Another Jewish family was destroyed this morning when 16-year old Aviad Mantsur died as a result of the injuries he sustained in a Palestinian terror attack on Friday afternoon. His friend, 17-year old Avichai Levy, was also slain in the assault.

All weekend long, Aviad had struggled for his life, as his father prayed for a miracle – but it was to no avail.

The government has been silent, the army has done nothing, and all that is left from this horrific event are the tears of two families left to mourn their loved ones.

For weeks, opponents of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s plan to withdraw from Gaza had warned that it would lead to an upsurge in Palestinian terror. Time after time, they cautioned that yielding to the terrorists would only embolden them, leading them to expand their operations and intensify their efforts to kill Jews.

And that is precisely what has happened.

If the terrorists are afraid of a possible Israeli military reaction, they certainly aren’t showing it. Islamic Jihad and Fatah both openly took responsibility for this outrage, as though they have no reason in the world to fear any reprisal.

And that is because they don’t – for, despite the recent increase in anti-Israel attacks, the government has done little to change its overall counter-terror policy. Other than renewing occasional pinpoint strikes against senior Islamic Jihad leaders, no other significant steps have been taken.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it here again: the only way to eliminate terrorism is to eliminate the terrorists. Unless and until Israel begins to wage war on terror with unrelenting determination, the bloodshed will unfortunately only continue.

In the past 24 hours, Palestinian terrorists have killed two Israelis, fired rockets and mortar rounds at Jewish communities in Gaza, opened fire on Israeli soldiers in Atzmona, and sent a suicide bomber to blow up Soroka Hospital in Beersheba (thankfully, she was caught on the way).

So how exactly is Prime Minister Ariel Sharon reacting to this renewed onslaught of Palestinian violence?

Why – by hosting Palestinian leader Abu Mazen, of course!

Sharon and Abu Mazen will be holding a mini-summit today to discuss coordinating the proposed Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and northern Samaria that is slated to take place in August.

In other words, even though Abu Mazen continues to allow Palestinian terror groups to attack Jews with impunity, Sharon seems to have no qualms about greeting him in Jerusalem or discussing the transfer of territory to his control.

This is not just a matter of national pride or even diplomatic niceties – it is a dangerous act that signifies weakness and frailty, for it sends a message to the Palestinians that they need not pay any “price” for their continued acts of terror against the Jewish state.

Instead of welcoming Abu Mazen to his home, Sharon should instead consider arresting him – by refusing to crack down on terror and by allowing terrorist groups to operate with impunity from territory he controls, Abu Mazen is responsible for the acts of violence which they perpetrate.

Abu Mazen belongs in a jail cell, not in a tete-a-tete with high-level Israeli officials. As US President George W. Bush has said time and again, those who harbor terrorists should be held to account. It is time Israel began applying that principle to its Palestinian neighbors, too.

Condoleezza Rice desperately needs a reality check.

Standing in Ramallah yesterday with Abu Mazen at her side, the US Secretary of State was practically gushing with praise for the Palestinian leader.

Making little more than passing reference to the need for Palestinians to combat terror, she could hardly contain herself in lavishing approval on him in front of the cameras.

“I’m honored to be here with President Abbas”, she said. “We applaud President Abbas’ commitment... The United States will stand with President Abbas”.

“This is a man of peace,” Rice concluded. “His government is a government that is seeking peace. And it is the goal and the policy of the United States government to support a Palestinian leadership that is, we believe, determined to come to a peaceful resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” she said.

Needless to say, Rice’s adulation for Abu Mazen has no factual basis in reality. It is little more than a continuation of Bill Clinton’s policy of ignoring Palestinian violations while pressing Israel to make concessions.

Indeed, just hours after Rice’s remarks, Palestinian terrorists attacked Israeli troops along the border with Egypt, killing one and injuring two others. And over the weekend, Israeli troops arrested a Palestinian planning to carry out a suicide bombing attack and also uncovered a bomb factory in Palestinian-controlled Jenin.

Rice’s reaction to this string of incidents? You guessed it – silence. Why should she let the facts get in the way of her little plan to boost Abu Mazen as a “man of peace”?

Israel has been down this road before – and all it led to was increased violence and terrorism. If Condi Rice really thinks that cheerleading for Abu Mazen is a viable policy option, then the former professor needs to go back and review some of the lessons of the past 12 years since Oslo, and stop giving a boost to those who kill Jews.

Today is Yom Yerushalayim – Jerusalem Day – the anniversary on the Hebrew calendar of Israel’s liberation of the Holy City during the 1967 Six-Day War.

And today, of all days, the country received a potent reminder regarding the intolerance and bigotry being fostered by ascendant Palestinian nationalism and Islamic fundamentalism.

When a small group of Jews ascended the Temple Mount this morning to visit Judaism’s holiest site, they were set upon by a group of Palestinians, who emerged from the gold-roofed Dome of the Rock and attacked them with stones, slightly injuring two of them.

The police were forced to step in and restore calm, but only after resorting to the use of stun grenades to quell the attackers.

The Temple Mount, of course, is effectively under the control of the Muslim Wakf, which is an arm of the Palestinian Authority. And so, while Israel is sovereign over the area, in practice the government allows the Palestinians to dictate what happens on the site of the ancient Temples of Jerusalem.

This is not only an affront to Jewish history – but as the attack today demonstrated, it is also an outrageous and absurd situation, in which Jews can not safely visit our holiest of sites.

The world media will undoubtedly distort today’s incident beyond recognition – but the key point to bear in mind is this: why is it that Palestinians feel they can riot because Jews visit a holy place?

And, more importantly, why does Israel tolerate such a situation?

The time has come for Israel to take back the Temple Mount, once and for all, and to reassert its control over the area. That is the only way to ensure that Jews, as well as others, are free to visit the site and worship there freely.

I am off to Portugal, where Shavei Israel (the organization I head) is convening a special seminar for Bnai Anousim (people whose ancestors were forcibly converted to Catholicism during the time of the Inquisition). To read more about it, check out the story below.

I will try to continue posting while I am away, so keep on checking back for more. But in case I don't, or can't, I will make sure to resume late next week.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/print.php3?what=news&id=79705

Crypto-Jews to Convene, Recall Forgotten Jewish Hero Wednesday, April 6, 2005 / 26 Adar 5765

Close to 100 descendants of Spanish and Portuguese crypto-Jews will gather this weekend in northern Portugal for a seminar being organized by the Jerusalem-based Shavei Israel organization.

Shavei Israel reaches out and assists “lost Jews” seeking to return to the Jewish people. Some of those helped by the organization, such as the B’nei Menashe, trace their roots back to the lost tribes of Israel, whereas others, such as those attending this weekend’s conference, are the descendents of Jews who were forced to convert to Catholicism but retained certain Jewish traditions in secret and passed them on to their children.

The three-day seminar, entitled “The Challenges of Jewish Belief in a Post-Modern World”, will be held in the coastal city of Oporto, and will include rabbis, professors and authors from Israel, Spain and Portugal.

The gathering will be dedicated to the memory of Portuguese Captain Arthur Barros Basto, a decorated World War I hero from a crypto-Jewish family who returned to Judaism and then launched an outreach movement to encourage other “hidden Jews” to do the same.

In addition to starting a Jewish newspaper and a yeshiva (Torah study center), Capt. Barros Basto opened Oporto’s only synagogue, which is where the Shavei Israel seminar in his memory is being held. Eventually, however, his activities ran afoul of Portuguese government and church authorities, and he was driven out of the military on trumped-up charges in the early 1940s.

Historians have dubbed him the “Portuguese Dreyfus”, after French General Staff officer Alfred Dreyfus, a Jew who was wrongly accused and convicted of treason in 1894 due to anti-Semitism.

“Captain Barros Basto was a Jewish hero whose only transgression was that he sought to restore the Bnei Anousim [Hebrew for people whose ancestors were forcibly converted to Catholicism during the time of the Inquisition] to Judaism,” said Shavei Israel Chairman Michael Freund. “He was a man of action and vision, and it is only fitting that we pay homage to his memory by convening a seminar for Bnei Anousim in the very same synagogue that he was responsible for having built.”

Freund noted that for the past two years, Shavei Israel has been waging a public campaign to get the government of Portugal to posthumously clear Capt. Barros Basto’s name as well as issue a formal apology for what was done to him. As a result of these efforts, letters have been sent by US Congressmen and various Jewish organizations to Portuguese officials, but they have thus far refused to reopen his case.