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      From the Hills of Efraim
      by Yisrael Medad
      This blog will be informative, highlight foibles, will be assertively contentious and funny and wryly satirical.
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      Yisrael Medad is a revenant resident of Shiloh, in the Hills of Efrayim north of Jerusalem.  He arrived in Israel with his wife, Batya, in 1970 and lived in the renewing Jewish Quarter, eventually moving to Shiloh in 1981. 

      Currently the Menachem Begin Center's Information Resource Director, he has previously been director of Israel's Media Watch, a Knesset aide to three Members of Knesset and a lecturer in Zionist History.  He assists the Yesha Council in it's contacts with the Foreign Media in a volunteer capacity, is active on behalf of Jewish rights on the Temple Mount and is involved in various Jewish and Zionist activist causes.  He contributes a Hebrew-language media column to Besheva and publishes op-eds in the Jerusalem Post and other periodicals.

      He also blogs at MyRightWord in English and, in Hebrew, at The Right Word.


      Tishrei 30, 5768, 10/12/2007

      Ann Coulter - Facts and Opinion


      For all the videos and transcripts, only after which one can make a judgement call, visit here at my MyRightWord blog.

      There is little doubt that this item will be very hot for a good few days, unfortunately, the level of interest in it will be more than what the invidious anti-Israel and anti-Zionist Left is doing and planning and saying.

      It will also serve those who wish to sever the link to the Christian Zionist movement and that would be a shame.  No one of us demands that these pro-Israel Christians become Jews and we should reject attempts by certain Christians that we adopt their religion.  And make that clear to them in no uncertain terms.

      But that is one playing field.  The other is whether Israel and the Jewish people can survive without friends and without support.

      So, can we all come together and focus on what I think is the real, the immediate and the more dangerous threat to Jews and our religion - the attempt to besmirch Israel, denude it of its security and ultimately to see the country dismantled as the national expression of the Jews.



      Tishrei 30, 5768, 10/12/2007

      It Started in 1930


      Too many Jews and supporters of Israel assume that our rights to the Temple Mount and the Western Wall, despite the claims of Muslims otherwise, are quite clear and its just a matter of ignorance, cosyness with Arab oil or plain hatred of Jews that allows them to ignore our rights.

      Well, for all our attitude, it's not that simple.

      If you click on over here, you'll be able to read a long and depressing report of an international commission that concluded in 1930 that the Temple Mount area and the Western Wall courtyard (it was then a small enclosed alleyway) are Waqf property and Jews are to be severely limited in what they can or cannot do.

      Most notably, it was the prohibition on blowing the shofar that drew attention to the report.

      It was established by the British, in coordination with the League of Nations Mandates Commission, after the 1929 riots which the Arabs, in the chutzpah, insisted was the result of Jewish provocations over the past year in asserting their rights to the Western Wall and our supposedly secret desire and plan to take over the Temple Mount.

      During Rosh Hashana 1928, the British tore down the mechitza that had been set up after the Mufti complained that the status quo was being violated.

      We may laugh or ignore it but it was PLO Chairman Arafat that continuously referred to "Muslim rights" and successive Israeli governments paid no attention to the potential weight this report carries.

      I deal with the issue a bit more extensively here and I invite you to deliberate and debate.



      Tishrei 29, 5768, 10/11/2007

      Lebanon, I Salute Thee


      Remember the several weeks-long fighting between Pal. refugees in Lebanon at a camp called Nahar Al-Barad?  You know, the one where Lebanese troops bombed, shelled and kicked these poor refugees around while the world applauded.  If you can't check here for a reminder.

      Well, some are being let back into the ruins that exist - yes, nothing but ruins.  You can read all about it and see some pictures here.

       Lebanese officials have a great idea: they want to create a new model for these people who unfortunately continue to believe that they are going to go back to Jaffa, Isdud, Iskalan and El Quds.  They want to prove that they will be better off under local Lebanese authority rather than their misguiding own leadership.

      Of course, there is this myth of a "right to return" and foremost among those who insist that Israel should not act like Lebanon, that is in resettling permanently the refugees in their host countries, will be Jews and Israeli academics. 

      But what Lebanon is initiating is defintely a step in the right direction.

      The Pals. started the violence against the Jews already in 1920.  They championed ethnic cleansing at Tel Chai, Jerusalem, Petah Tikva, Beer Tuviah, Tzfat and Hebron, among many other places they attacked and killed and raped Jews.  They caused 7000 Jewish refugees from Tel Aviv's southern neighborhoods in the first month of the 1947-49 war.  And that's just the short version.

      I think it's about time someone told them and showed them that they are not going back.



      Tishrei 25, 5768, 10/7/2007

      Annapolis, Here We Come


      Unless a major intervention occurs, and I am not excluding that possibility, another forum arranged to denude Israel of its necessary security, its national ethos and historic homeland, not to mention a cowardly retreat from fighting terror by America and Israel instead of rewarding it, is set to take place on November 26 at Annapolis, USA.

      Just before it, during Nov. 11-13, the General Assembly of the United Jewish Communities of America will be held at Nashville.  Two weeks before that, in Philadelphia, during Oct. 28-29, the Summit Conference of AIPAC will take place with Ehud Barak and Eli Weisel as guests.  As David Bedein mentioned to me, these two platforms will well serve Israel's leadership in garnering American Jewish support for their "We are tired" program (you do recall Ehud Olmert's "We are tired" speech of two years ago to the leftist Israel Policy Forum, don't you?).

      This lead up is very dangerous for Israel's supporters.  The momentum that Olmert & Co. will churn up at these major appearances could well quash potential protest activity.  But will there be such activity in protest?

      Is anybody in touch with the local community?  With Baltimore or Washington and its suburbs, closest to Annapolis?  Will there be rooms to sleep over at?  Food?  Support groups?

      If YESHA activists and others do mobilize good numbers, can they be provided with infrastructure, intelleigence, maps, etc. so that a proper protest activity, all legal, be launched?

      Of course, I would truly hope that people, here in Israel and in America, are thinking along these lines; and are planning and preparing.



      Tishrei 15, 5768, 9/27/2007

      Oiy, O Jerusalem!


      Many of us remember the book "O Jerusalem" which served as a sort of second "Exodus" of Leon Uris.  Written by Lapiere and Collins, who authored together "Paris Is Burning", it was assumed to be a definitive history of the 1947-49 war that Israel has to fight against the Arabs.  Many college students studied it despite its many shortcomings.
       
      The book, you should know, is now a film.  It'll be out shortly.
       
      At the movie's web site, they have a timeline.  I picked just one example from it to illustrate the problems.
      When does the timeline start?  In 70 AD - when Jerusalem is destroyed.  Well, by ignoring the previous 1500 years of history, when no Arab was near here, and skipping over the Jewish connection (Patriarchs, Judges, Kings, etc.), this allows the Arabs to still claim they were here before the Jews.  How?  Because, they assert, they were the original Jebusites.
       
      At a website, Jerusalemites.Org, I found this:
       
      The Jebusite Arabs founded the City, according to current available archaeological artifacts some 5,000 years ago, during the bronze age, and named it Uru Salem – the City of Peace.
       
      Wow, can you imagine that?  Melchitzedek was not a Canaanite but an Arab.  Were the Hittites also Arab?
       
      The next date in that timeline is 636 when "Calif Omar conquers Jerusalem and the Muslim occupation begins" as they write.  Okay, I'll grant them two points for using the terms "conquest" and "occupation" in an Arab context.  But what happened to Bar Kochba and his revolt against the Romans in 132-135? What about the Mishna and Gemara, composed and redacted during 250-500?
       
      What, we Jews weren't here at all?
       
      Now, if you take this "minor" point and begin to multiply it by the many minutes of the movie, you will realize that it's not "O Jerusalem" but "Oiy, O Jerusalem!".


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