Czech
French
German
Hebrew
Noruegan
Russian
Spanish
Swedish
Polish
Portuguese
The Israel-Hamas ‘War of Iron Swords’ was born in the UNRWA classroom, as decades of education to genocide revealed to the world on October 7, 2023. The Hamas takeover of UNRWA can no longer be denied.
Why did negotiations break down?
The hostages-ceasefire negotiations have broken down because of insufficient pressure from the Biden administration on Hamas’s patrons in Qatar.
The failure of the negotiations should be attributed to Qatar’s lack of action against the Hamas leaders who are living in luxury in Doha.
Qatar is not doing anything because it is not under any serious pressure from the Biden administration.
Has the Biden administration considered using the threat of withdrawing the US Central Command from Qatar’s Al-Udeid Air Base from to pressure the Gulf state’s rulers into convincing their friends in Hamas to free all the hostages?
‘UNRWA at war’: New film shows UN agency teaching kids to kill in Judea and Samaria
evelations by Israel’s government about the United Nations Relief and Works Agency have shattered the group’s carefully cultivated image as a humanitarian organization, revealing it to be no less than an arm of Hamas in Gaza. However, little light has been thrown on UNRWA’s identical role in Judea and Samaria.
A new film, “UNRWA at War,” focuses on the educational side of UNRWA’s activities, in which children are taught not just to hate, but to kill. Just as it did in Gaza, UNRWA is inculcating children with the same genocidal creed in Judea and Samaria, only in this case for Fatah, the controlling party in the Palestinian Authority.
The roughly 20-minute film was released by the Jerusalem-based Center for Near East Policy Research on Sept. 1 and is available online.
The center’s director, David Bedein, told JNS that the movie shows what’s happening in Bethlehem. “That’s the next place they [the terrorists] are going to break out,” he said.
When could such an attack take place? “It could be as soon as tomorrow,” he said.
The film shows that terrorists, such as Dalal Mughrabi, a Fatah member who participated in the 1978 Coastal Road massacre in Israel, in which 38 Israeli civilians, including 13 children, were murdered, are routinely held up as heroes and role models in UNRWA schools. Images of Mughrabi and other terrorists adorn the schools’ walls.
In the film, Arab students in Judea and Samaria, products of UNRWA schools, speak of Mughrabi with reverence.
“She’s like my sister, like my mother. She’s part of our people,” says a boy from the Al-Amari refugee camp east of Ramallah. A girl of about six, also from Al-Amari, says, “Dhalal Mughrabi is a Palestinian martyr. She fought against the Jews. She blew them up.”
Bedein, who has been sounding the alarm regarding UNRWA for decades, describes the indoctrination the kids are receiving as “murder education.” UNRWA, he said, is a “machine” that produces genocidal children in a “cookie-cutter” manner.
Kutaiba Hatab, 15, from the Jalazone refugee camp. Credit: UNRWA at War.Kutaiba Hatab, 15, attends the UNRWA Boys School in the Jalazone refugee camp north of Ramallah in Samaria. Asked in the film what he’s taught about the right of return, he says, “To fight, and to keep fighting, until Palestine is liberated!” He goes on to state that when he grows up, “I’ll be a jihadist and fight for Allah!”
“Do you hate Jews,” an interviewer asks Rada Abu-Hatab, 12, an UNRWA student in Jenin. “Yes, a lot,” she answers. “I want to fight and become a martyr and ascend to heaven with Allah!”
Mohammed Mahmud Khalil, an UNRWA student from Ein Arik, an Arab town near Ramallah, says, “What is the solution to Jerusalem? To kill the Jews. We’ll get rid of the Jews … With Allah’s help, I will become a holy warrior.”
All the children connected the Hamas invasion of Oct. 7 to the right of return, characterizing the gruesome attack as an effort to liberate the land from the Jews.
“Oct. 7 is related to the right of return because Hamas reconquered part of our land that was taken by the occupiers,” says Osama Belashe, an UNRWA student from Jalazone. “In school our teacher taught us we have to return. Even if Israel gives us compensation [to stay here] we have to return.”
For Bedein, the most important thing the film documents is that at UNRWA, children receive military training. In previous films, Bedein has shown that these training camps were set up near Israel Defense Forces bases.
He worries that Israel has been slow to adapt to the post-Oct. 7 reality. “They’re making the same mistake they made last October, not paying attention to the preparations for war in the UNRWA camps,” he said.
However, he sees signs of awakening, noting a recent Israel Army Radio report that the military intended to investigate military training at UNRWA camps.
And next week, Bedein is to present his findings to a Knesset committee. “People who did not take me seriously over a period of 36 years are now taking me seriously,” he said.
Incompetence, or willful blindness, on the part of the Israeli authorities is a recurring theme for Bedein.
He said the Foreign Ministry has a special division dedicated to overseeing UNRWA, yet its representatives were oblivious regarding the weapons held at UNRWA camps. He brought them to the Askar camp bordering Nablus (Shechem) to show them. “They had no idea about the guns,” he said.
Moreover, Israel never exercised what oversight it had, he said. “Israel has the power to veto anything in Palestinian education. What we learned from Oct. 7 is that they weren’t doing it,” he added.
“Back in the 1980s, I began this conversation with how humanitarian supplies were sold in the open market and with no supervision,” Bedein said. “And they [Israel] didn’t make any changes. There was no oversight. To say they’re not doing their job is an understatement,” he added.
Although many have argued for doing away with UNRWA, according to Bedein that’s not a realistic solution. The organization is too embedded in the territories and in the United Nations, and the General Assembly would never accept it, he argued. However, he continued, it is possible to change UNRWA from within by pointing out the absurd situation and demanding change.
“The theme of UNRWA education is ‘peace starts here,’” he said. “How could it possibly be that a U.N. social work agency would be using their education system to prepare kids for war?”
Bedein has put together a five-point plan for changing UNRWA from within:
1. Cancellation of the new UNRWA curriculum based on jihad.
2. Disarmament of UNRWA schools and cessation of paramilitary training.
3. Dismissing UNRWA employees affiliated with Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah.
4. Resettling fourth- and fifth-generation refugees from the 1948 war rather than keeping them in perpetual refugee status.
5. Demanding an audit of donor funds.
He has met five times with Antonio Guterres, the U.N. secretary general, whom he said is open to his proposals.
While UNRWA was always corrupt, it wasn’t always the way it is now, he said.
Even the children going through the schools, while they spoke of “their homes in Jaffa,” didn’t talk about going back and killing everyone in Jaffa as they do now, he said.
“The change took place after 1992 when the PLO was put in charge by [then-Foreign Minister] Shimon Peres,” he said. “UNRWA was handed over to the PLO.”
Going it alone
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu opens the weekly cabinet meeting at his Jerusalem office on February 10, 2019. - Nudged by rightwing political rivals after a deadly Palestinian attack on a young Israeli woman, Netanyahu who seeks re-election pledged today to freeze money transfers to the Palestinian Authority. (Photo by GALI TIBBON / POOL / AFP) (Photo credit should read GALI TIBBON/AFP/Getty Images)
Netanyahu has done many things throughout his many years in office. In my opinion, the scales are tipped against him in the balance of failures versus achievements, but now he plays a fateful, Churchillian role. He is facing terrible pressure from the hostile American government, which is also using at least some of the domestic subversion against him, and he is facing attempts at sedition, wild incitement, unbridled slander, and a public, which, although it is a minority, tries to burn the country in time of war as if there is no tomorrow and there are no enemies. He does all this in front of the majority of the hostile media, defeatist Chief of Staff and Minister of Defense who coordinate too much with the Americans and the corrupt justice system that does not lift a finger against the thieves of the state, the rebels, and the instigators, in a blatant display of hypocrisy and standing in favor of the rebels. This could be Netanyahu’s great and historic hour. His whole life so far, his whole career, all the mistakes he had to learn from—everything is now draining to a climax. A climax in insisting on eliminating Hamas, destroying Gaza, and proving that it does not pay to massacre the Jews in the State of Israel, and also a climax on the Iranian issue, which is now reaching the final stage of developing atomic bombs. If he stands up to the pressure and does what is assigned to him, which he knows very well, he will go down in history alongside Churchill, because not only the fate of Israel vis-à-vis Islam is now at stake, but also the fate of the Western world that has fought against that enemy. Israel defeating Hams may provide proof and a personal example that extreme Islam can be defeated, so Netanyahu’s role is twofold. We are in a critical period. We have the ability to turn it into a great period, our most beautiful hour. Today I am strengthening Netanyahu’s hand and keeping my fingers crossed for him.
Israel: Ceasefire Deal Will Prevent Hostages from Coming Home, Anti-Government Protests Only Embolden Hamas
Masked Hamas militants hold weapons during a protest against Israel's attacks on the Gaza Strip, in Gaza City, Monday, March 3, 2008. In the early hours of Monday, Palestinians counted nine separate Israeli airstrikes on weapons manufacturing and storage facilities, a Hamas headquarters and groups of gunmen, all over Gaza. Five Palestinians were killed in the strikes, all of them Hamas militants, Hamas said. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra) *** Local Caption *** ??? ??????
Hamas leaders, who are closely observing the protests, are likely to harden their stance in the hope that the Israeli government will give in to the demonstrators’ demands, including an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. Hamas has the Israeli public pressuring their government to allow Hamas to “live to fight another day”: to rearm, regroup and continue attacking Israelis – as Hamas official Ghazi Hamad vowed.
No More Credibility for You, Israel-Bashers
“What we do believe is that they heard us,” Gaza protest organizer Hatem Abudayyeh tells a New York Times reporter.
Sure, “they” – Democratic leaders – “heard” self-appointed activists for the Palestinians during the four-day Democratic National Convention. They heard Abudayyeh’s peers urge that a pro-Arab speaker address the convention, that the government impose an arms embargo on Israel and that a cease-fire go into effect to end the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
On the third day of the convention, Democratic leaders refused any speaking slot for a pro-Arab representative despite months of negotiations, protest leaders said. Nor have there been any of the policy changes that they demanded.
“There have been no changes made, there have been no statements made that are in line with what we want to happen,” complained Ashley Taylor-Gouge, a member of the Minnesota Anti-War Committee, as quoted in the Times.
The pro-Arab network has spent the past 5½ years pressuring Democrats to undermine Israel, forcing them to walk a tightrope between Israel-bashers and the Jewish community. Not now. A week ago, I was ready to suggest that their influence could be waning. Not could be. It is waning. They have lost much of their credibility, and both protesters and high-level Democrats agree with that assessment, in so many words.
A relatively low turnout materialized for their demonstrations in Chicago last week. It was still a substantial amount of people, but far lighter than they expected.
“A small handful of people does not represent close to even a sliver of where the Democratic Party is right now,” declared Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on Thursday, the last night of the convention, according to the Associated Press.
Protest organizer Taher Herzallah affirmed the national Democrats’ attitude, saying, “People are trying to employ different tactics because we recognize that after 10 months of being on the streets, we have to deploy different tactics to make sure we are being heard,” according to the Times.
They are being heard. None of us can avoid hearing it. Their problem is that much fewer Americans are buying it. Not “Free Palestine.” Not “globalize Intifada.”
First they exposed their mobster-like operation during last spring’s campus harassment of Jewish students, installation of illegal encampments, seizure of buildings and resistance to police. Not to mention blocking already congested bridges, highways and airport entrances. Many threatened to ignore both Biden and former President Donald J. Trump at the polls, which could tip elections in swing states to Trump.
Then on July 21, President Biden endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic nominee for president after dropping out of the race. Liberals, especially women, flooded a movement to elect Harris as president. Even those who sympathized with the Palestinians probably placed the Gaza war issue on the backburner. They have made it obvious that electing the first woman as president – one who will fight to enact liberal policies – is among their top priorities.
It would not surprise me if many Arab-American women vote for Harris rather than cast a protest vote for an independent candidate or not vote at all in standing up for the Palestinians. In Arab countries, subjugation of women is the rule and that system has been exported here to some extent. This election will be a golden opportunity to rebel – if they are allowed to vote.
Biden and Harris both tossed verbal bones to protesters during their speeches at the DNC.
“Those protesters out in the streets, they have a point,” said Biden. “A lot of innocent people are being killed on both sides.”
What point do they have? Yes, many “innocent people” are being killed. We learned that once tragic events unfolded since Oct. 7, the day when Hamas murdered 1,200 Israelis in southern Israel and took 240 others hostage. That was followed by Israel’s response that killed thousands of Gazans. What did Biden say that should satisfy the pro-Arab activists?
Harris’ words did little to appease them: “I will always stand up for Israel’s right to defend itself and I will always ensure Israel has the ability to defend itself…the people of Israel must never again face the horror that a terrorist organization called Hamas caused on October 7.”
She then referred to Gazan deaths as “devastating” and described the “scale of suffering” as “heartbreaking.” She also said she hopes that “the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity, security, freedom and self-determination.” Is that what they want? Hamas seeks to destroy Israel and at least some Palestinians feel that way. The Palestinian leadership has rejected proposals for a two-state solution in the past.
As evidence that activists recognize that their cause has weakened, two organizers cited the need to release Israeli hostages during a television interview. That is unusual. For almost 11 months, advocates for Gazans have typically ignored the plight of hostages and other examples of Israeli suffering. That would be an attempt at respectability. Too late for most of us.
In another sign of desperation, activists are pouncing on African Americans for gathering behind Harris, who is part Black, while abandoning the Palestinian cause. “I’m so sick and tired of Americans playing your identity politics,” said a British Israel-basher on TikTok who claimed to be part Palestinian. “It’s f-ing insane, a Black woman in f-ing presidency is not going to save us, and no I’m not f-ing saying vote Trump in.”
The New York Post reports that another British Muslim attacked liberals for “weaponizing anti-blackness to defend the US empire all because they want a token ethnic president…She has very clearly stated that she won’t impose an arms embargo…It’s very clear where she stands.”
They are assuming that Black voters so identify with the Palestinians that their so-called struggle takes in all causes. “These are people who feel that they are entitled to the support of Black people no matter what, that they get to push us around and tell us who the hell we get to vote for if we support them,” TikTokker Tori Grier pushed back. “As if that means we’re just not supposed to give a damn about ourselves.”
Pushback is evolving in various ways, especially on college campuses. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul on Monday held a conference call with 200 college and university leaders to reinforce the need to devise and implement emergency plans as students return to campus this fall, according to a news release. She also noted that they can connect with necessary resources.
Many colleges nationwide are preparing for the possible onslaught of protests. Swarthmore hired outside investigators to build cases against students, The Philadelphia Inquirer reports. Rutgers has banned encampments.
In Manhattan, Sonia Ossorio joined other women’s rights to press Antonio Guterres, secretary general of the United Nations, “to demand a full investigation of systemic rape during the Oct. 7 attacks and for the perpetrators to be held accountable for war crimes.”
In a Newsweek opinion piece, Ossorio writes, “The protests in and of themselves are not the issue…denying, downplaying and justifying rape and murder is inconsistent with protesting on behalf of human rights. Protests should not justify extremism. They should not excuse rape, they should not mislabel a terrorist attack as “a historic win for the Palestinian resistance.”
Ossorio, the executive director of the National Organization for Women New York City and Women’s Justice NOW, adds, “This lack of accountability isn’t an issue unique to Oct. 7. Women’s equality and women’s right to live free of sexual terror deserves greater world attention.”
The DNC’s resistance to the protest tactics should be studied by university officials, writes former federal prosecutor Gregory J. Wallance in The Hill, a Capitol Hill publication. “A no-appeasement policy should be the guiding principle for how, going forward, universities deal with disruptive, sometimes antisemitic pro-Palestinian demonstrations,” Wallance writes.
A no-appeasement policy is awfully late in coming, but it has arrived. Pro-Arab activists are on notice.
The Hostage Murders and the New Threat
An American has been murdered in the tunnels under Rafah—and by at least one IDF account at some point in the past day or so. Hersh Goldberg-Polin’s parents, Rachel and Jon, have represented the best of us, the most civilized, the most controlled, the most noble of us Jews battling to maintain our emotional stability in the face of what has gone on in Israel and in America since October 7. They are Jewish heroes. And now their son Hersh is a Jewish martyr. The crime done to him is unspeakable. The crime done to them is no less unspeakable. His body was found with five other survivors of 10/7, all of whom had families and loved ones and babies on the way.
And I cannot help but ask. I cannot. Had the Biden administration’s will not been bent and twisted in the months following the attack by the fiendish propaganda campaign causing them to worry about the war’s effect on Joe’s chances in Michigan—due to a population that effectively supported the terrorist monsters and cared not a whit for the eight Americans, let alone the 240 other innocents dragged into Hell—would Hersh and these others have survived? Imagine an Israel that had not found itself restrained and under assault, not told to pause, not scolded in pissy little phone calls with petulant American establishmentarians, without arms and aid held up, without being lectured about the geostrategic value of going slow or not going at all.
Imagine an Israel that was not told by its best friend in the world that offensive action in Gaza had become self-defeating, was not told that Israel should care more about feeding people in Gaza than about eliminating the threat to its 9 million citizens and pummelling Hamas until that evil group of thugs cried uncle and begged for way to negotiate to return the hostages.
Imagine an America that did not lose its nerve under a president whose team knew perfectly well he was infirm and was working desperately to stave off his eventual collapse and departure from the race to save their own rotten and misbegotten jobs. Imagine an America that had said, “You have right and justice on your side, and your actions in the first two months of the war succeeded in getting 78 hostages home. You keep on doing what you’re doing until they’re all home.” Imagine an America that wasn’t secretly ashamed by its own inability to secure victory in war and didn’t therefore see Israel’s insistence that victory was the only way forward as a moral rebuke to our own divided soul.
Imagine what might have been. Do not be unburdened by that. Be burdened by that. Ask yourself if an Israel that had done in Rafah over the past six weeks—had trapped the Hamas leadership, had begun eliminating the Hamas leadership, had pinpointed its attacks to a degree that the death toll in Gaza for all except Hamas seniors fell precipitously—had done this in March rather than in August.
Hamas is the evil here. America is not responsible for the deaths of anyone in Gaza, and anyone who says otherwise is a moral idiot—just like those deranged people who seem determined to blame Bibi Netanyahu for not surrendering to Hamas, as though the hostage deals of the past, like the one that freed Hamas mastermind Yahya Sinwar in 2011, weren’t among the root causes of this horrible conflict.
But we Americans are morally liable for our role in our backseat-driving in this war, for screaming at the Israelis at the wheel, unnerving them as they were trying to keep their eye on the road ahead.
Hersh Goldberg-Polin was 23 years old. There are two babies there, somewhere, in those tunnels that Kamala Harris said Israel should not go into. At her convention, Rachel and Jon spoke. America wept. Then Kamala Harris gave her speech and said Israel had the right to defend herself BUT there was too much killing and we needed a ceasefire and a hostage deal and a two-state solution and for the oceans to turn to lemonade, which is about as likely in the foreseeable future as a two-state solution.
And Hamas saw her, and saw Biden, and was so terrified by what they saw, so fearful of America’s martial response to their evil, that they killed Hersh and the five others whose bodies were found—and who knows who else yet.
This is a dangerous moment. This monstrous act of villainy will not quiet the campuses as the anniversary of October 7 approaches. No, it will embolden the very monsters who have been psychologically torturing Jewish students—and assaulting them in some cases—over the past year. The stories we’ve read in the past two days about the report of Columbia University’s anti-Semitism task force chill the blood. “Hillel Go to Hell,” read a banner at a Baruch College demonstration this week, in case you were wondering if things were going to quiet down.
The threats were real then and they are going to be even more real now, as those who support the destruction of the Jewish state and the crushing of the spirit and the freedom of American Jews make their moves over the next month. Their intention is to take over the anniversary of the massacre and turn it into a tribute, as they plan to do at the University of Maryland.
We don’t need to read Joe Biden issuing statements of outrage about Hersh. We need to see that things are going to be done to protect America’s Jews from the evil that might be visited upon us as we tick down the days until it’s been a year since Jews were plunged into this existential battle designed to destabilize the Jewish state and drive American Jews underground.
Joe Biden was sitting on the beach this afternoon as the Israelis recovered the bodies. He is a spent force, a quartered roasted duck. So what are you going to do about it, Ms. Harris? What are you going to do?
Chicago and other charades
As a non-American, I am always astounded when every four years millions of dollars are spent in hosting Hollywood style political extravaganzas.
One would have thought that by now a much better and more intelligent method might have been found in order to choose a candidate for President of the United States.
It seems to be a perversion of the true democratic process if the only individuals deemed worthy of standing for this position are those with either the biggest bank accounts or those with the richest friends and patrons.
This is not a new phenomenon but it has demonstrably grown in recent years. Allied with corruption of materialistic greed is the necessity these days to have some sort of charismatic media appeal. Once can be the dumbest candidate on the planet and unable to string together coherent sentences but as long as the teleprompter works and you look appealing then you are in with a good chance.
Other attributes likely to help a prospective Presidential candidate in today’s screwed up woke world is a mix of the right ethnicity and a spouse who can spout the most politically correct nonsense.
FDR picked Harry Truman as his running mate because he conceivably posed no threat. Truman was after all a bland non controversial ex-haberdasher and thus Roosevelt reasoned he would not pose a threat to the White House. That is why the Vice President was kept in the dark over the most sensitive military developments. When Truman assumed the Presidency after FDR’s sudden death he was totally unprepared for the momentous decisions needed to ensure victory over Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.
Despite everything, Harry Truman turned out to be one of the most successful Presidents of modern times. He had what unfortunately far too many others lack and that was common sense, a determination to confront unpopular decisions and a clear vision of what needed to be done. His successes vividly turn the spotlight on to the recent and current abysmal choices faced by American voters.
It never ceases to amaze me that the alleged standard bearer of democracy and freedom has such a warped and corrupted system for electing its leaders and legislative representatives.
The very essence of a democratic system should be to give its citizens the widest choice of aspirants so that all sectors of society can have a fair chance of being elected. Yet, amazingly, there are only two political parties with any possibility of success on offer. No independent or other alternative choice is available because these individuals have zero possibility of winning. In fact, even when some brave soul tries to challenge the two established parties they are ruthlessly squashed.
Thus, the American voter is denied the chance to pick someone who might be eminently suitable but is not an approved devotee of either of the two established political groups. As an American neighbour of mine pointed out this effectively disenfranchises millions of potential undecided voters and those not enamored with either candidate.
Another major flaw is the fact that instead of the person who polls the highest number of votes being elected President, the result hinges on an electoral college with unequal representation from the various states.
In order to vote one must be a citizen. This is a basic requirement in any true democracy. This year in the USA there are moves afoot to make illegal border infiltrators eligible to vote. This could be a blatant attempt by one party to garner votes and it will be interesting to see if it succeeds. An American friend from Chicago told me that back in the days of Mayor Daley the slogan was “vote early and vote often.”
Corruption of the electoral process is therefore not a new phenomenon.
The Republican and Democratic conventions followed a similar Hollywood style format with plenty of hoopla, hot air and hyperventilated rhetoric. Both crowned their Presidential choices and running mates without any semblance of a contest. The assembled multitudes indulged in mass chants which reminded me of the brainwashed crowds at North Korean and Chinese political indoctrination rallies.
However, in certain crucial aspects the Chicago extravaganza differed markedly.
It featured the dumped President trying to put a positive face on his ouster and past incumbents as well as other hangers on extolling his supposed single handed victories in overcoming Covid, rescuing the USA from economic disaster and defeating the forces of jihadist terror. It is a testament to the gullibility of those present and the media which peddled this nonsense that all these claims were received with rapturous adoration.
The next notable difference was the actions of the frenzied anti Israel/Zionist demonstrators on the streets of Chicago. The determination of the police to thwart violence may have contributed to the lower than predicted turnout but the mobs which marched and shouted made it clear what their message to the Democratic Party means. Much to the relief of the convention organizers the blatant haters were excluded from the hall so that an image of civility could be projected to the world at large.
The very mention of the word Israel in Chicago was very hard to find, whereas at the Republican convention full throated support of Israel and its war against terror was a noticeable feature. The assembled delegates may have chanted “bring them home” but in the absence of any meaningful support for the war against jihadist terror it is very hard to see how short of capitulating to a mass terrorist release this will be achieved. In fact I wonder how many delegates even know that thousands of rockets are being fired into Israel every week.
Another notable feature at the DNC was the need for Jewish groups to hold meetings in secret. Like the clandestine Spanish Jews evading the Catholic Inquisition, Jewish Chicago attendees were forced to gather anonymously lest the rampaging haters discovered their Zionist sympathies and caused chaos.
Speakers touting their Jewish roots were trotted on to the podium in order to deliver excruciating revelations about their loyalty to the Party and how this impacts their ethnicity. Unsurprisingly the words Israel and Zionist never escaped their lips. Ironically, Bernie Sanders, the only one to mention Israel did so in his usual negative connotation about the war against Gaza terror.
It was left to Kamala Harris and her husband to make a star studded appearance and give those assembled and everyone watching via media, an insight into what passes for “Jewish” these days in the USA and what can be expected in the four years to come.
The current “second gentleman” and aspiring “first gentleman” revealed to everyone how he defines his Jewish identity. Apparently it was Kamala, his non Jewish spouse, who urged him to become more deeply interested with his faith. He recounted how he took the bus to Hebrew School lessons, which seems an irrelevance. He admitted that Kamala, his second spouse, encouraged him to become more closely involved with the problem of Jew hate, something apparently not on his previous radar. Then he waxed enthusiastically how Kamala attends a Jewish service on the High Holidays and how he attends Church at Easter.
The piece de resistance was him extolling the wonderful brisket that Kamala cooks for Passover. After reading this riveting bit of news I wondered if perhaps he had become a follower of the Brisker Rav (Rabbi). If one needed proof of how assimilation has mangled the future of the American Jewish future this provided ample proof.
The sad fact is that any Jewish identity stops with him and certainly does not pass on to the next generation. Anyone who believes that a Jewish Presidential spouse will be a bulwark against rapidly rising anti Israel, Zionist and Jewish hate is living in a fantasy world.
Having made no mention of Israel it was the turn of Kamala to make her acceptance speech to the rapturous masses. She read the prompter flawlessly and demonstrated her accolade of being the candidate of joy by laughing and whooping.
In between these expressions of hilarity the Democratic candidate attempted to portray an image of being the potential savior of the country as it faces unprecedented challenges to its security.
Attempting to assure voters that Israel had nothing to fear she danced a delicate balancing act designed to placate both supporters of Israel and the progressively left haters of the Jewish State.
To my mind, her waffling word salads exemplify exactly why Israelis and those who stand with the Zionist enterprise must be very wary of a future Harris/Walz administration.
“The Israel – Hamas war must end so that Palestinians can have dignity, security and freedom and self determination.”
This one sentence encapsulates the underlying ignorance and cluelessness of the current and possible forthcoming White House.
Totally absent is any admission that the Arabs now reincarnated as Palestinian descendants of the ancient Canaanites have had nearly 80 years to achieve these objectives. Their continual refusal to do so and instead their single minded efforts to deny Jewish sovereignty remains at the root of the problem.
An inability and indeed stubborn refusal by democratic nations to acknowledge these truths and the subversion of international bodies by terror supporters has resulted in the current mess we face.
Unfortunately, witnessing the circus in Chicago I have no confidence that the next four years under Harris will be other than capitulation to woke scenarios and policies detrimental to Israel and Jews.
We Are Wanted Back Home!
Parashat Re’eh
Sometimes reading a verse in the Torah triggers off an unexpected association. In this week’s Parasha, we are told that we are G-d’s children – “Banim Atem La’shem Elokeichem” – this lofty ‘Yichus’, the Torah continues, comes with heightened responsibility. Noblesse Oblige – We are to respect ourselves for who we are and where we came from, and therefore we must treat our own bodies with respect: “Lo Titgodedu Ve’lo Tasimu Korcha Bein Einechem La’met” – You shall not make gashes in your flesh, nor shave your head between your eyes for the dead”, (Devarim 14:1). This same requirement is mentioned elsewhere in the Torah in cojunction with the similar prohibition against tattooing one’s body, (Vayikra 19:28).
While a gash will heal with time, and shorn hair will grow back – a tatoo can remain forever.
This brings to mind a number of Halachic dilemmas regarding tattoos, which I was confronted with during my service as Rav of Merkazei Klita, Absorption Centers. One such question was posed by an Oleh from the U.S. who had recently embarked on a new spiritual path, becoming a Ba’al Teshuva. During his former life he had rather unfortunately decided to tattoo the image of a naked woman upon his left arm. Understandably, in his current situation he was reluctant to exhibit his tattoo in public and was therefore careful to always wear a long-sleeved shirt. What was he to do, though, when it was time to adorn himself with the Tefillin every morning? Should he daven in private and not in Shul as part of a minyan? Should he put the Tefillin on his right arm instead of the left? When counselled, Rav Mordechai Eliyahu zt”l felt that no Halachic adjustments or leniencies would be needed. Embarrassment could be avoided by simply putting the Tefillin on at home and coming to Shul only after having them recovering the exposed arm. At the same time, R. Eliyahu advised that he turn to medical experts to determine whether the problematic tattoo could be removed without violating the same prohibition a second time. [Interestingly, in Teshuvot Minchat Yitzchak (3, 11) Dayan Weiss has a Teshuva dealing with this same exact situation].
A similar question was posed by a young lady who had grown up in a traditional family. On an outing with some friends, they had perhaps drunk more than they should have, and overcome by a temporary lapse of judgement and decided to tattoo themselves in order to ‘beautify’ their bodies. Subsequently, this young woman regretted what she had done, and remorsefully searched for a way out, on order to avoid bringing shame to her family. In this case Rav Eliyahu zt”l suggested consulting medical experts to ascertain whether a certain salve could be applied to remove the tattoo.
Returning to the verse from this week’s Parasha, it is interesting to note that the words “Lo Titgogedu” were granted an additional – and markedly different – interpretation in the Talmud. In Yevamot 14a we are told that the words of this verse contain a warning that the community must not torn apart. One may not divide up a Jewish community into competing, divisive, groups: “Lo Titgodedu – Lo Ta’asu Agudot Agudot”. Don’t allow a single community, to be torn apart – each partial segment appointing their own Batei Din.
The Talmud explains that although the simple meaning of the words “Lo Titgodedu” bear no relevance to the question of communal unity, this is hinted to by the Torah’s exact wording. Were the Torah’s sole intention to speak of defaming the body, it would have utilized the more exact, and grammatically apt form of “Lo Tagudu”. The Choice of the word “Titgodedu” hints to the additional meaning: do not squander your unity by creating “Agudot Agudot” – many communities.
The Ha’Emek Davar deals with the obvious question: The two meanings of the prohibition of “Lo Titgodedu” – Not to inflict self-harm to the body, and not to allow the community to splinter into divisive competing groups – seemingly have no connection to one another: How, then, can these two wholly disconnected commandments be derived from this one single verse?
The Ha’Emek Davar answers that the beginning of the verse (“Banim Atem La’shem Elokeichem”), provides the link which connects these two disparate concepts: If we are all the shared children of one G-d there can be no justification for splintering apart into different communities. Children of one father must remain united standing side by side while jointly keeping Torat Hashem.
Those coming on Aliyah today are confronted with a plethora of different communities – where should they move? Which community should they join? Sadly, it is hard to visualize us all joining to form one cohesive community – perhaps this is one of the reasons we anticipate the arrival of Mashiach…
A lot still needs to be done to bring all G-d’s children together, and yet the first step is by realizing that this is our home – we have no other! – come back home and help us learn to stand together!
RABBI YERACHMIEL RONESS was born and raised in Montreal, Canada. After serving as a congregational Rabbi and as a Hillel Director in New York City, he made Aliyah in 1983 with his wife Dina and their five young children.
Ever since, Rabbi Roness has dedicated his life to promoting Aliyah. First, as Rabbi of the Jewish Agency’s Absorption Centers, and subsequently as the executive director of the Aloh-Naaleh organization.
This article was taken from Rabbi Roness’s new book: Aloh Na’aleh – Eretz Yisrael and Aliyah in the Weekly Parshah.
The book is for sale on Amazon.
UNRWA Research Update
1. New movie, which will be on line as of Sept. 1. 2024
UNRWA AT WAR;
English Version:
2. New Study; Terror use of UNRWA facilities at a time of war.
https://www.idf.il/en/mini-sites/the-unrwa-hamas-connection/exploitation-of-unrwa-schools/#new_tab
