensure that, and b) the sheer violence of the act(s) can cause a sort of "shell shock" and apathy. Either way, forceful power displays can have astounding effects on the human psyche and creating "interesting" support systems, almost symbiotic, and we can again use Nazi Germany as an example. By the way, if you look at the rules of war as set down by Islam you'll see that they tap into that human group-thought phenomenon as a way to coalesce power - it usually ends up with the defeated party accepting Islam or forever being at war with Muslims, which is the case with Israel. This phenomenon is called "Stockholm Syndrome" after a woman (one person of many) was held hostage by a bank robber in Stockholm - she began to empathize (initially to save her life) with him and the two eventually got married.
----

Israel's actions served only to portray herself to the world as the aggressor in this conflict, and by default portray Hezba-llah as fighting to defend Lebanon - and ultimately being victorious in repelling Israel (without her two soldiers).

If this is true, which it might be, then that is because Israeli defense is considered to be an act of aggression - again, seen through the lens of pacifism, albeit selective pacifism (since Lebanon has the right to be aggressive and Israel, and therefore Jews, only have the right to be victims). By the way, Israel left in order to give the diplomatic route a chance - Hezba-llah's "interpretation," like all Arab-Muslim terrorist groups', is that Hezba-llah forced Israel out. How can you make or have peace with someone who thinks that way? Hezba-llah made the first (offensive) move and Israel made the second (defensive) move. After that point, even if Hezba-llah was defending Lebanon from Israel (which it was), its actions cannot be considered that of a defensive country because it started that war and/or series of battles. Truly, this is entirely Hezba-llah's doing, and by association, Lebanon's (Emile Lahoud) government, which did not prevent it but also made it possible by supporting Hezba-llah as an army.
----

I know this is a distortion of reality, but it was Israel who orchestrated the whole ill-thougt-out farce and failed to anticipate how it would look to the world.

If it is a distortion of reality, why did you even mention it? If it is a distortion of reality then we cannot rely on it.

Yaniv...

I'm always trying to record tidbits of observations I have here - consider it a bit of a running log of observations and random ideas that pop into my head but which likely have some relevance to the world around us and don't amount the to flavor of ice cream I ate today.

Anyway...

I have a video by a Palestinian "artist" - his name escapes me now. I say "artist" because the song and video is nothing more than a propaganda clip to demonstrate the suffering of the Palestinian people; I'll try to get it on here if I can one day. If you look at the clips and think about them, the short tidbits shown have nothing to do at all with the actual content of the song but they are arranged in a rather way convicing way - this is nature of propaganda.

Anyway, no point in talking about that much until I can get the video on here. Rather, I will try to reiterate something, a thing which I've tried to explain in the past.

Clearly the Palestinians feel themselves to be desperate, that is no argument. The argument rather has to be turned and to reflect on the cause(s) of the desperation. Sometimes I think that the term "Arab-Israeli" conflict is more suitable and accurate than the term "Palestinian-Israeli" conflict simply because of the fact that the Palestinians are not a fully independent entity and the Arab governments surrounding them and the Israeli's are behind much of the chaos, almost as if the Palestinians serve as a wing of the conflict, even without knowing it.

I do however feel that they are painfully aware of the role that they play in Arab politics, which is why, if anything, the Palestinians have a more important role to play than any of the other Arabs in bringing peace between themselves and the Israeli's. They understand the full effects on their society of the war with Israel that their terrorist groups and the Arab countries support, effects which are only secondary or tertiary to the surrounding civilian populations and governments but which destroy the quality of life of the Palestinians. Truly the Palestinians are landlocked between Israel's insistence on defense and the Arab states' insistence on destroying Israel, but they don't turn around and curtly tell the Arabs to knock it off, rather they emphasize the need for Israel to give them what they want, and the more they do this the more they serve the Arab purpose of seizing Israel - a purpose which serves the Arabs more than it does the Palestinians, much more. The Palestinians, to use a graphic and adult example, are like a whore and the Arabs are like a pimp and use them for their gains, not their own. The problem is that the Palestinians are people and accordingly will create a method by which to deal with the situation in which they find themselves , a coping mechanism. Islam has been used as a tool of war providing the Palestinians with the ideology needed in order to ennoble them and to give them hope in the face of desperation, to shed some light on their darkness.

It cannot be ignored however that this (Jijad) is not just your average run of the mill Negro Spiritual, it's a call to murder and destroy the perceived source of the chaos - it's truly a wonder how different cultures facing the same or similar circumstances react in starkly different ways. Can we imagine if the enslaved African Americans took the methods that the Palestinians use today; strapping bombs to themselves and detonating them in crowds of white people, both innocent and guilty? There was violent resistance but there was nothing in the African American culture similar to suicide bombing to draw upon. There was also violent resistance among the Jews in ghettos of Europe but that never amounted to Jews escaping the ghetto walls and blowing themselves up in German cafes. On top of the very orchestrated quagmire of the Palestinians by the Arab leaders, their culture, not just their situation, is to blame for the usage of suicide bombing, meaning that it is a conscious tactic, not an act borne out of desperation. We can't forget that Palestinian society has a suicide rate like anyone else's, composed of pill overdoses, carbon monoxide poisioning, and slit wrists - suicide bombing does not fall into this category. The leaders have manipulated Islam to use the worst elements of it, very likely in a fashion not in alignment with the wishes of Islam itself. However, that becomes a moot point when the clear association between suicide bombing in the name of Islam, and Islam, is Islam. For those who care about keeping Islam's good name and separating it from this false perversion and tactical manipulation of their pure faith, a simple declaration that people should not associate the two is a lacking and even irresponsible response for something that is so important to them. It is on the verge of causing people to think that the relative silence is absolute approval.


Consider the Orthodox Jews, some Israeli, Neturei Karta, whom take to the streets with anti-Israel (and pro-Palestinian) slogans and signs and try to chant down the Israeli state based on their own convictions that the State of Israel is an obstruction to Judaism's most cherished religious conceptualization of the Coming of the Messiah; nevermind that the gold-plated dome standing right on top of the Temple Mount and preventing its rebuilding also obstructs Judaism's most cherished religious conceptualization of the Coming of the Messiah. I am in severe disagreement with Neturei Karta and their ideology but that doens't stop them from standing out there in the heat in their black frock coats and shouting the worst half-truths about Israel possible, in the name of Torah. How disturbed they are, but oh, how gallant and noble at least they deserved to be called on the basis that they put themselves at complete odds with the rest of their co-religionists in the name of something they believe to be absolutely true. If the Muslims were the same they would also be producing the Muslim phenomenon of Neturei Karta, Muslims whom find wrong the notion of the Palestinian state based on a specific Qur'anic understanding. Neturei Karta points out that the Talmud, the same book of Jewish Oral that many Muslims say teaches that non-Jews are dogs, says that the State of Israel's establishment is not synonymous with Messianic Redemption, and it is THIS and this alone which is the core reason for Neturei Karta's hatred of the State of Israel, simply that there is a Jewish government that is secular and not religious, as if the Jewish people have not been through some of the toughest travails in the last 2,000 years, subsequently leading them away from religion. An aside, if Neturei Karta truly had the big picture in their mind, they would try to soothe the raging psyche's of their fellow Israeli Jews and try to bring them back to religion - alienation is never a tactic that works. It is so ironic that people lambasted Rabbi Meir Kahane for alienating Jews in the attempt to wake them up to the folly of their ways but Jew-haters exalt Rabbi Dovid Weiss for doing the same thing but in the opposite direction. Even more troublesome is that Israeli Jews were more bothered by Rabbi Kahane's teachings than by Rabbi Dovid Weiss'. It is an accurate enough depiction that Rabbi Dovid Weiss is a left-wing Orthodox Jew and Rabbi Meir Kahane was a right-wing Orthodox Jew. It also should be known that an Arab assassinated Rabbi Kahane while no Arab would ever assassinate a Jew in Neturei Karta (and they shouldn't) because they find their views to be instrumental to the bloody and false Palestinian cause.

A video of Rabbi Dovid Weiss


A video of Rabbi Meir Kahane

People all over the world commit suicide every year; let the Palestinians slit their wrists or overdose on pills or fill their cars with carbon monoxide for once, then I'll be convinced that they are committing suicide and not murdering Jews.

I have one question to ask a Muslim, and it is this.

Are we Jews, as a G-d-fearing and religious people, allowed to have dominance and sovereignty over our most holy sites (the Temple Mount), rest assuredly that Muslims will have full and protected rights of worship in the mosques there? No, we don't; our rights as believer-Jews extend to individuality; we are allowed to pray in our Temple (but not to rebuild it) and only if its under Muslim political and social control. We are allowed to be free but not to be a sovereign nation. In short, we are allowed to be dhimmi's, even in the 21st Century, and that's why there is suicide bombing, because this is what happens to dhimimi's who act up to the degree that we have and what happens when Arab see other Arabs as expendable throw aways in the war against the Jews; all you need to do is convince them that they are fighting for A-llah and they'll embrace death. The Jews have created an entire dhimmi state - is there anything more intolerable to Muslims? "Zionist" registers as "dhimmi" in the Muslim mind frame. You might be different, but you ARE different, you're a convert and therefore wired a bit differently. Don't worry, this is a phenomenon that exists in Judaism too (and all religions). Some converts to Islam have mastered the art of thinking like Arabs nearly perfectly.

Benyamin Netanyahu's Interview Response

Sent to me by Neti

When Benjamin Netanyahu was interviewed on British television last week, the interviewer asked him: "How come so many more Lebanese have been killed in this conflict than Israelis?" Netanyahu: "Are you sure that you want to start asking in that direction?" Interviewer: Why not?".. Netanyahu: "Because in World War II more Germans were killed than British and Americans combined, but there is no doubt in anyone's mind that the war was caused by Germany's aggression. And in response to the German blitz on London, the British wiped out the entire city of Dresden, burning to death more German civilians than the number of people killed in Hiroshima. Moreover, I could remind you that in 1944, when the R.A.F. tried to bomb the Gestapo Headquarters in Copenhagen, some of the bombs missed their target and fell on a Danish children's hospital, killing 83 little children. Perhaps you have another question?"

Goyishe

The word "goy" is a Hebrew word meaning "nation." The word appears in the Tanakh with that intended usage, which we can derive from Isaiah's oft-used phrase, "No nation shall lift sword against another nation and no longer will they learn war," which comes from the Hebrew "lo isa goy el goy kherev; lo ilmedu 'od milkhama." The Tanakh refers to the nation of Israel as a "goy kadosh," a "holy nation."

Later, the Yiddish word "goyishe," meaning "of or related to the nations" (in practice, thought, behavior, theology, ethics, etc...) was produced from the Hebrew word "goy." Although I'm not totally sure, so don't quote me, the word probably came around sometime during the European Jews' "contact" with Christianity in Europe, for the term largely refers to ideas and practices belonging to Christianity, such as the Trinity and transubstantiation - the concept that Jesus' blood and body are literally and physically manifested in the wine and the wafer used in Catholic service. The term was not used beforehand (during the 7th, 8th, 9th centuries BCE), again, to the best of my knowledge, because the distinction between monotheism and polytheism was clear (and we know that 'goyishe' is a Yiddish word, a langauge arising in 'Jewish Europe'). The word "goyishe" is meant to belittle the concepts which it describes, indicating that there is a clear association between the concepts/practices of the nations and polytheism and this is the case when the word is used in the context of Christianity. For example, if I say that Christianity is "goyishe" I am saying that there is a common strand between the polytheistic concepts found both in many of the religions of the nations and in the religion of Christianity. In other words, Christianity is yet another another expression of the concepts found in the world's polytheistic faith systems. Later, probably during this time, it developed to describe the individual state of being a part of the(se) nations; a goy.

Very, very generally speaking, "goyishe" also refers to concepts found in the secular world which seem to have a common root with polytheistic concepts. It seems to me that this association is based on the underlying and subtle link between secular and polytheistic concepts given that both reject, or at least do not consider the importance of, the centrality of the existence of the One G-d and His Imminence in the world. "Goyishe" is a belittling adjective referring to the concepts espoused by a polytheistic religion; it is Yiddish but is a term belonging to the Jewish lexicon, at least by Ashkenazi Jews.

A testament to the dynamics of the word, Muslims are also a nation (the Jewish concept of 'nation' transcends ethnicity, apparent in that Jews are a nation but of many ethnicities) but are not necessarily "goyishe," a word which I have never heard applied in the Muslim context. In purely technical terms Muslims are also a goy, a nation, but the word "goyishe" cannot be used to describe them unless one wished to confer polytheistic association on the religion of Islam, which would be difficult to do. This also indicates that the word "goyishe" developed under Christendom due to the relationship between Jews and Christians in Europe and not by Jews under Islam. This shows that "goyishe" is a descriptive word, an adjective, sometimes totally innaccurate in describing a "goy," another nation. Therefore, we widdle the word "goyishe" down to a word basically synonymous with "polytheistic" or "polytheistic-like."