Coming back from a long trip allows you the distance you need to view things more objectively. I returned to an Israel of bandaged wounds that are beginning to heal.

Yasser Arafat is dead, and that in itself is a cause for celebration. Like the Munchkins, we are happy to get rid of the wicked witch, even though other wicked witches remain (Hamas, Islamic Jihad, PLO, Tanzim). The fight is not over by a long shot, but that doesn't mean we can't feel joy about a year in which the deadly head of Hamas, paraplegic baby-killer Sheikh Ahmed Yassin was blown to bits and Yassir Arafat, the father of terrorism, died in a French hospital.

Yay!

The season has changed to a season of hope. The winter rains have begun to fall in abundance, watering our grape vines, our olive, date, pomegranate, apple, plum and almond trees; promising a summer of cool, delicious fruits. Our hotels are full of tourists again and our economy is climbing out of the doldrums.

There is still too much poverty, too many unemployed, too many poor children, especially in Jerusalem. There is still political turmoil over Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's disengagement plan, which would destroy decades of building and government-sponsored and encouraged settlement activity in Gush Katif and other Jewish areas. But the Left is in disarray, the Labor Party stalwarts like Shimon Peres and former prime minister, the much despised Ehud Barak, are at each other's throats. This gives me hope that the architects of Oslo, who have never taken responsibility for using the people of Israel as laboratory rats for a dangerous and untried experiment, which resulted in a thousand dead and thousands more horribly injured, may soon be relegated to history books where they can do no more harm. Hopefully, there will be new elections in which the people of Israel can make important decisions about their future democratically.

Outside the country, good things are happening. The United Nations has been shown up for what it is - the biggest obstacle to peace in the world. Thanks to United States congressmen, the oil-for-food scandal will not go away, and the millions diverted to support suicide bombers will make it difficult for Kofi Annan. So Annan -- the do-nothing who watches millions dying in Darfur at the hands of roving Arab murderers out to steal the land of black Africans -- will soon join the list of the unemployed.

In Iraq, democratic elections are underway, showing the entire Islamic world that they don't have to live under murderous dictatorships that steal their country's resources and provide heartbreak, poverty and fear in exchange.

We could have gone the appeasement way, the way of Germany and France, but we didn't. Americans decided the fate of the world not by a narrow margin but by millions of votes to stay the course. And although it was the Republicans they voted for, what they were supporting was a cherished American ideal that the Democratic party once epitomized. After Pearl Harbor (December 7, in which fewer Americans died than on September 11, by the way), Americans decided to take away the security of the Japanese enemy that their cities and people were too far away to experience any retaliation. Less than two months later, the US bombed Japan.

But wars don't last forever, and neither does violence and bloodshed. I have hope that our determination to win this fight against the enemies of mankind will result in a peaceful world for our children and grandchildren.

A new wind is blowing, and there is reason for the hope in the air. For everyone.

Happy Chanukah, and God bless us all.