Is Pesach Too Late for a Purim Shpeil?

Heard the "Matzah Song"?

Here.

Some Chametz on Pesach

Heavy-equipment giant Caterpillar opened negotiations with Christian groups threatening to divest from the company because of its sales to Israel.

The United Methodist Church has been contemplating a resolution to pull investments from Caterpillar due to the use of Caterpillar machinery in the West Bank. In a statement from Caterpillar, sent to Methodist leaders on April 7, the company said it would call on its clients to use their equipment in ways “consistent with human rights and requirements of international humanitarian law.”

Caterpillar also promised to look into engaging in “possible philanthropic activities in Palestinian areas.”

After receiving the statement, the Methodist Church withdrew a resolution targeting Caterpillar for divestment from the agenda of its quadrennial General Conference scheduled to open April 23.

Similarity to Pollard?

The arrest of an engineer on charges of spying have raised the issue of a link or similarity to Jay Pollard.

Here are some details:-

An 84-year-old former Army engineer in New Jersey was charged on Tuesday with leaking dozens of secret documents about nuclear arms, missiles and fighter jets to the Israeli government during the early 1980s, federal prosecutors said.

The engineer, Ben-Ami Kadish of Monroe Township, could face life in prison or possibly the death penalty if convicted on the most serious charge, prosecutors said.

His case is linked to that of Jonathan Jay Pollard, the naval analyst serving a life sentence for leaking documents to Israel around the same time. An Israeli official who came to Mr. Kadish’s house to photograph documents also received information from Mr. Pollard, prosecutors said.

...Mr. Kadish, a balding, gray-haired man wearing a hearing aid, shuffled into a federal courtroom in Manhattan on Tuesday afternoon, where he was released on $300,000 bail after a brief appearance before Magistrate Judge Douglas F. Eaton. He did not have to enter a plea because he had not been indicted.

...According to court papers, Mr. Kadish’s crimes occurred between 1979 and 1985, when he worked as a mechanical engineer at Picatinny Arsenal in Morris County, N.J., an Army research and development center. He would sign secret documents out of the library and take them to his home in New Jersey — prosecutors would not say in which town — where the Israeli official, a science adviser at the Israeli consulate in New York, would photograph them in the basement, according to court papers.

...The Pollard case has long been a contentious issue between the United States and Israel, whose leaders have argued for his release — a proposal that has been repeatedly rebuffed by American officials.

Mr. diGenova said the Pollard and Kadish cases were strikingly similar.

“They are carbon copies of each other,” he said. “They were the same kind of people, involved the same techniques of taking material from a library and copying it, and they took place at almost exactly the same time.”

...Though Mr. Kadish is suspected of having operated at the same time as Mr. Pollard, and not afterward, another conviction would be embarrassing for Israel because its officials were supposed to have disclosed to the United States all relevant information about Israeli intelligence gathering at the time of Mr. Pollard’s arrest.

...Mr. Applebaum said that while Mr. Kadish was a Zionist and a supporter of Israel, he did not seem particularly fervent.

“He wasn’t wild-eyed and long-haired like some people are when they promote a cause,” Mr. Applebaum said. “He supported causes, but in fact I felt sometimes he should have led more.”

...According to the article, Mr. Kadish grew up in Palestine, fought for the creation of Israel and served in both the British and American military during World War II.

You know what I think?

I think that Mr. Kadish was considered more important to Israel than Jonathan Pollard. And I think that, perhaps, somehow, to keep a possible spotlight off this man, who even may have been personal friends with Rafi Eitan, Shimon Peres or Yitzhak Rabin, that Pollard was sacrificed - kicked out of the embassy, documents were handed back to the US and for a good few years, interest and concern for Jay was kept at the barest minimum.

I hope that the probe of the State Comptroller will look into this.

Just In Case You Missed This Bit of Antisemitism

Fire Damages a Miami Beach Synagogue

MIAMI — A Miami Beach synagogue was severely damaged by fire early Tuesday morning, and members said they suspected arson after discovering a small piece of the Torah on the lawn outside the charred building.

Rabbi Zev Katz, founder of the Chabad House synagogue, said he found the piece of the Torah before crime scene investigators arrived and began poring over the burned remains. So far, police and fire officials have not formally confirmed Rabbi Katz’s suspicions that the fire was intentionally set, though Javier Otero, division chief of operations for the Miami Beach Fire Department, said responders to the fire had noticed that one of the synagogue’s window panes was broken.

...Mr. Weinberger, who lives across from the synagogue, which has 500 members, said he was shocked when he learned of the fire, saying it was a particular coincidence that it was destroyed during the feast of Passover.

“Just when we are celebrating a time of freedom,” he said, “this happens.”

Rabbi Katz said he would hold Friday Shabbat services on the lawn of the synagogue.

“We are going to show people that we are not quitting,” said Rabbi Katz, who later conceded that it was “very devastating right now.”

See here too.

An Exchange of Opinions

...[For Tony Judt] to equate any criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism is silly and perhaps dangerous. But it is equally dangerous to overlook, which is what Judt seems to be doing, the enormous destructive role that anti-Semitic theories play in anti-Israeli sentiments in most of the Middle East, be it in populist or intellectual guises. Jews may be doing well in Holland, the US, and Germany, but the attempts to downplay the potency of anti-Semitism will not aid in addressing the "problem of evil" anywhere.

That was Marat Grinberg, Assistant Professor in the Department of Russian and Humanities at Reed College, Portland, Oregon.

And Judt replies:

...anti-Semitism among Palestinians and other Arabs is stupid and deplorable. But far from fueling anti-Israeli sentiment, it has frequently been spawned by it. [?]

Anger and frustration at Israel's actions disposes people to hate all Jews and believe ill of them - as we have seen in Europe's own Muslim communities in recent years. I don't downplay this development. On the contrary, I see it as a new and dangerous twist in the long history of anti-Jewish prejudice. One hundred years ago, anti-Semitism was "the socialism of fools" (Bebel); today it is the consolation of losers. Those who complacently attribute the Middle Eastern tragedy to resurgent anti-Semitism among dispossessed, displaced, and humiliated Arabs should know better. They are blaming the victim.

Source

No, Tony Judt, the Arab is not the victim except, perhaps, the victim of his own stupidity, stubborness and desire to make the Jew the victim, again.

Malley Perverts History

The 1947 UN partition plan gave the Palestinians much more than any current proposal. Yet they rejected it because at the time they formed a majority in and controlled most of Mandatory Palestine.

The above, from a new article by the Pal. sympathizer Robert Malley and his sidekick, Hussein Agha, is true but misleading and actually, a perversion of history.

The partition was meant, as it had been back in 1937 when first promoted by the British as they slid into a reneging on their obligations as outlined in the Balfour Declaration and the League of Nations decision of 1923, to separate territorially the Arab and Jewish communities. It was intended to resolve the violence that the Arabs initiated.

The Arabs rejected it because they did not want the Jews to live as a sovereign and politically independent entity anywhere in the area they called "Palestine", a Latin name for a supposedly Arab country which never existed and was envisioned by Christian Arabs.

They launched terror and murderous riots in 1920, 1921, 1929, 1936-39 and then began their war of agression in violation of the United Nations.

This statement, though, is quite correct:-

The 1993 Oslo Accords, most Palestinians will concede...never mentioned statehood or independence. It did not define boundaries or the fate of Jerusalem. And it did nothing to halt the settlement enterprise.

And another Malley error:-

Hamas may not be willing to recognize Israel, but it could accept coexistence with it.

This is not what the so-called intellectuals should be reading.

Paris Taliban?

The "fashion" of Junya Watanabe

Ehud Olmert's First Two Years

On the Fourth Geneva Convention

And indeed, the military commander’s general authority to sequester land on the basis of the Regulations Concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land, The Hague, 18 October 1907 [hereinafter –the Hague Regulations] and IV Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War 1949 [hereinafter – the Fourth Geneva Convention], subject to conditions pursuant to international and Israeli law, has been recognized by this court in a series of judgments (see, e.g.: Beit Sourik, at paragraph 32; H.C.J. 940/04 Abu Tir v. The Military Commander in the Judea and Samaria Area (yet unpublished), at paragraph 10 (hereinafter – Abu Tir); H.C.J. 10356/02 Hess v. Commander of IDF Forces in the West Bank (yet unpublished), at paragraphs 8-9 [hereinafter – Hess]; H.C.J. 401/88 Abu Riyan v. Commander of IDF Forces in Judea and Samaria, 42(2) P.D. 767, 770; H.C.J. 24/91 Timraz v. Commander of IDF Forces in the Gaza Strip Area, 45(2) P.D. 325, 333-335; H.C.J. 2717/96 Wafa v. Minister of Defense, 50(2) P.D. 848, 856).

Source

Legal Aspects Regarding the Temple Mount

Here is a very good summary by Shmuel Berkowitz, pages 4-14.

And this:-

However, before he restricts the freedom of worship, the military commander must examine whether he is able to take reasonable steps which will allow the exercise of freedom of worship while ensuring the safety of the worshippers. As this Court stated:

“. . . Freedom of conscience, belief, religion, and worship is limited, to the extent necessary in order to preserve public security and order. Of course, before any act which could infringe upon and limit this freedom is taken due to a threat to public security, the police should take all reasonable steps at their disposal to prevent the threat to public security without compromising the right to conscience, belief, religion and worship. Therefore, if the concern regards violence by a hostile crowd against the worshippers, the police must act against this violence, not against the worshippers. If however reasonable action by the police cannot, due to its limitations, remove the threat to public security, there is no choice but to limit the freedom of conscience and religion, as necessary in order to preserve public security.”

H.C.J. 292/83 Temple Mount Faithful, at p. 455 (Barak, J.); see also Hess, at paragraph 19.

Herzl and the Third Temple

Another topic in this novel [Altneuland] is how Herzl's copes with the question of religion in the Jewish state. It is common knowledge that Herzl belonged to that segment of intellectual Viennese Jews who were very distant from traditional Jewish observance. In his first political pamphlet, "Der Judenstaat" ("The Jewish State"), Herzl made it clear that the rabbis would have a respected status in the synagogue - but not in the political arena. In "Altneuland," however, the picture is more complex and more interesting: Although the leaders of the New Society are all individuals with modern views, one of the central scenes in the novel is a description of the Passover Seder night ceremony in Tiberias, conducted by the New Society's president.

The depiction of Jerusalem is particularly fascinating. In it, the Old City is transformed into a historical reserve whose filth has been removed and from which the authorities have now banned the beggars of all nations and faiths who occupied every open space there, and whose presence so troubled Herzl during his only visit to the country in 1898. However, in the center of the new part of Jerusalem, a glorious structure proudly stands: This is, incredible as it may sound, the Third Temple of Jerusalem "which had been totally rebuilt because the time had come for its reconstruction. It had been built in accordance with the building procedures of ancient times, that is, with hewn stone ... Once more, the pillars, cast in copper, stood in front of Israel's holiest of holies. The left column is called Boaz and the right one Yakhin. In the front courtyard were a mighty copper altar and a wide basin of water that was called `the Copper Sea,' just as in ancient times, when King Solomon ruled the land." While it may be surprising to come across such a passage in Herzl's writings, it should be pointed out that the Temple is built in the new part of Jerusalem and not in place of the mosques on the Temple Mount in the Old City. Despite the altar mentioned in the above passage, Herzl does not state that animal sacrifices have been reinstituted. The description of Friday night services at the Third Temple - where there is a separate section for women worshipers, of course - is more reminiscent of a modern synagogue service in Vienna or Budapest than a ceremony based on Talmud tractate or any other ancient rabbinical source. Alongside the Temple there is the Hall of Peace, an international center for the resolution of disputes - a sort of League of Nations at a time when no such institution existed.

Herzl's somewhat conservative liberal position is very apparent here: Religion has a respected public position in an enlightened, tolerant society.

Source

Dirty Money

A new book on Jerusalem has just been published, well, actually an old book republished.

Entitled "Sha'arei Yerushalayim",



it is authored by Moshe ben Menachem-Mendel Reischer. This Moshe Reischer issued "Mishlei Yaakov", the book of the Dubnov Maggid's meshalim.

The book "Shaarei Yerushalyim" was published in the 1860s and is compared to the Tzuf Dvash's "Sha'ar Hechatzer".

But what really caught my eye was the inside of the title page:



And my translation:

"Printed on paper without any Shabbat violation [being involved] and from money without any Shabbat violation G-d forbid including monies from ministries calling themselves with the name of Israel but do not follow the customs of Israel and with the help of G-d [as it is written:] 'When the boughs thereof are withered, they shall be broken off' (Isaiah 27[:11] which is interpreted that when the slight merit that they possess shall be finished they will then break of themselves speedily in our days Amen"

The publishing house is called Migdalei Arnan.

Widening Roads at Shiloh

Here at the original Shiloh, the entrance road to our community was recently repaved, slightly widened and a sidewalk was contructed leading down to the junction where the road splits off to Shvut Rachel and our outpost communities.

Seems though that another Shiloh road project is stuck.

One in Montana:-

Cooperation needed to get Shiloh Road rolling

The widening of Shiloh Road was a big, complex project when it first was put at the top of the local highway priority list in 2000.

Over the past eight years, completion of the 4.5-mile arterial has grown much more expensive and no less complex. Two years ago, the project cost was estimated to be $20 million...A year ago, the project price tag was $39.5 million. Despite multimillion-dollar earmarks procured by U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, money is short because the costs have gone up with changes in the project and keep going up with construction price inflation.

...In an interview with The Gazette Friday, Lynch discussed some issues that concerned Policy Coordinating Committee members Wednesday. Lynch said that the price for right of way acquisitions along Shiloh Road has to be settled before construction starts because the project is "fiscally constrained." Questions previously had arisen about landowners granting right of way so the project could proceed with the price to be settled later.

...As City-County Planning Board Chairman Al Littler said, private land values along Shiloh will skyrocket after the public invests in improving the road. Hundreds of millions of dollars in commercial development has been projected for this arterial corridor.

But first, landowners, developers and government agencies at every level need to coordinate their efforts and clearly communicate their views. Let's get Shiloh moving on a faster, fully funded track.

Gee, it sounds as if they are ciopying the projects in Jerusalem.

A Possible Solution?

For the Democratic ticket?





Source

The Unasked Question

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter has been floating around these past two weeks and his last public appearance was as the guest of the Israel Council on Foreign Relations at the King David Hotel this morning. Your intrepid blogger, me that is, was present.



There were no demos, outbursts or contretemps. But he managed to display his foolishness just the same.

According to Carter, there were no peace talks for the 6 and half years prior to his book, the anathemetic "Palestine - Peace of Apartheid", appeared. He announced "new settlements" are being established every week and that the despair causes "both sides" to resort to violence.

In a typical sleight-of the-tongue maneuver, Carter that (a) many Pal. have been incarerated for 20 years or so; and (b) many were first jailed at the age of 12; and (c) and that since then they were imprisoned. If he means that Israel has kept behind jail persons who are now 32 and have been behind bars since the age 0f 12, I would suggest he doesn't know his tuches from a peanut.

He also made a semi-dramatic announcement: Hamas will agree to any peace plan the Abbas cabinet reaches with Israel, including recognition of Israel along the 1967 boundaries, as long as there is conducted a plebiscite of the Pal. people supervised by the Carter Center and other internationals.

Dramatic? Okay, idiotic.

Carter doesn't believe that the Hamas will demand that the entire Pal. people all across the gobe are to participate? That they will not start a fratricidal war to make sure the ballot box reflects their bullets? That they are to be trusted at all?

I raised my hand to ask a question.



It was supposed to go like this:

Mr. Carter, you have met twice with Hamas, persons you call terrorists and have announced that anyone involved in the final status resolution should be involved in the negotiations. If so, why do you ignore the Jewish communities in the areas of Samaria and Judea? I myself reside in Shiloh, a community you once tried to have destroyed in 1978. I have sent you several invitations to come see how we have developed since then as we now have celebrated our 30th anniversry. Do you think us as worse than the Hamas?

But, sorry to say, I wasn't recognized before the list of questioners was closed.

Lucky Carter.

================

UPDATE

How a referendum would work is not clear. Mr. Carter said in the interview that he understood that only those Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza Strip would participate and that the voting would be monitored by international observers, including observers from the Carter Center.

But Khaled Meshal, the Hamas leader in Damascus with whom Mr. Carter had spoken, gave a televised news conference late Monday and said that Hamas wants all Palestinians, including those living abroad, to vote. Palestinians in refugee camps in Lebanon, Syria and Jordan would likely insist on a right of return to their original homes in what is today Israel, something Israel has said it could never accept.

Mr. Meshal also focused on the return of Palestinians to Israel and Hamas’s refusal to accept Israel’s legitimacy when he said, "Hamas accepts the establishment of an independent Palestinian state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital and with full and real sovereignty and full application of the right of the Palestinian refugees to return but Hamas will not recognize the state of Israel."

Another "Apartheid" Wall?

Trying to stem the infiltration of militia fighters, American forces have begun to build a massive concrete wall that will partition Sadr City, the densely populated Shiite neighborhood in the Iraqi capital.

Running On Matza

Most Boston Marathon runners will participate in the tried-and-true practice of loading up on carbohydrates before Monday’s race. But some runners will defer to a much holier practice this year and replace their bread and pasta with matzo and potatoes.

The marathon falls on the second day of the Jewish holiday of Passover, when eating leavened bread is forbidden for eight days because of dietary rules.

For many runners used to filling up with carbohydrates in the days before a race, exactly what to eat, and not eat, to perform optimally and still obey the rules of Passover is somewhat vexing.

“We’re carb loading on matzo,” said Rabbi Jonah Pesner, who is running his first marathon.

Pesner and his wife, who are running the race for an autism-research charity, are having a Seder Sunday night with side dishes like potatoes and matzo ball soup, which has the sodium that runners need.

“This is my first marathon, so this was a total divine connection,” Pesner said. “I decided to run my first marathon, looked at the calendar, and it happened to be Passover.”

...Marc Chalufour, a spokesman for the marathon, said the Boston Athletic Association, which organizes the race, will provide matzo at its traditional Sunday night pasta dinner. There will be salad and other offerings.

The marathon is always run on the third Monday in April, Patriot’s Day in Massachusetts, so conflicts happen.

“With Boston pegged as the third Monday of April every year, this is unfortunately an inevitability for us,” Chalufour said. “It’s certainly not the first time, and it certainly won’t be the last.”

Source

Letter to the Editor of Haaretz (in Hebrew)

Here.

Crossing In These Modern Times

An artist's interpretation of a modern crossing of the Red Sea (thanks to SL):-




And here's one helluva lonely Egyptian:-