Ignore Blair's Bullying

Under fire at home for refusing to state when he will step down as premier, Britain's Tony Blair will visit Israel this weekend to try and squeeze the Jewish state into making concessions to the Palestinians.

Facing a revolt from within his own Labor party, many of whose members have opposed his support for the war in Iraq, Blair may well be tempted to try and calm their fury by pressing Israel.

According to media reports, Blair will stress to Olmert that progress in talks with the Palestinian Authority is "vital", even as Olmert seeks to focus on the Iranian threat in their discussions.

Simply put – Israel should ignore Blair and not take his demands all too seriously. He is a lame-duck Prime Minister who is vastly unpopular at home and who will be out of office within a year, at most.

Tossing Blair a political bone won't appease the British premier's critics at home, and it certainly won't help Israel's interests, either.

The best thing Olmert can do is to be a gracious host, offer Mr. Blair some tea, and when he starts making demands, simply show him the door and send him back into the waiting arms of his Labor party rebels back home in London.

Yawn - it's just another rocket attack

Ho hum. It has been just another day of Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel, and it seems as if no one really cares.

One after another, in broad daylight, four Qassam rockets were fired this morning by Palestinian terrorists aiming in the direction of the city of Ashkelon.

The projectiles landed in open fields near Kibbutz Karmiya and Kibbutz Zikim. Thankfully, no one was killed or injured in the assaults.

Needless to say, the ongoing attacks, which have only intensified since Israel withdrew from Gaza, have disrupted life in the Western Negev for untold thousands of Israelis.

Indeed, just yesterday, parents and children from Kibbutz Yad Mordechai held a demonstration to protest the fact that the Government has yet to reinforce the community’s school against rockets, even though it has already been hit several times in the past.

The rally came after the “Red Dawn” early warning system went off, signaling that rockets had been launched in the vicinity of the kibbutz.

One of the parents who took part in the demonstration told Yediot Aharonot that “there was great panic in the classrooms. Unfortunately, the kids have nowhere to escape to in the case of a Qassam attack. We call on the government and the defense establishment again to urgently fortify the classrooms."

So there you have it – not only has the Government failed to halt the rocket barrages, it has not even bothered to provide the most elementary of protection to its citizens who are being bombarded on a daily basis.

Sorry if we are boring you, Prime Minister Olmert, but isn't it time you did something about this?

Israelis Streaming into Judea & Samaria

These are trying times for Israel, as our Prime Minister lies in a hospital intensive care unit and his fate remains uncertain.

But even in these difficult days, there was a bit of good news last week which went largely unreported but which is worthy of our attention.

At first glance, you might find it hard to believe, but the facts speak for themselves: despite the forcible eviction of thousands of Jews from Gaza this past August, the total number of Jews living over the so-called Green Line nonetheless grew in 2005.

According to statistics released last Thursday by Israel’s Population Registry, the number of Israelis living in the territories increased by 1.5% in the last six months of the year, rising from 250,179 before the Gaza withdrawal, to 253,074 at the year’s end.

Since the former figure included the over 9,000 Jews who then lived in Gaza and northern Samaria and were subsequently expelled, the increase is actually much larger than the statistics suggest.

This is a remarkable development, because it shows that the Gaza pullout not only failed to deter Israelis from moving to Judea and Samaria - it also did not push those already living there to pack up and leave, either.

Indeed, according to the Population Registry, nearly all the communities in Judea and Samaria experienced growth, with some registering double-digit expansion.

The trend, then, is clear. Even with setbacks such as the Gaza retreat, the Jewish people are continuing to return home.