Israel Hayom..
02 January '11..
If you feel like lifting your gaze aloft from the eye of the storm in the current public discourse in Israel, filled with pre-election confrontation, defiance and criticism, turn your attention to the south. Go past Ashkelon, Sederot, Magen, Kisufim and Ra'em, until you get to Shalom Regional Council, an area in the northern Negev on the way to the Rafiah Crossing on Israel's border with Gaza. Stop next to the Bnei Netzarim community, close your eyes and think of Naomi Shemer singing "In the Nahal [Fighting Pioneer Youth] outpost in Sinai, my eyes see beautiful things." Suddenly, as in a dream, you will discover a wonderful village established by dozens of families whose homes were demolished and destroyed in Gush Katif.
I had the privilege this week of visiting a delegation of members of the Sha'arei Tzion Synagogue in Baltimore, let by Rabbi Moshe Hauer, a man with blazing faith in the great revival of the Jewish people in the Land of Israel and a proud Zionist in one of the world's largest Orthodox communities. The delegation included lawyers, doctors and business people, all who came on a journey to familiarize with and learn about the current reality in the state of Israel.
Winter winds greeted us as we drove along Israel's border with Hamas-ruled Gaza. The fine sand from the dunes rose from the bus wheels and presented us with a desert dance the entire drive south. Suddenly, as if in a vision, we saw massive greenhouses in which skilled agriculturalists grow peppers and zucchini, as well as broad fields growing carrots and potatoes designated for export.
The Bnei Netzarim community is similar to those of Neve and Shlomit, neighboring communities in the Halutzah Sand Dunes area. These dunes were offered to the Palestinian Authority in the framework of a potential land swap deal in 2005. The Palestinians rejected the offer on the grounds that since the dawn of creation, nothing could grow in this desert sand in Halutzah.
Lo and behold, the forces of will and resolve among Israeli farmers has turned the desert into a garden. The desolate valley of Achor (Joshua 7:24) has been turned into Petach Tikvah. It is difficult to understand from where good Jews, whose beautiful homes in Gush Katif were destroyed, drew the strength to start all over again without despair and without giving up. Only those who truly have an infinite love for the Land of Israel can rise like a phoenix from the ashes and rebuild their shattered lives.
Our group's guide, a member of the Bnei Netzarim community, told us that like other farmers, he gave his own greenhouses in Gush Katif to the Palestinian farmers who worked with him. They were happy to receive these highly productive greenhouses that the Jews left behind. For several years now, though, the Gazans have argued that their greenhouses never reach even a third of the productivity that they did under the Jews. Some of them claim that the Jews poisoned the soil of the greenhouses when they left and therefore the crops are not like they were in the past.
But the truth of the matter is really quite different. The Land of Israel proves time and again that the land in this country answers only to its returning builders. It does not recognize strangers. Since the return of the modern Zionist movement to the Land of Israel, the land's color has turned from brown to green. This green color has turned into a line, marking the border between Israel and its neighbors.
If there are still citizens in Israel who have not loosened their grip on this land, who are ready to start over again to redeem the land and return it to green, we are assured to have an eternal hold on our homeland.
Link:http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=1126
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