Cognitive Dissonance

Just last week Minister of Defense and Labor party leader Ehud Barak had this to stay concerning the deportation of foreign nationals' children who are in the country illegally. Jerusalem Post

Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Wednesday asked Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu reconsider the government decision authorizing the deportation of 400 children of foreign workers under the age of five, while letting 800 older children and their families stay. Barak, who did not participate in Sunday’s cabinet vote, asked Netanyahu to prevent the deportations. “The State of Israel cannot expel hundreds of children,” Barak said. “It is not Jewish or humane and will scar the entire Israeli society.”

Okey Dokey, I can be down with that, except, well, who do you explain this? Arutz Sheva:

Soldiers of the Nachal Hareidi regiment – a heretofore successful experiment in integrating hareidi-religious soldiers in the IDF – write of a “mortal blow” to their trust in the IDF command.

The soldiers say their commanders lied to them during the recent (July 26th) destruction of a large house in Givat Ronen (Ronen Hill) outside the Jewish town of Har Bracha in Shomron (Samaria). The Nachal Hareidi soldiers were sent to replace the Border Guard forces, after being falsely told that the latter had gone southward for police work.

The destroyed home, built at a cost of hundreds of thousands of shekels, belonged to the Afarsimon family. The dozens of Border Guard and special Yassam police troops also destroyed a goat pen and caravan (mobile home without wheels) at the site. The incident, in which each of the neighboring Jewish homes was surrounded by police to prevent the residents from attempting to block the destruction, was followed by a sharp clash – part of the residents’ “Price Tag” response to actions of this nature -  between Jews and Arabs in which four Jews were hurt.

Forty Nachal Hareidi soldiers signed a letter, unprecedented in its sharp tone, to their battalion commanders and to IDF Chief Rabbi Rafi Peretz. Excerpts from the letter:

“This was an arrogant, disgraceful and deceptive act… We are saddened that time after time, the IDF does not realize that it should respect the values of Jewish tradition. This, in addition to the fact that the IDF does not know the different between a political mission that hurts the IDF goals and crumbles its ethical strength, and a security mission for which we risk our lives.

“In order to accomplish this mission [of destruction in Givat Ronen], the commanders knowingly lied to the regiment soldiers, telling them that they were to replace a Border Guard battalion that was leaving for the south for active duty – when in fact these Border Guardsman were actually involved in destroying Jewish homes in Judea and Samaria. This fact is a mortal blow to our trust in the IDF command. To deviate from the norm of telling the truth in the IDF is a mortal blow that could have ramifications in all the various planes of military behavior, both in routine work and at times of emergency.”

The soldiers say that their senior commanders lied to them knowing that many of the soldiers would not want to take part even indirectly in harming Jews and their property. “Instead, they chose to sacrifice the trust of their soldiers in their commanders, causing a direct blow to their combat readiness and ability – and all this in order to carry out a grave act that stands in opposition to the goals of the IDF.”

So if its anti-Jewish and inhumane to evict the children of illegal aliens from Israel; why is the eviction of Jewish families from their homes and deliberately lie to the IDF soldiers about their mission ethical and somehow kosher?

Fun facts about the Disputed Terroritories

Which progressives of all stripes will never mention. Arutz Sheva:

IsraelNN.com) A new report from the IDF's Civilian Administration shows that of 293 illegally built structures owned by Jews in Judea and Samaria in 2008, 36 percent or 105 were destroyed. However, of 646 Palestinian Authority Arab-owned structures illegally built on Jewish-owned or state-owned land in Judea and Samaria, only 17 percent or 111 were destroyed. The figures were leaked to the Hebrew-language daily Maariv.

In essence, the report showed the Israeli officials are more than twice as likely to enforce building laws by demolishing buildings when those accused of illegal building are Jewish, rather than Arab.

MK Uri Ariel of Ichud Leumi, who follows the activities of the Civilian Administration, said he was unsurprised by the report. “Sticking our heads in the sand and ignoring illegal Palestinian building is going to get us in big trouble,” he warned. Ariel accused the extreme political left of discriminating against Jews while claiming to act in the name of justice. “The High Court's decisions allowing the eviction of Jews are not just at all, but rather are discriminatory and are used only against Jews,” he said. He called on the government to take note of the results of the previous government's policy regarding illegal building, and to change that policy immediately. The government must start applying the law equally in all sectors, he said.

Meanwhile there is no stay of execution for a Palestinian convicted under the Palestinian Liberation Organization’s Revolutionary Code of Justice for selling land to Jews….but Israel is the ‘apartheid state’…..

imagine facing a jail sentence for insulting the dignity of a public official

There are a great many of what I would call really asinine laws on the books in Israel. The real injustice is that these laws are dusted off from time to time to prosecute all those who don’t fall easily into line with the thinking of any given Israeli Administration. One of these laws is called ‘insulting the dignity of a public official’. When I first heard of this law, I immediately thought it referred to a bribe which was too small, and hence, it insulted the public official. Alas, it refers to a type of name calling – not libelous or slanderous name calling per say but insinuations which said public official finds offensive.

Currently, Nadia Matar, leader of Women in Green, is on trial in Israel for writing a protest letter to a public official against the Gaza Engagement. The offending paragraphs (courtesy of Arutz Sheva):

"The truth is that you are a modern version of the Judenrat - actually, a much worse version, because then, during the Holocaust, this was forced upon those Jewish leaders by the Nazis, and it is extremely difficult for us, today, to judge them. Today, no one stands with a gun to your head and forces you to collaborate in the crime, without any conscience pangs."

In her letter, Matar went on to warn of "the bloody price that we will have to pay for our retreat. If the criminal Oslo accords cost us more than 1,000 victims, Sharon's deportation plan will give such a push to the Nazi Arab terror (for the Arabs will see that Israel's folding is proof that terror pays) that I fear to think how many Jews will pay with their lives for Sharon's 'disengagement'." In comments defending the content and tone of her letter at the time, the Women In Green head said that it was justified by the situation, because the Disengagement will lead to "Katyushas and rockets fired from Gaza."

Matar’s trial has been post-poned - Arutz Sheva:

As it turned out, the call-up of the State's attorney due to the war in Gaza provided an even more ironic twist to Sheftel's response to the court. He said:
"Let it be written in the protocol that Attorney [Erez] Padan has been called up for the reserves as a direct result of the fact that his place of work, the Supreme Court, described the expulsion from Gush Katif, against which my client was protesting and for which she now stands trial, as something positive that will improve the security situation of Israel when today we know that it is that expulsion that brought upon us Katyushas in Be'er Sheva, Ashdod and Yavne. That is why Attorney Padan has been called up for reserves and my client is sitting on the bench of the accused."

Well. Well. If that irony doesn't rot ones socks, what will?

Show Cause

The Jerusalem District Court has ruled Noam Federman and family should be allowed to return to their home the Israeli government forcibly evicted them from a month ago. Jerusalem Post

"It is not clear to me," presiding Judge Moshe Drori wrote in his decision, "why it was necessary to embark on an operation involving 100 police officers in order to evict a man from a closed military zone which was closed 10 months earlier, without any warning, without any attempt at negotiation, and without checking the claims of the other side."

Around 1:30 p.m. on Sunday, October 26, security forces, in a surprise operation, destroyed an outpost which consisted of two unauthorized homes belonging to the families of singer Sinai Tor and Federman.

"I haven't heard any claims which would support [Federman's] inclusion in an order declaring a closed military zone," the decision read. "[He] is not suspected of conducting a terror attack against Israeli communities, which is one function of the order, and certainly the closure of this area does not apply to [Federman]."

"Indeed," the judge continued, "producing this order [implies an attempt] to prevent a 'terrorist infiltration,' and it is inconceivable that [Federman] be included in this category. For this reason he should have been permitted to remain in the closed territory in order to protect the Israeli communities from terrorist attacks and infiltration, and not have been expelled from the area."

"The methods by which [the State used to evacuate the outpost] were unconstitutional and not proportional, inasmuch as they prevented Federman from living in a significant portion of the land of Israel," the ruling read. "The petition by the State is defective [because of its] grave discrimination. I have not heard any explanation as to why the State chose to evacuate a man with a family which includes a wife and nine little children at 1:30 at night. I don't see how this kind of thing exhibits an obligation by the state to protect its children."

Ehud Barak, current Israeli Defense Minister, has announced his department will appeal this court ruling.

The Israeli state’s war also includes a front on Jewish teenagers

Three teenaged girls (a 17, 15, and a 12 year old) were indicted in Jerusalem district court for assaulting Israeli security forces and obstruction reports Ynet News:

Three teenage Israeli girls were indicted at the Jerusalem District Juvenile Court on Sunday for attacking police officers with rocks during the evacuation and demolition of an illegal structure in the Givat Harsina neighborhood of Kiryat Arba three days ago.

The State Prosecution is charging the young girls, aged 12, 15 and 17, with reckless endangerment, aggravated assault of security forces, and the obstruction of a police officer. Due to the severity of the accusations, the hearing on the remand of the girls' arrest through the end of the legal proceedings will be held at the Jerusalem District Court.

Apparently, this incident was not just any ‘outpost’ but part of the continuing conflict over the Federman farm area. The girls’ sage does end there either and good on them for fighting back. Ynet News:

Three girls who were arrested last week during clashes between settlers and security forces in Hebron claim to have been abused by the police, according to the attorney representing one of the suspects. Attorney David Halevy filed a complaint with the Police Investigation Unit (PIU) claiming that the girls, aged 12, 15, and 17, were falsely accused of a number of crimes in police reports and abused by officers in various manners.

(…)Halevy sent a letter to head of the PIU, Herzl Shviro, in which he claimed the arresting officers had committed fraud and breach of trust during the incident. He also accused one of the officers of forging signatures on the arrest documents. The attorney appealed to Shviro to launch an investigation against the officers and to suspend the case against his client, the 17-year old girl. He claimed the officers had unnecessarily used brute force against his client and her friends.

Halevy further claimed that his client had told him the officers denied the girls basic rights such as sleep and food for many hours, and refused to allow them to go to the bathroom. He wrote that the officers yelled at the minors repeatedly and used offensive language, calling them "smelly" and "dirty".

Finally, the attorney claimed the officers turned on the air conditioning to intolerable temperatures in order to freeze the girls and suppress their ability to fight back, simultaneously forcing them to sit with their faces just inches from the wall for a number of hours.

Don’t count on Rabbis’ for Human Rights or B’Tselem to be championing the case of these young teenager girls - as these ‘human rights’ groups only champion the human rights of anyone but Jewish children in Israel.

The Israeli governments continued war against the Jews

I have been trying to write about Noam Federman for days but just when I think I am done the papers report another new incident. I understand why someone like Noam Federman or an Avi Ran (and others too numerous to mention) is problematic to the secular Israeli body politic. They are eminently unbribable and imperious to coercive force. Knock them down, and they get up and soldier on. They pour their whole heart, mind and soul into things of an otherworldly nature. They are not only committed to an ideal but are committed to living out that very ideal at any price.

So how to deal with them? Well, the Romans choose to kill as many as possible and then salt the earth which worked but only for a short time. Christians and Muslims have been killing them for a few millenniums but still the Federmans and the Rans of the world are born and rise up. The current Israeli government, much like previous Israeli Administrations, has decided to pervert their own laws and persecute them to the fullest perversion which the law bends and twists to allow.

Case in point. Over 200 Yassam came to evict and destroy the Federman’s home October 25th in the middle of the night which works out to well over 10 Yassam for less than 20 people which makes you wonder how dangerous and tough those Jewish children are when a 2 year old needs to be subdued by at least 10 security officials. By all accounts, Noam Federman was immediately arrested and handcuffed with his arms fastened behind his back.

The Israeli border officials arrested him and attempted to indict him for allegedly breaking the leg of a soldier while he was handcuffed and pinned to the ground by at least 10 or more men - where it has been alleged he was beaten. The judge took a look at Noam Federman’s bruised and bloody body and asked for the medical report of officer whose leg was broken by Federman’s ‘assault’. The government was unable to supply any evidence and presented conflicting police accounts so a Jerusalem judge demanded Federman be released and dismissed the charges.

The original demolition of Federman’s home could only be carried out with the IDF surrounding Federman’s farm, and it required IDF command lie to the soldiers who had the misfortune of pulling guard duty that night. Federman’s neighbors set about rebuilding his home within 24 hours. By my count the structures have been set up at least 4 times since the original destruction by Israeli security forces. The government keeps destroying the buildings, and yet, they keep rising. On October 31st the Israeli security forces again entered the new structure and Israeli security forces beat up on the children and knocked one daughter unconscious and wounded four other children.

Noam Federman’s wife Elisheva was recently detained by police who demanded she uncover her hair publicly to provide a DNA sample. Who knew the Israeli police prefer the time consuming and expensive testing of hair samples rather than a cheek swab? Frankly, the whole exercise was nothing more than a simple case of police harassment with an eye to humiliate a religious Jewish woman. Although, it might not have turned out quite the way the Israeli police hoped for as the exercise in humiliation ended with a spontaneous protest by local Jewish women picketing the police station where Elisheva was detained.

Yesterday, the Jerusalem Post reported that Noam Federman was indicted for assaulting an Israeli border by breaking his arm and obstructing police.

The Jerusalem District Attorney's Office filed an indictment against right-wing activist Noam Federman on Wednesday for allegedly assaulting a policeman and obstructing a police officer during the evacuation of his illegal home at an outpost outside Hebron last week.

This time I suspect all the appropriate medical paperwork documenting the injury was duly submitted although there is no report in newspaper accounts of what day the alleged Super Jew Federman actually did the deed.

Today, Ynet News carries this report:

The Jerusalem Magistrate's court rejected Friday the Prosecutor's Office's second request to ban rightist activist Noam Federman from Judea and Samaria, after he was indicted for aggravated assault of a police officer. Judge Shulamit Dotan ruled Friday that the Prosecutor's Office petition to forbid Federman from entering Judea and Samaria is premature, and that the rightist activist should be allowed to see the evidence against him before any decision on the matter is taken. On Thursday, the judge rejected the first request made by the Prosecutor's Office because it failed to hand over the required documents to Federman.

I have always wondered about the ordinary people who can in good conscience commit or be a party to these kinds of acts for when you pervert justice for one it is only a matter of time before justice is perverted for all. But what is even harder for me to grasp is why Israeli secular society encourages and lights Chanukah candles. To light the Chanukah menorah is not only to remember to the miracle of the rededication of the second Temple but it is to remember why the miracle was needed. The Maccabbean revolt was not just a rebellion against a foreign ruler but a revolt whereby religious Jews actively rose up against their secular brethren who actively chose to live their lives outside of the Torah.

I know which side Federman stands in this long line of Jewish tradition, but on what side does the homeland of the Jewish state stand? In other news this week, over 50 kassams have been fired into Israel this Tuesday from the Gaza Strip - good thing there's a truce.

eating your own

If a second Jewish state is ever established or civil war breaks out in Israel you can blame the policies of the secular government of Israel for it. Arutz Sheva carried this report of an attempted kidnapping carried out by Arabs under the eyes of the Israeli border police who were too busy demolishing a Jewish home to care what happened to two young Jews.

(IsraelNN.com) Jewish residents of Migron reported Monday that Arabs from a nearby village had attempted to kidnap two young Jews. The attack took place on Monday morning as border police were demolishing five buildings, including a structure used as a meeting place by local Jewish youths. Border Police either failed to notice the attack or chose not to intervene, residents said, and the kidnapping was foiled only due to the efforts of alert local teens.

The attack began when a group of Arab men approached two Jewish youths who were standing near an olive grove on the outskirts of town and began pelting them with stones. The Arab men had gained access to the area by telling soldiers they were farmers who had come to harvest olives. The attackers managed to overpower and grab the two youths. They then bound them and began dragging them away. The two youths continued to struggle and were beaten by the mob. One was stabbed in the head and wounded.

The two were saved thanks to an alert young man who noticed the struggle and gathered a group of 15 young Jews from Migron, who ran after the attackers. The attackers fled, leaving the two bound and injured Jewish youths behind. One youth was treated at the scene of the attack, while the other required more extensive treatment and was taken to a hospital.

The end result – the kidnapping was foiled and Israeli border police arrested one of the injured Jewish youths. Go figure.

War against the Jews makes Israeli cabinet discussions

Cabinet discussions Sunday revolved around the ‘settler question’ and not Jewish settlement in Tel Aviv. Ha’aretz offers this account:

A government decision to evacuate more territory may lead to a large-scale violent conflict with settlers, complete with live fire, Shin Bet security service chief Yuval Diskin warned at yesterday's cabinet meeting. The meeting ended with the ministers voting to end all government support, both direct and indirect, for illegal outposts.

"The scope of the conflict will be much larger than it is today and than it was during the disengagement," Diskin warned. "Our investigation found a very high willingness among this public to use violence - not just stones, but live weapons - in order to prevent or halt a diplomatic process."

While Diskin did not comment explicitly on the danger of another political assassination, the timing of his warning - just days before the anniversary of prime minister Yitzhak Rabin's assassination - was not lost on cabinet members.

"They [the settlers] don't think like us. Their thought is messianic, mystic, satanic and irrational," Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer said, warning of another political assassination.

In response, the Yesha council is set to file a complaint against MK Ben-Eliezer and Vice Premier Chaim Ramon for libel and incitement reports the Jerusalem Post:

The Committee of Samaria Settlers is set to file a complaint against Vice Premier Haim Ramon and National Infrastructures Minister Binymain Ben-Eliezer, claiming that remarks made by the two made during a cabinet meeting Sunday constituted libel and incitement against the settler community. Ben-Eliezer and Ramon had railed against the settlers during the meeting, which was devoted to extreme right-wing violence.

There is a real pot kettle moment in Ramon ranting about settler conduct when he was found guilty of an indecent sexual conduct against an IDF soldier in 2007. And at least one’s daughter is safe from sexual harassment by the ‘settlers movement’.

Any way, back to Ha’aretz:

"What we are seeing today is the result of a deep rift with the faith-based community, and not only in the West Bank," Diskin said. "Their approach began with the slogan 'through love, we will win' during the [Gaza] disengagement, but has now reached 'through war, we will win."

He also warned that right-wing extremists view their "price tag" policy, in which they retaliate for every outpost evacuation with attacks on soldiers and/or Palestinians, as having been successful, and are therefore liable to expand it to within the Green Line.

The Shin Bet believes there are a few hundred extremists of this type. "There is no clear leadership," Diskin said. "They are motivated by a unity of purpose - not to allow the security forces to evacuate people." Following the cabinet vote on the outposts, the Yesha Council of settlements termed the decision "scandalous and demagogic," saying there is "no connection" between the outposts and extremist violence.

"The decision constitutes collective punishment and denies essential services to loyal citizens whose only sin is living in communities that the State of Israel built and sold apartments in, but has not yet finished the process of approving," it stated. The Legal Forum for the Land of Israel also called the decision discriminatory, as many illegal Arab neighborhoods receive services from the state.

In addition to its decision on outposts, the cabinet ordered a ministerial committee headed by Defense Minister Ehud Barak to submit recommendations within two weeks on how to tighten law enforcement, including by taking action against civil servants who facilitate illegal outpost construction. Most of the meeting, however, was devoted to ministerial tirades against violent settlers and attempts by security and law enforcement agencies to pass blame.

Public Security Minister Avi Dichter said that about one-tenth of Israel's total police force is already in the West Bank, and that it is impossible to transfer additional forces there, other than temporarily for specific missions. He also said that lenient sentencing by the courts deters the police from pursuing indictments "even when they have a suspect in hand."

Dichter must have had the Noam Federman case in mind. Arutz Sheva:

The Jerusalem Magistrate's Court ordered the police Sunday evening to release Hevron community activist Noam Federman from custody. Federman was arrested on Sunday morning on charges of attacking and injuring policemen who were destroying his family's home on an unauthorized outpost. During a hearing to extend Federman's being held in custory, several policemen testified that Federman was hand-cuffed at the time he was accused of assaulting the officers.

Or who knows, maybe Dichter had the children’s case in mind when he suggested the Israeli courts were far too lenient with Jewish dissenters: Arutz Sheva

(IsraelNN.com) The Jerusalem Magistrates Court ordered the release of four of the seven minor girls who have been imprisoned for three weeks despite their continued refusal to cooperate with the justice system. This, as opposed to earlier reports that all seven had been freed. One girl was released Thursday when it became clear that police knew her identity from a card in her posession, and three more were freed Friday after a court-order required the parents to identify their daughetrs. A fast day on their behalf took place Thursday.

The first 14-year-old girl that was ordered released after police admitted she had been identified due to a card that was among her possessions. She continued to refuse to identify herself, along with her six friends. The girl was forcibly evicted from Gush Katif during the 2005 Disengagement and lives at the Nitzan caravan camp with hundreds of other expellees. About 30 friends of the young activists protested outside the courthouse on Friday.

Take note, that even though Israeli police were in possession of the 14 year old girl’s identification, Israeli police still choose to detain her for three weeks because she would not offer willingly offer up her name. But Dichter is right, there is a deep rift between the secular and religious community within Israeli society and is just one of the reasons why the idea of a second Jewish state carries much more weight now than it did even five years ago.

Lies, lies, and more shameful lies

Arutz Sheva carries the only English report of a horrific story concerning the weekend home demolition of the Federman/Tor farms:

(IsraelNN.com) How did it happen that yeshiva students in the Givati Brigade took part in the military operation to destroy the Federman-Tor farm and homes three nights ago? Very simple: Senior security commanders lied to them and told them they were participating in a mission to help catch a terrorist.

Ro'i Sharon, reporter for the Maariv daily newspaper, revealed that it was feared that the young soldiers would refuse to take part in the mission if they knew it was not military but rather one of destroying Jewish homes.

A member of Hevron's emergency alert team, which generally works closely with the army, was quoted as saying: "This creates mistrust between echelons in the military framework, and is liable to cost human life. In the next security incident, the residents won't believe the security forces, and the soldiers won't believe their commanders.""It is sad that for the purpose of destroying two Jewish homes, they cause such harm to the delicate security relations here," the man said.

Border Guard officials confirmed that the soldiers had been tricked. "The sensitivity of the incident required us to maintain high secrecy," a Border Guard source told Maariv. The incident in question was the bulldozing of two Jewish homes in Kiryat Arba in the middle of the night, in which the occupants of the two buildings were given five and zero minutes, respectively, to get dressed and pack some belongings.

The forces arrived in three rings: Special black-uniformed Yassam policemen in the inner ring, doing the actual destruction, including breaking windows, hitting the occupants (at least one woman and some children), throwing and trampling books and clothing, and bulldozing the buildings; policemen to protect them and ensure that Jewish neighbors not come close; and soldiers at street intersections to prevent Jews from entering the area.

The soldiers were some 40 yeshiva hesder soldiers whose job it was to man the entrances to the area. They told residents who wished to enter the area to fight the destruction that a terrorist had been sighted in the area. In some cases, they had to fight with Jews who tried to enter despite the warnings. Thanks to the soldiers' work, the Federman and Tor homes were practically empty of Jews, and their destruction proceeded without interruption.

One soldier told reporter Sharon afterwards, "I still cannot believe that I had a part in this eviction. I am a soldier in the Israel Defense Forces, not a policeman, and there is no reason that they should take me on missions that have nothing to do with protecting Jews. I almost cried when I found out." Though the Border Guard confirmed the deception, the IDF claimed that a terrorist had in fact been sighted near the Machpelah Cave, some three kilometers away. Hevron's Jews said they received no word of any such incident.

A word about yeshiva hesder soldiers. Briefly put, hesder soldiers are religious soliders who actively combine military service with advance Talmud studies. Overall, I can think of a better way to demoralize an army than having commanders deliberately lie to the grunts who are needed to carry out a mission. Arutz Sheva does have a English video report online of the incident. Current Minister of Defense Ehud Barack's latest remarks suggests the pogrom against the Jews will not have a forseeable end in the near future.

In other news, a kassam attack was again launched from the Gaza Strip. Some truce.

Israeli election fever

You can tell election fever has hit Israel bigtime. Labor leader, Ehud Barak talks tough. Arutz Sheva:

"Not all Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria are a threat to law and order," Barak said. However, when it comes to those who fight soldiers and police, he continued, such as those who protested the destruction of the Federman farm, “that's clearly an attempt to undermine the state's authority over its civilians, and requires harsh action with no compromises.”

The first step in punishing Jews who protest the destruction of communities lacking government approval will involve using existing punishments more frequently, Barak said. “We'll need to find a way to convince our judges that we're not talking about just another case of interfering with a public official as he performs his duty to national security, but rather an attempt to undermine the state's authority, and therefore these people must be put behind bars,” he explained.

The second step, Barak said, would involve using laws reserved for use in emergency situations; laws which allow the government to take steps that would otherwise be considered undemocratic. “If there won't be a choice, we'll need to consider using the emergency regulations,” he said. The regulations in question “are a remnant of the British Mandate.”

The “emergency regulations” would allow security forces to arrest suspects without charges and without a warrant. “They allow a different course of action, that allows us to [immediately] arrest people who otherwise would not be arrested for another six months, if at all,” he explained. The regulations would only be used if necessary, he added, “in order to secure the state's authority over its citizens.”

As odd as the idea may seem, arresting any Jew who dissents from the Labor party line does have a strong appeal for Israeli progressives.

A rabbi teaching torah – the utter chutputz of it!

Artuz Sheva carries a report of a MK criticizing the IDF Chief Rabbinate:

(IsraelNN.com) MK Ophir Pines-Paz (Labor) said on Thursday that he would request an emergency meeting of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee to investigate the Rabbinate of the Israel Defense Forces, following an article in Thursday's Haaretz daily that claimed the Rabbinate is "brainwashing" soldiers religiously and politically. The former minister also wrote a letter to Defense Minister Ehud Barak, asking him to order an immediate investigation into the Rabbinate's activities.

According to the Thursday article, IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi, has already ordered an investigation of donations that have allowed the Rabbinate to increase its activities in areas previously served only by the IDF's Education Corps. This includes the activities of the Jewish Awareness unit, which offers information on historic Israeli military battles and learning about the Land of Israel, as well as what the unit's brochure calls activities and programs "based on biblical sources, appropriate for all soldiers and commanders, also for those who do not come from a religious background".

Other publications include a booklet for "commanders from a Jewish viewpoint", and Jewish Awareness offers advice and help in writing and integrating programs and materials on Jewish awareness in military courses. The unit also offers seminars and conferences all over the country, including Shabbat retreats, which the Education Corps does not have the funds to match.

(…)In his letter to Barak, Pines-Paz wrote "The Rabbinate is overstepping its authority, which is solely to provide religious services, and is acting in an aggressive manner in order to cause Israel Defense Forces soldiers to become religiously observant. This activity undermines religious-secular relations in the IDF and leads the army into dealing with areas beyond its scope. It uses the IDF to advance religious and political ideas. The Rabbinate is bringing religion in through the back door, in a dangerous manner, and harming the IDF's ability to fulfill its mission."

The original Ha’aretz article can be found here but Pines-Paz oversteps his bounds and reason if he thinks the rabbinate in the IDF should not be teaching Torah and Jewish law.

Although, I do understand his concern as long as the government insists on giving orders which are in direct violation of Jewish religious laws. It sets up a situation whereby religious soldiers are forced to choose between serving G-d or the government. And from Pines-Paz’s point of view a secular soldier who remains ignorant of Jewish law is not only a desirable but pliable soldier for the directives of the state. Pity the Pines-Paz’s of Israel, since a good third of Israel is made up of religious Jews, who have the fastest growing demographic within the state.

But the IDF Chief Rabbi also came under fire today for going into Israeli prisons and teaching torah and Jewish law to ‘right-wing extremists’ who have been incarcerated by the state. All of which makes me wonder what role progressive lefties would find appropriate for a rabbinate to do?

h/tip Joe Settler

The war against the Jews

Photo by Nadia Matar

Elections in Israel are a dirty business and are not for the weak or faint-hearted. The first opening salvo of the current administration starts off with the illegal house demolition of a homestead near Hebron shortly before the expected announcement of a general election call. Here is how the incident is reported in Ha’aretz.

Settlers rioted on Sunday near the West Bank settlement of Kiryat Arba, desecrating a Muslim graveyard, after Israeli security forces evacuated a nearby illegal outpost. The settlers smashed some of the graves and poured paint over others. Right-wing activist Noam Federman had established the outpost, a farm, which was evacuated by contingents of the Israel Defense Force, the Border Police and police earlier Sunday

Rightists came to the site and threw stones at the security forces in response to the evacuation. A number of them were arrested for attacking a police officer, and two young women were arrested after they tried to set a police car alight. During the rioting, settlers hurled abuse at the members of the security forces, called for a "revenge attack" against them. "We hope they will be defeated by their enemies, that they will all be [kidnapped IDF soldier] Gilad Shalit, that they will all be killed and all slaughtered because this is what they deserve," they said.

In addition to vandalizing the graves, settlers also damaged over 80 Palestinian vehicles by smashing windows and puncturing tires. Two police cars were damaged during the altercations.

It is easy to read this and think, whoa, settlers are getting mighty violent and lawless but it is not until one gets mid-way through the report that a rationale starts to peak through the spin. Ha’aretz chooses to frames it this way:

Settlers, for their part, argued that security forces carried out the evacuation without a preliminary order and that they did not give the outpost's residents time to pack up their belongings.

There are many ways this incident could have been reported. For example, the army deliberately circumvented the law and acted outside not only due process but in a manner which is totally illegal under Israeli law but Ha’aretz would rather use the settler’s claim formula near the end of the article. Ha’aretz is a newspaper and presumably staffed by journalists so it should be a rather easy and straightforward matter to verify the ‘settlers claim’. For if the IDF didn’t follow the law and had no order issuing the demolition the homestead; why is the IDF following the path of lawlessness and on whose authority or order did the IDF choose to act on? How far up the chain of command did this illegal order come from and did the current Defense Minister have a hand in this decision, and if so, what is the rationale for acting outside the law?

In fact, this whole article could have been written like this. The IDF deliberately acted in an illegal manner under the authority and order of XYZ and the repercussions of this illegality caused a riot outside of Hebron. But it is not just Ha’aretz who is at fault. Ynet News carried a similar report to Ha’aretz but the motivation for the riot is buried near the end of the article:

Shortly after 1:30 am on Saturday night, massive police, Border Guard and IDF forces arrived near the Federman home. Noam Federman was arrested for assaulting a policeman and breaking his hand, and two young girls were taken into custody after reportedly attempting to set fire to a police car. Another person was detained for questioning.

Federman's wife, Elisheva, recounted the events in a conversation with Ynet. "It was a regular Saturday evening. We were cleaning after Shabbat. Our nine children went to sleep. I finished working on a paper for school, Noam was on the computer, when we suddenly heard dogs barking. "We received a phone call that massive forces were headed towards us. Noam went out to see what was happening, and then Yasamniks ((Israel Police special patrol unit) jumped on him. I haven't seen him since."

But I will give Ynet News credit for at least writing up an earlier report which gives a little insight to the destruction and havoc caused by the IDF’s own brand of lawlessness.

Massive police, Border Guard and IDF forces demolished an illegal outpost in the West Bank city of Hebron on Saturday night. Four people were arrested during the evacuation. Shortly after 1:30 am, the forces arrived near the home of extreme right-wing activist Noam Federman. He was arrested for assaulting a policeman and breaking his hand, and two young girls were taken into custody after reportedly attempting to set fire to a police car. Another person was detained for questioning.

Federman's wife, Elisheva, recounted the events in a conversation with Ynet. "It was a regular Saturday evening. We were cleaning after Shabbat. Our nine children went to sleep. I finished working on a paper for school, Noam was on the computer, when we suddenly heard dogs barking. "We received a phone call that massive forces were headed towards us. Noam went out to see what was happening, and then Yasamniks ((Israel Police special patrol unit) jumped on him. I haven't seen him since. "I saw herds of black uniform. I locked the door, but they broke into the house, smashed the windows, and all this without any warning. The children woke up and came to my room. "Three of the children – aged six, eight and 12 – asked me what to do. I told them to go to Givat Haharsina, knock on good people's doors and ask them to take them to their grandfather and grandmother in Kiryat Arba.

"They pulled out the entire contents of the house. Everything that was in the cupboards – books, clothes, money. They forcibly removed us from the house and took us to the Gush Etzion Junction. They said we were all under arrest. Me and six other children – aged one, three, nine, 14, 16 and 17. "They destroyed the entire house and cut off its gas supply. Several hours later, they told us we were not under arrest and let me go back to the house to take the car. I saw the complete destruction in the place and they told me, 'Take what you want.' "Eighteen years of marriage are folded under the wreckage. I didn’t even have Materna to take for the baby. The oldest daughter was taken to the police station and was arrested after her hand was broken."

The Federman family has been living in the place for two and a half years. According to the residents, the farm had been manned for 11 years. Elisheva Federman said there was no legal motive for the evacuation. "We have had right of possession on this land for 10 years. No Arab has demanded it. We launched legal proceedings and paid a lot of money. How can they do this without any warning? I hope God gives us the strength to return. We have no property now. We can build a tent there. We have nothing to lose," she said.

While the Israeli press and politicians were quick to denounce and decry the allegedly lawlessness of the Israeli Jews who rioted after the illegal destruction by the IDF of the Federman homestead, I have to ask how one can demand the Jews follow the letter of the law of the state of Israel when the government of Israel chooses to act selectively in enforcing those laws or when the government blatantly refuses to follow its own law which govern due process?

And if there is to be one law, it should be enforced impartially, and therefore, the defense minister should immediately issue orders to the IDF to demolish illegal Bedoin dwellings in the Negev or the illegal Israeli Arab residences in Tira, Taibe and East Jerusalem. Ultimately, what Ehud Barack, as Minister of Defense, forgets is this; what the government refuses to do the homes of Arab terrorists without due process should be the minimum standard employed against Jews who have not wantonly murdered anyone.

No place for a Jew to pray

I realized after I made a comment at Stage Left that few people actually realize two things outside of Israelis and Diaspora Jews. The holiest place in Judaism is not the Western Wall or HaKotel but the Temple Mount above the wall, and a Jew is forbidden by Israeli law to pray there in order to protect the religious sensitivities of the Arab Muslim minority. In fact, even moving one's Jewish lips and silently mouthing a prayer leaves one open to arrest by Israeli Police. Think I am joking? Read this January 2008 article from Ha'aretz:

A Jew is not allowed to pray in any overt manner whatsoever on the Temple Mount, even if he is just moving his lips in prayer, Public Security Minister Avi Dichter recently wrote MKs Uri Ariel and Aryeh Eldad (National Union-NRP).

In 1976, the Supreme Court ruled that it accepted the government's position that it was not opposed to individual Jewish prayer on the Temple Mount, providing that it was not of a demonstrative nature that could lead to public disorder. High Court rulings in recent years have also been seen to support individual, as opposed to group prayer on the Mount.

Ariel and Eldad recently decided to test the State's position on this issue. They informed the police that "they intended to manifest this right" [to non-demonstrative prayer] by first coordinating the best time and place to enter and exit the Temple Mount complex. The two MKs explained that all they intended to do was to pray, without informing the media of their plans, or wearing a talit or tefilin, or bringing a Torah scroll with them.

"It is not possible to arrest a person for 'conversing with his maker,'" Dichter replied, using the same terminology of the MKs' letter. "However it is possible to carry out an arrest for expressions of outward and demonstrative signs [of prayer]."

This interpretation, Dichter continued, "is in line with the rationale that bans Jews from praying at the site, in light of serious concerns that this will serve as a provocation, resulting in disorder, with a near certain likelihood of subsequent bloodshed."

It was further explained to the two MKs that from the police's point of view, there is no substantive difference between the prayer of an individual and group prayer, since the threat to public safety is the same. Such act would be considered "altering the status quo at the site."

Dichter stressed that the state's decision to ban Jewish prayer from the Temple Mount does not distinguish between an individual praying and that of a group, and that this has been the basis of the status quo since 1967.

As outrageous as it may seem, it is enough to qualify for sufficient cause to arrest a Jew for silently mouthing out a prayer under the current law. I suggest reading this Israeli Insider article detailing a visit to the Temple Mount (circa 2006) in the first person. Here is an excerpt:

So I arrive at the security gate leading to the Temple Mount early in the morning during hol hamoed sukkot. A long line of religious yeshiva boys are waiting, and Israeli policemen collect their ID cards to check their records, afraid some fanatic is going to blow up the Al Aqsa Mosque.

I meet up with a group of American Jews led by an expatriate American tour guide named Nahum. We are given an easier time than the yeshiva boys, but we have to wait at least an hour until the boys pass security.

Tensions are high and many of us are getting impatient, especially since people cut in line to go ahead of us. One antsy member of our group, a religious looking gentleman, complains loudly to a gruff Israeli policeman looking cool in sunglasses.

"Why are you making us wait so long?" he says to him.

The policeman answers with a scowl: "Did I do anything to you?"

They get into a verbal scuffle which ends with the policeman saying in Hebrew: "I don't give a $%#@ about you." What a spiritual way to begin entrance into one of the holiest sites in the world, I think. Nahum warns us to avoid confrontation with the Israeli police. He suspects they want to make it hard and undesirable for Israelis to enter.

"I remember after the Six Day War Jews would go to the Temple Mount and visit all the sites there freely and fearlessly," he explains with some nostalgia. Over the years, he continues, as Israel slowly gave up sovereignty over the Mount, the site became more restricted to Jews. The Muslim waqf which administers the Temple Mount cooperate with Israeli police to make sure the Jews "behave". Behavior includes modest dress, no trespassing to forbidden areas, and-- believe it or not-- no prayer.

Nahum relates a story of a religious woman who, upon touring the Mount, was tired and sat by a tree to rest. She closed her eyes and it looked like she was meditating. The police detained her for violating the ban on prayer.

Luckily for me, as a generally secular person, I don't pray the traditional Jewish way. My thoughts and dreams are my prayers. However, as Nahum warns me not to pray as we enter the site, I wonder what the police would do if silently mouth Madonna's "Like A Virgin" towards the Dome of the Rock, or if I silently recite a psalm and then tell them I'm an atheist. Would that be cause for arrest?

But as I crossed into the site via a bridge adjacent to the Western Wall, I was in no mood to make trouble. I was too awed by the vastness in front of me. The area where the former Hebrew Temple once stood looks like a peaceful park. Olive trees and stone pathways surround the Dome of the Rock and the Al Asqa Mosque. It occurs to me that this is the one spot in the world where at any moment I could face a different direction to pray towards "Jerusalem." But, alas, I'm not allowed to pray.

We circle the Dome and the Mosque, which are closed to non-Muslims, and Nahum shows us where the PA has converted the area known as Solomon's Stables into a mosque. As we tour around, the Waqf agents, who look like Arabs dressed in Western clothes, come up to us every so often to make sure Nahum isn't teaching anything blasphemous. Luckily, they don?t understand English. Nahum is disapproving of the recent Muslim constructions, which he says are designed to increase Muslim stakes in the site.

The Israeli police largely leave us alone. The religious members of the group have disguised themselves as secular by wearing hats over their kippahs. We manage to blend in with Christian and Asian groups, who actually visit the site more than Jews. As we walk at the edge of the eastern wall, a policeman tightly escorting a teenage boy passes us. The boy, whose long tendrils stick out from below his knitted kippah, must have made some trouble. His lips were moving in prayer as he was leaving the Mount.

Shame.

"Next year" - and the year after, and after, and after until the end of time - in Jerusalem!"

I have shamelessly stolen this blog title from the ending of an opinion piece running in the Jerusalem Post today which was originally published in the Times of Israel shortly after the Six Days War circa 1967. The piece not only still resonates (well at least with me) but is also extremely relevant given the lead up to Annapolis and beyond.

I am not a creature from another planet, as you seem to believe. I am a Jerusalemite - like yourselves, a man of flesh and blood. I am a citizen of my city, an integral part of my people. I have a few things to get off my chest. Because I am not a diplomat, I do not have to mince words. I do not have to please you, or even persuade you. I owe you nothing. You did not build this city; you do not live in it; you did not defend it when they came to destroy it. And we will be damned if we will let you take it away.

There was a Jerusalem before there was a New York. When Berlin, Moscow, London and Paris were forest and swamp, there was a thriving Jewish community here. It gave something to the world which you nations have rejected ever since you established yourselves - a humane moral code.

Here the prophets walked, their words flashing like forked lightning. Here a people who wanted nothing more than to be left alone, fought off waves of heathen would-be conquerors, bled and died on the battlements, hurled themselves into the flames of their burning Temple rather than surrender; and when finally overwhelmed by sheer numbers and led away into captivity, swore that before they forgot Jerusalem, they would see their tongues cleave to their palates, their right arms wither.
For two pain-filled millennia, while we were your unwelcome guests, we prayed daily to return to this city. Three times a day we petitioned the Almighty: "Gather us from the four corners of the world, bring us upright to our land; return in mercy to Jerusalem, Thy city, and dwell in it as Thou promised."

On every Yom Kippur and Pessah we fervently voiced the hope that next year would find us in Jerusalem. Your inquisitions, pogroms, expulsions, the ghettos into which you jammed us, your forced baptisms, your quota systems, your genteel anti-Semitism, and the final unspeakable horror, the Holocaust (and worse, your terrifying disinterest in it) - all these have not broken us.

They may have sapped what little moral strength you still possessed, but they forged us into steel. Do you think that you can break us now, after all we have been through? Do you really believe that after Auschwitz we are frightened of your threats and blockades and sanctions? We have been to hell and back - a hell of your making. What more could you possibly have in your arsenal that could scare us?
I HAVE watched this city bombarded twice by nations calling themselves civilized. In 1948, while you looked on apathetically, I saw women and children blown to smithereens, this after we had agreed to your request to internationalize the city. It was a deadly combination that did the job: British officers, Arab gunners and American-made cannons.

And then the savage sacking of the Old City; the willful slaughter, the wanton destruction of every synagogue and religious school; the desecration of Jewish cemeteries; the sale by a ghoulish government of tombstones for building materials, for poultry runs, army camps - even latrines.

And you never said a word. You never breathed the slightest protest when the Jordanians shut off the holiest of our holy places, the Western Wall, in violation of the pledges they had made after the war - a war they waged, incidentally, against a decision of the UN. Not a murmur came from you whenever the legionares in their spiked helmets casually opened fire upon our citizens from behind the walls.

Your hearts bled when Berlin came under siege. You rushed your airlift "to save the gallant Berliners." But you did not send one ounce of food when Jews starved in besieged Jerusalem. You thundered against the wall which the East Germans ran through the middle of the German capital - but not one peep out of you about the other wall, the one that tore through the heart of Jerusalem.

And when the same thing happened 19 years later, and the Arabs unleashed a savage unprovoked bombardment of the Holy City again, did any of you do anything? The only time you came to life was when the city was at last reunited. Then you wrung your hands and spoke loftily of "justice" and the need for the "Christian" quality of turning the other cheek.

There is more here, and if I were to quibble with this piece, it would be in referring to the Kotel or Western Wall as "the holiest of our holy places". It is not. The Temple Mount above the Western Wall is the holiest place in Judaism, and ironically a place where no Jew can openly pray whenever the spirit so moves him to do so without facing penalties under Israeli law. Time to take back the Temple Mount too.

Prayer as Provocation

By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept when we remembered Zion. On the willows, there we hung up our lyres" …"If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand wither, let my tongue cleave to my palate if I do not remember you, if I do not set Jerusalem above my highest joy."

Yesterday in Israel celebrations were held in memory of the 40th anniversary of the unification of Jerusalem. It seems silly to point this out, but I have found over and over that most North Americans don’t fully appreciate the meaning of the unification of Jerusalem. It seems beyond ridiculous since the celebrations for the last 40 years center around “unification” of Jerusalem, but be that as it may, most North Americans don’t fully comprehend that a portion of the city of Jerusalem always remained in Israeli hands.

For example, take this Canadian government decision not to recognize Jerusalem, Israel as a birthplace for naturalized Canadians born in Jerusalem. I mean really, how does the government know that a naturalized Canadian citizen was not born in the Jerusalem which has been recognized as part of the Israeli state since the armistice lines were drawn in 1949? It does not. Therefore, it refuses to make any distinctions and invokes the fabrication that no such city has ever existed within the modern Israeli state.

I read this editorial in Ha’aretz today criticizing a group of Rabbis who ascended the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, to pray at the holiest site in Judaism, and I think perhaps it is somewhat pre-mature to celebrate the unification.

If a Jew cannot pray openly and freely in the Jewish state at the holiest site in Judaism without a condemnation from an Israeli paper - there is something seriously wrong within the so-called Jewish state and with the whole "unification" process. Imagine Muslims being refused access to pray in Mecca and you have the equivalent.

Name this country!

And here's a hint: it’s not Toronto, Canada.

I just don’t understand why I can’t live in a country like this. I thought I did, but I haven’t seen snow in so long, that I am starting to believe it’s a national myth - like Santa Claus lives in the North Pole. Arutz Sheva carries this report:

Pisgat Yaakov is a small hilltop caravan neighborhood of Beit El located on Mount Artis. Residents woke up early to find their beloved mountain covered in a velveteen layer of pure-white snow. Twenty-nine families live in the close-knit community, which has its own synagogue and vista observatory. From the top of the mountain, Tel Aviv can often be seen to the west, while Jerusalem's Mount of Olives can be viewed in the south. On rare days, when weather conditions permit, snow-capped Mount Hermon appears to the north.

The 909-meter tall mountain is covered, as are most mountains in the Binyamin Region, with ancient terraces. These terraces are the work of Jews, dated by archeologists to the Second Temple period. Ancient Jewish burial caves, as well as ancient wine and olive presses, abound throughout the terraces. Alongside the new Jewish neighborhood, animals continue to make the mount their home, including gazelles, porcupines, eagles, and wild boars.

Other Beit El neighborhoods are sprouting at the foot and midriff of the mountain, and they include a girls' high school, a new mikvah (ritual immersion bath), and a winery that sits below an ancient Jewish winepress. Some researchers believe that this mountain is the spot of Jacob's dream of the ladder which the Torah describes as occurring in Beit El.

Arutz Sheva is hosting a photo gallery of the snowfall in the Beit El area taken by Artis resident Yishai Fleisher.

When the State becomes an Ethos of Destruction

I skirt around certain issues in Israeli politics such as the settlement movement and rarely blog outright about them. It is not that I don’t have opinions but it is such a complex and contentious subject and I am very aware of all the holes and gaps in my personal knowledge of the settler movement. Frankly, I am often not sure I have the gist of it - let alone the right of it. Certainly there are individuals in the settler’s movement that capture my attention and I have to say that I hold a kind of grudging admiration for them. People like Avi Ran, who ask absolutely nothing from their government but to be left alone to live out their lives in the best way they see fit and who cannot be bought or placated to tow any government party line.

My grandfather taught me never to scorn the religious among us as they live their lives according to the truth of their beliefs and have the courage to make that belief the center of their lives. They are our light in an all too often fickle world. It is in fact, far easier to give into secular pressure than practice faithfully a religious credo in everyday life - I am living proof of that. In Israel and the world, I have watched the settlers being vilified and demonized by successive current Israeli administrations and in the western press for their allegedly uncompromising positions and my ire is raised. But how does one remain religiously faithful and not compromise one’s belief to suit the fashion of the day without becoming a kind of secular outlaw? And whose law shall the religious obey in times of direct conflict when the laws seem to collide?

It is easy to look casually at Amona and condemn the settlers outright and say that the settlers have no one but themselves to blame for crack of Israeli security forces’ batons that rained down on their and their children’s heads for flaunting the law. And yet, what of the law, and for those who sent the security forces to take up arms against their fellow citizens? If laws are only selectively enforced against certain citizens and then used as a weapon to beat them into submission by the state - what does that say for the law or the state? Why is there one law for the settlers and another for others? This article is taken from a YnetNews Online reports that illustrates my concern:

Illegal building by Israelis in the West Bank is considered a criminal offence, requiring expedited moves to obtain demolition orders. That's how the justice ministry flexes the muscle of the judicial system. But is that really the case? More than 1,000 illegal buildings have been built each year by Jerusalem Arabs since 1997. Only 30-40 are destroyed each year. Tens of thousands of illegal buildings are built each year by Arabs in the Galilee, the Arab Triangle, the Negev, Ramla and Lod. About 100 are demolished each year.

Since 1967 there has been more Arab building in Jerusalem – a majority of which is illegal – than Jewish building. But the Israeli government flexes its muscle against a few dozen Jewish buildings in Hebron and the rest of Judea and Samaria, while keeping its eyes tightly closed in the face of the plague of illegal Arab building.

The government is impotent judicially and politically in the fight against illegal Arab building, which threatens Israeli sovereignty in Jerusalem and the rule of law in general. Palestinian documents found in Orient House, the now-closed PLO headquarters in the city, show that illegal Arab building in the city is part of an overall strategy to prevent the "Judaization" of Jerusalem. The Palestinian Authority supports such building in the capital (Shuafat, Beit Hanina and A-Zaim) in order to prevent Jewish neighborhoods from linking to one another (French Hill and Pisgat Zeev; Maaleh Adumim to Jerusalem.) Illegal building runs rampant along Route 443 from Jerusalem to Modiin, in a drive to turn it into an internal Arab road while threatening Jewish freedom of movement between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

But the Israeli government enforces the law with regard to a few dozen Jewish buildings in Hebron and throughout the West Bank. In 1999 a Palestinian document reported the Israeli government's "stubborn intent to destroy 400-500 illegal houses in Beit Hanina and Shuafat." But in 2000 a different document said, "There is nothing to worry about," because Israel would only destroy a few dozen buildings, and building could therefore be accelerated." And so, with PA support, Saudi funding and under the tightly-closed eyes of Israel, illegal building became a norm, to the benefit of many Palestinian functionaries.
(…)
By forging title documents for land and buildings has become a thriving "business" that is taking control of state lands, on absentee assets and the "small Palestinian." It feeds a phenomenon of blackmail, threats, gang warfare and illegal inhabitants and provides a feeding ground for terror. But the Israeli government enforces the law against a few dozen Jewish buildings in Hebron and around Judea and Samaria.

Administrative and legal processes have made slow process in trying to uproot the clear and immediate threat of illegal Arab building. These usually stand to support open violations of the law. For example, a demolition order is signed only if it is impossible to obtain a retroactive building permit – a clear incentive to break the law! Demolition orders are signed only if the building was built on state land that was intended for public building, roads, parks or absentee property. Demolition orders are signed only if building was completed no more than 30 days before the order was signed if people live there, and 60 days if it is empty.

So why do the sum total of 9 homes in Amona suddenly become the special focus of a caretaker government for immediate action? It becomes even more outrageous when looks at the vast numbers of security forces (in excess of 7,000) that were deployed to evict 9 homeowners while kassam rockets rain down daily on Israel from Gaza and Hamas controls power in the Palestinian Authority next door.

What you won’t find in accounts in the Globe and Mail concerning the eviction of the settler’s homes in Amona is that the settler’s themselves petitioned the courts and asked for time to remove their homes physically from land and relocate them elsewhere. It seemed a relatively benign compromise that could have averted not only confrontation but also bloodshed. And yet, the court ruled in a 2-1 decision that it cannot be so and not only would the court allow their eviction, it would not lift a judicial finger to save their homes from the purely punitive action of the State razing the buildings to the ground. From the Jerusalem Post:

The tumultuous events at Amona on Wednesday began early in the morning, when the High Court of Justice cancelled an interim injunction preventing the security forces from dismantling the nine illegal houses. The request for the temporary injunction was submitted by the Binyamin Regional Council and the Bar Amana building company, which promised to remove the houses themselves and move them across the road to Ofra while the injunction was in force.

Attorney David Rotem, who represented the petitioners, told a panel of three justices that his clients wanted a peaceful resolution of the dispute, like the one the army and the settlers had found for the illegally occupied houses in the Hebron wholesale market.

Osnat Mandel, head of the High Court section of the State Attorney's Office, told the court it was too late for compromise. "There are 7,000 security forces deployed at Amona," she said. "Fifteen of them have already been injured in clashes with the protesters, including one who was hit by a rock and seriously hurt. The fight is already going on... The moment of truth has arrived." Justices Ayala Procaccia and Edna Arbel rejected the petition and cancelled the interim injunction. Justice Elyakim Rubinstein voted to extend the interim injunction for seven days, to give the settlers time to remove the houses themselves.

"There is no basis in law or moral or public justification to order the state to stop the implementation of the demolition orders at this stage and give the petitioners more time to remove the buildings themselves," wrote Procaccia. "The time for the occupants of the buildings in Amona to consider their actions and propose alternatives to the demolition orders is over.

Yesterday, watching Israeli security forces decked out in black riot gear a la Darth Vader while mounted on horseback and stomping on civilians as they struck their batons indiscriminately on the heads and backs of men, women and teenagers appeared more than a tad surreal. Far more reminiscent of reports I have read concerning the pogroms of Czarist Russia rather than the lawful functioning of a modern western democratic government. It is hard for me not to conclude that the evictions at Amona and Hevron are nothing more than a cheap political ploys designed to further Olmert’s claim to “bulldozer” credentials on the blood and backs of others. Israel may need a bulldozer from time to time but it is also written that a house divided cannot stand. Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert leads a caretaker government until elections are formally held at the end of March, but if Amona is the new gold standard in relations with between the settlers and the State, his tenure can be realistically characterized as more “undertaker” than “caretaker.”

Update: I came across these truly heart rendering pictures of yesterday's clash in Amona at Sultan Knish.

Avi Ran is Freed

The Israeli trial of Avi Ran is finally over and he has been acquitted of all charges reports the Arutz Sheva:

Ran was arrested last March at his Gvaot Olam farm, near Itamar in the Shomron, after Arabs from a neighboring village, accompanied by left-wing activists, brought a tractor onto his farmland and began plowing over his crops. Police were waiting nearby, and when volunteers from the farm damaged the tractor, they appeared and arrested Ran together with his workers.

Judge Nava Bechor delivered her verdict at the Kfar Saba Magistrate’s Court Monday afternoon, finding the four not guilty due to lack of evidence. A fifth man had made a plea bargain in order to be released from prison during the lengthy trial process.

Ran's brother Nir told Channel 2 TV that justice had finally been served, albeit way too late, and at the expense of a dedicated Israeli patriot's freedom.

Last April, High Court Justice Edna Arbel had ordered Ran placed under house arrest far away from his farm until the end of proceedings against him. The decision was widely seen as an organized sting operation aimed at keeping Ran out of Judea, Samaria and Gaza during the period leading up to the Disengagement from Gaza and northern Samaria last summer. At the time, Ran said: "In the Supreme Court, I understood that the legal system is willing to take views and a political situation and to manipulate them to advance processes that suit its own interests. I understand that what I am saying is terrible. There is a civil war going on here. But it isn't a war between brothers and it isn't being fought by both sides."

Ran left his brother’s house, where he was being confined, and went into hiding at the various communities which he helped found until the week before his first court date. Knowing that he would be imprisoned, he went on vacation with his family near Lake Kinneret (Sea of Galilee), where he was swiftly arrested and jailed until “the end of proceedings.”

Holding Ran in jail for several months has created a situation in which he was found innocent, but spent months in prison under harsh conditions, regardless. The practice of keeping prisoners in jail until the end of proceedings has been used increasingly against ideological prisoners arrested opposing government withdrawals in the past year.

According to his lawyer, the defense succeeded in proving that all the events transpired due to provocations created by the leftist Ta’ayush extremist group, in addition to members of the Rabbis for Human Rights, funded by the American Reform Movement and the European Union. During the trial, the defense aired an interview with one of the Arabs from the village who testified that the whole episode was initiated by members of the Ta’ayush.

So the light of the middle east’s only democracy still burns but there is a lingering odor to the whole proceedings. I first wrote about Ran last November 2005. Whether one agrees with Ran’s politics is irrelevant but what is not irrelevant is that coercive powers of the state should never utilized to muzzle the voice of a citizen or restrict the freedom of a citizen because their views are not in ideological harmony or even considered politically inconvenient for the State.

What’s next – An American Partition of Jerusalem?

Israel’s Ehud Olmert may have failed the first test of leadership; if there is any truth to this report from the Jerusalem Report:

Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas announced on Monday that he has received assurances from the US that the Palestinians would be permitted to vote in Jerusalem for the parliamentary election late this month. "Today, for the first time, we received from the Americans assurances that the elections will be held in Jerusalem," he said during a press conference in Gaza City.

Abbas said he spoke to US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Sunday and was given a message from US President George W. Bush on Monday giving him assurances that Israel would allow the vote in Jerusalem to go ahead.

He stressed, nevertheless, that the PA still hadn't heard similar assurances from Israel. "We are receiving contradictory messages from the Israelis," Abbas said. "Once they tell us that we would be allowed to hold the vote in Jerusalem, and another time they say we can't. Now that we have received American guarantees, the elections in Jerusalem will be held on the basis of the 1996 model [where voters cast their ballots at Israeli post office branches]."

Abbas threatened to call off the election if Israel did not allow the vote to take place in Jerusalem. He said he had informed all Palestinian factions of his decision to cancel the election if Jerusalem was excluded. Abbas also urged the factions to work toward ending lawlessness and anarchy in PA-controlled areas, saying that he had instructed the PA security forces to deal harshly with anyone who tries to disrupt the electoral process. "I have instructed the security forces to use force to prevent any attempt to sabotage the democratic process," he said.

Meanwhile, high-ranking Fatah official Kadura Faras said in an interview with Channel 2 on Monday evening that Abbas would likely retire if Hamas won the parliamentary elections. In such a situation, according to Faras, Hamas would stand at the head of the Palestinian Authority.

What does the Bush Administration hope to gain by dismissing the sovereignty of the Israelis - a peaceful mid-east occupation? And if you think that allowing all Palestinian political parties the right to campaign freely in East Jerusalem is a small concession for any Israeli Administration to grant to the Palestinians - think again.

It’s not only the potential security threat that these organizations pose to ordinary Israeli citizens of Jerusalem but this time Hamas (an organization designated by even the United States as a terrorist’s organization) will be actively campaigning in East Jerusalem. A cornerstone of the Hamas platform is the annihilation and destruction of the Jewish state. The last thing I would want to hear ringing in my ears if I were to pray at the Kotel (Wailing Wall) is Hamas’ campaign slogan which I believe is still “Death to the Zionists” coming from a rally being held on the Temple Mount or be standing as the kassams rained down from above.

The Jerusalem Newswire Service and Debkafile have more.