Genghis Kahn wouldn't be happy...

... but I am very proud and glad to be part of the country and religion that saves lives. I'm glad that we are not barbarians.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4043536,00.html

IDF forces and local paramedics helped save the life of a Palestinian woman and her newly born infant Wednesday, at the settlement where Fogel relatives are sitting Shiva for the five Israelis brutally murdered last week.

Please pass on the message to Roger Waters. The wall between Israel and the Palestinians is not a wall around the West Bank, but a wall protecting the citizens of Israel from terror attacks. Remind him that 'The Wall' of his album was built in self defence, and tearing it down destroyed Pink, and started the entire cycle all over again. (I don't think Israel has become as psychotic as Pink though). Tell him that he has been misled and lied to by the advocates of the Boycot, and finally, tell him to read this reply by Kobi Oz of Teapacks (which I always thought was Tipex)

Near Miss

Phew! That was a close thing! Cyber pirates tried to hack into an Israeli website, but accidentally hijached the website of a stately home in Israel, according to the Daily Telegraph. I hope this is another encouraging sign for the peace process. If the Palestinians (or Algerians in this case) are happy with stately homes instead of Israeli land I'm sure we can reach some kind of deal with the British. They were the ones who gave land to the Palestinians (though they weren't called that back in '47) in the first place. Surely they could spare a few grand homes, fortresses and castles for Hamas and Fatah. That isn't asking too much is it?

One of Britain’s best-known castles fell victim to a band of hapless Middle-Eastern “cyber-pirates” last week after they mistook it for a Crusader fortress of the same name more than 2,000 miles away.

Belvoir Castle, the family seat of the 11th Duke of Rutland, was mistakenly targeted by a subversive group of Algerian hackers who confused its website with that of Belvoir Fortress in Israel.

The hackers hijacked the castle’s homepage and replaced images of the stately home nestled in rolling Leicestershire countryside with a black page displaying the Algerian flag and a tirade against the Jewish state in Arabic.

Alan Johnston's answers

Alan Johnston is a BBC reporter who was held hostage in Gaza for 114 days. On the BBC website he answers readers questions in (what seems to me) quite a fair, honest and evenhanded way.

Of course his kidnapping led him to a higher opinion of Palestinians in general (it was only the hostage takers themselves who weren't very nice, and some of them were almost embarrassed about it), and he sees a lot of good in the Palestinian people (which is reasonable, because there is). He also thinks that the Jewish claim to Israel is purely a religious one, and seems to ignore history, international resolutions and the persecution that ultimately led to the State.

But he has quotes like this, which IMHO show a better understanding of the conflict, and the likelihood of peace, than many of our politicians seem to have (and may I take this opportunity to wish our Prime Minister a Refuah Shleima - but couldn't you at least have used it as an excuse to avoid Annapolis?).

Q: How has your experience shaped your views on the Palestinian problem? Do you think there is a solution?
John Craig, Glasgow

For a century or more, this has been a dispute over the control of the narrow strip of land that stretches from the River Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea. If the Israelis were to withdraw from every inch of occupied East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza, the Palestinians would be left with about 22% percent of that land. The Israelis would have 78% percent.

Every time you see an American president sit down with the two sides to talk peace, the question is largely about how much of that 22% the Palestinians should be allowed to have - and under what conditions.

I tend to feel that the Israelis will never really give enough - or be forced by their American friends to give enough. And for at least some angry young Palestinians, 22% could never be enough. They would want to fight on for much more.

I think that they would be hard to rein in, and in the poverty, despair and oppression of the occupation, the ranks of the radicals are only likely to grow.

Set against that, most people on both sides do want an end to the conflict - a settlement that might allow their children to live in peace and prosper. So, perhaps there is hope - "God willing", as they say in Palestine.

Read the full piece on the BBC website

Looking Bad(ly)

Last week we read the Torah portion of the spies. They were punished for bringing back a bad report about the land of Israel. As a result of this report and its acceptance by the people, the Israelites had to wander in the desert for 40 years (corresponding to the 40 days the spies were spying out the land) until that generation had died and the new generation, their children, were finally able to enter the land of Israel.
R’ Chaim Shmuelevitz asks why they were punished for 40 years if the sin was only the speaking and acceptance of the evil report about Israel. In other words, why were the spies punished for doing their job of scouting out the land? And why were the people punished for doing nothing during those 40 days?
R’ Matis Weinberg points out that the Hebrew words for speaking evil, lashon hara, don’t actually means ‘bad language/ tongue’ (that would be ‘lashon ra’ah, since lashon is a feminine word). Rather it means ‘the language of evil’. The real sin of lashon hara is not causing damage to someone else, or offending them, but is more fundamental. It is the sin of seeing the world in a way that everything looks bad. Speaking about the bad things that one sees is just the consequence of viewing the world in this way. R’ Matis also points out that Rambam puts the laws of lashon hara in the book of ‘de’os’, which talks about perfection of character traits, rather than in a section of forbidden speech or damages.
The main prohibition of lashon hara is viewing the world in a certain way, where everything looks bad. This was the sin of the spies – for 40 days they only saw the negative aspects of the land of Israel. All the miracles that G-d did for them while they were there, and all the Divine protection they received, they managed to twist into seeing how bad the land was.
Similarly, the people who were so keen to send the spies were not looking at the positive aspects of Israel. They wanted spies who would seek out the negatives and allow them to remain in the desert, or even return to Egypt, rather than having to fight a war to enter the land. The whole enterprise was therefore doomed from the outset. This is why they were punished for 40 years. Moshe realized that things were going wrong from the beginning, which is why he prayed for Yehoshua that he should be saved from this wicked counsel.
I always wondered how people could view Israel in such a negative light that they were punished with 40 years of exile. Sure, there are some things in Israeli society, mentality or geography that I complain about from time to time, but how could the whole country be viewed so negatively? What about the daily miracles of survival and blessing? What about the homeland for the Jewish people? What about the ingathering of the exiles?
Luckily I have found the answer to my question – from the ostensibly unbiased news service of the BBC (I say ostensibly, because the Arabs in Britain complain that their news service is biased in favor of Israel – bear that in mind as you look at this article!).
Just to clarify – they don’t tell too many outright lies. But they manage to distort the facts to see only the negative side (from the Israeli/ Jewish perspective) of every main area of the modern political situation in Israel.
So, if you have the stomach to read what might have come directly from the words of the spies (and you will need a strong stomach) – here is the summary of the Middle East story, and obstacles to peace, by the BBC:

Obstacles to peace: Moveable frontiers
Obstacles to peace: Refugees
Obstacles to peace: Water
Obstacles to peace: Jerusalem

And for a final stomach wrenching personal account:
Samia Zaru, Palestinian refugee sculptor living in Jordan

Or perhaps you don’t agree with me. If you think these are fair and honest reports please leave your comments at the bottom of the page. And if you think they are seeing the real picture and I am wearing rose colored glasses, please let me know.

(cross posted from wwww.torahlab.org