Personal thoughts on current events, cultural events, Israel, Judaism, Jewish/Israel innovations and life from a Jewish perspective - read into that what you may.

Tuesday, March 02, 2004

An Article on the Correct Persective of Jewish Belief and a Sense of Reality

By Moshe Feiglin

Fifty-six years ago the Jews decided to establish a state. America,
which initially
supported the idea, sensed the Arab opposition and retracted its
support. The entire
world stood aside and left the tiny Jewish country to its fate. They
all waited to see how
seven Arab armies would continue from the point where Rommel was halted
in El
Alamein, and add to the six million Jews murdered in Europe another six
hundred
thousand Jews in Eretz Israel. An embargo was imposed on the sales of
arms to the new
Jewish State which attempted to defend itself. Weapons purchased by
Jews in the US
(from Second World War surplus stocks) were confiscated in the port of
New Jersey
before they could be sent to Eretz Israel.

There had never before been such a desperate, dangerous, and hopeless
attempt to
establish a state. Only a few of the 600 Jews taken prisoner by the
Arabs in the War of
Independence remained alive. The Arabs made no effort to hide their
intentions
regarding the fate of the Jews during that war (or during the wars that
followed it).

They were sentenced to death with terrible cruelty. The leader of the
Arabs in Eretz
Israel, Haj Amin el Husseini (the same family) received training in
German
concentration camps for the construction of gas chambers. An area had
already been
allocated for the death camps to be constructed in Eretz Israel, in a
special place in the
Dotan Valley, not far from my home in Karnei Shomron where I am writing
this.

Against all the odds, the State of Israel arose and became a
well-established and
strong country in the region.

Over the last ten years the entire world, led by Israel itself, has
been attempting to
establish another state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean,
an Arab state
for the same Husseinis.

However, in contrast to the case of the Jews, this time the entire
world is
enthusiastically supporting the idea. Not merely supporting, but
raising funds for the
Arabs, and supplying weapons. The CIA is training the terrorists in
special camps.

They are given well equipped military bases, international recognition,
support from
the media, and ports and airports are being built for them.

Never before has an ethnic group of any kind received a country on such
a red carpet.

But, amazingly, the Arab state in Eretz Israel is not being
established.

It seems that reality in Eretz Israel has its own rules: it is directly
linked to the wishes
of the Creator. Whatever matches His wishes is realistic, even if the
entire world is
recruited in order to do the opposite. This is of course true at all
times, but in our time,
in Eretz Israel, the Holy Land, it is felt immediately.

Again and again the apparently "realistic" people are hitting our heads
against the
wall. They think that their brand of logic matches reality. For them
the country is only
a piece of real estate (as Rabin said about the Golan Heights), a
bargaining counter for
negotiations. Those who do not take the Creator's wishes into account,
are denying
reality, and the price of the denial by our leaders is unbearable.

We know that there is always hope for Israel. We know that our Father
in Heaven has
not returned us to our country for the third time in order to destroy
the renewed Jewish
presence in the land of the Patriarchs. The latest version of the
Return to Zion is not a
macabre joke of the Creator.

So why do we need Manhigut Yehudit? After all, everything will turn out
all right
anyway.

It is possible to regard belief as something divorced from reality.
Such a religious
attitude characterized the Jewish people through the exile until the
appearance of
Zionism, and it still characterizes important sections of it. This
disconnected attitude
is not a real Jewish one, and it led entire Jewish communities to
destruction during the
period of the Holocaust. Those Jews who believed that the Jewish people
would return
to their country in a miraculous way were right, but what a terrible
price was paid for
belief divorced from reality.

Authentic Jewish belief is not divorced from reality. On the contrary,
it defines reality
and obligates us to act in order to realize it.

Reality is the wishes of the Creator in His world. The reality is that
there is G-d, that
there is a nation indicating Him by its very existence, and that there
is a country
chosen by G-d for His nation only, and that only in it and from it the
sons of the
Creator can carry out their universal mission.

This is the reality, and our task is to expose it and realize it.

There is at the moment only one political body acting in coordination
with this reality.

This is Manhigut Yehudit. This correlation with reality is becoming
clear even to
those who were opposed to the movement in the beginning. Like a surfer
who rides
the wave instead of fighting it, Manhigut Yehudit correctly understands
the reality and
is advancing Israel and the Jewish people towards a safe shore.

Join in the wonderful challenge of Manhigut Yehudit and avoid
unnecessary suffering
for our people.

Be realistic, and join Manhigut Yehudit.