The past few days I've been walking around on the brink of tears. Israel is undergoing contortions and convulsions around the Prime Minister's Disengagement Plan. The arguments are fast and furious, mostly furious.
Meanwhile, I'm on the brink of tears. I'm on the brink of tears because noone is giving any thought to the fact that, no matter whether it's right or wrong, Jewish families are going to be ripped out of their homes and their synagogues destroyed. They won't have a home to go to. They will be refugees. The only thing is that this time in thirty five hundred years of lachrymose history, this will be carried out not by Assyrians, not by Babylonians, not by Syrian Greeks, not by Romans, not by BYzantines, not by Arabs, not by Visigoths, not by Swabian Germans, not by Franks, not by Poles, not by Ukranians, not by Italians, not by Spaniards, not by Czarist Russians, not by Nazis, not by Communists, not by Muslim...but by force of Jewish arms.
And noone cares or is horrified by that prospect. The media pundits and the politicians don't evince one iota of feeling for the people whose lives are about to be destroyed. After all, they're only settlers. As Shakespeare might have said:
Hath not a Settler eyes? Hath not a settler hands, organs,dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed withthe same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as another Israeli Jew is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die?
The answer would appear to be in the negative. Otherwise, they too would be on the verge of tears, and not gloating.
3 comments:
It has been obvious to all that if Peace is at all possible Israel would not be able to settle in the "territories" acquired after 67. Admittedly Rabbi Riskin-who I admire, had as a teacher and in fact stayed one shabbos in his apt. circa 78 when he had some Israeli-Jewish Agency type and planning Efrat-but sometimes it is necessary to amputate a leg to save the body. It may be such at time now. That is a decision for the Israeli people as represented by its Knesset to decide. Once decided-one has to obey the rule of law.
1) Peace will not be possible in the Middle East, until Islam divests itself of its most central beliefs, among them that infidels may not rule over land that was once Muslim (waqf). Since that is not about to happen, you can forget about European-style peace.
2) That leaves the question of under what terms does one try for a long term 'status quo.' This is the essence of the debate among Israelis (aside from the doctrinaire Left and the doctrinaire Right).
3) My point was that settlers, who have a principled position too, are demonized and dehumanized, turning them into non-beings that can be expelled from their homes without anyone so much as shedding a tear. That type of moral obtuseness is totally un-Jewish.Indeed, it's anti-semitic.
4) As it happens, I strongly oppose refusal to obey orders. Indeed, only leftists disobey orders, because they see no value in defending the lives of the Jews in Yesha.
1) Peace will not be possible in the Middle East, until Islam divests itself of its most central beliefs, among them that infidels may not rule over land that was once Muslim (waqf). Since that is not about to happen, you can forget about European-style peace.
2) That leaves the question of under what terms does one try for a long term 'status quo.' This is the essence of the debate among Israelis (aside from the doctrinaire Left and the doctrinaire Right).
3) My point was that settlers, who have a principled position too, are demonized and dehumanized, turning them into non-beings that can be expelled from their homes without anyone so much as shedding a tear. That type of moral obtuseness is totally un-Jewish.Indeed, it's anti-semitic.
4) As it happens, I strongly oppose refusal to obey orders. Indeed, only leftists disobey orders, because they see no value in defending the lives of the Jews in Yesha.
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