Dear Prime Minister,
I watched you as you exited the failed meeting you insisted on conducting with Abu Mazen and his cohorts, disciples and students of the devil. Your face betrayed your inner feelings; how you wished that the hand you stretched, in a real attempt to begin a true 'peace' process, failed miserably. It seemed that your shoulders sagged a bit more than they did only twenty-four hours earlier. Hevron, Pisgat Zev, Afula, Sderot... the murders and terror continues without stop and your shoulders are sagging under the ever-growing burden. The anguish you are filled with is transmitted to all around you. It seems that the confidence you brought to the chair you occupy has dissipated and run its course. Only yesterday, it seems, your bravado thundered as you declared and vowed that security and peace is your chartered goal and you will accomplish that vision: "I will bring security to Israel. I will not compromise. I will bring peace."
And I, Mr. Sharon, am here to explain to you why peace in your time will not be achieved.
I feel for you, Mr. Sharon. Truly and wholeheartedly, I sympathize with the impossible goal you are attempting to achieve. I feel your pain and your true desire. I feel great sadness at the weakness that has eroded your natural bravery. The Sharon we see today is but a minuscule shadow of the one we fondly remember from the ?50s, ?60s and ?70s. The confidence you attempt to portray to us today conveys an inability to stay the proper course. The fire-brand oratories have lost their fire; what you say is not what you mean and what you do has no correlation to what you actually promised. Your actions belie the inability to fulfill. The zigzag path you try to walk on confuses your most ardent supporters. Your followers are dropping away like flies. History will magnify the erosion, while minimizing the past.
You see, Mr. Ariel Sharon? Your rush to ensure that posterity will remember you fondly as the 'peace maker', has instilled in you a false sense of invincibility and bravado. You took upon yourself to emulate - and at times to outpace - those of our wayward brethren whose rejection of our traditions and eternal way of life is their life-long mission. G-d, in your lexicon, has become non-existent, banished and obsolete. Your speeches avoid mentioning His name, lest your conscious may obligate you; the reliance on your own physical and mental ability is blasphemy.
The governmental company you keep, Mr. Sharon, has declared as its creed the eradication of our religion. Point at hand is the first and foremost priority of governmental adjudication these partners had upon joining your ship - to allow the open and free sale of pig meat in our Holy Land. You stood on the sidelines, Mr. Sharon, and allowed your partners to use our religion as a doormat. I know you were way too busy and occupied with the on-going terror to pay attention to such minor lapses in judgment. The correction of such lapses has to wait for a better day.
Having given a tacit hand and silent permission to the trampling being done, you continue to defy the written and spoken words of our Prophets. As a younger version of yourself, you claimed our history as part and parcel of your existence. ?There will never be peace with these terrorists.? The words spoken twenty centuries ago still resound audibly clear; every day that passes, the reality and truth of this proclamation resounds ever more vivid and precise. Yet, ?I am ready for painful concessions for the sake of peace.? Your announced willingness to deal with our avowed enemies (in obvious collusion with the Oslo criminals), and to give them parts of the land G-d has given to his children, seems to have created an anger in heavens. It seems, Mr. Sharon, that the words of the Prophets (those you either choose to ignore or are perhaps unfamiliar with) are coming back to haunt you and us; those age-old, ominous prophecies will doom the disaster your are attempting to revive. Their predictions, Mr. Sharon, are ostensibly laughing at your attempt (ignorantly, be it granted) to circumvent the consequences. Namely, Mr. Sharon, peace with the terrorists with whom you are shaking hands will never come to fruition.
Do you see, Mr. Sharon, out there, the fresh mounds of so many graves? No more need for ?painful concessions towards peace?; it seems that we already paid the ultimate price.
--------------------------------------------------------
Isaac Kohn writes from Brooklyn, New York. He can be reached at [email protected].
I watched you as you exited the failed meeting you insisted on conducting with Abu Mazen and his cohorts, disciples and students of the devil. Your face betrayed your inner feelings; how you wished that the hand you stretched, in a real attempt to begin a true 'peace' process, failed miserably. It seemed that your shoulders sagged a bit more than they did only twenty-four hours earlier. Hevron, Pisgat Zev, Afula, Sderot... the murders and terror continues without stop and your shoulders are sagging under the ever-growing burden. The anguish you are filled with is transmitted to all around you. It seems that the confidence you brought to the chair you occupy has dissipated and run its course. Only yesterday, it seems, your bravado thundered as you declared and vowed that security and peace is your chartered goal and you will accomplish that vision: "I will bring security to Israel. I will not compromise. I will bring peace."
And I, Mr. Sharon, am here to explain to you why peace in your time will not be achieved.
I feel for you, Mr. Sharon. Truly and wholeheartedly, I sympathize with the impossible goal you are attempting to achieve. I feel your pain and your true desire. I feel great sadness at the weakness that has eroded your natural bravery. The Sharon we see today is but a minuscule shadow of the one we fondly remember from the ?50s, ?60s and ?70s. The confidence you attempt to portray to us today conveys an inability to stay the proper course. The fire-brand oratories have lost their fire; what you say is not what you mean and what you do has no correlation to what you actually promised. Your actions belie the inability to fulfill. The zigzag path you try to walk on confuses your most ardent supporters. Your followers are dropping away like flies. History will magnify the erosion, while minimizing the past.
You see, Mr. Ariel Sharon? Your rush to ensure that posterity will remember you fondly as the 'peace maker', has instilled in you a false sense of invincibility and bravado. You took upon yourself to emulate - and at times to outpace - those of our wayward brethren whose rejection of our traditions and eternal way of life is their life-long mission. G-d, in your lexicon, has become non-existent, banished and obsolete. Your speeches avoid mentioning His name, lest your conscious may obligate you; the reliance on your own physical and mental ability is blasphemy.
The governmental company you keep, Mr. Sharon, has declared as its creed the eradication of our religion. Point at hand is the first and foremost priority of governmental adjudication these partners had upon joining your ship - to allow the open and free sale of pig meat in our Holy Land. You stood on the sidelines, Mr. Sharon, and allowed your partners to use our religion as a doormat. I know you were way too busy and occupied with the on-going terror to pay attention to such minor lapses in judgment. The correction of such lapses has to wait for a better day.
Having given a tacit hand and silent permission to the trampling being done, you continue to defy the written and spoken words of our Prophets. As a younger version of yourself, you claimed our history as part and parcel of your existence. ?There will never be peace with these terrorists.? The words spoken twenty centuries ago still resound audibly clear; every day that passes, the reality and truth of this proclamation resounds ever more vivid and precise. Yet, ?I am ready for painful concessions for the sake of peace.? Your announced willingness to deal with our avowed enemies (in obvious collusion with the Oslo criminals), and to give them parts of the land G-d has given to his children, seems to have created an anger in heavens. It seems, Mr. Sharon, that the words of the Prophets (those you either choose to ignore or are perhaps unfamiliar with) are coming back to haunt you and us; those age-old, ominous prophecies will doom the disaster your are attempting to revive. Their predictions, Mr. Sharon, are ostensibly laughing at your attempt (ignorantly, be it granted) to circumvent the consequences. Namely, Mr. Sharon, peace with the terrorists with whom you are shaking hands will never come to fruition.
Do you see, Mr. Sharon, out there, the fresh mounds of so many graves? No more need for ?painful concessions towards peace?; it seems that we already paid the ultimate price.
--------------------------------------------------------
Isaac Kohn writes from Brooklyn, New York. He can be reached at [email protected].