To the roaring cheers of the local media, on Sunday the Schalit family embarked on a cross-country march to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s residence. They set out two days after the fourth anniversary of IDF Sgt. Gilad Schalit’s captivity.
Outside their home in the North on Sunday, Gilad’s father Noam Schalit pledged not to return home without his son. The Schalit family intends to camp out outside of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s home until the government reunites them with Gilad.
For weeks the local media – and especially Ma’ariv and Yediot Ahronot – have portrayed the Schalit family’s trek to Netanyahu as a reenactment of Moses’ journey to Pharaoh. Like Pharaoh, the media insinuates that Netanyahu is evil because he refuses to free Gilad from bondage.
The only drawback to this dramatic, newspaper-selling story is that it is wrong. Gilad Schalit is not a hostage in Jerusalem. He is a hostage in Gaza. His captor is not Netanyahu. His captor is Hamas.
And because the story is wrong, the media-organized cavalcade of ten thousand well intentioned Israelis is moving in the wrong direction. And not only is it going in the wrong direction, it is doing so at Gilad Schalit’s expense.
The truth that Yediot and Ma’ariv’s marketing departments ignore is that Schalit’s continued captivity is a function of Hamas’s growing strength. To bring him home, Israel shouldn’t release a thousand terrorists from prison. It shouldn’t strengthen Hamas.
To bring Gilad Schalit home a free man, Israel must weaken Hamas. And this is an eminently achievable goal. Gilad’s father Noam knows it is an achievable goal. That is why last week Noam Schalit was the most outspoken critic of Netanyahu’s decision to abandon Israel’s economic sanctions against Hamas-controlled Gaza. That is why over the past four years the Schalit family has staged countless protests against Israel’s massive and continuous assistance to Hamas-controlled Gaza.
If anything positive is to come from this march, then when the Schalit family arrives in Jerusalem they should abandon the newspapers’ demand that Israel surrender to all of Hamas’s demands. They should acknowledge that doing so will only guarantee that more Israelis will be kidnapped and murdered by Hamas and its allies.
If the Schalits wish to criticize the government, they should criticize Netanyahu and his government for the steps they have taken to strengthen Hamas. The Schalits should demand that the government reinstate and tighten Israel’s economic sanctions against Gaza. They should demand that Israel end its supply of electricity and gasoline to Gaza and take more effective action to block smuggling into Gaza through the tunnels along the Gaza-Egypt border. All of these actions will weaken Hamas, and so contribute to the prospect of Hamas being forced by the Gazans themselves to release Schalit to his family.
ONE OF the important truths ignored by Israel’s pathological media is that Hamas and its Iranian sponsor are not all powerful. They are vulnerable to criticism from their own publics. And Israel is capable of fomenting such criticism.
For example, the imprisoned terrorists whose release Hamas demands in exchange for releasing Schalit have consistently responded rationally to Israeli threats. The Knesset is slowly debating a bill that would worsen prison conditions of terrorists. And the terrorists are worried. Their worry provoked them to demand that Hamas be more forthcoming with Schalit.
By the same token, were Israel to cut off electricity to Gaza – an act that is not merely lawful, but arguably required by international law – we could expect residents of Gaza to express a similarly rational demand to Hamas. That is, were Israel to weaken public support for Hamas, Hamas would be more likely to bow to Israel’s will.
And if Hamas is vulnerable to public criticism, the Iranian regime is downright terrified of public criticism. Take the regime’s behavior in the wake of the Turkish-Hamas flotilla campaign. In the days that followed Israel’s bungled May 31 takeover of the Mavi Marmara terror ship, Iran announced it was sending two of its own ships to Gaza. Israel responded rationally and forthrightly. The government warned that any Iranian ship would be viewed as an enemy ship and Israel would respond in accordance with the rules of war.
As Iran expert Michael Ledeen has argued repeatedly, the Iranian regime is terrified of getting the Iranian people angry over its radical foreign policy. In light of its precarious standing with its own public, Israel’s forthright threat of war brought the regime to its knees.
Last Thursday Hossein Sheikholdslam, the Iranian regime functionary responsible for the Gaza-bound ships told the Iranian news service IRNA that plans to send the ships were scrapped because Israel “sent a letter to the United Nations saying that the presence of Iranian and Lebanese ships in the Gaza area will be considered a declaration of war on [Israel] and it will confront it.”
During the war with Iran’s Hizbullah proxy in 2006, thousands of Iranians demonstrated against Hizbullah. They demanded that the regime invest its money in the local economy and not in Hizbullah and the Palestinians. Were Israel to present Schalit as an Israeli victim of the Iranian regime, it could provoke a similar popular outcry against Iran’s support for Hamas.
The media-manipulated Schalits are not the only ones acting precisely against their own interests. The government is acting with similar madness in its relations with the Obama administration. Indeed, Netanyahu ended Israel’s lawful economic sanctions against Hamas-controlled Gaza, (sanctions that served, among other things as a bargaining chip for freeing Schalit), because the Obama administration placed overwhelming pressure on him to do so.
Not wishing to let the Mavi Marmara crisis go to waste, US President Barack Obama has used it as a means to weaken Israel against Hamas. Obama announced that he is giving Hamas-controlled Gaza $400 million in US aid. He forced Netanyahu to end Israel’s economic sanctions against the illegal Hamas regime. And he continues to threaten to abandon US support for Israel at the UN. Moreover, according to remarks by a senior Hamas terrorist to the London-based al Quds al Arabi newspaper on Friday, the Obama administration maintains direct ties to the Hamas leadership in Syria.
When Netanyahu entered office last spring his desire to appease Obama was understandable. At the time, he was operating under the hope that perhaps Obama could be appeased into ending his onslaught against the Jewish state. But the events of the past year have made clear that Obama is unappeasable . Every concession Israel has made to Obama has merely whetted the US President’s appetite for more.
The policy implications of this state of affairs are clear. First, Israel must strive to weaken Obama. Since Israeli concessions to Obama strengthen him, Israel must first and foremost stop giving him concessions.
Weakening Obama does not involve openly attacking him. It means Israel should act in a way that advances its interests and forces Obama to reconsider the desirability of his current foreign policy.
Regionally, Israel should make common cause with the Kurds of Iran, Iraq and Syria who ar
e now being assaulted by Iran, Turkey and Syria. Doing so is not simply the moral thing to do. It weakens Iran, Syria and Turkey and demonstrates that Obama’s appeasement policies are harming those who love freedom and empowering those who hate it.
e now being assaulted by Iran, Turkey and Syria. Doing so is not simply the moral thing to do. It weakens Iran, Syria and Turkey and demonstrates that Obama’s appeasement policies are harming those who love freedom and empowering those who hate it.
By the same token, Israel should do everything it can to strengthen the Iranian Green movement. Every anti-regime action in Iran – regardless of its size – harms the regime and therefore helps Israel. And every anti-regime action in Iran exposes the moral depravity and strategic idiocy of Obama’s policy of appeasing the mullocracy.
As for the US domestic political realm, in Ambassador Michael Oren’s all but schizophrenic recent statements about the Obama administration’s policy towards Israel we may at last be witnessing an embrace of political sanity on the part of the government. For the past several months, Oren has acted as the Obama administration’s most energetic cheerleader to the US Jewish community. Oren has repeatedly and wrongly reassured US Jewish audiences that Obama is a great friend of Israel, that his Democratic Party remains loyal to the US-Israel alliance and that the Republicans are wrong to claim that there is a difference between the two major US political parties when it comes to supporting Israel.
The pinnacle of Oren’s pro-Obama campaign came with his interview last week with the Jerusalem Post. There he brought all of these false and counter-productive claims into the public realm. Apparently Oren’s decision to make his adulation of the Obama administration public finally forced his bosses in Jerusalem to order him to cease, desist and do an about face.
And so, last week, Oren told a closed audience of Israeli diplomats the truth. Under Obama, Oren whispered, there has been a “tectonic rift” in US relations with Israel. While some of Obama’s advisors are sympathetic to Israel, these advisors have no influence on Obama’s positions on Israel. No doubt recognizing how silly his about face made him look, Oren tried to deny his statements at the Foreign Ministry. But it is hard to imagine anyone will take him seriously.
During his visit to the White House next week, Netanyahu should follow the path set by Oren’s quickly leaked remarks. Netanyahu should abstain from praising Obama for his friendship and speak instead about the fact that the US-Israel alliance is vital for both countries’ national security.
NETANYAHU SHOULD insist on the right to call on questioners at his joint appearance with Obama. And he should use those questions and those appearances to discuss why Israel’s actions are not only legal and necessary for Israel, but vital for US national security. During his stay in the US, Netanyahu should discuss the global jihad, Islamic terrorism, the freedom loving Kurds and the freedom loving Iranian people every chance he gets. Indeed, he should create opportunities to discuss them.
Here we see a crucial point of convergence between the Schalit family march to Jerusalem and Netanyahu’s trip to Washington. To increase the effectiveness of their efforts on behalf of Gilad, ahead of Netanyahu’s visit to Washington, the marchers should split into two groups.
The first group should continue to Jerusalem and demand that Israel take a firmer stand against Hamas. The second group should walk to Tel Aviv and camp out outside the US Embassy. There they should demand that the administration end its contacts with Hamas, end its pressure on the Israeli government to strengthen Hamas, cancel Obama’s plan to give an additional $400 million dollars in aid to Hamas and use the US’s position on the UN Security Council to condemn Turkey for its material support for Hamas.
For too long, by allowing themselves to be led by our deranged media, Israeli citizens and governments alike have ignored the basic fact that the answer to every question is not more Israeli concessions. Contrary to what our tabloids would have us believe, surrender is only one option among many. It is time we try out some alternatives.
Originally published in The Jerusalem Post
While I totally agree with your description of the Israeli media as deranged & pathological, I trust you are including the JPost in that catagory. I have to tell you that I, for one, have just about stopped reading the JPost, I just quickly scan the headlines & move on.
I wait until Friday to read the editorials – your column, Sarah Honig, & just for laughs, Mr Horowitz. I’d rather read Ynet although it’s far more Left-wing. Ynet’s format is far more user friendly & their talkback feature is excellent so that even if the article is stupid, the talkbacks, which are generally Right-wing, correct the stupidity of the articles. And, they post comments (with no length limitations) almost immediately. They also censor comments much less frequently than the JPost, which censors quite a bit.
Why has the JPost gone Left/Liberal? That’s the real question.
By the way, I didn’t write this with the intention of having it posted in the comments.
I just thought you might be interested to know the opinion of a former reader of the JPost.
I’ve always felt that consumer feedback is important, a notion that sadly is very under-developed in Israel.
Sorry to be so pessimistic, but I have to say what I think. I came to Israel five years ago from an Arab country. I expected to find a Jewish country (not exactly in a religious sense) with a toughness of spirit, determination, & a willingness to fight. Admittedly, my attitude was a bit idealistic, perhaps unrealistic from lack of information.
But I was totally unprepared for the reality that I found here.
While the material accomplishments I found here are indeed impressive, the spiritual or moral (for lack of a better word) side of things is a great disappointment.
I have to say right away that Israelis are very nice people generally, most people I’ve met here are genuinely friendly, helpful, good people.
But, they are politically naive, uninformed, complacent, passive, & lack the intellectual tools to face the challenges we face.
I attribute this to years of Leftist propaganda, poor education, a lack of political leadership.
You are generally preaching to the choir, so to speak. But much of the country is oblivious to the reality of our situation.
They are in denial – they just cannot contemplate reality, that tomorrow is not necessarily a continuation of today. Our existence as a sovereign Jewish state is not a given.
Victory is Israel’s alternative to surrender, and she should retake Gaza to ensure the unprovoked rocket attacks and arms smuggling would end. Defeating Hamas should be Israel’s goal, and cutting off electricity to Gaza would embolden Israel’s adversaries and further isolate the nation. As for Prime Minister Netanyahu’s upcoming US visit, he should replace US Ambassador Michael Oren with Moshe Arens. Mr. Netanyahu must vigorously defend Israel’s right to secure borders, and speak directly to the American people. Finally, Israel needs to maintain its naval blockade of Gaza without reservation.
Israel has been succesfully neutered.
The once mighty and feared lion has been downsized to a toothless kitty without claws.
The concept of VICTORY over one’s enemy no longer enter’s into the thought process of the deballed Israeli heirachy.
The agenda has now moved to ending the limited approach of blocakde from the Israeli psyche. Soon Israel will be fully compliant with her destroyer friend’s plan.
This growing threat in Gaza can be traced back to Israel’s failure to defeat Hamas under direct U.S. pressure to end the short war before victory was achieved.
Ehud Barak was only too happy to comply.
Victory is no longer in Israel’s vocabulary.
That’s why you are now reduced to blockade lite and legitimizing Hamas.
Only the US can have long never ending wars. Israel is on a very a short leash and it’s wars are only allowed to last a but few days or weeks at most before the choke collar is tightened on the neck.
If you haven’t noticed, under long standing US policy Israel is forbidden to defeat another Arab army ever again as we saw with Hizbollah in 2006 and Hamas in 2009. Supplying Lebanon’s Military factors into this.
Before Pharoah tied the leash Israel would defeat her enemies.
The slaves continue to make religious pilgrimages to Egypt, too weak and subservient to end the Road Map farce.
There is not one Israeli politician who has the moral fortitude to shut off power to Gaza or anything strong to break Hamas because they are by their nature weak and subservient .
Those individuals with moral and spiritual fortitude are kept from positions of power in Israel.
Only corrupt lackys beholden to the old boys network rise to the top in Israeli politics.The US only permits weak and subservient Israeli’s to become Prime Minister.
Any who show the slightest independence from Washington are quickly brought to heel.
This is why Netanyahu keeps trying to get Livni into his Vichy government,just following orders.
He’s always yeilding because he understands their power ro destroy him.
He’s owned.
So it’s a sure bet that the quisling Netanyahu will bring his knee pads to Washington and Israel will suffer more to please Pharoah.
‘Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help,
And rely on horses,
Who trust in chariots because they are many,
And in horsemen because they are very strong,
But who do not look to the Holy One of Israel,
Nor seek the LORD!’
Isaiah 31:1
Thank you!!
Supporting the Kurds (who are natural allies), should be a top priority for Israel.
Not surprisingly, this idea has not even been discussed in our media.
A strong relationship with the Kurds, a non-Arab people with whom we share so many common enemies, would be an immense source of mutual strength to both Israel and the Kurds.
The support could be public or covert.
Bold, public support(the best option but not very likely to happen), would place the “Palestinian” issue on the back-burner (if any burner at all) given the stakes involved with the Kurds.
Iran and Turkey don’t give a hoot about what happens in “Palestine”. They care deeply and profoundly about what happens in “Kurdistan”.
Public support would also provide Israel with the sort of bold foreign policy that used to give both our friends and enemies pause before threatening us or making demands of us.
Increased covert support, (such that only those who set policy for the governments of the US, Iran, Turkey, etc… would be aware of it) might have the same basic effect, but to a much lesser and less certain degree.
Whether Israel went for a covert increase in support for the Kurds or, more sensibly, turned the strategic tables 180 degrees by offering public support, it is high time our government increased our support for the Kurds.
It’s a rare thing to have the opportunity to do what is both morally right and strategically advantageous.
Having said that, there is no doubt Barak, Netanyahu, and the rest of the recycled, proven-failures who lead us will ignore this opportunity and push us deeper into the hole they have dug for us.
Thank you for putting support for the Kurds on the public table.
Much of Israel’s population, including the members of the electronic and written media, lives on the Coastal Plain from Ashdod to Haifa. This population has very different mentality and is physically very far removed from the problems of those Israelis who live on the periphery, on the borders with Gaza or the Palestinian Authority areas, or in the Territories.
Thus they tend to minimalize the dangers posed by Hamas, or the PA, or even the possible exchange of Palestinian terrorist leaders for the IDF soldier Gilad Shalit. Certainly most Israeli journalists consider themselves to be an elite, secular, Left wing cadre and are far more European in their outlook than Israeli or even Jewish. This mindset and their physical distance from the Palestinians is what allows them to trivialize the dangers Israel faces from the terrorist flotillas, a lopsided terrorist exchange for Gilad Shalit, an easing of the Israeli embargo on the Hamas Gaza Strip, or the possible division of the city of Jerusalem.
I cannot fault Michael Oren for trying to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear by defending Barack Obama as long as he did. It is very easy to damage alliances and to drive allies away; much harder it is to strive and labor to maintain as much good will as possible under trying circumstances.
This is especially true when someone like President Barack Obama is in charge of American foreign policy. Obama is not averse to making clear his personal antagonism towards Israel, his profound disgust towards Jewish Israeli leaders, and his hostile diplomatic conviction that Israel and her Jews are the main and perhaps only obstacle to peace with the Palestinians and an improvement of the United State’s relationship with the Arab world.
These are definitely hard times for Israel, when our allies and even much of our own media condemn us for actions and policies that every other sovereign nation takes for granted.
It’s a far cry from the days when terrorists used to hijack airliners and the Israeli policy, which proved to be effective, was not to negotiate with terrorists in the slightest. The thought now is that as long as we’re talking with the terrorists (like Abu Mazen) they won’t kill Jews whereas as every negotiation has shown there is only an increase in terrorism as a result. In the end you know that Shalit’s throat will be slit just before he gets handed over to Israel. The appeasement policy typical of Jewish leadership cynically calculates that the death of a few Jews now and then is worth it. This shows how little Jewish leadership values Jewish life. It’s ultimate result would be gratifying to Helen Thomas. It’s quite a different matter to face one’s enemies with courage and while some Jews will unavoidably be murdered, the People will survive.
Israel should help the Kurds as it would be mutually beneficial.
Weaken Hamas. Stand up to Obama and not cave into things which are not good for Israel.
Thank you, Caroline for being the most consistent writer in Israel who stands up for Israel and what is good for it!
Caroline, the validity of your statements is without question. When I read of the censorship and condemnation against Israel I begin to wonder if everyone in the Israeli government and the public sector has lost his mind. We have everything to gain by digging in our heels and taking a stand against our enemies and that includes the Obamanation in the White House. Furthermore we have nothing to lose. Some might say our self esteem, but we’ve lost that by conceding on every issue. Enough is enough! It’s time to pick up the pieces, declare our independence and bring Gilad home.
Typo:
“Regionally, Israel should make common cause with the Kurds of Iran, Iraq and Syria who are now being assaulted by Iran, Turkey and Syria. ”
‘ It is very easy to damage alliances and to drive allies away;’
Yes ben,
little declawed,toothless kitty cats have nothing left but to beg and grovel for everything and are always in fear of losing the tight leash around their neck as this is their only hope and security.
Woe is you !
Keep you knee pads close for begging my dear deballed slave.
You are absolutely correct. To say that requires no loyalty, leap of faith or political double think. It is very simply obvious that you are presenting logical truth. One does not get where one wants to get by driving in the opposite direction, which is what so many in Israel, and so many supposed friends of Israel seem to do and to advocate.
Committing suicide is not an improved, alternative, life style option.
But, still, no one asks why on earth the leaders and friends of Israel are advocating what amounts to suicide.
I find it very hard to believe that people who have been clever enough to advance themselves to the peak of political power and influence can actually be so stupid. Therefore I am forced to conclude that what they do is more or less intentional. The fact that Israel and the West fight to lose seems to be the strategy of those who design the strategy. And therefore one has to ask what is their real intent – what are their true goals?
Don’t ever forget that the Kurds are muslims and they bombed Israeli embassies in 1999.
Caroline, you are right again! You make perfect sense and you difinitely need to be Israel’s prime minister!!
Incompetence! In the name of all that is right, are there no warriors remaining?
In warning Iran, the Israeli leadership failed to play war, as the engagement is intended to be played—”forthright”, is a word which as here used was quite out of proper context—Israel was foolish, . . .
PUT PRESSURE ON GAZANS, AND THEN WHAT?
– Yes, by all means toughen up conditions for all Arab prisoners. And absolutely no more releases. This due not only to Shalit’s captivity but to Arab hostility in general.
– You write: “To bring Gilad Schalit home a free man, Israel must weaken Hamas.”
Up to a point. Not too much.
In fact, Hamas’ upfront evil intentions towards Israel – unlike the deceptive Fatah – have given Israel a reprieve on the roadmap to a unified state of Palestine.
As long as Israel has weak leaders, I hope Hamas continues to prevail in Gaza.
– “End supply of electricity”?. You can’t win that one. THEY CRAVE VICTIMHOOD. It works. It’s their most effective weapon against Israel.
You say it’s lawful under international law. So is building in Jerusalem. So is building anywhere in Israel! So is demolishing illegal Arab housing. But all three actions are deemed “unhelpful” or outright “illegal” by the the UN Secretary General and the State Department.
If Israel is going to USE INTERNATIONAL LAW, Caroline, the government should cut this Gordian Knot once and for all and ANNEX ALL THE TERRITORIES.
Enough of playing hostile games with Gaza that backfire against Israel every time!
– “were Israel to weaken public support for Hamas, Hamas would be more likely to bow to Israel’s will.”
Caroline, public opinion means very little in a tyrannical regime. If there were elections in Gaza, Hamas would not concede power to any other group.
And if elections were held in the PA, Hamas would get huge support.
– What I STILL DO NOT UNDERSTAND is Israel’s ultimate goal for Gaza.
a) A friendly neighbor? Not a chance.
b) A severely weakened Hamas so that Fatah can take over? That’s insane! That would lead to a united state of Palestine under Fatah, an Arab corridor between Ramallah and Gaza, a divided Israel, a besieged Israel.
c) More of the same games with Gaza provoking Israel, followed by Israel’s retaliation, followed by UN investigations and ever increasing media and international condemnation of Israel.
What does Israel REALLY want or can reasonably expect from Gaza and the PA in the next five, ten and fifty years?
Does the government ever think that far in the future? Or just tomorrow’s headlines on Israeli media?
Jews have waited 2000 years to recover Israel, but weak, “misguided” governments have squandered much of it in only a few decades.
When the Hamas missiles and rockets rain down on Sderot,Ashdod,Ashkelon,Tel Aviv and every other town and village around Gaza killing thousands of Israeli’s I will remember how Israel was more concerned about looking humanitarian to the inhumane world of worthless back stabbing hypocrites who won’t shed a tear for the latest mass murder of Jews.
I will remember how Israel was so concerned about worthless world opinion and the health and well being of the mass murderers and made sure they had everything to keep them strong and a growing threat.
How the average Israeli was so timid and fearful of public opinion from the care less outside world that they coluldn’t imagine shutting power off the the Nazi enclave as they prepared their extermination plans against an Israel who aided and encouraged them with their kindness.
At least these dead Jews wil have gone to their graves knowing they fed and helped their killers every step of the way.
You are much more generous and kind towards your executioners than your grandparents were to the Nazi’s.
For that accomplishment you can be very proud fools.
With encouragement, another alternative to surrender is simply this: to put the God of Israel back into the equation. He is EVERY strength Israel needs (as an immoveable buffer against weak government, a hostile left and enemies champing at the bit to destroy her). His covenants with Israel remain unbroken; the land (all of it) has been promised to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as an everlasting inheritance. No force from within Israel or without can bring her down.
In view of the relentless hosility closing in on Israel from her enemies and enormous pressure bearing down from so-called ‘friends’,
Isaiah (8:8b-10) reminds us:
“God is with us! His outspread wings protect the land. Gather together in fear, you nations! Listen, you distant parts of the earth. Get ready to fight, but be afraid. Yes, get ready, but be afraid! Make your plans! But they will never succeed. Talk as much as you like! But it is all useless, because God is with us.”
Amy said,
on June 29, 2010 10:10 PM
“- What I STILL DO NOT UNDERSTAND is Israel’s ultimate goal for Gaza.
a) A friendly neighbor? Not a chance.
b) A severely weakened Hamas so that Fatah can take over? That’s insane! That would lead to a united state of Palestine under Fatah, an Arab corridor between Ramallah and Gaza, a divided Israel, a besieged Israel.
c) More of the same games with Gaza provoking Israel, followed by Israel’s retaliation, followed by UN investigations and ever increasing media and international condemnation of Israel.
What does Israel REALLY want or can reasonably expect from Gaza and the PA in the next five, ten and fifty years??”
+++
Exactly so Amy!
What path forward, for Israel, Israelis, the Jewish people???
‘Palestinians’ will, NEVER, EVER, offer the Jewish people a ‘final solution’ to this conflict, which involves peaceful co-existence between ‘Palestinians’ and the Jewish people.
‘Palestinians’ [Hamas, Fatah, and good moslems within Israel proper] are philosophically committed to fighting a NEVER ENDING war of attrition, against the Jewish people.
Period.
When will the Jewish people face up to that very apparent truth?
How much longer must their affliction continue?
‘…a God of truth.’
Hosea 5:15
I will go and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me early.
Isaiah 42:18
Hear, ye deaf; and look, ye blind, that ye may see.
19 Who is blind, but my servant? or deaf, as my messenger that I sent? who is blind as he that is perfect, and blind as the LORD’S servant?
Dear Caroline
To win one must oppose the wishes and intentions of the enemy, and upend the tables on him
But who is the enemy? opinions vary, but in essence it is the presence of Muslims in the Land of Israel. The wish and intention of Hamas and all other Muslim organizations (egypt syria and Jordan included) is to fill the Land of Israel with Muslim invaders, encroach upon the Jews so they are forced into diaspora again. Every Muslim on this side of the Jordan river is a fulfillment of the wishes and intentions of the Enemy.
So, if one wants to save Schalit and gain victory one must do the opposite of their wishes and repatriate Muslims to their ancestral homelands, east and west of the Land of Israel.
Lets start with one hundred prominent Hamas members being repatriated to Gaza. If that does not restore Schalit, then maybe a thousand will do. I will bet you anything that by the time you get to 5000, that is fewer than the Jews deported from Gush Katif , would suffice for Hamas to restore Schlit pronto
Now Israel’s Defense Ministry is buying Turkish made Hyundai trucks in addition to showing Turkish soldiers how Israeli drones work. The Israeli desire to maintain ties to a country led by a regime dedicated to its destruction is absolutely suicidal. This self-destructive desire to be liked is more insidious than any bribe offered to Israeli politicians. When you have this pervasive lack of integrity in a society, that society is not likely to last nor deserve to.
God bless you. מעט מן האור דוחה הרבה מן החושך
I can’t even understand why President Obama wouldn’t at least make the 400 million of support to Hamas conditional on the release of Gilad Schalit and a written pledge never to take such hostages again. But I suppose that would look too much like rewarding Hamas’ illegal actions and we certainly wouldn’t want to do that!
God Bless Israel
Someone must have “photoshopped” the picture at the top of this article…don’t see the knives at each others back. “I kill you more!”
You “kill” me Latma!