A victory over both terrorism and schemes to uproot the Jews of Gaza was celebrated in Kfar Darom today. Eliezer and Chana Bart held the brit - ritual circumcision - of their week-old son today, naming him Amichai [My Nation Lives] Yisrael. Chana is wheelchair-bound and paralyzed in the lower half of her body, following a terrorist shooting attack two years ago. Among her first concerns at the time was whether she would be able to bear more children. Doctors closely tracked her pregnancy, fearing that she would not be able to feel the onset of labor pangs. The family has seven other children, and the joy in Kfar Darom today was complete. Baby Amichai was born the day after Sharon's bombshell announcement of his plan to expel the nearly 8,000 Jews of Gaza from their homes.
Contrary to popular perception, Gaza has long been a Jewish area, and is in fact included in the Biblical Land of Israel; a dispute among traditional Jewish commentators exists only regarding the area west of El Arish in northern Sinai. It is mentioned in the Book of Joshau (13, 1-3) as land that should have been conquered by Joshua; was home to Jews during the times of the Hasmoneans and the redaction of the Mishna; and its Jewish population was strong enough to withstand an attempt by Constantine in the 4th century to build a Christian church there. More recently, Jews lived there from 1885 until World War I, and a renewed Jewish community remained there until the Muslim pogroms of 1929. Kfar Darom was established there in 1946, lasting only until the War of Independence two years later, and in 1973, Netzer Hazani - the first of 17 Jewish communities that now exist in Gaza - was established.
Contrary to popular perception, Gaza has long been a Jewish area, and is in fact included in the Biblical Land of Israel; a dispute among traditional Jewish commentators exists only regarding the area west of El Arish in northern Sinai. It is mentioned in the Book of Joshau (13, 1-3) as land that should have been conquered by Joshua; was home to Jews during the times of the Hasmoneans and the redaction of the Mishna; and its Jewish population was strong enough to withstand an attempt by Constantine in the 4th century to build a Christian church there. More recently, Jews lived there from 1885 until World War I, and a renewed Jewish community remained there until the Muslim pogroms of 1929. Kfar Darom was established there in 1946, lasting only until the War of Independence two years later, and in 1973, Netzer Hazani - the first of 17 Jewish communities that now exist in Gaza - was established.