Who Else? Haaretz Portrays Judaism as the Obstacle to Peace

...Doubtless, Burg’s message will resonate with those who, in another era, would have warmly endorsed Karl Marx’s maxim that “the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.” The fact that we are still having this same conversation is precisely what should alarm us.

Ben Cohen..
Commentary Magazine..
07 July '14..

Israel’s Haaretz newspaper will tomorrow (today) host the grandly-named “Israel Conference on Peace” in Tel Aviv. In a crammed schedule across twelve hours, an intriguing array of speakers–Israelis, Arabs, Europeans, and Americans, left-wingers and right-wingers–will address economic development, human rights, access to water, the prospects for a diplomatic breakthrough, and other critical aspects of this particular Middle Eastern conflict.

As is often the case with such events, one can tell a great deal about the nature of this conference through what’s not being discussed, as well as who isn’t in attendance. Despite Israel’s location in one of the most violent and illiberal regions of the world, the conference does not deem the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear program, or the conquest of vast swathes of Syria and Iraq by the Islamists of ISIS, as worthy of a separate session–evidently, all that is secondary to the fate of the Palestinians. However, since two prominent Palestinian leaders, Palestinian Authority negotiator Saeb Erekat and businessman Munib al Masri, have already pulled out of the conference, citing as a reason “respect” for the “feelings of the Palestinian people” in the light of “the developments of the last few days,” one might legitimately wonder whether the Palestinians share the conviction of the Israeli left that in times of crisis, dialogue is of paramount importance.

Yet to portray this conference as a dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians–as UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon does, in an op-ed that praises “Israeli civil society” for “its vibrancy in speaking out against incitement,” while ignoring the integral role that incitement plays in the articulation of Palestinian goals­–rather misses the point. There is another agenda here, one that centers upon promoting the idea among Jews that racism and bigotry are inherent in the notion of a “Jewish state.”

That is why, in the collection of articles assembled by Haaretz to accompany the conference, you will find Gideon Levy, one of the paper’s resident anti-Zionists, declaring preposterously that “a Jewish state means a racist, nationalistic state, meant for Jews only.” You will find an official Haaretz editorial insisting that the murderers of the Palestinian teenager, Mohammed Abu Khdeir, are the “descendants and builders of a culture of hate and vengeance that is nurtured and fertilized by the guides of ‘the Jewish state.’” And you will find a longer meditation on the same theme by Avraham Burg, the scion of a leading Zionist family and the former Speaker of the Knesset, who concludes that the root of Israel’s problem lies (as he describes it) in the anti-gentile culture that distinguishes the Jewish faith.

To anyone familiar with the historical trajectory of anti-Zionism, this linkage between an antagonism towards non-Jews that is underscored by Jewish religious beliefs with the very existence of a Jewish state is nothing new. In “Judaism Without Embellishment,” a notorious anti-Semitic screed published by the Soviet Union in 1963, Trofim Kichko asserted that “all of Judaic ideology is impregnated with narrow practicality, with greed, the love of money, and the spirit of egoism.” The Jewish state, Kichko went on, expresses these values through its discrimination against non-Jews.

(Video) Are #GazaUnderAttack images accurate? By BBC Trending

"...Over the past week the hashtag #GazaUnderAttack has been used hundreds of thousands of times, often to distribute pictures claiming to show the effects of Israeli airstrikes on Gaza" however...

BBC Trending..
07 July '14..
H/T Daled Amos..

Graphic images are being shared on social media to show how people have been affected by the renewed tensions between Israel and the Palestinians.


israSpin

Over the past week the hashtag #GazaUnderAttack has been used hundreds of thousands of times, often to distribute pictures claiming to show the effects of Israeli airstrikes on Gaza.

A #BBCtrending investigation has found that many of these images are not from the latest conflict and not even from Gaza. Some date as far back as 2009 and others are from conflicts in Syria and Iraq.

Produced by Neil Meads

Link: http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-28198622

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Check-it out!
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The question ‘Are you a Jew?’ should remain as a “teachable moment” for all of us

These types of attacks occurred throughout the Arab world before the establishment Israel and before a single Israeli settlement was ever built.

MK Shimon Ohayon..
Op-Ed Contributor/JPost..
06 July '14..

There are not-infrequent moments which perfectly illustrate what our long-standing conflict is all about. Many, especially around the world, accept the lazy assumption that it is mainly about land, occupation and settlements. However, for this to be true it would be a sine qua non that before Israel liberated Judea and Samaria in 1967, built a single community over the Green Line or even before the State of Israel was proclaimed, there was no conflict.

However, those with knowledge of history will be familiar with an ancient enmity expressed by radical adherents of Islam toward the Jewish People.

It is surely no coincidence that one of the most popular rallying calls at anti-Israel demonstrations around the world is “khayber khayber ya yahud, jaysh Muhammad saya’ūd!” (“remember the Khyber, oh Jews, the army of Mohammed is coming now”). This genocidal chant recalls perhaps the first massacre of Jews under Islam as the ancient Jewish community of Khayber (in present day Saudi Arabia) was almost wiped out by Muhammad and his first followers. Those that did survive had their land confiscated, were humiliated with oppressive laws and forced to pay the jizya tribute tax.

These enforcements, meant to hold the Jews collectively in an endless inferior status, set the standards for Jews who found themselves under Islam during the Arab conquest and occupation of the Middle East and North Africa over the next almost millennia and a half.

During this time, tens, if not hundreds of thousands of Jews were massacred across what became known as the “Arab world,” in places like Granada, Fez, Algiers, Damascus and Sana’a. All of this long before the rise of modern political Zionism.

In Hebron, the oldest Jewish community in the Land of Israel, during 1929, 67 Jews, many of whom were yeshiva students, were hacked to death, disemboweled and burned.

These types of attacks occurred throughout the Arab world long before the reestablishment of Jewish statehood in Israel, and decades before a single Israeli settlement was built.

Although it is hard to accept, the roots of the conflict are a negation of the rights of the Jewish People to equality and liberation from the yoke of Arab torment. The highest insult to the Islamist sensitivity was the reconstitution of Jewish sovereignty in the heart of dar al-islam, an area which was theologically assigned to Islam in perpetuity.

This is what fueled the wars against Israel and still fuels the hatred against Jews around the world. The war has never been against Israel per se, it has been against the Jewish People, and its major front is directed against the Jewish state.

A Culture of Kidnappings, Killings, and Conspiracy Theories

...Instead of catering to Palestinian sensibilities by, for instance, avoiding all mention of Jewish rights in Jerusalem, the West must start demanding that Palestinian leaders publicly acknowledge, and educate their children to know, some basic truths about both the historic Jewish kingdom and the modern Jewish state. For only when Palestinians replace their feverish conspiracy theories about Israel with the truth will they be capable of making peace with it.

Evelyn Gordon..
Commentary Magazine..
07 July '14..

The kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teens by Hamas, and the subsequent murder of an Arab teen by Jewish extremists, actually underscored two fundamental differences between Israeli and Palestinian society. COMMENTARY contributor Eugene Kontorovich and the Wall Street Journal’s Bret Stephens both addressed one difference–the societal response to such murders. But the second is no less important: Israeli police swiftly nabbed the suspected Jewish killers because Israelis are generally prepared to face facts, even when the facts point to a horrific revenge killing. Palestinians, in contrast, are so mired in conspiracy theories that many refused to even believe the kidnapping had occurred.

This view started from the very top: Palestinian Authority Foreign Minister Riyad al-Malki, for instance, said the kidnapping might be either “a childish game on Israel’s part, meant to attract attention,” or “part of a bigger game meant to turn the Israelis from aggressors into victims.” And as even Haaretz’s pro-Palestinian reporter Amira Hass acknowledged, many Palestinians agreed:

As long as the bodies hadn’t been found, a great many Palestinians believed no abduction had ever occurred. In their view, the kidnapping was fabricated to thwart the Palestinians’ national unity government, undo the achievements (from the Palestinian perspective) of the deal to free kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit, and harm Hamas.

This is simply mind-blowing. For 18 days, thousands of Israeli soldiers searched for the missing boys round the clock, as did numerous civilian volunteers. Mass prayer rallies were held throughout Israel. The kidnapping dominated both politics and the media; even major geopolitical events like the Islamic State’s takeover of swathes of Iraq got second billing. Yet “a great many Palestinians” found it perfectly reasonable to think this was all part of a massive conspiracy–that Israel’s political and military leaders, media outlets, and even the boys’ own families and friends had conspired to virtually shut down the country for weeks for the sole purpose of harassing the Palestinians.

Israel, the Left and the Making of David Into Goliath

...Mr. Muravchik provides a nuanced and illuminating guide to the ideological developments that have led many on the left to detest Israel. Yet those developments, without more, don't fully account for why many progressives turned against the Middle East's only liberal democracy while embracing Islamist terror groups as "social movements that are progressive," as the feminist theorist Judith Butler described Hamas and Hezbollah in 2006. The other main factor was a pathological self-hatred.

Sohrab Ahmari..
Wall Street Journal..
06 July '14..

The abduction in June of three Israeli teenagers by West Bank Islamists placed the world's top two human-rights organizations, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, in an awkward spot. Both groups are committed partisans of the anti-Israel cause, yet the kidnapping of minors called for some form of condemnation.

Amnesty on June 17 released a statement running to 19 paragraphs. Of these, only four could reasonably be construed as expressions of concern for the fate of the three teenagers, whose bodies Israeli authorities eventually discovered buried in shallow graves. The rest of the statement was devoted to castigating Israel for a litany abuses and to discouraging the Jewish state from defending itself.

HRW's response was more coldblooded. "Attending school at illegal settlement doesn't legitimize apparent kidnapping of #Israel teens," Kenneth Roth, HRW's executive director, tweeted on June 14. "They should be freed."

Make a decision. The nation will support you

...It is appropriate for the police to recall former Police Commander Alik Ron. Thanks to him the Galilee is still in the hands of Israel. At the same time, it is best to forget now the Orr Commission. The IDF and its soldiers are required to go back out and protect the citizens in the ordinary sense of the word. The campaign must also be on the ground, and the public should prepare itself for the victims. This also is not something new.

Dr. Aaron Lerner..
IMRA..
06 July '14..




Netanyahu is risking his leadership
Amnon Lord - Makor Rishon 6 July 2014
[IMRA translation with permission to translate and distribute from Amnon Lord]

If you are among the group of top security officials and passed the age of 50, the odds are good that you've seen everything. Or almost everything. The next round of violence, that you know for sure will come, is one that you have not yet seen. It is difficult to know what it will bring with it. But there is one sentence sitting on the shelf ready for such situations and it's the one that the veteran experts take with them to the studios: "You know how you go into war, but you do not know how to get out of it."

The news is that while the security elite veterans, especially those over age 60, have seen it all and are looking with an experienced weariness at the deterioration of the situation and know that nothing will change after this round, those lighting the Molotov cocktails on the Arab side remain always the same age. Not that they read the writings of the Minister of Finance, or Bob Dylan. But they are, "Young Forever". Between age 15 and 30. They are not tired like the former heads of Military Intelligence and the Shin Bet. And they throw Molotov cocktails, shoot and launch rockets like they were only born yesterday. They do not take into account the fact that the old timers have already seen it all since 1920.

So, you have to respond to them as if we haven't see anything. A quick and powerful strike in Gaza has become a necessity also to stem the flames on the outskirts of Jerusalem and Arab towns in the Triangle.

Prime Minister Netanyahu already entered a dangerous area of leadership. He is making a real effort to calm things down. He presented an ultimatum to Hamas, it is already difficult to remember when he gave it: cease-fire within 48 hours. That's exactly what Ehud Barak did as Prime Minister 14 years ago in the early days of the second intifada, when he presented an ultimatum to Arafat. He didn't honor his own ultimatum and his leadership disintegrated. The destruction and helplessness experienced by the Israeli public in September 2000 to the end of that year, with Barack at the top, the current defense minister serving as Deputy Chief of Staff and the current Chief of Staff Gantz serving as commander of IDF forces in Judea and Samaria, broke Barak's leadership and with it an entire group in the political system. This lesson must stand before Netanyahu and Ya'alon today.

Now the fire is burning along the seam lines within Israeli sovereignty. We do not see a rampage-style intifada in Hebron or other areas of Judea and Samaria. It is a sign that there is a guiding hand behind the riots...

The Chance That Jewish Terrorists Will Be Released for Peace?

...one can imagine the outrage from the Palestinian side if the Israeli government insisted on springing these Jewish terrorists as a “sweetener” to open peace talks. Apart from the new trauma of the victim’s family, the Palestinians could say this does not seem like a government serious about peace, if freeing murders is part of the peace process. That outrage is what Israel has been going through over and over as it released scores of savage murderers per Mahmoud Abbas’s request.

Eugene Kontorovich..
Commentary Magazine..
06 July '14..

The arrest of Israeli Jewish soccer hooligans for the murder of an Arab teenager in Jerusalem has unleashed a wave of cheap moral equivalency. Some of it is obviously pure demagoguery: those who call for the destruction of the houses of these suspects will not ask that for the house of the Israeli Arab arraigned yesterday for the terrorist murder of a 19-year old Israeli girl, Shelly Dadon, three months ago.

Several points should be borne in mind in considering Israel’s treatment of the accursed murders. To be clear, the soccer hooligans deserve, and are receiving, broad and unconditional condemnation–not because they do not help Israel, but because they are evil.

1) Prisoner swaps. We know Israel will never ask for these Jewish killers to be released as part of a peace deal. This is because Israel recoils with revulsion from their act. They are no one’s heroes.

Indeed, one can imagine the outrage from the Palestinian side if the Israeli government insisted on springing these Jewish terrorists as a “sweetener” to open peace talks. Apart from the new trauma of the victim’s family, the Palestinians could say this does not seem like a government serious about peace, if freeing murders is part of the peace process. That outrage is what Israel has been going through over and over as it released scores of savage murderers per Mahmoud Abbas’s request.

A useful initiative for Prime Minister Netanyahu now would be to offer to make a joint statement with Abbas, that neither would ever seek the release of either set of killers.

2) Pensions. Israel will never pay pensions to the killers. The prime minister will not take photos with them, or do anything other than condemn them. The glib questions making the rounds–will Israel knock down the Jewish terrorists’ houses–rather avoids the question that home demolitions are in part a way of offsetting the generous financial benefits Palestinian terrorists receive.

The Question Being Will Hamas Choose War?

...Hamas knows the price it will pay (and it seems unconcerned about the price the Gazan economy will pay), but the terrorist group’s own interests may lead it to keep going and ensure an Israeli attack. Portrayals on Al Jazeera of damage to people or structures in Gaza (where Hamas can easily pose fraudulent cameos of children, hospitals, schools under attack) to elicit the world’s pity, pictures of damage in Israel to stir the blood of their own terrorist ranks–the Hamas high command may be unable to resist. In which case Israel’s messages asking for restraint will be ignored, and next week will be a time of war.

Elliott Abrams..
Pressure Points..
04 July '14..

As the United States enters the July Fourth weekend, the Hamas leadership in Gaza faces a difficult and potentially important decision.

The last couple of years have hurt Hamas. The level of support it receives from Iran has declined, so it is short of cash. The Egyptian Army has closed the smuggling tunnels between Sinai and Gaza, further hurting the Gaza economy and Hamas’s tax revenues. The kidnappings in the West Bank last month turned into a disaster for Hamas: instead of having captives to trade for Israeli prisoners, Hamas was condemned universally for the crimes and suffered severe blows to its organization in both the West Bank and Gaza.

In response Hamas has started attacking Israel with rockets and missiles, something it had kept to a minimum and had prevented other terrorist groups from doing. Indeed the weeks when Israeli troops were searching desperately for the three young kidnap victims was precisely the moment when Hamas rocket attacks began to increase each day. Israel has now warned Hamas that the rockets must stop this weekend–or there will be a severe Israeli response. For Hamas, each option has costs and benefits. An Israeli attack could deprive Hamas of most of its stores of rockets and missiles, which are harder to replace now that the tunnels are largely closed. And at least some of the Hamas high command would likely fall to Israeli targeted attacks.

Equivalent to what?

...Ostensibly her piece was scrupulously symmetric. But that doesn’t make it fair. By choosing to write about the two mothers in the one feature Rudoren was implying a moral equivalency. The online editors helped tip this into an imbalance by running the photo of only one grieving mother under the headline. To find the photo of the woman whose son was kidnapped (and, we now know, killed) the online reader had to go into the accompanying slide show.

Liat Collins..
Columnist/JPost..
03 July '14..

I didn’t so much get dragged into an argument on moral equivalency this week as jump into it in a moment of weakness. It was one of those Facebook debates which remind me why I avoided joining the social media for so long. Perhaps I wasn’t so much weak as angry. I had read the same article earlier in the day and not been irritated enough to comment. But when a former colleague shared The New York Times piece by Jodi Rudoren titled “After West Bank Kidnapping, 2 Mothers Embody a Divide,” posting it on June 30, a few hours after the news that the bodies of the three teenagers for whom I had literally been praying had been found, I went from numb to incensed.

Along with most of the country, I had spent the previous 18 days consumed with worry for the fate of three teenagers I’d never met – Naftali Fraenkel, Gil-Ad Shaer and Eyal Yifrah, kidnapped and murdered as they hitched a lift home from their high school and yeshiva studies.

My response was actually aimed at my Facebook friend who’d described the feature as “excellent.”

I don’t want to become a member of the automatically bash-the-New-York-Times brigade – or the always-bash-any-journalist brigade for that matter. Even columnists I don’t generally like occasionally have something worth considering to say. Why deny myself a chance of discovering something interesting by ruling out everything they write? Rudoren’s piece gave voice to two mothers – Rachel Fraenkel, whose 16-year-old son Naftali was still missing at the time she was interviewed, and Aida Abdel Aziz Dudeen, whose 15-year-old son Muhammad was fatally shot when he joined a group hurling stones at IDF soldiers participating in the search for the three abducted teens in the village of Dura, near the spot where the kidnappers abandoned and burned the vehicle they had used.

“Ms. Fraenkel and Ms. Dudeen share little aside from deep religiosity and empty beds where their sons should be. But both have been thrust into conspicuous roles in their side-by-side societies, reflecting the conflict’s human costs,” wrote Rudoren.

She studiously tried to be fair to both women and came across as sympathetic to both mothers and sad at the loss and pain in the ongoing conflict.

And here lies the crux of the problem. Ostensibly her piece was scrupulously symmetric. But that doesn’t make it fair. By choosing to write about the two mothers in the one feature Rudoren was implying a moral equivalency. The online editors helped tip this into an imbalance by running the photo of only one grieving mother under the headline. To find the photo of the woman whose son was kidnapped (and, we now know, killed) the online reader had to go into the accompanying slide show.

Those rockets are about money, power, foreign aid and (naturally) corruption

...Arguments among Palestinian Arab factions over cash and the payment of salaries to people who don't have to show up to work and who plainly have nothing to do and are not expected to do it are a constant in this ongoing war. The 2013 report of the European Union's Court of Auditors referred to it and got almost no attention. The Issacharoff article will probably get the same treatment. This is not what the mainstream news media want us to be thinking about Arab/Israel conflict.

Frimet/Arnold Roth..
This Ongoing War..
05 July '14..

It was reported Thursday night that Israel had issued an ultimatum to Hamas in Gaza to halt the rocket fire or face a massive Israeli strike. The rockets have continued. Here's a Saturday night overview.

The rocket-men of Gaza have been pressing their attacks further and further into Israel today, aiming at Be'er Sheva for the first time since November 2012's Operation Pillar of Defense. At that time, Ashkelon, Ashdod, Tel Aviv and Jerusalem all absorbed Hamas rockets. In the course of eight days of fighting, the IDF carried out some 1,500 airstrikes against terrorist targets. Six Israelis and 167 Palestinians were killed.

There were three rocket attacks on the southern desert city tonight (Saturday evening). One incoming rocket was intercepted in mid-flight by the IDF's Iron Dome defense system. Two others crashed and exploded in open fields with no reports of casualties. Beersheba has a population of 200,000.

Times of Israel says shortly after Be'er Sheva was attacked, five additional rockets were fired towards the Hof Ashkelon and Eshkol regions. Three were intercepted by Iron Dome; two crashed and exploded in open areas. 

Ofakim (population 25,000) also came under rocket fire in another barrage today.

By nightfall, the tally of rockets and mortar shells was at least 20 and possibly higher. That's also how many were fired at Israel during Friday.

Times of Israel says: "With the attack on Beersheba, Israeli patience could now be wearing thin." 

Meanwhile a Hamas statement late tonight ["Hamas boasts that all Israeli cities are within its reach"] makes their public posture quite plain.

What's behind the Gaza rockets? According to Avi Issacharoff, who writes for Times of Israel today and has commented for several other media channels, it's about power and cash ["For Hamas, it’s all about the money", posted Saturday night July 5]. He quotes sources in Gaza who say the ongoing rocket fire from Gaza keeps happening because Hamas is seeking to achieve a public relations victory in the eyes of its Gazan public. They prefer to sidestep a larger conflict but they need to be seen as being unafraid of an escalation.

So where's the power? And what's happened to the cash?

(Continue)

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Check-it out!
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Documenting 18 days of impossible emotions, unity and love

...At Gil-ad's funeral, I wanted to tell him: Gil-ad, my dear beloved Gil-ad, we did everything we could. Your parents, your friends, your community, the Israel Defense Forces, that elusive thing called a people, we did everything we could.

Emily Amrousi..
Israel Hayom..
04 July '14..

On Sunday, before the Israeli security forces discovered the bodies of Gil-ad Shaer, Naftali Frenkel and Eyal Yifrach, a rally was held at Rabin Square to pray for their safe return. During the rally, suddenly there was quiet. Silence. A thin sound of women singing rose from the crowd. The words they sang were taken from a prayer for the ransoming of captives, which had become a sort of anthem in the weeks leading up to the service: "May the All-present have mercy upon them, and bring them forth from trouble to relief, from darkness to light, and from subjection to redemption."

The host of the rally, television and radio personality Avri Gilad, remained quiet for a long time. The spontaneous singing sounded like violins. It was at that moment that I realized that it didn't matter how this ordeal would end -- the people of Israel had won. That song made its way to the heavens.

The three boys, who were kidnapped on June 12 and murdered shortly after the abduction, were buried on Tuesday, but they had been laid to rest for the 18 days that preceded their funerals. The time that it took to break the news of their death was excruciating, but it was also a blessing. It gave the families time to prepare; it provided a large network of support for them, of thousands of arms hugging them. The layers were peeled back and underneath it became obvious that we are one people, with a single shared fate that put us here, and when one of us is taken from us, something in all of us dies. After too many years of being "citizens of Israel," we were reminded that it is okay to be the "people of Israel," too.

This was the first time, and hopefully the last time, in my life that I was so personally involved in the news. I saw the news from inside, and it rocked me to the core. Throughout my career as a journalist, I encountered many mothers who were in the midst of an emotional quake. I interviewed Aviva Schalit, the mother of Gilad Schalit, three years after her son was kidnapped by Hamas. I spoke with Miriam Peretz, who lost two of her sons in two separate wars. I sat with the mother of Ruth Fogel, who was brutally murdered along with four other members of her family at their home in Itamar. I sat with the only surviving member of the Attias family that was killed in a devastating car crash in Tiberias. I encountered buckets of tears and mountains of sorrow. But this time I was too close to the disaster zone. This time, it was my neighbors, Ophir and Bat-Galim Shaer, members of my community of Talmon, and sweet Gil-ad whom I've known since he was in the fourth grade.

On Monday, an hour after the news emerged that the bodies had been found, I stood outside the family home and could not bring myself to go in. It is near impossible for me to separate Emily the person from Emily the writer; writing is a second nature to me. At that intimate moment, when a family's world was collapsing, I felt that I could not allow myself to be in that house. I was afraid that I would collect pieces of the life around me, out of habit, and write about them in the paper, thus violating their trust. It was only later that I entered. And I won't write about that.

Tears over Shabbat candles

For two and a half weeks I was very close to the parents who, against their will, became symbols. They are impressive people, but not the kind one would imagine being the object of public admiration. Regular people like anyone else. The strength they discovered within themselves, amid the journey to rescue their son, was like something from another world. What I can say, however, is that they are exemplary parents. Here's one example that only a neighbor would know: They affix a page containing a Torah sermon or general knowledge to the boxes of breakfast cereal that their children eat, so that the children have something worthwhile to read while they eat their breakfast. They make sure to make a new page every day.

The terrorist murderers are not the only ones who bear guilt by Dr. Mordechai Kedar

...At the open grave of Naftali, Gil-ad and Eyal all controversies between architects and accusers, between the trustworthy and the opportunists, between those responsible and the victims faded. All of the Jewish people faces challenges that will not differentiate between citizens of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, between the righteous and the wicked, the laggards and the studious, the soldier and the citizen. Realizing the mistakes of the past, we must look ahead at the changing reality in our neighborhood and respond strongly and without pity to each threat, those from within and without. In the Middle East, peace comes only to those who are not defeated.

Dr. Mordechai Kedar..
israelnationalnews.com..
04 July '14..

An entire nation stood mourning at the open graves of Gil-ad, Eyal and Naftali, united in grief, aching and stunned at the youthful glow and purity, the loving hopes of parents shattered in an instant by bestial murderers who took advantage of the innocent boys' trust in them. The memory of the three will remain in our midst and the events of the past few weeks will accompany our nation in Israel and the Diaspora for a long, long time.

Accusing fingers are pointed at Hamas, and I believe that the Israeli government has proof of the movement's involvement, or that of its members, in the despicable crime. Except that I do not only accuse Hamas, just as I would not accuse a poisonous viper for biting a child whose father brought the snake home and freed him to roam about at will inside it. The snake is not guilty because it is in his nature to bite. The father is the guilty party, and everyone understands that.

In the case of the boys, the guilty party is also whoever brought the snake inside the house and allowed him freedom to move around undisturbed.

The problem began in the eighties, when the Coordinator of Activities in the Territories decided to encourage and fund "Almajama Alaslami" - The Islamic Center - despite warnings he received from Gaza that this was not a social welfare agency but a particularly violent sector of the Muslim Brotherhood. Towards the end of 1987, when the first Intifada broke out, the "Almajama" founders of Hamas encouraged the violence.

The guilt continues on to 1993 when President Bill Clinton pressured Israel to allow 415 leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, all of whom had been banished to Lebanon after the kidnapping-murder of Border Police soldier Nissim Toledano, to return.

Just as guilty are the members of Israeli and world media who presented these terrorist leaders as unfortunates suffering from the inclement weather of Marj-a-Zohor, where they remained living in tents so as to appeal to the world's mercy.

But the greatest guilt lies on the shoulders of those of us who thought, in 1993, that if they would bring back the PLO and arch-terrorist Yasser Arafat at its head to Israel, he would "take care of Hamas without the courts and without Betselem" (a reference to Yitzchak Rabin's remark that Arafat would destroy Hamas without leftist NGO's turning to the Supreme Court to limit his activities as they do to the IDF, ed.).

That's how they sold us the Oslo Accords. They knew perfectly well that Arafat was lying through his teeth, but they ignored all warnings, helping him create a terrorist network in the heart of the Land of Israel. In all of history there has never been a Trojan horse as dangerous and as massive as this one. They allowed him to bring an army of terrorists in the expectation that he - our greatest enemy - would ensure our security. They hid the recording of Arafat's 1994 speech in Johannesburg, South Africa, in which he admitted publicly that the Oslo Accords are nothing but a temporary peace - a "Hudibaya peace" with heretics to which Muslims are allowed to agree, until such time as the chance to destroy the heretics arrives.

We are guilty for building a system of security cooperation with a terrorist authority, that used it as an opportunity to learn about our intelligence capabilities. We gave them information about terrorists and they created a revolving door for them: play backgammon by day at the police station, plan and carry out terrorist operations at night.

We allowed the terrorist authority to run a school system whose books show "Falestin" without the State of Israel and did nothing about it.

We allowed Arafat to build a communications system - TV and radio - which he used to incite against us, talking openly about "victory". He inflamed his listeners with the slogan "a million shaheeds will march on Jerusalem" and we did not react.

"The operation is not over. We're not done yet."

"Lt. Col. Yuval, the commander of the elite Maglan unit, was going about his routine three weeks ago when he received news that three young boys were abducted.... "We're not done yet," he says. "We need to find the terrorists.""

Lilach Shoval..
Israel Hayom..
04 July '14..

Lt. Col. Yuval, the commander of the Israel Defense Forces' Maglan special forces unit, was just going about his day on Friday, June 13, when he received news that three young boys had been abducted.

"I heard about the abduction at the same time the rest of the army heard about it," the 36-year-old officer said. Two days after the discovery of the bodies of Gil-ad Shaer, Eyal Yifrach and Naftali Frenkel, I sat down with Yuval not far from where the three's remains were found.

"Once word reached the army, units were deployed at the speed of light. Word got out to everyone very quickly, all the way down to the last soldier. Since the army follows orders, we were initially operating in 30-minute intervals. We were told to follow the Hannibal Protocol so not to waste time," he said, referring to the military's directive regarding the potential abduction of Israeli soldiers by enemy forces.

On his own volition, Yuval, who has been commanding Maglan for just two months, decided to recall all of the troops who were on weekend leave. "I was the one who made that decision because I'm quite familiar with these kinds of incidents based on past experience," he said. "We stopped our training sessions. We stopped everything that we were doing. We brought everyone in. We suspended all special operations in southern and the northern Israel. We focused solely on this incident because we understood that you require a great deal of strength for whatever mission comes along."

The unit quickly made its way to the Hebron area "to get a better understanding of what the unit could do to help out," he continued. "I was told that the working assumption was that the three were kidnapped. There were still no indication from the [Palestinian] side that this was an abduction, or any other kind of hostile act. As the day went on, initial indications became focused and by Friday afternoon-early evening, we realized that this was serious

"From the early morning hours, this proved to be an extensive operation. The army amassed forces on the ground to canvass the area, apprehend suspects, and do whatever else was necessary. We knew that the time factor was critical. We knew from past experience that mounting a rapid response would have a significant impact on our search for the teens and the hopes that we would find them alive."

From that moment on and for 18 days, Maglan soldiers participated in dozens of raids and numerous searches on multiple fronts.

"We worked 24 hours a day, seven days a week, nonstop," Yuval said. "We were working like crazy, in double shifts. Weekend leaves were cancelled, the soldiers didn't go home and no one complained. I didn't go home for 28 days. I missed my children's end-of-the-school-year parties. My wife told me, 'Don't come back until you bring those boys home.'

Any Guesses to When the Media Cares About Incitement?

...To be fair to the Times, part of the focus on Israeli social media habits was driven by the fact that Justice Minister Tzipi Livni decided to turn this into an issue of national—and now international—concern. Perhaps she will be successful in these efforts to ensure Israelis only use social media for politically correct purposes from now on. Just so long as no one thinks that the next time Israelis are kidnapped or killed, there won’t still be rejoicing on the Facebook pages and Twitter feeds of the other side.

Tom Wilson..
Commentary Magazine..
03 July '14..

After several weeks out of the headlines, Israelis and Palestinians are regrettably back at the forefront of Middle East news once again. But during that brief ISIS-led interim the international media didn’t forget its line on Israel, and when three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped in the West Bank reporters quickly became preoccupied with bemoaning Israeli heavy-handedness during the search operation. It was, however, only once confirmation came that the three victims had been murdered that the gloves really came off and a narrative emerged that aggressively condemned all potential Israeli responses, rather than reflecting upon those who kidnap and kill Israelis in the first place, or upon wider Palestinian attitudes that celebrated these acts.

Yesterday the New York Times devoted an entire piece to the apparently small minority of Israelis who have been making anti-Arab postings over social media; we live in strange times when such things constitute news. Only at the very bottom of the page was there any mention of the Tag Meir coexistence rally that Israelis had organized in Jerusalem. And as the British media watchdog CIF Watch noted, the British media gave universal coverage to the perhaps 200 or so Israelis involved in the scuffles with police in Jerusalem following the funerals of the three teenagers, while remaining completely silent about the 1,000 who turned out for the Tag Meir rally the following day. The mood at that gathering was one of total condemnation of the recent killing of an Arab teenager in East Jerusalem, in what has been widely interpreted as a revenge attack. And this sentiment would appear to be far more reflective of the Israeli mainstream. Still, it also seems fair to ask if it is conceivable that a similar rally condemning the killing of the three Israeli teens could ever have been held in Ramallah? Indeed, had the Times cared to look for it, they would have found ample material showing Palestinians celebrating the kidnapping of the Israelis.

Yet even before the anti-Arab disturbances in Jerusalem or the ill-judged Facebook postings by young Israelis responding to news about the murders, parts of the press were already condemning Israel in advance. The unforgiving attitude was particularly palpable at the BBC where, in the same breath that commentators expressed disapproval at the killings, they quickly moved onto speculating about what kind of terrible and disproportionate revenge the Israeli government would inflict on the Palestinians next. The focus was less about the coldblooded murder of three Israeli boys and more concerned with criticising Israel for a wild policy of retaliation that hadn’t even happened yet. Indeed, a paralyzed Israeli cabinet still hasn’t made any firm statement on what the response will be, something which has clearly stoked anger among those sections of the Israeli public already incited by the murders.

When the news about the discovery of the bodies first broke, large numbers began spontaneously gathering at solemn candlelit vigils in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. From what I could see it was pictures of these gatherings, not calls for Arab blood, that were dominating Israeli social media sites. So I was surprised when a BBC correspondent reporting from the field where the bodies had just been found spoke not of the vigils but instead about a small “angry right-wing” protest reportedly taking place nearby.

You can continue building your army if you stop shooting?

...So please accept our "quiet for quiet" offer and let us continue to indefinitely postpone our actually addressing the situation.

Dr. Aaron Lerner..
IMRA..
03 July '14..

Observation: Israel's Message to Hamas: You can continue building your army if you stop shooting

"Now we are preparing for two possibilities in the south: The first is that the firing at our communities will stop and then our operations will stop as well and the quiet that prevailed in the south after Operation Pillar of Defense will continue. The second possibility is that the firing at our communities in the south will continue and then the reinforcement forces that are located in the field will act forcefully. The security of our citizens comes first."
PM Netanyahu's Remarks at the US Embassy Fourth of July Celebration 3 July 2014

Let me spell out what this message to Hamas is actually saying:

Dear Hamas leadership,

If you stop shooting - at least stop shooting much - then we will leave you alone so that you can continue to build up your offensive capabilities.

We call this our "quiet for quiet" policy.

And we don't have to tell you just how much the "quiet for quiet" policy has been a gift for Hamas until now.

When we first began the "quiet for quiet policy" there were only very primitive launching devices in the Gaza Strip with extremely limited range and payload.

At the time we adopted the "quiet for quiet" policy because we didn't want to invest the military effort required to clear out the Gaza Strip of the terror threat as we did in the massive operation we carried out in the West Bank and we wanted to keep life bearable within the area that was within range of attacks from the Gaza Strip.

Thanks to Israel's "quiet for quiet", there are now weapons factories in the Gaza Strip producing rockets and missiles that can reach Tel Aviv and beyond.

Let's Consider What a Proportionate Response Would Look Like

“If Hamas launches three crudely-fashioned rockets into Israel, should the Israeli government respond with three equally-crude rockets? If three Israeli Defense Forces are kidnapped by Hezbollah, should the IDF respond by kidnapping an equal number of Hezbollah foot-soldiers?”

Abe Greenwald..
Commentary Magazine..
01 July '14..




In a 2009 COMMENTARY article on Israeli use of force, Ruth R. Wisse wrote:

“Would the international community truly prefer a proportionate or equal response?” asked Alan Richarz, a Toyko-based writer, in the Christian Science Monitor. “If Hamas launches three crudely-fashioned rockets into Israel, should the Israeli government respond with three equally-crude rockets? If three Israeli Defense Forces are kidnapped by Hezbollah, should the IDF respond by kidnapping an equal number of Hezbollah foot-soldiers?”

Grimly, the present moment offers an even clearer elucidation of the point: If Hamas slaughters three innocent Israeli teenagers, should the IDF sharpen their knives and find three innocent Palestinian teenagers? Indeed that would be a proportionate use of force. It would also be monstrous.

Latest Blood Libel Against Israel From the Washington Post

...The Times still may be downplaying the lethal ferocity of Palestinians tangling with Israeli security forces – as it euphemistically waters down the extent of Palestinian violence to merely “confronted them.” But at least readers are informed that Israelis aren’t just shooting down Palestinians with no reason or provocation whatever, as Eglash does in the Post.

Leo Rennert..
American Thinker..
03 July '14..

Over the centuries, Jews have been targeted with inciteful falsehoods that nurtured outbreaks of virulent anti-Semitism and pogroms. Jews often have been pictured as bloody killers of innocent Gentiles. Such libels have become all too familiar, including most recently in the pages of the Washington Post.

The latest example can be found in the July 2 edition, in an article by Jerusalem correspondent Ruth Eglash about the funerals of three Israeli teens kidnapped and murdered by two suspected Hamas fanatics (“Israelis gather to lay 3 slain teens to rest,” page A9).

In a foul attempt to inject equivalence of guilt between Israelis and Palestinians, Eglash writes in her third paragraph that “Israeli forces have arrested nearly 400 alleged terror operatives and killed at least five Palestinians during a more than two-week search” for the teens.

The clear impression is that on the lethal scorecard of spilled blood, it’s 3 Israelis and at least 5 Palestinians.

There isn’t a word to distinguish the grisly circumstances of three Jewish innocents from the brutal Palestinians who died during stone-throwing attacks and other violent tactics against Israelis.

All Eglash tells readers is that Israeli forces “killed at least five Palestinians.” Were Israeli forces provoked or not? Were they involved in life-threatening situations? Or were they just trigger-happy for no good reason? Eglash won’t tell us. But she certainly opens the way for readers to think the worst of Israeli forces. Especially since Eglash put them on a par with the Palestinian killers of the three Israeli teens.

No Excuses. Period

The irony? If the Palestinians are the uncontrollable savages that their leadership makes them out to be, how can they possibly expect to ever be able to have their own state?

Dr. Aaron Lerner..
IMRA Weekly Commentary..
02 July '14..





People who engage in criminal activity are just that.

Criminals.

And they remain criminals even if they are spurred to engage in this criminal activity by frustration, desire for revenge, or the "occupation".

Yes.

It is criminal activity to murder.

It is criminal activity to assault someone.

It is criminal activity to throw rocks at people and vehicles.

It is criminal activity to wantonly destroy public property.

People who engage in criminal activity are criminals.

And they should be prosecuted and punished for that criminal activity.

There is no place for a free pass on this.

To repeat: they remain criminals even if they are spurred to engage in this criminal activity by frustration, desire for revenge, or the "occupation".

And that. Unfortunately. Is the chasm between how we and how the Palestinian leadership sees the world.

For Their Modeling Faith and Love, We Are in Their Debt

...They gave Israelis a model for religious commitment, national unity and brotherly love not only in times of crisis but also in everyday life; throughout all regular seasons of our rough-and-tumble spiritual-social-political life. For this, we are in their debt.

David M. Weinberg..
A Citadel Defending Zion..
02 July '14..

So it turns out that the families of Naftali Fraenkel, Gilad Shaer and Eyal Yifrach knew almost from the beginning of this ordeal that one or two of the three boys were likely to have been killed in the course of the kidnapping on June 12.

There were gunshots on the recording of the SOS call made by Gilad, which was played for the families. There were bullet casings and blood found in the burnt shell of the getaway car, and the families were told this too.

They were told that the lack of demands from the kidnappers was a sign that the boys might no longer be alive.

And yet all three families exuded optimism, faith and positive energy for 18 long days. They went before camera and after camera, reporter after reporter, concert after concert, and prayer assembly after prayer assembly, and asserted their confidence that just a bit more effort could bring a positive result. They met every youth group, every foreign diplomat, every UN assembly, every IDF commander they could, thanking everybody for their efforts, in their upbeat, affirming and unassuming way.

What amazing people! What noble people! How they raised the spirits of an entire nation; united an entire nation; comforted an entire nation!

They taught us how to harness all our temporal powers to drive towards a national goal in unison. They taught us all what it means to believe in powers greater than our own.

Perhaps the most profound thought uttered over the past three weeks was expressed by Racheli Fraenkel at the Western Wall last week. In a clip shown on Israeli television, and seen I think by just about every person in this country, Mrs. Fraenkel is approached at the Wall by a group of very young girls who want to wish her well.

Instead, Mrs. Fraenkel bends down to them and offers theological reassurance and warm wisdom. “I want you to promise me,” she softly says, “that no matter what happens, you won’t be crushed or broken. That you won’t lose faith. After all, we must remember that G-d isn’t our ‘employee.’ He doesn’t always do as we wish.”

With these crushingly humble words, Racheli Fraenkel captured the hearts of an entire nation. Her words resounded through every living room and every workplace. People repeated them, reflected upon them, debated them. Agree or disagree, nobody could deny her strength of spirit. Nobody could avoid being awestruck at her clear-sightedness; at her breathtaking display of faith within realism.

A Real Failure of Imagination

...Making good policy requires an ability to imagine the likely consequences of both your own actions and those of other players. And defense professionals, at least in Israel, seem to be sadly lacking in that ability.

Evelyn Gordon..
Commentary Magazine..
02 July '14..

It’s ironic that Amos Yadlin expounded his proposal for a unilateral Israeli withdrawal from much of the West Bank just one day before the bodies of three kidnapped Israeli teens were found there. Yadlin is one of Israel’s most respected former senior defense officials; aside from his record as a senior air force officer and head of Military Intelligence, he has scrupulously eschewed hyperbolic partisan attacks on Israel’s political leadership of the kind that have disenchanted mainstream Israelis with many of his colleagues. Yet he appears to share another of his colleagues’ fatal flaws–a complete inability to imagine that the security status quo could ever change.

Yadlin’s proposal has many problems; David M. Weinberg of the Begin-Sadat Center ably analyzed several of them yesterday’s Israel Hayom. But the one I found most astounding was one Weinberg didn’t address: Yadlin’s assertion that, having defeated terror, Israel could now afford to quit much of the West Bank.

It’s certainly true that Israel defeated the second intifada (2000-05), and some of the tactics it used, like the security barrier, would remain in place under a partial pullout like Yadlin proposes. But Israel’s most important counterterrorism tactic was boots on the ground: In 2002, the Israel Defense Forces effectively reoccupied most of the areas vacated over the previous decade under the Oslo Accords, and they never really left again. This enabled Israel to do the daily grunt work of counterterrorism: arresting suspects, interrogating them for leads, seizing weapons stockpiles, and so forth. As I’ve explained before, this ongoing effort is what ultimately dried up a supply of recruits that once looked limitless: Only when the likelihood of being arrested or killed became too high did terror become an unattractive proposition to most Palestinians.

Thus the minute the IDF departs, so will the crucial factor that has restrained terror over the last decade. And terrorist organizations will respond by escalating their activity. After all, as the Palestinians’ enthusiastic support for the teens’ abduction amply shows, their motivation to commit attacks hasn’t declined; what has declined is only their ability to do so.

But once Israel has withdrawn fully from the territory–not a mere troop redeployment as in the 1990s, but a full-scale evacuation, including the dismantling of settlements–it will be powerless to launch the kind of prolonged counterterrorism operations needed to suppress renewed terror: Anything more than brief incursions will become politically untenable, just as it has in evacuated Gaza.

Yet Yadlin appears incapable of imagining a recurrence of the second intifada’s deadly terror, which killed more than 1,000 Israelis, most of them civilians. As far as he’s concerned, we’ve defeated terror; now it’s safe to withdraw.

Heeding the last bit of advice - Count to 10, and act in full force

...We need courageous leadership to look at the big picture and understand that the terrorist armies and states around us are an existential threat. The answer is hard and painful to hear. There, without responding tempestuously, without making empty promises and threats, we have no choice but to eliminate Hamas in Gaza, from its leadership down to the very last of its terrorists. No pinpoint assassinations, no increasing our deterrence, no special operation -- a war over our right to exist.

Zvika Fogel..
Israel Hayom..
02 July '14..

I have never received so much advice, directly or indirectly. The bombardment of counsel did not pass me over. "Control your temper," "Don't make decisions while your blood is still boiling," "Show restraint," "Count to 10," were just some of the suggestions the pundits have showered upon us. I decided to answer the challenge, and at least heed the last bit of advice by counting to 10:

1. Three yeshiva students, who were on their way home after a day of classes, paid the price for not internalizing, not understanding and willfully ignoring the need to truly acknowledge the vicious enemy, which has declared its goal of destroying us.

2. Two weeks ago, a 12-year-old boy, who on his first day of summer break joined his father at work on the Golan Heights, was killed by a missile fired from Syrian territory. This followed dozens of shooting incidents of various types toward communities, civilians and soldiers in that sector.

3. Since Operation Pillar of Defense in Gaza in 2012, more than 180 rockets have been fired at Israel, an average of 10 per month. Deterrence was not achieved.

4. In that time, 10 rockets have been fired at Israel from Sinai. One soldier and one civilian have been killed in attacks perpetrated by global jihadists and al-Qaida. Sinai has become a breeding ground and safe haven for vagabond terrorist groups, motivated by a religious ideology resolutely aimed at harming us.

5. The hundreds of underground smuggling tunnels connecting Sinai to Gaza and the dozens of vessels and arms shipments are a testament to the financial aid and encouragement Hamas and Hezbollah receive from Arab states that support the extermination of Israel.

Confronting evil - Crush it, rather than surrender to it

...There are many lessons to be learned from the frightful kidnapping, ranging from tactical to strategic. But perhaps the most important of all is that we finally realize what we are up against: an enemy for whom cruelty is a virtue rather than a vice. The Palestinians are merely the latest incarnation of those who throughout history have sought our destruction. Like those who preceded them, they too shall fail.

Michael Freund..
Pundicity/JPost..
02 July '14..

The announcement on Monday night that the three Israeli teenagers kidnapped by Palestinian terrorists had been found dead near Hebron sent shockwaves throughout the nation.

After 18 days of Psalms and prayers, tears and tribulations, the people of Israel received a jarring reminder regarding the undeniable iniquity of our enemies.

There are those who still refuse to acknowledge this cold, hard truth, and instead choose to cling to futile hopes of Palestinian sincerity regarding reconciliation.

But the abduction and brutal murder of Eyal Yifrah, Gil-Ad Shaer and Naftali Fraenkel by Palestinians should lay to rest once and for all any such delusions.

To kidnap and slaughter three innocent teens is an act of pure evil. To put their families through the emotional hell of heart-rending uncertainty and anxiety is a feat of sheer wickedness. And to celebrate the incident, as Palestinians have been doing since it occurred, is indicative of a deep-seated depravity, one that salutes savagery and applauds barbarism.

Consider, for example, the interview with the mother of one of the Palestinian kidnappers, Amer Abu Eisha, that was broadcast Sunday night on Channel 10. After denying that her son was involved, Abu Eisha's mother proceeded to express delight in the possibility that he might actually have carried out such an atrocity.

"They're throwing the guilt on him by accusing him of kidnapping," she said, adding that, "If he truly did it, I'll be proud of him till my final day."

What can one possibly say in the face of such twisted immorality? There were no condemnations by Palestinian officials or commentators of the kidnapper's mother or her warped words, no expressions of shock or disgust that a human being could actually take pride in such malevolence.

Begging an answer. If coexistence is impossible, then what?

...So if I am crazy, here is a suggestion: explain to me how you would deal with the situation. Do you want the Jewish people to survive? If so, do you agree that we can’t give up control of the territories? If so, do you think we can coexist with the Arabs?

Vic Rosenthal..
Abu Yehuda..
01 July '14..

(While not necessarily agreeing with all of Vic's assessment, the question clearly requires more than passing attention. Y.)

Today (Tues.) we found out that the three boys, Eyal, Gilad and Naftali, were murdered shortly after their abduction. I’m sure we’ll hear the full story, in horrifying detail, at some point.

I can’t imagine how the families must feel. Or rather, I can imagine it but I am certain that their actual experience must be far worse than what I can imagine.

There have been so many terrorist murders, so many murders of children. The Ma’alot massacre, The bus of blood, the Haran family, the Sbarro bombing, the Dolphinarium, the Fogel family. The Palestinians and their supporters tell you it is “resistance to occupation” but in fact it is pure evil, hate made substance. Hate made flesh.

The Left says that it is our fault that they are doing these things because we are not giving them what they want. But what if what they want is to kill us?

Societies protect themselves against murderous criminals by killing or imprisoning them in order to separate them from normal society.

“If a man comes to kill you, rise up and kill him first.” Good advice, but how do we follow it when a whole culture has been created out of the idea that they should kill us?

The Palestinian people have demonstrated by the whole-hearted support shown for the kidnappers, the murderers, that they are satisfied with the path they have taken, the path of hate.

The problem is not a few extremists or criminals or terrorists who need to be killed or captured. The problem is a culture whose essence is to negate ours. These acts will not stop until the culture changes or dies out, or we completely separate ourselves from it. I don’t think our society can tolerate living as a target of terrorism forever.

The message needs to be clear and convincing

...The Israeli government must make courageous decisions in order to end the campaign of murder undertaken by the haters of Israel. We came back to the land of Israel so that Jewish blood would never again be forfeit. This is the leadership's duty toward the citizens of the country, toward the victims of terror and the thousands of years of Jewish history.

Dr. Haim Shine..
Israel Hayom..
01 July '14..

All of Israel was overcome by grief and pain after receiving the news that the bodies of Eyal Yifrach, Gil-ad Shaer and Naftali Frenkel had been found. An entire people, normally divided, identified with the cries of the mothers, and with their dignity and courage in hope and prayer. These have been rare days of unity, which rose from the ancient spring of mutual assurance. Who can know the pain in a mother's heart after losing a child, and who can understand the soul of a father weeping for his son, taken as a sacrifice on the altar of Israel's resurrection in its land.

The War of Independence is still not over; we must still pay the price of freedom. These pure and innocent boys join the multitude of Jews who gave their lives for our right to live as free people in our land.

After 2,000 years, we returned from an extended and terribly costly exile. We believed the return to Zion would put an end to the bloodshed that had become our lot on foreign soil. We hope that our matriarch Rachel would finally be able to stop crying for her lost sons. Yet we are still unable to rest in tranquility. For many years we have had to fight in the city, the village, at home and on the front lines against enemies and evil-wishers that have risen against us.

The people of Israel must contend with people who lack humanity. The difference between them and predatory animals is miniscule at best, because animals usually avoid killing their own species; but our enemies are willing to slaughter anything in their path for the sake of glorifying the sword and their brutal religion. Throughout the Middle East, the sword of God spills blood without pause.

No, There is No ‘Cycle of Violence’

...The sad reality, as we have tragically learned once again, is that the differences between the Palestinian and the Israeli societies, as well as the contrasting basic goals and aspirations, are fundamental. Attempts to erase these differences by repeating simplistic mantras based on invented “cycles of revenge” are tragically misleading, and worse. They are brutally immoral.

Gerald M. Steinberg..
Times of Israel..
01 July '14..

Three Israeli teenagers, Naftali Fraenkel, Gil-ad Shaar and Eyal Yifrach, were kidnapped and murdered in cold blood on their way home from school only because they were Israeli Jews. Their Palestinian Arab murderers, as identified by Israel, did not know their victims and they did not care. The objective was to attack some hated Israelis, and perhaps exchange them or their bodies for jailed murderers. Any random Jews would do.

So it has been for some 100 years in this long war against Jewish national sovereignty and equality among the nations. Long before the 1967 war and the “occupation” provided an excuse for hate and murder, such acts of inhuman violence were common. In 1929, when the Jewish community of Hebron was massacred (ethnically cleansed in modern parlance), there was no cycle of violence — this was an entirely unilateral act.

In November 1947, when all Arab leaders rejected the minimalist UN Partition Plan and launched a wave of mass terror against the Jewish community, there was no cycle. And the 1967 war, which led to the subsequent “occupation,” was triggered by Nasser’s renewed effort to destroy the Jewish state, and not part of an action-reaction cycle.

Similarly, today, there is no “cycle of revenge,” as many journalists, diplomats and self-proclaimed human rights activists often claim. A cycle means symmetry, automatic tit-for-tat, mindless action and reaction, in which all sides, and none, can be held morally responsible.

But attack and defense, terror and counter-terror, incitement and fear are not symmetric or morally equivalent. When diplomats and academics repeat the “cycle” analogy, and meekly issues calls “to both parties to exercise restraint,” as the European Union, the UN and even the US did after the kidnapping, they are endorsing a dangerous fiction. When journalists invent an artificial balance and an immoral equivalence between attacker and victim, or an NGO with European and US taxpayer funds equates the mother of a Palestinian terrorist with the mothers of Gilad, Naftali, and Eyal, this is fundamentally immoral.

Good Question, Yes? Where are the Palestinian Mothers?

...As for the Palestinians and their inveterate sympathizers in the West, perhaps they should note that a culture that too often openly celebrates martyrdom and murder is not fit for statehood, and that making excuses for that culture only makes it more unfit. Postwar Germany put itself through a process of moral rehabilitation that began with a recognition of what it had done. Palestinians who want a state should do the same, starting with the mothers.

Bret Stephens..
Wall Street Journal..
30 June '14..

In March 2004 a Palestinian teenager named Hussam Abdo was spotted by Israeli soldiers behaving suspiciously as he approached the Hawara checkpoint in the West Bank. Ordered at gunpoint to raise his sweater, the startled boy exposed a suicide vest loaded with nearly 20 pounds of explosives and metal scraps, constructed to maximize carnage. A video taken by a journalist at the checkpoint captured the scene as Abdo was given scissors to cut himself free of the vest, which had been strapped tight to his body in the expectation that it wouldn't have to come off. He's been in an Israeli prison ever since.



Abdo provided a portrait of a suicide bomber as a young man. He had an intellectual disability. He was bullied by classmates who called him "the ugly dwarf." He came from a comparatively well-off family. He had been lured into the bombing only the night before, with the promise of sex in the afterlife. His family was outraged that he had been recruited for martyrdom.

"I blame those who gave him the explosive belt," his mother, Tamam, told the Jerusalem Post, of which I was then the editor. "He's a small child who can't even look after himself."

Yet asked how she would have felt if her son had been a bit older, she added this: "If he was over 18, that would have been possible, and I might have even encouraged him to do it." In the West, most mothers would be relieved if their children merely refrained from getting a bad tattoo before turning 18.

***

I've often thought about Mrs. Abdo, and I'm thinking about her today on the news that the bodies of three Jewish teenagers, kidnapped on June 12, have been found near the city of Hebron "under a pile of rocks in an open field," as an Israeli military spokesman put it. Eyal Yifrach, 19, Gilad Shaar, 16, and Naftali Fraenkel, 16, had their whole lives ahead of them. The lives of their families will forever be wounded, or crippled, by heartbreak.

What about their killers? The Israeli government has identified two prime suspects, Amer Abu Aysha, 33, and Marwan Qawasmeh, 29, both of them Hamas activists. They are entitled to a presumption of innocence. Less innocent was the view offered by Mr. Abu Aysha's mother.

"They're throwing the guilt on him by accusing him of kidnapping," she told Israel's Channel 10 news. "If he did the kidnapping, I'll be proud of him."

A Moment for “Restraint” Against Hamas?

...It may be that Israel’s options are limited by political realities and Hamas’s ability to withstand attacks. But no matter what choices Netanyahu makes, “restraint” will be merely an invitation for Hamas to repeat this crime again in the future.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary Magazine..
30 June '14..

In a sentiment that was echoed across the Israeli political spectrum, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed today that “Hamas will pay” for the murders of three Israeli teenagers kidnapped two weeks ago. What exactly Netanyahu meant by this phrase isn’t yet known. But given the track record of both Israel and the Palestinians and the efforts by President Obama to head off any tough action by Netanyahu, the leaders of the terror group may not exactly be shaking in their boots.

In the wake of the discovery of the victims’ bodies, anger against the Islamist terror group is widely felt and it is likely that Netanyahu’s government will have wide political leeway to hit Hamas hard, both in the West Bank and Gaza. But the question facing Israel is not so much whether to launch air strikes at Hamas headquarters or to round up even more of their supporters. Rather, it is whether if, after an interval of a week or two, Hamas is still functioning and is still part of the ruling coalition of the Palestinian Authority. If, after absorbing a pounding from the Israeli army, the Islamist movement’s leadership can claim that it not only shed more Jewish blood but also survived another Israeli counterattack, then despite all of the fearsome rhetoric coming out of Jerusalem, Hamas will have won.

President Obama’s condemnation of the deaths of the three Israeli teens was appropriate but it was accompanied by the standard call for “all sides to exercise restraint.” Which is to say that the U.S. is making it clear to the Israelis that anything beyond a minimal retaliation that will not make a difference will be condemned as worsening the situation. But, like all past efforts to enforce restraint on Israel, such counsel merely ensures that this tragedy will be played out again and again.

It must be understood that while the gruesome crime committed against three teenagers may damage Hamas’s already shaky reputation in the West, the willingness of the group to commit this atrocity may increase its popularity among Palestinians. In the last year, Hamas’s political stock has fallen as the cash shortfall caused by its rift with Iran and the closing of smuggling tunnels to Egypt undermined its ability to maintain local support. Where once it was seen as a viable alternative to the Fatah kleptocracy that rules over the West Bank, it is now seen as merely an Islamist version of the same corrupt model. Its willingness to maintain a rough cease-fire with Israel along the border with Gaza also robbed it of its mantle as the standard-bearer of the struggle against the Jewish state. It was for these reasons that it was forced to sign a unity agreement with Abbas’s Fatah.

Should a determined Israeli offensive take out some of its leadership and undermine its capacity to function, perhaps that decline will continue. But Hamas and its backers also know that violence has always been the main factor legitimizing Palestinian political parties. Should the kidnapping lead to another round of violence in which Hamas could portray itself as the true defender of Palestinian honor, then the incident could give it a new lease on life even as its members duck for cover.