In the library at Mercaz haRav yeshiva
In Gaza, they celebrated by giving out candy, as they always do when something bad happens to Jews. No surprise.
The BBC reported the events (and NPR rebroadcasted the BBC report), making sure to include a statement that the yeshiva was “…the ideological cradle of the settler movement in the West Bank”, and that its graduates often serve in combat units in the IDF, thus ‘explaining’ the murders. No surprise.
Mahmoud Abbas condemned the attack as he condemns “all attacks that target civilians, whether they are Palestinians or Israelis”, although there are no attacks by Israel that ‘target’ Palestinian civilians. No surprise.
The UN security council was blocked from issuing a condemnation by Libya, which wants to also condemn Palestinian deaths in Gaza. Israel’s Ambassador Dan Gillerman said, correctly, “the UN has been infiltrated by terrorists”. No surprise.
The family of the “Israeli Arab” perpetrator (from East Jerusalem, like the Hebrew University bomber) put up flags of Hamas and Hezbollah around their house. No surprise.
And Condoleezza Rice called it “a terrorist attack which aims at foiling the peace efforts”. Also no surprise, and entirely wrong.
The view that there are ‘extremists’ who wish to stop the ‘peace process’ by terrorism who must be prevented from doing so — but not by Israel defending herself, because that would ‘feed the cycle’ — is nonsense.
There is no significant segment of the Palestinian population, and indeed, of the entire Arab world, which believes that there should be a Jewish state in the Mideast. None.
There are various factions whose views on what is the most effective way of destroying Israel differ. And they differ on when and how to use their best weapon, terrorism against civilians. The ‘peace process’ is an American creature in which one faction gets arms and financing which they will use to achieve their goal in their way, unless they are defeated by another faction who will take their resources to advance their (similar) goal.
Israel needs a government which will tell the US to go to hell. If the US feels that it has a better ally in the Mideast, so be it. Israel does not have to permit herself to be used as a sacrifice to solve American problems in Iraq.
Israel needs a government which will simply fight to protect its citizens, not tell them to sit still while their enemies — which the IDF could crush like the vermin that they are — sometimes randomly and sometimes carefully, pick their targets.
Technorati Tags: Israel, Merkaz haRav
Israel needs a government which adopts an uncompromising position on its own security- and permits no one including the United States preventing it from taking the actions required to do this. It has to act first and explain later, and not beg for permission to do whatever it does- or allow itself to be halted in the middle of what it has been doing.