Picking on AIPAC

There is a conference scheduled in Washington DC on May 21-24, 2011 called Move Over AIPAC.  AIPAC is the support group that I belong to, so am distressed at seeing such an event.  It is supported by Stephen Walt, John Meirsheimer, and the Jewish voice for Peace, a very leftist organization, and Palestinian speaker Nadia Hijab. 

They are so unbiased that they had invited Helen Thomas, the elderly Lebanese-American  news reporter and favorite in Washington DC that said publicly that Jews should go back to their old homeland to speak, but she has declined, wanting the negative attention on Israel and not on herself.   It wasn't mentioned, but I imagine that J. Street is also attending.  After all, they are the ones trying to replace AIPAC. 

AIPAC has been behind Israel for the past 50 years. " As America's leading pro-Israel lobby, AIPAC works with both Democratic and Republican political leaders to enact public policy that strengthens the vital U.S.-Israel relationship. With the support of its members nationwide, AIPAC has worked with Congress and the Executive Branch on numerous critical initiatives -- from securing vital foreign aid for Israel to passing legislation aimed at stopping Iran's illicit nuclear program." It's America's pro Israel Lobby. 

With such speakers, I can only imagine that this is going to be a "Let's bury Israel"  as well as AIPAC. 

http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=217293
http://www.aipac.org/about_AIPAC/default.asp
http://www.moveoveraipac.org/

Israel's Fate Amid Arab Uprising

Nadene Goldfoot
The Jewish Review newspaper's front page April 15th article, "Can Israel weather Arab spring?" brings to mind the fact that Israel has many political factions, and that the important leaders in Israel questioning Netanyahu's stand in the peace struggles with Fatah's Palestinian faction are the doves who are not in power.  Their position is to give up Judea and Samaria.  Just as Israel has a group called "Peace Now" who were a part of the Labor Party, they are proposing doing what Israel has done in the past, give up land for peace.  After Israel did just that with Gaza and has received nothing but missile attacks for this, I don't believe the present Likud party will go along with it, though it has logical elements to it.  Another thing they propose is to make Jerusalem a shared capital.  They say nothing about expecting Arabs to accept Israel as a  Jewish state which is the first concession that Likud expects.  They do have expectations of a Palestinian state being demilitarized, which is also on Likud's agenda.  In fact, this proposal really doesn't differ from other plans of the past ten years that were brought up. 


The problem is that Israel is not dealing with logical advisaries right now.  If instead of the foe they are dealing with, they were confronted with Canada, they would be completely wise.  This isn't the fact which makes the solution difficult no matter which way you look at it.  One has to think out the problem with a psychological understanding of the advisary.

Yaakov Perry was the spokesman for the new Israeli Peace Initiative which was the topic of the article.  He is the type of Israeli that was the subject of the book, Start Up Nation, which was about Israel's position of being the number one country that is starting new businesses.  He has been the president and general manager of a cell company and was the head of a general security service.  Naturally he has had an IDF background of army service.  He's speaking about the concerns of businessmen in Israel who are confronted with blockades against their products and country. 
Netanyahu has begged Abbas to come to the peace table, but since he decided to go to the U.N. instead to create Palestine, Abbas has refused to address Netanyahu.  From his position, he feels there is no need to have a palaver.  He has shown that it's his way or the highway and has wanted conditions met before they break bread. 

Netanyahu is up against a jury that is out to lunch.  It's like he's on trial and the opposer is his estranged wife who has been beating the children as well as practicing other physical abuses on them, but the jury and judge are all females of the same ilk and behavior.  They are finding that this father will lose the children no matter that he is the kindest and wisest father in the land.  He's set up to lose his children. 

The above is my way of expressing that Israel has done everything correct in establishing Israel.  They bought land that was exceedingly expensive, but being holy land they bought it anyway.  They went through all the legal hoops and challenges and went through the United Nations to establish Israel.  They are not agressors but have wanted to live in peace since the first moment.  They have returned to their ancient land which holds a religious and cultural meaning to them developed over 2000 years of hope and prayer and we find that Jews had never completely left in the first place.  They have been attacked by Arabs even before their country's renewed birth and the attacks have continued for the past 63 years of its life.  They have lived in a constant state of anxiety and have had to be militarily prepared for their whole existence.   The bottom line is that they have no other choice of living and intend to do just that, for L'Chaim is their watchword:  To Life! 

Israel is a democracy and they have the same magnetic pulls as the United States, the Doves and the Hawks, or Democrats and Republicans.  Netanyahu is working on yet another proposal for a peace pact and we will see what he comes up with.  The religious groups will not be happy with giving up the even more ancient and important land of Judea and Samaria and allow it to become Judenrein or free of all the Jews who live there.  Neither will all the Christian groups who are backing and praying for Israel to have strength of mind and courage of body.  Israel didn't go after Judea and Samaria but received it after being bitterly attacked with a loss of life and blood.  Will Arabs ever learn to stop trying to carry out their goal of driving Jews into the sea if they are rewarded or will they continue to see Israel as weak?  Will they ever see that Israel has reacted magnaminously by having a democratic state with over a million Arabs as citizens?  After all, this was what our Jewish founding fathers saw as the Utopia they were trying to create. 

Resource: Jewish Review article by Dina Kraft from Jewish Telegraphic Agency: Analysis

Intel Trains Staff in Beaverton

Over the past 3 weeks some 300 Israeli families have moved into the Beaverton area near Intel to be trained for 5 months.  They brought about 400 children with them.  This means that the school districts have to make extra provisions for these non-English speaking children.

As I remember, English is introduced in many Israeli schools in the 4th grade.  Older children arriving will pick English up quickly.  It will be a great experience for them.

Resource: http://www.oregonlive.com/beaverton/index.ssf/2011/04/intel_surprises_beaverton_and_hillsboro_schools_with_influx_of_israeli_families_sending_principals_and_teachers_scramb.html

Italian from "Free Gaza Movement" to be Executed by Jihadists

Nadene Goldfoot
Vittorio Arrigoni, Italian pacifist and blogger obviously has thought the worst of Israel and of Jews for he joined the "Free Gaza Movement" who campaigned against Israel's blockade of Gaza.  They came on a boat bringing supplies in 2008 that Israel allowed into Gaza's  port.  These people never looked into why Israel was blockading Gaza nor cared that Gaza was shelling Israel constantly.  It was the "thing to do."

Evidently some of the Jihadist  Gazans decided they didn't like this Italian who came to  Gaza in 2008 and never left.  They said that he entered their land to spread corruption and they described Italy as the "infidel state."

This Jihad group is aligned with al Qaeda and has threatened to execute Vittorio who they have abducted in a few hours unless the Hamas terrorists release their group's leader, Hesham al-Sa'eedni.  We see terrorists threatening  terrorists.  They have posted a You Tube clip saying the execution will take place on Friday at 5pm (10am EST).

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is trying to get him released before it's too late as he realizes this is only harming his cause.   Abbas is of the PLO former terrorists called Fatah, and does not have much clout with Hamas terrorists, so I doubt if they will listen to him.  they continue to have the  power struggle that drove Abbas out of Gaza.  Vittorio's life depends on how Hamas either cares to be seen by the outside world or how he views his control over the Jihadist group. 

5:43pm  my time:  News just came in that his body has been found in an abandoned home.  Right now it is 3:46 am on Friday in Gaza.  It looks to me like they jumped the gun on their time for the execution. 

A kidnapping  happened once before when BBC journalist Alan Johnston was held for 114 days by an al Qaeda type group, the Army of Islam.  They released him in 2007.  He had been kidnapped by gunpoint on March 12 and released on July 4th. 

Resource: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110414/wl_nm/us_gaza_italy_kidnap/print
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kidnapping_of_Alan_Johnston
5:43pm: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110415/wl_nm/us_palestinians_italy_kidnap body found
http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/city.html?n=702

Palestinian Textbooks Teach Hatred for Israel

Nadene Goldfoot
What Israelis have known for some time has just been made real when  the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education just released their study about the Palestinian textbooks.

They reviewed 118 textbooks used in their schools along with 22 teacher guides from the Palestinian Authority's Ministry of Education and the findings revealed that:
1. A denial of the existence of Israel
    a. If there is one, it is extremely negative.
    b. Israel not appearing in geography textbooks
2. Palestine is in place of Israel, the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) and Gaza in geography books.
    a. Jewish cities of Tel Aviv, etc are ot shown.
    b. Jerusalem's Jewish quarter not on map
3. Israelis not shown as friend or partner
4. Oslo Accords rarely mentioned
   a. Political agreements mentioned resulting from Arab and Muslim weakness

Funding for these textbooks comes from the EU.  They are encouraging demonizing Jews and praising martyrdom.  To think that this has been going on for the past 44 years is horrendous, while all the time pressure has been upon Israel to make peace with them.  How can a peace ever come about when people are fed such hatred?  
http://www.jpost.com/DiplomacyAndPolitics/Article.aspx?id=216374

Israel's Dangerous Backyard: IRAN

Nadene Goldfoot
The son of a friend of mine from Safed, Israel is Noam Bedein who is the Director of the Sderot Media Center.  Noam is on his 6th campus tour trying to bring some truth to the students about Israel and the Palestinian War. 

He explains that 97% of the rockets fired by the Palestinians into Israel come from within their civilian population.  Reporters never mention the suffering that goes on in Israel.  Many Israelis are suffering from PTSD, a condition more common with returning American soldiers from Vietnam, etc.  Imagine yourself driving to work and only have 15 seconds to get to a bomb shelter if an alarm goes off.  That's hard to do even if you're in your own house, say, in the bathroom.  These drivers cannot use seatbelts because it would interfere with that 15 second break. 

Just about all the weapons the Palestinians use come from Iran.  Noam calls his talk, " Iran in Israel's Backyard".

Noam's father, David Bedein, was a social worker when we moved to Safed.  My husband was a former actor from Brooklyn and Miami, so he sat down and wrote a laugh-in type skit about us moving to Israel with all our experiences.  David and Danny did the shtick and I did big cards that were part of the show.  We played in hotels in Israel that David managed to line up for us.  He got us the gigs.   Later, I wrote plays and David and his wife were among the actors in some of them.  David always knew what was happening, and later became a newsperson.  He investigated the Corrie Affair. 

You see, Israel is such a small country that if you aren't related to everyone you just about know everyone.  Who moved across the street from us in Safed but a family from Portland.  Then it turned out that Sam's father had worked with my father.   It's a small world.  That's why when there is an army alert call-up because of danger, we all suffer. 

Be sure to read the article below.  It tells a lot more that is very worthwhile reading with pictures. 

Resource:  http://blogs.jpost.com/content/educating-rocket-reality

Burning the Koran

Nadene Goldfoot
A lot of the news is about the minister of a very teeny  congregation who burned the Koran which started a stampede of Muslims killing many Christians outside of the USA. 

It brings to mind to this Jewish mother who is not a Rabbi, of our advice to do unto others as we would have done unto us.  In other words, don't do something to other people that you would hate to have happen to you.  No matter what.  No matter how much you hate them.  That's implied.  It's the Golden Rule. 

I don't want anyone drawing cartoons of my people, either.  They used to do that about Jews.  They drew hideous cariatures of Jews with big noses, etc, and had horrible comments about us.  We didn't say anything about it.  Of course Muslims don't appreciate cartoons of their Mohammed.  Just because we are used to the freedom of doing so doesn't mean that it's a wise thing to do.  The people being made fun of are explosive types.  They react unwisely and highly emotionally.  They rely on killing as the means to solve any problem. 

I don't want anyone to burn our Torah and associated books, prayer books, etc, which the Nazis did.  I don't appreciate and am shocked with things found in the Koran which I myself have seen and read with my own eyes.  But I'm not about to burn the book.  I have to hope that someday such viewpoints will change.  Somehow.  But I'm not going to make a martyr out of the  Koran. 

The people doing this killing are not thinking on our wave length.  The gap between us is wider than the Grand Canyon.  So since we are the great thinkers, we've got to think outside the box for a change.  We have enjoyed freedom of speech and of newspapers for a long time and they haven't. 

We shouldn't have to stop our freedoms just because Muslims now have communication skills and pick up on what we're doing and saying, but knowing this, it's time to think of that Golden Rule.  I don't know if it will create a better environment for us but we'll feel better about ourselves for doing so.  You wouldn't hurt your best friend just because they're of a different religion, would you?  So include the Muslims in that circle of sensitivity.  Just use the Golden Rule.  We're not going to improve life by threatening Muslims by burning their Koran and drawing pictures making fun of them.  We get the opposite reaction.  Our being free doesn't give us the freedom to be cruel or mean.

Sometimes, but not always, people learn by how they are treated.  Israel has tried to treat Palestinians with the Golden Rule, and they have been rebuffed and lied about.  However, I think that the Palestinians citizens of Israel themselves might be realizing just how they have been treated differently than their fellows living in the surrounding Muslim countries.  They get the same treatment as Jewish citizens.  So maybe they realize that by them not trying to kill off the Jews of Israel has created a good living environment for them.  Let's hope so.  After all, the Golden Rule is golden.  It couldn't hurt. 

The citizens of Israel are not burning Korans.  They even have minarets in their neighborhoods as well as mosques.  After all, it's the Middle East. 

On the other hand, I don't care to see what I am seeing: kowtowing to the Muslims and giving them more rights than the general public has.  They haven't come to live here with a ticket to take over everything.  They have to learn not to expect extra special treatment and this is what I am seeing happening.   I don't want to see America turn into a Muslim country.  There are still things that I would like to have as a Jew and have not received.  For instance, we have a few holidays where we are expected to attend synagogue service and to not work.  Every year as a teacher I would put in for a day off for Rosh Hashana and Yom Kipper, and I was in line with the hunters. Guess who got first choice.  The hunters.  I was just ignored in most years.  This made me very angry with the system.  My administrator was not practicing the Golden Rule.  My request was not out of line.  He was not sensitive to my religion.  The Muslim teacher that wants almost a month off during the school year to go to Saudi Arabia is out of line.  She chose to live in the States and should understand that "this is not kosher."  She could make her trip in the summer.  Or, she could teach in a Muslim school where this might be allowed.  Sometimes we have to make hard choices.  This is the problem that comes from living in another country.  Jews have been wrestling with this for 2,000 years.  Finally we have seen the day when it's become better, but there's still room for improvement.

The Golden Rule.  Advice from about 4,000 years ago, and still people have not made it a part of their practice.  There's room for improvement for all of us.  It's the key to having a good life.