Lies Palestinians Tell About Our City, Hebron-Holy Sites Closed Now to Jews

Nadene Goldfoot
Hebron has been a Jewish city  since the creation of Judaism by Abraham, who had bought the Mearat Hamachpela or Tomb of the Patriarchs.   This is recorded in  the Torah.  Thousands want to pray at the Meara.  David Wilder of Arutz Sheva writes about its history for this timely Shabbat Hevron.  Jews have lived there continuously for thousands of years, which is so sad considering that the Muslims have now grabbed Jewish religious sites  and are preventing Jews access. It is our ancient city in Judah and is 18 miles south of Jerusalem. 

Abraham had bought the Cave of Machpelah  from the Hittites so he could bury his wife, Sarah, and the tomb now has a mosque built over it, as that is what Muslims seem to do when they take someone's land, either right on or very near.    Hebron became a city of refuge under Joshua.

The Hittites disappeared along with many other ancient peoples.  Their main kingdom in existence from the 15th century BCE fell in  1200.  Smaller groups in N. Syria and around the Euphrates River were finally overrun by the Armenians and the Assyrians.  Jews are the only ones that remain.  Esau, the son of Isaac and twin of Jacob,  had taken wives from the Hittites.  They were one of 7 peoples that the Israelites had conquered in Canaan.  King David had Hittite warriors and his son Solomon had Hitttie wives, so one can say that some were integrated into the Jewish society after their kingdom ended.  They were not killed or necessarily exiled by the Jews. 

King David (1,000 BCE- 960 BCE) ruled for over seven years from Hebron before moving to Jerusalem..  For proof, archaeologists have found artifacts dating to the era of our Patriarch Abraham that are 2,700 years old inscribed with the word "Hevron" in ancient Hebrew.  (the b and the v are the same letter using the bet/vet.)  Along with Jerusalem, Tiberias and Safed, it was one of the four sacred towns for Jews. 

By 1890 there were 1,500 Jews living there with yeshivot and religious schools.  The great Lithuanian yeshival of Slobodka was transferred there in 1925. 

In August 1929, Arabs rioted against Jews suddenly, killing 67 and wounding 70 in a Jewish population of  700.  Survivors were then exiled from the city by the British, of all people, who held the reins then for the League of Nations.  In 1931  30 Jewish families returned, but there were more Arab riots in 1936, and the Jews were exiled again. 

Jews entered their city again after the 1967 War when Israel won over many Arab countries that had attacked them.  At that time the population of Arabs had grown to 38,310.  Jews were not occupiers, they were returnees to their homes after forcible exile of 38 years.  1968 was the year Jews koshered a kitchen in the Park Hotel when Jews had their first Pesach in decades at home. 

Moshe Dayan, Minister of Defense, must have been thinking of his defense problems because he told his people to live in the Hebron militry compound which was several kilometers outside the center of the city.  It had originally been a British police station, hardly homelike.  It was either live there or leave entirely, as he could not defend them in Hebron at that time.  So they lived in there for 2 1/2 years until they created the suburb of Kiryat Arba. 

People kept trying to return to the 450 year old Jewish Quarter of Beit Hadassah, but had problems.  In 1979 with Menachem Begin, Prime Minister, 10 women and 40 children set up housekeeping in the basement of the old medical center of Beit Hadassah in the very middle of the city.  The next year 6 men were murdered outside Beit Hadassah.  Then they were given the green light of official Israeli recognition of being there as a Jewish community.  By 1988 there were 3,700 Jews in Kiryat Arba. 

Hebron now has 1,000 plus of almost 100 families with a yeshiva for 250 post-high school student.  They'd have more but there isn't any more apartments available.  Thousands of Jews have been coming there to visit each year.  People come from all over the world besides Israel.  The total population of Hebron is 163,146 and is under the control of Abbas of the Palestinian Authority.  75% are Muslim, 17% Jewish and 8% Christians and others making up Hebron.  Altogether, there are 350,000 Jews living in Judea-Samaria and 210,00 Jews living in East Jerusalem. 

Jordan messed things up for us by illegally occupying Judea with Hebron from 1948 to 1967, a total of 19 years,  keeping Jews out but allowing Arabs to propagate.  The UN is against Israel in saying that Jews living here again is an illegal settlement.  Jews say they are only 3% of Hebron's population.  The land is divided into two areas; H1 and H2.  H2 is 20% with H1 being 80% of the land.  To protect the 3%, Israel is defending  H1 where it lies. 

The mayor is an Arab, Mustepha Natsche.  He told visitors that Jews were not allowed to pray at Ma'arat Hamachpela, the 2nd holiest site to Jews in the whole world.  He went on to tell them that it is a mosque, and only Muslims are allowed to pray there.  They have now claimed a Jewish site as a mosque!  Jews and Christians cannot pray at the Tomb of the Patriarchs either, because it is not a church or a synagogue, but is a mosque, and again, only Muslims are allowed there. 

To top off this horror, Israel has put Hebron on its list of Heritage Sites with UNESCO, and the Palestinians are claiming it as Muslim, which UNESCO goes along with.  We're fighting two battles here; constant missiles and mortars from Gaza and now the lies about our teeny land just claimed for the Muslims through downright detestable lying.  We have a Russian roulette situation with missiles raining down on Southern Israel from Gaza but how do we fight people willing to believe such lies:  only with education and the hope that people will be willing to learn.  Denying our presence in this Holy Land and right to our Jewish Homeland has already been decided in 1948.  We shouldn't have to keep reiterating our history as proof that it is our homeland over and over again because of others who covet what is precious to us.  Actually, they don't really want these places; they just want to keep us away and out of the country completely.  Otherwise they would continue sharing, like Israel does with Jewish religious sites. 

Resource Arutz Sheva news@israelnationalnews.com by David Wilder, Hevron
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia; Hebron
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judea
http://www.hebron.com/english/article.php?id=632
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Bank

Re-Writing Jewish History: Muslim/UNESCO Admiration of Maimonides Leads to Calling Him Muslim

Nadene Goldfoot
The Muslims of the yet uncreated state of Palestine through UNESCO have been busy trying to claim that many of the Jewish sites and people so popular with tourists are actually Muslim.  One such person is the well-known Jewish doctor and rabbinic scholar, Rabbi Moshe ben-Maimon or Maimonides, also called "The Rambam."  In December 2010, UNESCO published a report on the history of science in the Arab world listing him as a Muslim but renaming him as "Moussa ben Maimoun."  He had lived in Egypt for a period of time and that may have been his name there, but he was not an Arab or a Muslim.  He was a highly known Jew.  UNESCO has been busily doing many things like this cited by Caroline B. Glick in her "Deligitimizing the deligitimizers." 

Moses Ben Maimon or Maimonides, also called the Rambam was born in 1135 CE in Cordova, Spain and died in 1204CE.  He was a philosopher, halakhist, doctor  and medical writer.  He left home at 13 with his family to escape the Almohade persecutions of Moslem sectaries from North Africa in the 12th Century who conquered Southern Spain in 1149 to 1174.  They forced all non-Moslems to  convert.  Northern African Jewry finally recovered from this blow, but in Spain it brought final disaster to the communities living under Moslem rule, for they ultimately converted to Islam or fled to Christian Spain.  The Maimons did not convert.

The Maimon family wandered about in Northern Africa and then went to what was called "Palestine", Judea renamed by the Romans in 135CE.  By then he had already written treatises on the Jewish calendar called Sepher ha-Ibbur and on interalation in 1158 at age 23 and works on the technical terms of logic.  The most important thing he also wrote was the list of 613 precepts.

They  couldn't settle in Palestine as it was still suffering from the aftermath of the Crusades, so the family traveled to Egypt.  Moses signed a paper in 1167 showing he was a Rabbi and soon became the spiritual head of the Cairo community.  Our Rambam finished his commentary on the Mishnah, Kitab as-Siraj in 1168 which he worked on as he was traveling.  He was explaining the exact meaning of the text and to show which opinions were accepted as halakhah.  The prefaces which he wrote to Avot (Shemonah Perakim) and to the 10th chapter of Sanhedrin (Helekk) are often printed and studied separately.  The latter leads up to the famous 13 Articles of Faith. 

For a paying occupation, he traded in jewels with his brother David. After David died he beame a physician to the viceroy of Egypt in 1170 at the age of 35.

All these earlier books were written in Arabic and translated later into Hebrew.  from 1170 to 1180 he worked on his Hebrew compendium of the entire halakhah, Mishneh Torah so that when he was very old he wouldn't have to look up facts in the Talmud every time he needed to check on something.  The systematic arrangement is unsurpassed.  This famous doctor was able to show  the principles of the Jewish religion and wrote in the technique and spirit of Aristotelian philosophy which was accepted by the educated.  He wanted to prove to Jews with a secular education that Judaism was rational within that framework. 

 He died at the age of 70 in 1204 CE and was buried in Tiberias where his tomb still attracts pilgrims.  One can surmise  that Hamas and Fatah didn't bother to read anything Maimonides ever wrote; that they just knew he was the author of something in Arabic.  However, I think they certainly knew that he was a famous Jew and are taking advantage of the fact that he at one time lived in Egypt.  Next to Abraham, he is certianly one of the most important men in Judaism.  UNESCO, you certainly have made a gigantic boo boo by listing Maimonides as a Muslim.  He was the most Jewish of all of us Jews. 

UNESCO is a 194 member UN organization.  They needed 81 votes for a majority and 173 voted.  107 nations voted for a Palestine, even though they did not meet the regulation of being a peaceful nation.  52 abstained.  The 14 brave nations that voted against a Palestine were the following:
Australia, a country which I admire for sticking up for their beliefs with fantastic Prime Minister Julia Gillard who also told Muslims in her country that Australia would not accept Sharia Law, Canada, Czech Republic, Germany, Israel, Lithuania, The Netherlands, Palau, Panama, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Sweden, USA and Vanuatu. 

Not surprising were all the Muslim states that voted for Palestine membership into UNESCO.  There are at least 48 nations with a majority Muslim population and the Organization of Islamic Conferences lists 57.  Among the yes votes were France, Spain, Austria, Norway, Korea and Greece. 

Resource: http://www.jewishworldreview.com/1111/glick110411.php3?printer_friendly Caroline B. Glick's Delegitimizing the deligitimizers
New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/01/unesco-countries-vote-palestinian-membership
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Muslim-majority_countries

Abbas Denies Jewish Presence and History in "Holy Land"

Nadene Goldfoot
When President Mahmoud Abbas delivered his speech to the United Nations General Assembly in which he only recognized Islam and Christianity as religions in the "Holy Land" .  He deleted Judaism from history. He knows perfectly well that in 135CE the Romans renamed the Jewish state of Judah as a Latin name of Palaestina, therefore called Palestine afterwards.  The Holy land was also called the "Promised Land," as   G-d was the one who designated that Jews were to  live there. 

Because of this, Director-General Irena Bokova asked that her aide get the Abbas speech that was showing a deligitimization of Israel and the entire Jewish people.  He is unwilling to fess up that Jews were in the area over 4 thousand years ago with Abraham as father of the Jewish people.   Has he also forgotten that Islam did not come on the scene till the 600's CE? Mohammed was born in 570 CE and died in 632 CE.   Judaism is almost 3,000 years older than Islam.  Mohammed copied many of the works of Judaism, and when he saw that he could not win over the Jews to follow him, developed a hostile attitude toward them and either killed them or had them expelled. 

Because of this outright lie, Rabbi Hier has proposed that UNESCO and the Wiesenthal Center co-sponsor an exhibit of the 3,500 year Jewish attachment to the Land of Israel to be launched at UNESCO's Paris headquarters.  They said that UNESCO is obligated to demand that the newest member, Palestine, to hold to the regulations of UNESCO in excising anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial from its school texts and newspapers.  As always, the Center will continue to monitor developments at UNESCO. 

Bokova has received thousands of petition protests from Simon Wiesenthal Center supporters around the world, and I was one of them.  Fatah and Hamas can't get away with this.  There are people in the world who do know the history of Jews in the Middle East.  For one thing, our history is well documented right in the Bible down to names and places.  You can fool some people some of the time but you can't fool all the people even some of the time. 

Abbas has also been pinpointing main tourist sites to be taken over by the Arabs that are precious to Jews and now in Israel's supervision since Palestine was accepted into UNESCO.  Under Israel's law and order, all religious dominations are welcome, but it will not be that way under the Arab authority.  They have already announced that there will be no Jews in their Palestine.  Also, right now they are raining missiles down on Israel, and this is not a friendly gesture by any means.  To me, the situation is slightly ridiculous. 

Resource: Simon Wiesenthal Center SWC Officials Meet With UNESCO Director-General
New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia

Premature UNESCO Vote in Palestine While They War Against Israel

Nadene Goldfoot
Children can't go to school today in Ashkelon and some of southern Israel's schools still lack bomb shelters, but that didn't stop the brain-dead UNESCO members from voting in Palestine, a state not yet created, from becoming a full-fledged member.  Now they are the 195th member of an already heavily populated Arab controlled group.  The vote was 107 for, 14 against with 52 abstentions. Some  voting against were The Netherlands, Germany, Czech Republic, Romania and Lithuania. Bosnia was one who abstained.  They were among those knowing that this is wrong to do until the involved parties return to the negotiation table as requested by the UN Security Council.  . Netanyahu has asked repeatedly for Abbas to sit down and talk, but he has just snubbed the offer.  Hamas and Fatah figure this is a shortcut to getting into the UN, and they just won this round.  The United States and the other 13 countries feel that this is not right to allow 3rd parties or international groups  to make decisions to receive full membership without being a member of the UN already. 

Like Hitler said that he wouldn't invade Poland, Riad al-Malki, Foreign Minister of the "Palestinians"  praised the Paris meeting and said that this act will be the best step toward peace and stability and added that it wasn't linked to their request to join the United Nations at all.  How can he dare speak of peace when Hamas is raining missiles down on Israel and everyone at this meeting is fully aware of it?   The one good thing out of this is that the United States will not even pay this month's  22%  to their coffers and will no longer continue doing so.

The"Palestinians" now want UNESCO to recognize Hebron as a World Heritage Site which would take it out of Israel's hands.  Israel provides the protection for this holy site.  This includes the Tomb of the Patriarchs, a sacred place of much visiting of Jewish people. 

Hebron, called Kiriath-Arba in the Bible, is an ancient city of Judah, one of two ancient Jewish states.  It is 18 miles south of Jerusalem.  Abraham had boughtr a plot of land which had the Cave of Machpelah so that he could bury his wife, Sarah, there.  Today there is a Mosque on this site.  Joshua had assigned Hebron to Caleb and it became a levitical city and a city of refuge.  King David reigned there for 7 1/2 years before going to Jerusalem.  A Jewish community continued there and in 1890, there was a Jewish population of 1500 with yeshivot and religious schools.  In 1925 the great Lithuanian yeshival of Slobodka moved there.  However, 1929 was not only a bad year for the USA but there as well.  The Arabs had one giant pogrom and massacred many of the 700 Jews living there, scaring away survivors.  In 1931 30 Jewish families returned, but the Arabs kept slaughtering them.  After 1967 Jews returned, establishing the Kiryat Arba quarter east of the city.  In 1988 there were 3,700 Jews. 

There is no valid reason for changing the status of Hebron, except for the Palestinians to take something most dear away from the Jews.  Under Israel's  watchful eye, no one is kept from visiting the tomb unless they are carrying bombs.  They haven't been able to scare away Jews with their missiles, so this is just another way to stab them in the heart. 

Resource: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/01/world/middleeast/unesco-approves-full-membership-for-palestinians.html
Oregonian Newspaper Palestinians gain UNESCO entry; US funds end page A6
The Standard Jewish Encyclopedia: Hebron

UNESCO Voting on New member of "Palestine" Today in Paris

Nadene Goldfoot
The state of Palestine has not been accepted through the U.N. as yet.  Even so, UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization has its general conference today in Paris.  It is scheduled to vote to admit "Palestine" as a member today by having the 193 country members vote.  If this passes, our US law mandates cutting off its $70 million dollar contribution to UNESCO, which is 22% of their total budget. 

The situation is that if and when these Hamas-Fatah terrorists become a UNESCO member, they will gain international support to continue erasing the history of Jews in Eretz Israel.  To do this they will have holy sites, such as 'the Cave of the Patriarchs' in Hebron, 'Joseph's tomb' in Nablus, 'Rachel's tomb' in Bethlehem, and 'the Church of the Nativity' in Bethlehem  declared as just Palestinian heritage sites. 

The Palestinian plans with UNESCO are part of the heavy-handed political campaign in many UN agencies for a state led by Mahmoud Abbas to openly refuse to acknowledge Israel as a Jewish State.  Their plan is to deny our 3,000 year old connection to our Holy Land.  Why?  It's their idea of politics in their zeal to take over the land from us. 

Reference:  Simon Wiesenthal Center enewsletter@wiesenthal.com
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/06/world/middleeast/palestinians-win-initial-vote-on-unesco-bid.html
http://www.unesco.org/confgen/press_rel/251001_culture.shtml
http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/palestinians-nearing-unesco-membership/

Muslims Stealing Jewish Traditions

Nadene Goldfoot
Jonathan Tobin wrote a great article for jewishworldreview about the Hamas-Fatah Arabs of Gaza and Judea-Samaria protesting that Israel is "Judaizing" its capital, Jerusalem!   They have even demanded that Israel stop all archeological work in the the Old city section of Jerusalem.  Last year they had the chutzpa to say that Rachel's Tomb and the Tomb of the Patriarchs were "Muslim mosques."  They believe that research or renovation projects "reinforce Israeli occupation."  This is so disgusting to me.  Heaven help us if people do not remember that Jerusalem was the city King David, our Jewish king,  established as our Jewish capital about 3,000 years ago in 1,010 BCE.  It's been a Jewish city forever!   We were there and we have never left.  All these years we have had a Jewish presence there. 

Now we have the problem with UNESCO,  which stands for the executive board of the United Nations made up of representatives of 58 nations.  It stands for Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.  They did it.  They actuallly voted to admit Palestine in as a full member.  This is what Abbas wanted and got.  UNESCO's motto is "Building Peace in the Minds of Men and Women."   All I see is that they have built up hatred for their member state of Israel.  There are 193 member nations and 7 associate nations that belong to UNESCO.  Will all these 193 natons vote to deny Israel's Jewish rights?  Can it actually be that they will deny the rights of the one and only Jewish state in this whole world?  For this is the only fact that the Muslim states have against Israel; that and that they are so successful and inventive.  To make peace the Muslims cannot bring themselves to recognize this one Jewish state and that it has a right to exist. 

The USA voted against doing this and Obama is to give his veto.  This is to come up as a vote to be finalized in the UN's full membership later this month.  If we fail to stop it and we remain in UNESCO, it will be illegal.   UNESCO is a center of anti-Israel behavior and thinking already due to their high membership of Muslim nations who do nothing but hate Israel and Jews. 

The history I have discovered is that Mohammad was an illiterate man in Saudi Arabia and used to listen to stories from the Torah being told orally by Jewish people in the city he lived in.  He wanted to be from a people of the book also like the Jews and the Christians.  He went on to finally create his own version, taking stories he had heard from Jews but inserting his own version to fit his people, like changing the names here and there.  Now the Muslims are stealing Jerusalem's past and making it theirs!  Jerusalem has no place in their Koran except for Mohammed going to heaven from there on his horse.  Their holy place is Mecca and Medina.  This is just a ruse to take land, the site of our most holy city. 

When you get right down to it, all the Jews living in Eretz Israel before May 1948 were called "Palestinians" along with any Arabs living there as well.  This was due to the renaming of the land by the Romans, and the name remained during the Ottoman Empire days.  By teaming up with the Germans, the Ottoman Empire fell at the end of World War I, and that's why the British were given the mandate to oversee the land and decide what to do with it.  It looks to me like they are still practicing Hitler's theory of telling a lie so much that people will eventually believe it.  Yes, Mahmoud, Jerusalem is a  Jewish city.  Get used to it. 

The USA has put a lot of money into UNESCO , and in these days of trying to recover money being wasted to improve the national budget, this money may be cut off to both the Arabs calling themselves "Palestinians" and the UN over this statehood of Palestine.  Obama and Clinton may want to remain in the group but the law is quite clear.  The USA" must withdraw from any group that offers "full membership as a state to any organization or group that does not have the internationally recognized attributes of statehood."  USA money makes up 22% of their funds. 

Hani al-Masri, writer, called Washington's blocking the UN recognition of Palestine "an act of aggression."  I wonder what he calls the decades of shelling Israel by Hamas?  Now that's real aggression. 

http://www.jewishworldreview.com/1011/tobin100711.php3?printer_friendly
http://www.unesco.org/new/en/unesco/about-us/
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/10/06/international/i000842D61.DTL

Palestinian Authority Wants All of Jerusalem

Nadene Goldfoot
Many people have thought that the Palestinians were only demanding to have East Jerusalem as their future capital. They want all of it. They are calling it "al-Quds A Sharia"-holy Jerusalem, meaning all of Jerusalem. They plan on declaring that "the capital of Arab culture" is Jerusalem, and are coming up with this pretext that Jerusalem was the center of their culture for many years.

UNESCO works with these Palestinians to organize celebrations that are against Israeli occupation of "Holy Jerusalem". They won't receive my donations, that's for sure.

So far, there are many "capitals of Arab culture." since 1996. Damascus, Syria is one, Algiers, Algeria is another. Cairo, Egypt, Tunis, Algeria, Amman, Jordan, Beirut, Lebanon, and Khartoum, Sudan are others. It's more like declaring beachheads of Islam, to me. Choosing Jerusalem now is a symbol of the battle against Israel's control of Jerusalem.

Actually, Islam's connection with any area in Israel is very questionable. Their one connection to Jerusalem is that Mohammed rose on a horse and went to heaven from there. That's it. A few Muslim Arabs lived there as well as Jews before 1948. More entered when Jews returned in the 1800's and were seeking jobs with Jews in rebuilding cities. It was just a hot desolate area then. All of a sudden now, it is being declared "their capital".

As I've said before, their aim in life is not to live side by side in peace with Israel. It is more obvious now that they mean to swallow Israel up, now aiming for Jerusalem. I had actually thought at one time that a 2 state solution was the only answer for peace. I don't think that anymore.

http://www.thebulletin.us/site/printerFriendly.cfm?brd=2737&dept_id=576361&newsid=20
David Bedein, who was a friend of ours in Safed, Israel when we were putting on Yiddish Theater in English, and Laughing Through Klita and performing in hotels in different cities, and was a community organizer, is now head of news departments.