One need not be a pollster to guage the mood of most Jews who reside in the Jewish State today. The anxiety and stress mirrored on the faces of passersby hurrying to and fro in their daily activities, or nervously glancing at fellow bus travellers to discern if an Arab terrorist is among us clearly speaks volumes.



What can be done to alter this depressing matzav (situation) that has struck fear in the hearts and minds of formerly ?fearless? Israelis and weakened the life line of Israel's tourist industry? This is the overriding question that continues to generate hours of debate by members of the Knesset, as well grassroots citizens.



Seemingly, every effort to solve and put an end to these critical problems has been unsuccessful. Despite a myriad of valiant operations by the Israel Defense Forces to thwart terrorist attacks, Arab terrorist carnage against Israelis continues without abating. In a desperate search to find answers to the plague of ongoing Arab terror, Israeli military and academic ?experts? are interviewed ad infinitum in the press, on radio and TV talk shows, where their opinions and erstwhile solutions abound:



?Exile Arafat and the terror will stop!?



?Do not exile Arafat, for the terror will accelerate!?



?Accept the ?road map? or Israel will be in danger!?



?Do not accept the ?road map?, it endangers Israel!?



One hardly knows whether to laugh or cry at the Kafkaesque scenario being played out today in the Holy Land.



After suffering the most devastating persecution known to mankind during two millenia of wandering, the Jewish people were miraculously returned to their ancient homeland, Eretz Yisrael, where five decades ago, with G-d?s help, we established an independent Jewish State and declared "Never Again" would Jews be victims of anti-Semitic hate. Here at last, in Medinat Yisrael, Jews would be free to carve out their own destiny.



Fast forward to the present time. After implementing the disastrous Oslo ?peace? (sic) accords, a succession of Israeli governments from both left and right agreed to cede vast areas of our sacred Jewish homeland land to Yasser Arafat, resulting in the slaughter of more than l,300 Israeli men, women and children and the wounding of over 5,000 others. Incredibly, this suicidal policy was followed by giving the chief PLO terrorist Arafat and his murderous henchmen caches of Israeli weapons and humongous amounts of funds, both of which, not suprisingly, he is utilizing to continue killing Jews.



Now, reportedly, the present Prime Minister of the ?independent? State of Israel, Ariel Sharon, has agreed to ?accept in principle? the ?road map? formulated by a quartet of such stalwart ?friends? of Israel as England, France, Russia and our ostensible only ?true ally?, the United States.



Never mind that this ?road map? calls for Israel to retreat to the borders of l967, which the late, dovish Abba Eban called ?Auschwitz borders?. Never mind that this suicidal-for-Israel ?road map? calls for the establishment of a ?palestinian state?, which, aside from rewarding Arab terror (and despite Sharon's myopic requests to Bush to include Israel's objections), will allow the influx of millions of Arab so-called ?right-of-return refugees?, thereby putting an end to the Jewish State.



It is high time that the leaders of Israel and United Jewish Appeasers everywhere cease their shameful capitualtion to gentile nations, whose main concern is not Jewish blood, but Arab oil.



The Arab war of terror cannot be solved through ?negotiations? or concessions, for the conflict is not

political... it is a religious war between Islam and Judaism, and, indeed, between Islam and the world.



In searching for answers to the grave problems confronting Israel, just as our Biblical ancestors were also forced to fight the enemies of their day understood that the source of Jewish truth is our Holy Torah, so today Jews throughout the world, showing faith, not fear, should return to live in our Holy Land, Eretz Yisrael, remembering G-d?s promise: ?If ye walk in My statutes and keep My commandments, I will bring peace to the Land.? (Parashat Bechukotai)

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Shifra Hoffman, a noted journalist, is founder of the Victims of Arab Terror International Organization (VAT) and Executive Director of SHUVA (Return), the Israel Emergency Aliyah Movement. She can be contacted at [email protected].