Portland's Rabbi Stampfer and his Ancestors Establishing Israel-A Jewish State

Nadene Goldfoot                                        

With all the heart-ache happening in the Pale of Settlement with pogroms against Jews, a return to the land became a movement for Jews with the desire to revive  Jewish national life.  The Jews who never left the land were called the Yishuv and they started the movement. They knew that the Jews in the Pale of Settlement belonged in their ancient land with them.   The Pale was land owned by Russia where Jews were allowed to live.  Jews couldn't come into Russia proper, only live in the Pale.  The Pale consisted of Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Ukraine and  Belarus.

In 1860, Jews built the first neighborhood or quarter outside the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem.  There were 2 Hebrew periodicals regularly published in Jerusalem, both calling for a return to the Land.
 In 1870, the first Jewish agricultural college was established in Mikveh Israel which is today on the outskirts of Tel Aviv.

In 1878, Jews from Jerusalem founded the first new village in the land-Petah Tikva  which today is a town of over 85,000 and only 10 miles from Tel Aviv.  Other villages were founded near Jerusalem and in the Galilee.  " It was founded in 1878, mainly by religious orthodox Jews, also known as the Old Yishuv, and became a permanent settlement in 1883 with the financial help of Baron Edmond de Rothschild.

According to the Central Bureau of Statistics, at the end of 2009, the city's population stood at 209,600. The population density is approximately 5,800 inhabitants per square kilometre (15,000 /sq mi). Petah Tikva's jurisdiction covers 35,868 dunams.  

Portland, Oregon's Rabbi Joshua Stampfer's ancestor started Petah Tikva.  "Born in Jerusalem on Dec. 28,

1921, Rabbi Stampfer is the son and grandson of rabbis and pioneers.  His paternal great-grandfather and namesake, Yehoshua Stampfer, was a founder of Petach Tikva, the first modern Zionist settlement in what is now Israel.  His maternal grandfather, Rabbi Tzvi Pesach Frank, was for several decades the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem.  Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, the Chief Rabbi of Israel and a close friend of Rabbi Frank, served as Stampfer's sandek or holder at his brit milah.  

In 1881 and following years, Jewish immigrants who belonged to the Hibbat Zion (Love of Zion) movement arrived in Israel from Eastern Europe.  This was called the First Aliyah-going up spiritually of living in Israel.  Some joined existing  villages, others founded new ones.  Some of the villages  established during the last 2 decades of the century are large towns today like Hadera and Rishon Le-Zion.  The living for these pioneers was harsh.  The population was small and dispersed.  Communication was poor.  The Land was in a state of neglect with swamps, and malaria was the rule.  The Ottoman Empire administration was hostile and oppressive towards Arabs and Jews.  It can be compared to life of pioneers in the USA at that period.  

Knowing the struggles these people went through to create the state of Israel makes today's population most appreciative.  By the end of WWI in 1917, the Ottoman Empire lost their hold on the land.

One would never think that after having been accepted that Jews were to have a Jewish Homeland from the land of Palestine, land lost by the Ottoman Empire because they sided with Germany in WWI and actually the former empire of Israel and Judah, that there would be no problem.  It was decided by the League of Nations that it was to be and Britain was given the responsibility to bring it about in the form of the mandate.  One would never think there would be any doubts about it after the  the United Nations voted it in as a state on May 14, 1948-a double legal entry that Israel was a legal Jewish state.  Here we are, again defending our right to be called a Jewish state.  Who's having a fit about it?  The Palestinian Arabs who want it for themselves-at least to start with their own state out of land belonging to Israel right smack alongside and inside of Israel in east Jerusalem, which they want as their capital.  David's capital.  Jerusalem.  King David who created it for Israel.  King David who lived from 1010 BCE to 970 BCE, 3,000 years ago.

When Sharon was Prime Minister of Israel, the US. government put enormous pressure on him to "do something," and he did.  He decided to move Israeli citizens out of Gaza for the sake of peace.  He also moved villages and towns out of Samaria.  Now there are two counties if you wish, Judea and Samaria.  Samaria is the northern one.  Jews call them by this established name.  Americans journalists and others call them the West Bank, a name from Jordan grabbing them as they were land west of the Jordan River.  Jordan had grabbed them in 1948 when the fledgling Israel state was busy fighting off all their neighbors who had declared war on them 15 minutes after their declaration of being a state.

Sharon did this in the hopes and half-promises and innuendos of the USA that this might lead to an end of the bloody Arab/Israeli conflict.  Even Sharon's own Likud party overwhelmingly rejected the plan.  This is because Gaza did not belong to its mostly Arab inhabitants.  Gaza had been a province of the Ottoman Empire and became part of the British Mandate of Palestine.  In 1947, the UN proposed to partition Palestine into 2 states,  one Jewish and the other Arab.  The Jews, seeing it amounted to only 20% of the original piece of promised land to them for a Jewish Homeland,   decided it was better than nothing and accepted the offer.   The Arabs rejected the offer.

Fifteen minutes after the announcement of Israel being a state, 5 Arab armies invaded Israel.  Israel wasn't the mighty army based country it is today.  It was a ragtag group of Holocaust survivors, tired groups that had been fighting for survival already, and hopeful people who had waited 2,000 years for such a moment, for they had been praying every day for this return.

It was a huge miracle that they defeated the combined Arab might.  After this war, though, Jordan still had control of Judea and Samaria and east Jerusalem and Egypt stayed in control of the Gaza Strip.  They held it until the 1967 Six Day War when another huge miracle happened; Israel won that one, too, against all odds.  This miracle gave Israel back all they had previously lost, including the Gaza Strip.
                                                                           

                                                            Gaza
Now Israel made every effort to improve life of the Gazans and give them decent housing and infrastructure.  The Arabs only pouted and rebuffed all the efforts of the Jews of improvement.  The Arabs wanted to keep the Gazans in miserable "refugee camps".  They have been there, festering in squalor for over 50 years and dreaming of vengeance against Israel.  They've learned no skills, and have not improved their minds except to learn to built rockets against Israel and to build tunnels to bring in contraband- things used as ammunition against the Jews.

This was the worst plan imaginable-to vacate Gaza. 7,500 Jews left in the name of peace and many still haven't been able to regain their lives that they had.   It set a precedent, that to make the Arabs happy, they had to have land that was Judenrein-free of Jews-something invented by the Nazis.  It rewarded terror and was viewed by the Arabs as a sign of weakness.  They would be free to import arms through their port and airport.    What this did was to exacerbate the problem.  That the Jews abandoned their homes and businesses was seen as a victory for terrorism.  The Israeli military left and this was seen as the chance for terror to increase and violence would explode and drive all Jews out. by raining down rockets, missiles and mortars.  They saw this as causing thousands of Jewish deaths and Israel would be defenseless.

What have the Jews gained in return for their efforts towards peace?  The raining down of rockets, missiles and mortars, air raid sirens and many portable bomb shelters.  Besides that, they now have Kerry saying that it's a mistake to expect the Arabs to accept Israel as a Jewish state.  No-they'd much rather call it an Arab state-no doubt.

One idea that came up in 2004  proposed in the Forward newspaper was that if all Jews were moved out of Gaza, and Judea and Samaria, which the Arabs want to use for their Palestine, evacuate all Arab from Israel and resettle them in Gaza, the West Bank, or wherever they might want to go.  It would be an exchange of populations.  It's happened before on the Indian subcontinent.  Of course it caused a lot of bloodshed, but is a good example of a population exchange.

Well, this population exchange didn't happen.  Of course, Arabs who were working and living already in Israel proper certainly didn't want to move and they were not the problems.  We have Hamas terrorists who have taken over Gaza and have turned everyone into worse terrorists.  Fatah won't recognize a Jewish Israel.  Could we then say we shouldn't have recognized a Muslim Arab state?  Sharon did, though.  Can we say we were just kidding?

There was a province of Palestine, called that in 135 CE by the Romans who had taken Jerusalem in 70 CE.  There was Bar Kokhba who fought against them for 3 years from 132 to 135, but they finally lost against this massive army, but really gave them a headache in doing it, for it was a ragtag Jewish army that fought harder than any other had against the Romans.  That's why the Romans named the land "Palestine" after an enemy group of the Jews.  Arabs lived in Syria as well as all the surrounding countryside.  They called the province Syria, though.    The Arabs of today are descendants of the Arabs who came to the Jews looking for work as their countries didn't have jobs.  Very few Arabs actually owned land in Palestine.  Those who did sold their weed infested dried or swampy mosquito-filled land to the interested Jews who paid their high prices.                                                                  

Now that the Jews have made a modern miracle out of the land, the Palestinians are chomping at the bit to take it over.  One self-important personage, Abbas Zaki, a senior PA official of the Central Committee,  is bragging that now that the Jews are in one place it will be easier to kill them all. "Zaki currently serves as Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas’ commissioner for dialogue with the Arab world and China.  Earlier, "In response to United States president Barack Obama's U.N. Speech on Palestinian Statehood on September 23, 2011, Zaki called Obama and Benjamin Netanyahu "trash", and said "The greater goal cannot be accomplished in one go.... If Israel withdraws from Jerusalem, evacuates the 650,000 settlers, and dismantles the wall – what will become of Israel? It will come to an end."  It sounds like that's what his goal is, to bring Israel to an end now.  We see his idea is including the dismantling of the wall because that is in east Jerusalem.  

Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abbas_Zaki
 http://www.jewishjournal.com/rosnersdomain/item/basic_law_the_jewish_state_problem_wont_go_away
Forward, July 9, 2005, page 3.  , Abandoning Gaza, would Israel's withdrawal from Gaza lead to peace?
http://pamelageller.com/2014/03/palestinian-official-allah-gathering-jews-israel-can-kill.html/
See more at: http://www.ojlife.com/2013/oct/seniors/portland-celebrates-60-years-rabbi-stampfer#sthash.Rmf6oVoS.dpuf
Facts About Israel from Division of Information, Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Jerusalem 

US Ensuring Israel's Safety? Our Last Chance? How?

Nadene Goldfoot                                                                  

This morning's paper, the Oregonian, has an article from the Washington Post by Anne Gearan headlined, "US works to ensure Israel's safety."  In it we are told that the US is trying to establish new ways to guarantee Israel's security in the event that it no longer occupies the West Bank (Judea and Samaria).

Doesn't the USA realize that this has already been discussed in the 1993 Oslo Agreements and that there are 3 sectors in Judea and Samaria, section A, B, and C.  Israel is allowed to settle in sector C which is 61% of the area and includes the Israeli towns and is under Israeli control  Sector A is 11% of the land and is under the Palestinian Authority.  Sector B is 28% of the area and the Israeli military and the Palestinian civil authority control this area.   East Jerusalem is now part of the rest of Jerusalem and is Israel's capital.  It is not a part of the West Bank, even though Abbas wants to make it his capital.

This tells me that something is brewing to finagle all of Judea and Samaria away without batting an eyelash and make it Judenrein, which is the wish of the Palestinians.  It remains a wish only.  There has been no negotiations due to the decisions the Palestinians demand BEFORE they sit down to talk to the Israelis.  Has Kerry fallen into their trap?  It seems more that the USA is trying to placate Israel instead of thinking of its safety.  How can they possibly guarantee safety in the first place?  Only Israel can do that as it's always only Israel's IDF that is involved.  On the other hand, it is the Palestinians who have managed to attack Israel with the help of at least 7 Muslim nations who have attacked her all at one time.

Retired Marine General John Allen has been brought out of retirement to be the special adviser to both Kerry and Chuck Hagel. He is the former commander of the NATO forces in Afghanistan.  His new job is to formulate US security policy in the Israel-Palestinian negotiations.   I hope he will uphold the honor of the Marines by being forthright and honest about Israel's need for defense against a hostile neighbor.  Do they not realize that the motto of Hamas is:  We love death as much as the Jews love Life! Have they bothered to read the charter of Hamas?  Fatah has been wishy-washy about linking up with Hamas with a power play at hand.  Remember, it was Hamas who kicked out Fatah from Gaza.   

 Judea and Samaria are acting like buffers against attack on the center of Israel and are necessary.  By becoming a tight line of Hamas-Fatah into Judea-Samaria moves the danger closer than Jordan is, where the last attack came from in 1967 when Israel won the battle against all odds.  

It sounds to me like they're going to try to find holes in Netanyahu's feelings about what Israel needs for security.  I believe only Netanyahu and his Generals know for certain what works and what doesn't work to protect Israel, not even an American General who hasn't been involved in this defense line, even though he is a respected general.  Show a little respect for Israel's knowledge, please, Mr. Kerry.  It's nice to have the opportunity to consult with an American General, but that's it.  It shouldn't be the last word.  It is better than going by Kerry's knowledge of war and security, though.  It's good that he is going to listen to some experts.  
The article goes on to say that the goal is to remove potential deal-breakers at the outset of the push for new talks before they can spoil what Kerry calls a last chance for peace between Israel and the Palestinians.  Is this forewarning another attack on Israel?  Possibly allowing Iran to attack by not stopping Iran's ability to make nuclear weapons?  Is this a threat saying, you either comply by giving up Judea and Samaria or we won't do a thing about Iran?  Pardon me if I sound paranoid, but I've found out too much about my lovely country and spies and what happens between nations and especially how Israel and Jews have been treated throughout the ages.  I've gone from a naive teenager to an extremely wary grandmother.  

The talks between Abbas and Netanyahu have been dead for the past 5 years due to the stubbornness of Abbas.  Netanyahu has wanted to talk peace without any preconditions to start with.  He even begged Abbas to come talk when they were both in the UN for a meeting.  It was seen on TV.   There was no response.  

A USA official stated that the purpose is not to take issues off the table but to drive a deeper examination of a range of issues so all parties can see what options might exist and to see if common ground can be found.  It still sounds threatening to me.  The common ground, possibly of wanting peace, is not in the charter of either Hamas or the Muslim Brotherhood.  It is only the desire of Israel to have peace being it's been 65 years and the Palestinians haven't come around yet.  Is there unity between Hamas and Fatah?  How can Abbas sit down when he isn't the representative of both Fatah and Hamas?  Maybe they're waiting for the 100th anniversary of Israel to sit down and consider peace.  Another day; another American dollar.  

Resource: Oregonian Newspaper 7/1/13, page A4
http://jewishfactsfromportland.blogspot.com/2011/08/israels-claim-on-judea-samaria-and-east.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Bank
http://www.israpundit.com/archives/56077 Palestine and Nazi connection 
http://warnewsupdates.blogspot.com/2013/05/gen-john-allen-appointed-special-us.html

All About Israel's Administered Areas From Six-Day War

Nadene Goldfoot                                                                       

  We Jews Do Not Enter Area A.  There is no similar sign on the other side for B and C.

Territories that were occupied by Israel in the course of the Six-Day War against Israel came about when the Israel Defense forces miraculously defeated the massed Arab armies which menaced Israel's frontiers.  There are 4 administrated areas.

1. Judea and Samaria (West Bank) of the Jordan.  This territory had been until 1948 part of the British Mandate of Palestine.  Between 1948 and 1967 it was ruled by Jordan, which annexed it in 1950.  Since Judea and Samaria were never officially annexed by the Israeli government, the IDF Civil Administration has jurisdiction over the districts today.

2. The Gaza Strip had also been, until 1948, part of the British Mandate of Palestine.  Between 1948 and 1967 (with a short interruption in 1956-7), following the Sinai War, it was administered by an Egyptian Military Government.  It was not annexed by Egypt. Israel left completely in 2005 but keeps control of shipping lanes to keep out arms to be used against her.  .

3. The Sinai Desert was, until 1967, under Egyptian administration. It was given back to Egypt in return for peace agreement in March 1979 by Sadat with Begin.  .

4. The Golan Heights were, until 1967, under Syrian administration.  Since the 67 War, the Golan has officially been incorporated as parts of Israel.

The status of the administered areas had not changed from June 1967 to 1973.  Pending a peace settlement in which the borders between Israel and its neighbors will be decided, it is that of territories occupied during a war.  Israel had not annexed any part of the areas.  East Jerusalem was reunified in June 1967 with West Jerusalem.

Population: By July 1972, almost a million Arabs lived in the administered areas.
640,600 of them in Judea and Samaria (2,270 sq miles)
388,600 of them in the Gaza Strip and North Sinai (140 sq. miles)
   8,000 of them in the Golan Heights (500 sq miles)

The population of the areas is predominantly Muslim.  The smaller Christian communities of Greek Orthodox and Latins are mainly in Ramallah, Bethlehem and Beit Jala.  In the Golan Heights there are Druzes.

Until a peace settlement, which will determine the political future of the areas, Israel's policy tries to achieve the objectives of co-existence and cooperation between the Arabs of the areas and Israelis.  It is trying to enable the people to live normal lives  and to maintain security to all alike.  During the 1970's, Judea, Samaria and Gaza were the 4th fastest growing economy in the world-ahead of such places as Singapore, Hong Kong and Korea, and substantially ahead of Israel itself. (Historian Efrain Karsh).  Israel had been working hard to improve their lot.  

Local Authorities include 23 municipalities and 31 rural councils in Judea and Samaria.  Elections were held in 1972 in accordance with Jordanian law.  75% of voter participation caused about half the mayors to be replaced by new ones.   There were 3 municipalities and 7 rural councils in the Gaza Strip and North Sinai.  Liason officers of the Israel Ministry of the Interior approved their budgets, arranged to lend them funds at low interest, and audited their finances and administration.

Israeli Living in Administered Areas:  Between June 1967 and December 1972, Israel had established 14 towns in the Golan, 6 in Judea and Samaria, 7 in Gaza and North Sinai and 5 in East and South Sinai.  by 1977 there were 76 Jewish communities built in the Territories on undeveloped land.
 There are 3 different types:

1. Nahal villages:  Established by the IDF.  Nahal is a corps which combines military training with farm work.  Members become farmers when service ends.  The villages are military points, like those held by any other unit of the IDF.

2. Civilian villages:  Established in areas which Israel hopes may be assigned to its jurisdiction by peace treaties.  Israel knows where borders need to be for security.  These positions are not conditions and that in peace talks, everything will be negotiable.

3. Communities: Established where political future is not covered  with the assumption that should the area revert to Arab sovereignty under a treaty of peace, it should be allowed to continue to live in it just as Arab communities live in Israel..  We are talking about our ancient history of Judea and Samaria, established by King David and his son, King Solomon of which this land contains the Jewish holy shrines in areas beyond the bounds of pre-1967 Israel.  No Israeli would relinquish large parts of the administered area or accept any arrangement that banned Jews from living in places which are of religious and historical significance.

By 1977, some Israelis, such as the survivors of the Gush Etzion block, returned to rebuild Jewish communities that Arab forces had captured and destroyed in the 1948 war.  After 1977, 74 additional communities were built in the Territories on unallocated government land.  By 2005, the 150 communities included about 200,000 Israelis living on less than 2% of the land of Judea and Samaria.   80% of the people here live in communities close to the Green Line, currently consisting of suburbs of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.  The Green Line (a pre-1967 boundary) is not an internationally recognized border.  It is an armistice line, marking positions held by Israeli and Arab troops when the final truce was called at the end of the 1948 War.  the Green Line remained an armistice line because Arab leaders refused to negotiate to set final border lines.  The Oslo Accords called for Israelis and Palestinians to negotiate for a final border between the State of Israel and a future Palestinian state.  To date, these negotiations haven't resolved outstanding issues to the satisfaction of both parties.

Disputed Territories:  The communities that Israel built in Gaza and Judea and Samaria were in undeveloped, uninhabited areas and are entirely legal.  Palestinians have legitimate claims to sovereignty over some of the land..  Many are longtime inhabitants who feel they have been deprived of political rights and self-determination.  Israel disputes their territorial claims and Israel also has strong claims to the land.  Therefore, these lands are referred to as disputed territories.  Israel has 3 types of claims:

1. Legal claims:  The British Mandate 1920-1948.  this was the last legal sovereign authority for the Territories.  Jordan and Egypt illegally held them between 1948 to 1967.  They remain unallocated portions of the British Mandate since no government formally replaced the mandate's jurisdiction.  The guidelines called for Jews to settle the area on what was called, The Jewish Homeland as per League of Nations.  the Jews' right to live on the land is a "legal right assured by treaty and specifically protected by Article 80 of the UN charter.  ...the Jewish right of settlement in the area is equivalent in every way to the right of existing Palestinian population to live there.  (Eugene Rostow, former US under Secretary of State, 1990).

2. Historical claims:  Judea and Samaria (West Bank) were the cradle of Jewish civilization since the 2nd millenium BCE and had a continuous Jewish presence until the 1948 War when Jewish inhabitants were killed and about 10,000 were expelled by the Jordanians.

3. Security-related claims:  Arab states had repeatedly launched attacks against Israel from the Territories' strategic locations and UN Resolution 242 envisioned bilateral negotiations that would give Israel more secure borders and lead to greater regional stability.  Until 1988, the PLO officially continued to call for a Palestinian state to replace Israel, not for a separate state that would exist alongside it.  Today Abbas offers recognition if Israel takes his steps that would allow the destruction of the state as they continue to call for the destruction of the state!

Ending Occupation:   From 1993 to 2007, Israel gradually ended the "Occupation."  when the Oslo peace process began in 1993, Israel began ending its military administration as it turned civil governance of the Palestinian population over to their elected government.  In 1994 Israel began turning the administration over to the PA.  However, radical Palestinian groups call all of Israel "Occupied Territory."  Since 2005, Israel uprooted Jewish communities from Gaza.  Israel's goal was to help create a self-governing Palestinian state in all of Gaza and most of Judea and Samaria, incorporating land where 98% of Palestinians live.

Since 1993, the regions have been divided into areas A, B, and C.  Area A was assigned to the Palestinian Authority where most of the Arab residents live. According to many estimates, 1.5 million Arabs live in the region.  Accurate statistics have been difficult to obtain with claims that Arab demographics have been artificially inflated.   Area B is under joint control and has large tracts of barren land.  Israel has full control of Area C where most of the over 340,000 Jewish residents live.

All the while, Israel's security needs remain urgent.  In Gaza, the Hamas-led Palestinian government continues to call for Israel's destruction and even after the recent cease fire, have fired rockets, missiles and mortars into southern Israel.   Israel has been repeatedly attacked from Palestinian and Lebanese territories.  Hamas has ties with Iran, Syria and Hezbollah and has forged ties with al Qaeda.  They all call for Israel's destruction.  

Today an even bigger threat looms over Israel with Iran getting atomic capabilities and their threat to destroy Israel.  Syria, though engaged in a 2 year old civil war and has killed almost or more than 80,000 of their own people, are now threatening Israel with missiles bought from Russia.  Egypt is falling apart since putting in a Muslim Brotherhood leader, Morsi.  Jordan is straining with taking in Syria's refugees and a large Palestinian citizen population.  The Middle East is heating up along with the weather.   

Resource:  Facts About Israel 1973, published by the Division of Information, Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Jerusalem
Israel 101 published by Stand with Us, supported by Christians United for Israel
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egypt%E2%80%93Israel_Peace_Treaty
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/163774 Sections A, B, C
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judea_and_Samaria_Area
http://jewishfactsfromportland.blogspot.com/2013/04/some-facts-about-occupation-subject.html
http://israel-nadene.blogspot.com/2013/05/1973s-real-nitty-gritty-on-judaea-and.html

Peace Proposal from Kerry and Abbas At World Economic Forum to Israel

Nadene Goldfoot                                                 

                      Jordan 's Dead Sea Palms, a Health Resort

This alert from Palestine Media Watch tells it all.  What Abbas says in English is one thing, but what he says in Arabic to his people is another thing. Palestine Media Watch can translate from Arabic to English and tell us the real scoop.   "Jibril Rajoub, senior PA and Fatah leader:

"We as yet don't have a nuke, but I swear that if we had a nuke, we'd have used it this very morning."[Al-Mayadeen TV (Lebanon), 

April 30, 2013]

You have to understand what people stand for and what their motivation is besides what comes out of national media- and then be able to get a translation.   

If you read the Oregonian this morning about the World Economic Forum on the Middle East and North Africa, you will see on page A4 a picture of John Kerry, Mahmoud Abbas and Shimon Peres at the World Economic Forum in Jordan at the Dead Sea.  It is the worst picture I have seen.  Peres is staring straight ahead looking rather sickly next to Kerry who is smiling and whose right hand is almost touching Abbas's while Abbas has such a grin on his face and has is left hand extended to Kerry's right hand.  It just looks like they're laughing at some joke and enjoying themselves so, and Peres is just sitting with his hands folded in his lap out of it.    The heading is "A plan to invigorate Judea and Samaria (West Bank). Of course cameramen take upteen takes on pictures.  They couldn't possibly get a picture of all 3 smiling  and being more together.  Well, maybe that just wasn't the case.  I can understand why Peres felt a little out of it if that was the case as the picture conveys to me.  (picture by Jim Young/The Associated Press)

I just sent an article I wrote in 2008 to a friend about all the things Israel did by 1973 to help Judea and Samaria in agriculture (see reference below) , which is much  what Kerry is proposing to Abbas.  I bet Peres is sitting there saying, but didn't we do all this ages ago? Of course now it's been proposed by the Arabs. 

The Arab proposal offers Israel full recognition and normalization with all Arab nations in exchange for:

1. Israel withdrawing to its 1967 borders including

    a. pulling out of East Jerusalem

2. A "just" settlement for Palestinian refugees who wish to return home to live in peace or receive compensation.-(sure...)

This proposal would give the region of West Bank an estimated $4 billion in economic boost.  Where would it come from?  Promises from the Arab states like they do at the UN or cash from the USA?  It always winds up with the USA carrying the load.  

Abbas is saying, "so what are we waiting for?  We plead with you.  Just read these 2 pages. "  Well, we waited for 5 years for him to sit down and talk to us, and it doesn't look like he is doing much talking to Peres in the picture.  I don't think Israel can possibly go for this even with the inducement to be able to converse with Syria or Iran, if they're even in on this.  How lucky can Israel get?  These proposals that Kerry thinks are so neat would break Israel apart.  Good grief!  Netanyahu wasn't at the meeting.  He's busy with the chemical "Sarin" attack practice of the whole country of Israel, no doubt.  Also, a missile just came into Israel from southern Lebanon late Sunday night.  

Abbas isn't fooling Israel.  Most people there are tri-lingual.  He can't pull the wool over their eyes.  His proposal are the two topics that cannot be given into for Israel.  Obviously, Kerry's forte is economics, not history.  

Reference:  Palestine Media Watch http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=9090 Abbas falsely proclaims that there is no PA incitement
http://israel-nadene.blogspot.com/2013/03/land-of-judea-samaria-west-bank-and.html  about all the agriculture activities Israel had done to help Judea and Samaria 

Oregonian newspaper, page A4, A plan to invigorate West Bank-by Anne Gearah and William Bogth, Washington Post, also News Update: Syria-Lebanon strife page A4.  

Little Interest in a Palestine in 1948: Why the Change?

Nadene Goldfoot
While the Palestinians are angry with Obama because he did not demand and insist that Israel stop building either in East Jerusalem  or Judea and Samaria (original land of the Israelites),  they lobbed 2 Qassam rockets from Gaza into Sderot on Obama's 2nd day of visiting Israel. They had originally fired 5 rockets, but 3 must have been duds as they didn't reach their target.  Possibly they fell into Palestinian territory in Gaza.  It was enough of a trek to make 5 alarms go off in southern Israel, though.

He had another chilly reception in Fatah's area of Judea-Samaria (West Bank).  A gang of Palestinians held an anti-Obama protest on a hillside east of Jerusalem Wednesday and unfurled a banner saying, "Obama:  You promised hope and change, you gave us colonies and apartheid". 

What did they get, "colonies"?  Is that the only word they could find for a translation from Arabic to English? They can only blame their rulers from Arafat to Abbas for that.   Apartheid?  Arabs plan on taking over all of Judea-Samaria and kicking out all the Jews.  Now, that's apartheid.  Israel has 1.4 million Arab citizens that they did not kick out at the creation of Israel.  Those that stayed with them became citizens.  Friends get rewarded, enemies get bubkes.  These "young men" had the audacity to call the A word, apartheid,  at a time when Obama had just met Miss Israel, a beautiful Ethiopian former sergeant in the IDF.  

Has it always been the desire of the Arabs to have their own state?  Would this satisfy them to live peacefully with Israel?

In the summer of 1948, the UN sent Count Folke Bernadotte to Palestine to mediate a truce as war existed since 1947 between the Arabs and Jews.  Bernadotte was from Sweden.  His plan called for the Jewish State to relinquish the Negev and Jerusalem to Transjordan and to get the western Galilee in its place.  This plan had been rejected on both sides.

The proposal was offered AFTER  the Arabs had gone to war to stop the partition plan and a Jewish state had already been declared.  It was again rejected by both sides.  You have to have some knowledge of "the Old Testament" to understand the relevance of Jerusalem to Jews, I suppose, but it was a no brainer to keep Jerusalem for Israel.  To take it off the table was showing Folke's lack of historical value that  it held.  Could he find the word "Jerusalem" in the Koran?  The answer is "NO."

Bernadotte was surprised to find little enthusiasm among the Arabs for independence in having their own state.  This is something that Great Britain thought was only fair between the two contestants for the land they held a mandate for.  Bernadotte then wrote in his diary the following:  Great Britain had already given away 80% of the Jewish Homeland to make Transjordan.

"The Palestinian Arabs had at present no will of their own.  Neither have they ever developed any specifically Palestinian nationalism.  The demand for a separate Arab state in Palestine is consequently relatively weak.  It would seem as though in existing circumstances most of the Palestinian Arabs would be quite content to be incorporated in Transjordan."

Obama spoke to the college students in Israel as if we can forget our long history and importance of Judea and Samaria and Jerusalem.  It's like asking us to forget our grandparents and the struggles they went through. It is our very history that causes us to live in Israel.   He expects the young people to just consider the Palestinians, the people who have been attacking Israel for 66 years.  

He doesn't have to tell Jews to think of them as they already do anyway.  Otherwise Israelis might be acting like the Syrians of today.  I would hope he could see that ethics of Israel is quite different from their neighbors.  That's something that Golda Meier spoke of so often.  Our religion  teaches us to do so, but not to lie down and die.  We were also taught that this land was to be ours by a much higher power than presidents of any country.  Yet the Arabs pronounce to the world over and over their intentions to end Israel,  and where are the reprisals to such pronouncements?  Where is the uproar?  

Like Golda had said, "The Egyptians could run to Egypt, the Syrians into Syria. The only place we could run was into the sea, and before we did that we might as well fight."  or, "We don't thrive on military acts. We do them because we have to, and thank God we are efficient.".  She also said, "We Jews have a secret weapon in our struggle with the Arabs; we have no place to go."  " We do not rejoice in victories. We rejoice when a new kind of cotton is grown and when strawberries bloom in Israel."  and "One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.."  and what she is most famous for saying, "“We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children. We cannot forgive them for forcing us to kill their children. We will only have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us.”

I hate to get preachy, but this is Friday and Shabbat starts this evening.  When the Palestinians get wise and follow the Golden Rule like a lot of the world tries to follow, and that is to not treat others as you wouldn't want to be treated, then maybe peace will be spoken of from the heart.  Following the rule of killing Jews that are hiding behind trees and rocks will get you nowhere.  We're not asking you to become Jewish or Christian, just act like human beings with a heart.  All Israel has been getting are a lot of people who have been taught hatred and the desire to kill Israelis and Jews.  With such an outlook, peace will always be elusive to us all.  You know, I think Obama was trying to say this as well.  

It is hatred that drives the Palestinian Arabs, but it is love of their original homeland that drives the Israelis. 

Resource:  http://www.jpost.com/Diplomacy-and-Politics/Palestinians-disappointed-with-Obama-307375
Oregonian newspaper 3/23, 13 page A5. Obama calls for Mideast talks to resume.
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/g/golda_meir.html

Spring Summit Meeting With Obama, Netanyahu, King Abdullah II

Nadene Goldfoot
First, the word was out that there wasn't going to be any talk about Palestine and peace when Obama made his first visit to Israel as the USA President.  There was speculation, though, as to what he would do and who he would visit.  According to Danny Ayalon, the former Deputy Foreign Minister in Israel,  Obama is planning a summit meeting with Netanyahu and King Abdullah II of Jordan.  It's not for sure if PA leader Mahmoud Abbas is invited or not at this time.  This was reported back on December 27, 2012.

It's a USA-Israeli-Jordanian plan to pass up the core issues of the Israel-Palestine dispute by "establishing a self-ruling Palestinian entity " inside the framework of a confederation with Jordan.  So far, Abbas and his group have no money in which to pay anyone.  The question is for me that they have been demanding a state but where are their plans to be economically self sufficient? They are in "extreme jeopardy."  In fact, Abbas at one point threatened Netanyahu with handing over the problem to him.

In June 1967 (Six Day War) Israel was attacked by all the surrounding states both near and far but won and took over the West Bank (Judea and Samaria).  The culminating event for Israel was the capture of the Old City of Jerusalem.

Jordan is made up of many Palestinians as it is.  They had their war called Black September which started in September 1970 and lasted till July 1971 led by Yasser Arafat of Fatah.  The Palestinians had attempted to assassinate King Hussein on September 1st.  Thousands of Palestinian fighters moved onto Lebanon afterwards.  Thousands had died in the fighting.  The Palestinians had outnumbered Jordanians.  "King Hussein feared an independent West Bank under PLO administration would threaten the autonomy of his Hashemite kingdom."

For a long time many have felt that Jordan is Palestine.  "These ideas took more specific form in July 1989, when Shamir raised the possibility of a Palestinian state being established in Jordan in the course of his discussions with Arab residents of the West Bank."  Here are the steps that were discussed then.

• "The land of Israel east of the Jordan River shall be the Palestinian state.
• In the first stage, the Palestinian state shall be established east of the Jordan River. This state shall enjoy all the characteristics of sovereignty.
• In the second stage (after the establishment of the Palestinian state east of the Jordan River) those areas of the land of Israel in the West Bank under Israel's control and areas inside the green line [delimiting pre-1967 Israel] inhabited by Palestinians shall become part of the Palestinian state.
• The West Bank and Gaza shall not be handed over to or placed under the sovereignty of the Palestinian state except after peace with this state prevails and is manifested in mutual economic, tourist, and cultural relations, and through cooperation in establishing economic and water projects, in addition to allowing free movement of people and goods." from Daniel Pipes.  

Notice that Gaza had been included in the above, but as soon as Israel left, the attacks on her started.  

In the summit meeting they will have to address these same points.  A lot depends on the attitude of Abbas and if he will recognize Israel, something he has refused to do.  Or is this one of the core issues that will be passed up at this time?  If so, let's not allow another Gaza situation where they will be able to attack Israel.  

Resource: DebkaFile Newsleetter, Debka@thejmg.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_September_in_Jordan
http://www.danielpipes.org/298/is-jordan-palestine  Is Jordan Palestine?
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/67_War.html  Listing of countries that attacked.
http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/History/Modern+History/Israel+wars/The+Six-Day+War+-+June+1967.htm
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/07/world/middleeast/palestinian-authority-threatened-by-fiscal-crisis-premier-says.html?_r=0

INTERNATIONAL LAW: On West Bank-Professor Eugene Kontorovich on The Legal Case for Israel

Nadene Goldfoot
I just listened to a fantastic lecturer on youtube (below) The Legal Case For Israel through international law.  People throw this law around like peanuts, but it has specific parameters.

Professor Eugene Kontorovich  teaches at Northwestern University, School of Law, and specializes in constitutional and international law.  He is one man that knows the history of Israel and how it was dealt with through the League of Nations to start its history.

He  " is an internationally sought-after lecturer, and speaks frequently about the legal and historical aspects of the Israeli-Arab conflict at synagogues, Chabad houses, and student groups at dozens of universities across the country, such as Columbia, NYU, Berkley, Chicago, Georgetown, Michigan, and dozens of others, as well as the Israeli Military Advocate General’s International Law Department, CAMERA, the AJC, Decalogue Society."

"He attended the University of Chicago for college and law school, and ultimately taught there. After law school, he clerked for Judge Richard Posner on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. In a previous career, he was a newspaperman at Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, and for many years at the Forward, where he reported from New York, Washington, Israel and Lebanon."

You will hear him explain that "The 1949 Armistice Lines (mistakenly called the "1967 borders") are emphatically not national boundaries."  The video below is about an hour and well worth the time spent listening.  It's like attending a fantastic class with points well explained with some dry humor added.    Did you know that "War" is illegal?  Self defense is legal.  Aggressive conquest is illegal according to international law.  There are laws that do make sense, only it seems that many disregard them.  Please listen if you care about what the international law really is saying.

Reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub2x5UvjUs4
http://www.law.northwestern.edu/faculty/profiles/EugeneKontorovich/
http://www.torahcafe.com/scholar/professor-eugene-kontorovich_0000000742.html
http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2012/01/eugene-kontorovichs-talk-at-nyu-on.html

Have the Jews Ignored Palestinian Arabs Human Rights?

Nadene Goldfoot
Maybe I should first ask if the Palestinians have ignored the Jewish human rights in Palestine. The Palestinian Arabs did things like attack communities such as Hebron in 1929 with full sized pogroms, killing 133 and injuring far more.  Emir Faisal of the Hashemite family of Saudi Arabia was  a willing sponsor of Jews coming into Palestine and settling down.  He understood their need of their own state, as he also had the same desire for himself and his people.  They only had to deal with the English who held the mandate over Palestine and the French, another mandate overseer from the League of Nations in achieving their states.

Hajj Amin el-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem was not one of the educated Arabs who went along with the Jews' return, however and did everything he could to attack and kill them.  Unfortunately many of the English  stationed in Palestine to carry out the mandate were quite anti-Semitic themselves, and made it easy for Husseini and his gangs.

This led to constant battles of  Jews and  Arabs, especially in 1947-1949 in the War of Independence where the Jews were able to legally pronounce their state was born through the newly created UN on May 14, 1948, only to be attacked viciously the next minute by all the surrounding Arabs.  Even though the Arabs were offered 80% of what was to be the Jewish Homeland, their leaders turned the offer down to opt for more warring.  There was no human rights to be shown the Jews.  They were trying to drive them into the sea.

This antipathy  for starting their own state of Palestine has been going on for the past 64 years.  A people who just want to antagonize and hate are now complaining that the Jews are not giving them any human rights.  There are even some Jews who have fallen for this vitriolic  propaganda and are leading the parade of  Jewish imperfections.

The Jews went through all the legal steps of achieving their state which took many years of red tape and many meetings. In their initial statehood plans the Jews  had wonderful hopes to turn the land into a real Utopia for both Jews and Arabs.  They were met with war.  From 1948 to 1969 they were not even allowed into East Jerusalem, as it had been grabbed by Jordan, which is a surprise since the king was the son of  Emir Faisel, who had shown far more understanding and desire for Jews to be there.  Jews later found that Jewish cemeteries had been used as latrines by the Arabs, showing no respect at all.  Headstones had been carted away to be used as paving stones.

Now we get to the Human Rights issue of the Palestinian Arabs.  1.4 million remained in the newly formed Israel to become citizens, but the rest had fled and were placed in camps.  It was not Israel's doing to keep them there.  They have been used as pawns in the propaganda fight against Israel, something that has been more effective than bullets.  They have not been integrated into any country or community, and even had a major battle with Jordan, so that much of their population is made up of Palestinians today.  In fact, the king of Jordan's son and present king is married to a Palestinian.  However, the king still is the king of Jordan, not of Palestine.  His grandfather had fought with his 4 sons in the war against the Ottoman Empire on the English side, and he felt he deserved his state of Jordan, too.

Judea and Samaria (West Bank of the Jordan River) is settled by Arabs and Jews.  Since 1967's Six Day War, Israel had become the administrators of this and of East Jerusalem being they won the war over unbelievable odds.   Of course the Arabs have not been happy with this and still plan someday to create their own state and have this piece of property pegged to be it along with Gaza. When and if they do, their state is to have no Jew living there.  So much for human rights!   Israel put the Palestine Authority in charge of it who take care of all problems, but Israel keeps the right to have a security force there as well, since they have had attacks from there in Israel like suicide bombers, for one.  The status of the administered areas have not changed and are waiting a peace settlement in which the borders between Israel and its neighbors will be decided.  The Arabs refuse to come to the peace table and talk.  They want everything decided their way before sitting down.  Israel has not annexed any part of the areas.  East Jerusalem was united with West Jerusalem and are served by one mayor for the better.  Israel's feeling are that it is to remain one and is Israel's capital as in ancient days.

There have been nothing but improvements since 1967 for the Arabs.  Israel maintained an Open Bridges policy allowing movement of people and goods between the administered areas and the Arab countries.  With Hamas being voted in power over Fatah, that had to ultimately change.  The people of Gaza had voted for terrorists who have attacked and killed Israelis.  Israel had even moved all of their own people out of Gaza for the Arabs in order to make peace but that just gave them more room to be used as a staging ground for shooting rockets, missiles and mortars into southern Israel, which they have been doing for the past 12 years.  It just keeps getting worse.

This is why Israel has had to set down rules of conduct to keep them from getting even more arms to use against Israel.  These rockets, mortars and missiles come to them through tunnels they have dug, and now they are getting supplies from Libya as well. Most all weapons come from Iran to Syria and onto Gaza.   Ships coming in must also be searched for weapons.  The truth is that Gaza is not being deprived of any goods.  Israeli trucks bring in supplies every day.  They probably have more items than many communities in the United States.  There would be no need for Israel to monitor shipments if there were no  shooting coming from Gaza.  It's plain and simple.

Any problem, such as Arab homes that have been destroyed came about for very good reasons.  They have housed ammunition to be used against Israel.  The families were given numerous chances and warning before the ultimate punishment of house damage.   It makes great headlines for newspapers who love to find fault with Jews, though, and that's what happened in the Corrie affair where a Washington state daughter was accidentally killed because she stood in the way of a tractor on purpose to protect a house whose driver couldn't see her.  It was a tragedy that could have been avoided.

What Israel has hoped for is that the Palestinians would get into the groove and better themselves economically so that they could run their own state.  They left nurseries that were supplying goods for Europe when they left Gaza, yet the Palestinians only destroyed them.

The general Arab population are given the education in their schools and homes of only hatred for Jews and for Israel.  It's in their books, on their al-Jezeera TV, in their public assemblies coming from their own leaders.  They're constantly told that it is the Jews who are  depriving them of human rights, but never told to treat Israelis like humans.  Even in their religion they're told that Jews are animals, pigs, whatever.

So I ask the world community who are all in favor of the BDS movement that is coming down taking away the human rights of Israelis, just what is being deprived of the Palestinians that is truly Israel's fault?   If they are so sensitive of human rights, what could Israel have possibly done better?  How would the United States have handled it and remember, we're comparing today's 7 million Israelis to the USA's  almost 313 million.  That's almost 45 times more chances of coming up with great answers.  Of course, it's the Israelis whose lives are on the line, not the couch potatoes sitting at home refereeing the action in the Middle East.

No, the Jews of Israel have not ignored the human rights of their aggressors, the Arab Palestinians.  They have done their utmost to remember they have human rights. Israel has tried to live by the Golden Rule, treat others like you want to be treated.  But at the same time, they are bound and determined to stay alive doing so.

 If you just look at Syria, you can see how a state treats their own kind when attacked.  For 64 years and more, Israel has had to deal with just aggressiveness and only a few groups have come to bat for them. From the Evangelicals, we are uplifted and find encouragement.  What about the rest of the world?

Why We Look At History: Israel and the Palestinians-Past, Present and Future

Nadene Goldfoot
Between 1514 CE and about to 1850, the Arab population of Palestine which was in the control of the Turkish Ottoman Empire remained to be about 340,000.  It suddenly increased around 1855 and by 1947  stood at about 1,300,000, multiplying 4 times over in less than 100 years.  Why?  What happened?

We look at our history because we did not get to the present without its past.  As Einstein has said, it's all connected as one, anyway.  His theory of relativity and thinking that there are 4 dimensions to deal with, the quantum theory and now even a string theory emphasizes the connections involved in time, so we will start looking at the validity of the past.  Maybe it has some bearing on our present and indeed, our future.  Just what are the residual effects from our past?

We have a refugee problem where Arabs want to be able to allow the return of millions of their descendants.  Israel is only a neighborhood in size and is set up to be the homeland of the Jews since they have faced discrimination for 2,000 years in this world.  It would become swamped with Muslims and therefore would become like the many countries that would be intolerant of our presence.  We feel they can go to the 48 Muslim  majority states already established instead of turning the one Jewish state into another Muslim majority.


The other issue of prominence is that we are said to be  occupying Arab lands and have Jewish settlements in the "West Bank" (Judea and Samaria) and of course all occupiers are bad people.  Arabs were hostile to Jews before Israel's birth of May 14, 1948, and became even more so afterwards.  Since 1967 and the Six Day War, we find ourselves with Judea and Samaria because of being victors in the battle, and always, to the victors go the spoils.  In this case the spoils turns out to be the ancient homeland of Jews which was a part of the original Jewish Homeland in the first plan.  If Arabs wanted to keep this property, they shouldn't have attacked Israel in the first place.  Being who they were, the Jews tried their utmost to make life for the Arabs as normal and happy as they could.  What they were running into were the leaders who instigated the people into having a huge attitude problem and turned many of them into terrorists, suicide bombers, killers.

The 1850's CE found Jewish pioneers who had come to "Palestine" and joined up with local Jewish communities from the time of King David to rebuild in what was then the Turkish Empire.  They bought land from the Turkish Crown and Arab landowners.  It was done very peacefully.  Arabs living in the region had been Turkish subjects for the past 400 years.

By 1892 a group of Arab landowners (effendi) sent a letter to the Sultan asking that he make it illegal to sell land to the Jews because so many had bought so much.  More did the same thing in 1915.  At this point it had become offensive to some to have Jews in the land.  However, no Arabs were driven from their homes, the sales were all legal.  It was like whites having to become accustomed to Blacks moving into the neighborhood, and we Americans know how that went.  People have to get used to changes.

A demographic study published by Columbia U shows that the Arabs benefited and grew quickly during this time because of the economic growth that the Jews generated.  With the Jews' presence, though a shock to the existing Arabs, the economy entered the modern day and serfdom came to an end which had been the case that they lived under.  An Arab was now working in a factory or farming community and could earn in one month what his father earned in a year using medieval technology.  Infant mortality dropped and longevity increased.  Knowledge was shared with the Arabs.

What kind of land did the Jews buy?  We wouldn't have considered such poor land.  It was desert or swamp.  It was deserted and uninhabitable even by the Arabs.  Jews fought off either heat or mosquitoes, reclaimed this land and turned it into prime real estate with wonderful farms, growing communities with modern technology and a healthy market economy.  Would you expect anything less?

Now the other Arab migrants came flocking from the surrounding states.  They too wanted a better life and opportunity.  It was like having the USA right next door.  Sheikh Yousuf al-Qaradawi himself, the head religious leader of Qatar, speaker to millions in Egypt, known international Arab terrorist and lieutenant to Osama bin Laden, spoke on TV in May 2005 and chided his followers saying:  "Unfortunately, we Arabs do not excel in either military or civil industries.  We import everything from needles to missiles....How come the Zionist gang has managed to be superior to us, despite being so few?  It has become superior through knowledge, through technology, and through strength.  It has become superior to us through work.  We had the desert before our eyes but we didn't do anything with it.  When they took over, they turned it into a green oasis.  How can a nation that does not work progress?  How can it grow?"  


From 1919 to 1936 Arab violence grew with the British doing almost nothing to stop it and even sometimes helped it along. In 1922 Britain ceded all of the Palestine Mandate east of the Jordan River to the Emir Abdullah which became the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and by their law, no Jews was permitted to enter.   Lord Earl Peel led a commission of inquiry in 1936 to find a way to stop it.   He came up with a partition plan of letting Jews have their state on 15% of the lands they had bought and redeemed.  Let the Arabs have the other 85%.  Partition came about as an appeasement to the Arabs.  The Arabs, instead of taking their 85%, chose war and terrorism  in 1937.  This was called the "Great Arab Revolt" of 1937-1939.  World War II was starting.

Even so, Zionists continued to buy more land from the British.  According to international law, what had been crown land under the Turkish Empire was now legally crown land under the British Mandate.  The purchases were made legally.  Then WWII was over and by that time Zionist organizations owned about 28% of what is today Israel, and private Arab land ownership or British crown land accounted for the rest.   The Arab leaders promoted violence and terrorism against Jewish settlements and the British there.  Jews were preaching restraint and tried to find political solutions through the U.N.  A minority was involved with "terrorism" against the British and reprisals against the Arabs.  Their idea of terrorism was not exactly like the terrorism practiced by the Arabs, however.  When the King David Hotel was bombed, the hotel was informed of the plan so that the occupants could get out safely.  Lives were not wanted, only a statement.

Now the British decided to give the "Palestine Question" back to the new UN and they came to agree with Lord Peel.  November 29, 1947 the declared 2 states: the Arabs got 45% of the land and Israel would get about 55%.  The division sounded good but the Jews' part was that 60% of their 45% was on the Negev desert.  It was crown land, unpopulated and worthless, supposedly.  Arab states were members of the UN and you'd think they'd abide by the decision, but they didn't.  Instead they started a war of aggression which as they said, was to be the war of annihilation.  They were out to destroy the new State of Israel and get rid of the 605,000 Jews living there.  Arabs were biting the hand that had brought them out of poverty and into the 20th century.

Back to the past.  Moses had led his 600,000 minion of Jews to Canaan out of slavery from Egypt.  Could that be a coincidence in numbers?  That brings us to the day of creation of Israel once more and how we got into this muddle in the first place.

Resource: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternalism_(philosophy_of_time)
http://quantumrelativity.calsci.com/
David Meir-Levi, Publication of the David Horowitz Freedom Center, 2005-2006, Los Angeles, CA

Rumbles, Terrorist Activities in Gaza and Samaria

Nadene Goldfoot
Gaza is not "Occupied" by Israel, but is under the authority of Hamas, a terror organization which the people voted for.  Gaza is right next door to Israel, like across the street.  Since Israel pulled out, lock, stock and barrel, they've been the targets of an ongoing raining of missiles, mortars and rockets.  It was done as a good will gesture towards peace but instead got war in return.  This happened in August 2005 causing Jews to be resettled that were ousted from Gaza and 4 towns in northern West Bank (Judea and Samaria).

The IAF struck back at 3 factories who were making weapons in the central part of Gaza on Saturday night and hit 2 terror tunnels as well, one in northern Gaza and one in the south.  This came as a response to the killing of a 21 year old IDF soldier when terrorists tried to infiltrate the western Negev from Gaza early Friday morning in the fog.

The terrorists had been advised some time ago that Israel is no longer just sitting on their haunches while they are being used as target practice.  If their Israeli citizens and IDF soldiers are harmed in these terrorist acts, Israel will respond.  Israel tries to take out the sources of the problems and not the people in the area like the rockets, missiles and mortars can do when they fall everywhere into Israel.

 A separation barrier was built in 1994 by Israel between the two places to protect its citizens,  but it doesn't stop the lobbing of this shelling.  Gaza is only 13 miles away from the large city of Ashkelon, Portland's sister city and cite of  the big hospital, "The Barzilai Medical Center which services all people, Palestinians and Israelis.  Sitting right on the border just about is the town of Sderot  "which has been in the line of all the fire which has been under constant attack, shock and confusion, suffering daily fears and a regular routine of silent threat."

And then we have UNESCO's slant on things.  "At the three days of meetings in Paris, which began Wednesday, speakers charged Israel with “systematic terrorism,” “throttling the people” of Gaza, pursuing “criminal” policies and a “policy of racist violence.”  When will they ever  look into the causes of Israel's "throttlings?"  


Now that Abbas has teemed up with Hamas, there are more attacks on Jews coming from Judea and Samaria, who also are not "Occupied" by Israel.  The PA are the authority in their area, of which Abbas is responsible.  Israel's military looks out for the Jewish villages, towns and cities also located there.

 One such attack just came in Shomron, Samaria in the town of Yitzhar which is south of Nablus.  This is an Orthodox Jewish community of about 895 people.  Yitzhar lies in area C of the West Bank which is under Israel''s civil and security control.  They often have clashes with Israel's security force and the local Palestinians.

Two incidents happened with one attack prevented by the Israeli security team..  The proposed demolition of the Ulpana neighborhood in Beit El is thought to induce more violence. Some homes in this Beit El  have been deemed to be illegal according to Israel's Supreme Court and were ordered to be demolished, but has now been given a 60 day extension.  However, the Supreme Court has ruled that Israeli law does not apply in Judea and Samaria, which has never been annexed and remains under military rule.

 Two weeks ago some young people of Yitzhar fought with nearby PA Arabs.  When the army reached the scene one of the security force members wounded a Palestinian in retaliation to a threat from him.  Arson was one cause from either the residents or the Arabs.  Incitement is also a big cause for arrests.

It is the Palestinian goal of ousting all Jews from Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem and make it their state, which will be Judenrein, free of Jews.  On the other hand, Israel is made up of 1.4 million Arabs and is a democracy.  The fear is that this is only step one in ousting Jews out of Israel period, as they have threatened to do.

Resource: Arutz sheva news@israelnationalneews.com:  IAF Strikes Terror Targets in Gaza by Elad Benari
PA Arabs Attack, Israelis' Weapons confiscated by Maayana Miskin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel%27s_unilateral_disengagement_plan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yitzhar
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/155691 Beit El
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=_Q5--mNIZhU&hd=1 Israel's first Cantor of the IDF, a Lt. Col of the Paratroopers sings "Avinu" with Philharmic Orchestra. It's the prayer for the state of Israel.   Not a lot of connection with above essay except to say our soldiers are also abiding by Jewish ethics while doing their job of defending their people from onslaught.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/156500#.T8035rDL5GY

Occupation? Israel's Involvementa in Judea and Samaria Isn't This

Nadene Goldfoot
Looking at the facts may be hard as they are so flavored with political involvement that they are almost hard to decipher today.  The fact is that Israel was attacked by all the neighboring states in 1967 and won.  The many against the littlest on the block is what occurred.  It wasn't a fair fight nor was there even a logical reason to attack.  It was out of greed and misplaced  egotistic righteousness on the attackers' parts. In fact, it was downright coveting, that sin listed in the Ten Commandments that many think is out of date.

In winning, Israel took over the West Bank, a name given to Judea and Samaria by Jordan, who had occupied the area without any legal basis in 1948 when Israel was created a state legally through the UN.  Israel did not take land from a state called Palestine.  It was taken from Jordan who occupied it illegally in the first place from 1948 to 1967.  Actually that area had been supposed to be a part of the future Jewish state under the British Mandate, and they in turn had the Mandate because the Ottoman Empire had it and lost it at the close of the 1st World War, and they had lost it to the Allies because the Ottoman's had sided with Germany who was defeated, but then the only people noticing this little fact are a few Israelis and a smattering of other caring historians.

"Occupation" is often used as a political word.  The people who use it do not understand the general or legal meaning of the term.  By using "occupation" it reduces complex situations of competing claims and rights to Right and Wrong.  Today it's freely used when talking about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict which implies that Israel bears ultimate responsibility for the welfare of the Palestinians and is used in an extreme derogatory manner.  This denies Israel's right to even defend itself against the continual Palestinian terror.  It takes away the Palestinian's responsibility for their own actions and the consequences thereof.  It's another assault on Israel's legitimacy, as if Israel didn't follow enough of the rules to be re-established after its 2,000 year hiatus.  It has nothing to do with Israel's status as an occupier under international law, which I'm sorry to say, is not being followed by the U.N. itself.

Israel maintains that Judea and Samaria are "disputed territories" under international law.  This does not stop them from developing and settling its own ancestral homeland.  What had become absolute untended and wild wasteland, left alone for Israel's absence of  2,000 years, was sacred land to the Jews, land of historic and valued meaning.  It was only when Jews had returned to their brothers who had never left the "Palestine" area-in reality Judah and Israel but renamed by the Romans to remove the stigma or fact that it had been the Jewish state, did the nomadic Arabs come around hoping to get jobs.  They had no interest in building another state themselves.  When Mark Twain visited in the 1860's it was an utter wasteland.  One should read his "The Innocents Abroad"  when he traveled to "Palestine" in 1867.  When he visited Jerusalem there were only 14,000 people living there: " Moslems, Jews, Greeks, Latins, Armenians, Syrians, Copts, Abyssinians, Greek Catholics, and a handful of Protestants of which there were 100.  Rags, wretchedness, poverty and dirt, those signs and symbols that indicate the presence of Moslem rule more surely than the cresecent-flag itself abound."   page 240.

Today we still hear the obligatory call of "OCCUPATION' from Judea and Samaria even though  they were placed under the Palestinian Authority (PA-meaning Fatah through Abbas) on September 28, 1995.  Israel had then withdrawn its military forces and today one cannot call it "occupied" by Israel.  The agreement did include the presence of Israeli troops in the area.  That was a part of the Agreement, but that this presence can not longer be looked upon as the O word-OCCUPATION.  Let's face it.  The Arab people living there are constantly fed a diet of hatred for the Israelis by their leaders, no less.  They have not ended their attempts and successes of killing Israelis.  Thus the need for this policing of terrorism.  If it didn't happen there would be no need.

The miracle of this all is that Judea and Samaria were originally to be a part of the Jewish Homeland, decided upon on November 2, 1917: England was in favor of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.  It was given international ratification.  This was laid down in the preamble.  Therefore, the British Mandate was to carry this out, but everything got under the control and pressure of politics going on under the surface and once again the Jews were screwed.  They wound up settling for far less.  Another miracle came along under the guise of a slaughter of little Israel and who knew the little land of milk and honey could conquer all those armies?  Our rose garden in Eden is full of thorns, though, one of which is the UN who cannot bring themselves to accept Israel today.  Probably they never thought they'd last for 64 years in the first place.  But they have and in doing so are trying more than any other country would to be be fair to those that hate them and desire their blood.

Occupation?  Are the people locked up inside a ghetto as the Jews had been treated in Italy's  past?  No!  Since 1967 Israel had an Open Bridges policy allowing movement of people and goods between the administered areas and Arab countries.  People traveled overseas freely through Israel's airports and harbors.  Open bridges over the Jordan River permitted regular trade with the Arab countries and free movement of persons either way.  People had family reunions, work and study advantages.  In 1972 people in the administered areas visiting Arab states were over 100,000.  Every summer residents got permission for visitors from Arab states to stay with them for up to 4 months.  152,000 arrived, with some asking to remain and most went on to visit---yes---even Israel.  There were more than 40,000 Arabs joining their families by the end of 1971.  An arrangement with Egypt was an exchange of people, so that 3,1000 Palestinian Arabs had been brought back.  Any problems?  Only the ensuing terrorism against Israel that doesn't make any sense at all.

Resource: http://emetnews.org/analysis/why-is-israels-presence-in-the-territories-st
http://emetnews.or/analysis/occupation-whose-occupation.php  by Moshe Sharon
Book: The Innocents Abroad by Mark Twain, copyright 2009 by Seven Treasures Publications
Facts About Israel, Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Jerusalem by division of Information.  

Two-State Solution's Viability: Give Peace a Chance

Nadene Goldfoot
Netanyahu says to President Abbas, all Israel is saying is, "Give Peace a chance."  It's like John Lennon said in his hit song of 1969, possibly  realizing that 1967  brought  about such a definitive  war in the Middle East.  It's when all the neighboring Arab states ganged up together and attacked one very small Israel to drive it into the sea.  To everyone's astonishment, Israel won out against this onslaught, setting the future for themselves with continual problems anyway, but the main point is that they did survive.

Abbas, pressured by Hamas and Iran, no doubt along with the Muslim Brotherhood's dogma, has not been willing to talk to Netanyahu.  I don't blame him.  His defense of wanting outlandish demands is unacceptable to the lifeblood of Israel, who has already gone through the hoops of establishing their state legally through the UN back in 1948 through enough bloodshed.  What Abbas is asking for is the highest most ridiculous price of the shuk.  He wants Israel to step back to the already proven 1967 indefensible borders they had had; free all murderous terrorists, no matter what crimes they have committed, and stop all construction again which would be the second time that Israel has gone along with this demand which led to nothing towards peace negotiations at all.  Israel had stopped for 10 months with the carrot being peace discussions.  It didn't happen.  Again, empty and deceiving promises.

Netanyahu is about to give away the baby for the sake of peace, meaning going along with what they have already deemed necessary, a two-state solution, for this is far better than losing Israel's reason for being in the first place, the one and only Jewish homeland.  A one-state condition would overwhelm Jews completely, just like Lebanon's Christians did.  I see such dangers even for the two-state situation, but if...if...if the Palestinians would see that to live in peace is far superior to live in war and hatred...if they could see that hatred eats up their well being and shortens their life anyway, without the help of bullets....if they would only give peace a chance....I suppose Netanyahu thinks it could be.

For those of you who are against an established religion to be part of the democratic framework of the constitution of a state, Israel's creation is the result of not being accepted in all the other countries of the world since the fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE  who do happen to have an established religion in their country.  For example, Jews had been ousted from England in  1168, 1275, 1290, with a few Sephardic merchants living dangerously there in 1656, and again in 1753, a country with the Christian Episcopal religion as its own.   Now there are at least 300,000 Jews living there which makes England the 2nd largest population of Jews outside of Israel in the world. With such a history, for how long will this go on, we wonder?  Things are becoming bad again for Jews there.

 The USA is one place where all religions are accepted and is  made up of the few remaining  native Americans who were here to begin with and all the immigrants from other countries.  It is unique. It's a stew pot that has been able to blend all these people together into one tasty American flavor.  Israel is surrounded by 22 Moslem states, guided by their own religion. There are 48 Muslim majority states in the world but only one Jewish and very teeny one in the world; Israel.  We are one people who have survived out of all that have disappeared from bible days, and we do plan to continue.

All we are saying....is Give Peace a chance.  Written for the USA and very popular in the 70's, but is so appropriate for Israel and the Palestinians.  How can one listen to this song and not feel the power of this plea?    I was floored with Netanyahu's offer this morning.   Take advantage and make the right decision; not just Abbas alone but all.

Resource: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Subscribe "Netanyahu to Abbas, "Give Peace a Chance" by Gabe Kahn
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Give_Peace_a_Chance
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkZC7sqImaM John Lennon, "Give Peace a Chance"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_England

What Oslo Accords Said About Declaring a Palestine

Nadene Goldfoot                                                         

                           House of Representatives of USA

The Oslo accords concerning the Arab "Palestinians" and Israel were signed by both the USA and European countries.  It said that there would be no lateral steps allowed by either the Palestinians or Israel.  Peace was to be negotiated between Israel and the Palestinians.  By going to the UN on the 21or 22 of September, Abbas is breaking the Olso agreement.                     

For a counter measure,  Israel may be able to annex Judea and Samaria (called the West Bank).  This has been suggested by Knesset member Danny Danon as a "day after" plan. He suggests annexing area C which holds major Jewish cities and towns plus rural lands.  It does not include the largest Arab communities.  All of Jerusalem is a part of Israel.  David Pollack found in a survey that 40% of Arabs there would move to stay under Israel authority if East Jerusalem ever came under "Palestine" rule. 

 The reason Israel has not wanted to do this in the first place is that they need to maintain a  Jewish majority in their state as that is why Israel was created in the first place.  Since we lost Jerusalem in 70 CE, we have been homeless.  We were called the wandering Jews; a name even for certain plants.   The Holocaust showed the leaders that there was a huge need for our own state as we have been scapegoats long enough for other countries.  We've had dhimmi status in Arab countries and do not want this again, as well.  Right now Israel has 1,571,000 or 20.4% Arab citizens already.  The total population of Israel as of May 2011 was 7,746,000  with 5,795,000 Jews.  That's pretty close to the 6 million Jews lost to the Holocaust of 1936 to 1945, not to mention that Moses arrived outside the wall of Canaan with 601, 730  thousand Israelites from the Exodus to start with.  

The idea is backed by The USA's Joe Walsh, a member of the House of Representatives.  He feels that this breaking with the Oslo Accords by Abbas is an affront and that Obama should be very strong against it.  If he can't do this, the House of Reps should show a backing of Israel  this way. 

http://unitedwithisrael.org/reaction-to-palestinian-state-declaration/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Israel
Arutz Sheva
http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/holocaust/timeline.html
http://www.jcpa.org/JCPA/Templates/ShowPage.asp?DRIT=1&DBID=1&LNGID=1&TMID=111&FID=442&PID=0&IID=8573&TTL=What_Do_the_Arabs_of_East_Jerusalem_Really_Want?