[Freeman Note: When will the Israelis realize that you don't have to negotiate WHAT IS YOURS. It would be comedic if it wren't so tragic for the Jewish People to have the leaders we have now. Please read what i wrote many years ago and consider its meaning in light of the following Jerusalem Post article.
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While I considered myself a Zionist by 1960 and made my first trip to Israel in that year, it would be seven years before fully understanding the connection between Israel and the Jewish people. Israel's victory in the Six Day War in 1967 was the background for the most meaningful experience of my life. I arrived in Israel a few days after the war ended and like many Jews, rushed to Jerusalem to see the Western Wall.
The Wall, the last remaining remnant of Solomon's Temple and sacred to Jews for over 2000 years, had been in Jordanian controlled Jerusalem since 1949, The Jordanians, acting with malice aforethought, had denied Jews access to their sacred holy place. I walked with hundreds of Jews, praying and singing through the Old City. The feeling of anticipation and exhiliration was contagious as we approached the Wall. As I stood a few feet away, I saw pious Jews pressing little scraps of paper into the cracks between the sacred stones. The pieces contained prayers, which legends hold go straight to G-d when placed in the holy Wall.
The people in front of me finished their prayers and suddenly I was pressed up close to the object of all our joy and hope. I had expected the stones to be rough and weathered after all this time, but they were smooth from 2000 years of touching and kissing. The gentle caresses of Jews over the ages had worn soft finger grooves in the hard rock. As I placed my hands on this magnificent relic of our forefathers, I felt a surge of light and energy the likes of which I had never known. In what had to have been but the flash of a second, I felt at one with Jews from all periods of history.
At the Passover sedar we are told to thank G-d for delivering us from Egypt as though we ourselves had been brought out of bondage. At that moment in Jerusalem, this sedar message was very real for me.
In an instant I saw the continuity of Jewish history and its unbreakable connection with Eretz Yisrael (Land of Israel). I understood how modern Israel is the beginning of the Third Temple Period and the spiritual heir to Joshua, Saul, David, Solomon, the Maccabees and Bar Kokhba. I frequently write about the security reasons for incorporating Judea, Samaria, and Gaza into the body of Israel. There is another side to this issue and that is the spiritual-religious side. The truth, which many find inconvenient, is that the Land of Israel was promised by G-d to Abraham and his seed in perpetuity. The Land of Israel is not speculative real estate to be bartered away for some high sounding (but probably false) promises of peace. The hills and valleys of Judea and Samaria contain the collective memory of the Jewish people. It was here that the Israelites first entered the Holy Land. And it was here they fought the battles, built the towns, elected their kings and were preached to by their prophets and judges. And it was on this soil that they wrote the Holy Scriptures we call our Bible.
In my blinding flash of insight at the Wall, I also understood that Israel on its own soil was more powerful than the sum of its weapons and men. Jews who had wandered the earth powerless for two millenniums attained great power when re-united with the soil of Israel. Anyone who has followed the Arab-Israeli conflict must be aware of the rising cost paid for Jewish blood. Before Israel was established, nations of the world took Jewish lives with impunity. Today, Arabs have discovered that the iron fist of Zahal (Israel Defense Forces) exacts a high price for even one Jewish life.
One thing is clear to me: the Lord has blessed Israel by re-uniting Jerusalem and bringing Judea, Samaria, and Gaza back under its control. It would be a horrendous sin against G-d and common sense for Israel to renounce this inheritance to which it is entitled. Israel holds these lands as a sacred trust for the Jewish people in perpetuity.
It would not only be sinful, but also criminal, to abuse that trust by denying future generations of Jews their Holy Land -- Land of their Fathers; the one tiny spot on planet earth given to them by G-d.
[This article was first published in the Jewish Herald-Voice (Houston) on July 11, 1992]
Jerusalem, US debate status of Ariel
Aug. 12, 2009
HERB KEINON and TOVAH LAZAROFF , THE JERUSALEM POST
HERB KEINON and TOVAH LAZAROFF , THE JERUSALEM POST
The West Bank settlement of Ariel(not far from the
Jewish settlement called Tel Aviv)
According to the sources, the two sides are continuing to discuss a compromise solution on settlement construction whereby most of the 2,500 housing units currently under construction in the West Bank would continue to be built, but Israel would declare a temporary moratorium on any new projects.
Most of those 2,500 units are in the large settlement blocs that straddle the Green Line. A question, however, has emerged regarding Ariel, which juts deeper inside the West Bank then the other settlement blocks, such as Ma'aleh Adumim, Givat Ze'ev, Gush Etzion and Betar Illit.
There are currently some 98 units under construction in Ariel.
The sources said the Americans want to take Ariel out of the equation and stop all building there. Israel, on the other hand, defines Ariel as one of the large settlement blocs.
Discussions on the matter are continuing in advance of the planned meeting in about two weeks between Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and US Mideast envoy George Mitchell in London.
Officials in the Prime Minister's Office denied any knowledge of this discussion, saying that nothing was being released about the negotiations, and that only a few people truly knew what was happening in the ongoing meetings on the matter between Israeli and US officials.
Another issue that still needs to be worked out between the US and Israel is an "exit strategy" for a settlement freeze, or what building the US will permit once the freeze ends.
Israel is keen on returning to the understandings that it had with the US under the Bush Administration, whereby settlement construction would be permitted in the large settlement blocks as long as this building took place inside the settlement's current construction lines.
The widespread feeling among diplomatic officials is that when and if Israel and the US reach an agreement on a settlement freeze, it would be just a matter of time before Israeli-Palestinian talks were renewed.
This is based on a sense that even though Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has conditioned talks with Israel on a settlement freeze - something he did not do with former prime minister Ehud Olmert - nevertheless, once the US and Israel agreed on a formula, the Palestinians would have little choice but to re-start the talks.
There is also an expectation that once the talks begin, some Arab countries such as Morocco, Bahrain and perhaps other Persian Gulf countries, would ante up with some normalization gestures toward Israel. There is little belief, however, that Saudi Arabia would make any such gestures.
Ariel Mayor Ran Nachman, said he knew nothing of any plans to stop existing building projects in his city.
Dani Dayan, who heads the Council of Jewish Communities of Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip, said his understanding was that there was "no legal way to stop the ongoing construction." He dismissed all talk to the contrary as merely "spin."
However, MK David Rotem (Israel Beiteinu), a former legal adviser to the council, told the Post recently that since the settlements were under military administration, the government could order a halt to existing projects, but it would have to compensate the contractors, investors and buyers.
Nachman blamed the American attitude against settlements in part on what he termed the "Jew boys" in the White House, such as Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and senior Obama adviser David Axelrod.
There was no peace before the Six Day war in 1967, and at that time there were no settlements, Nachman said. Similarly, he said, Ariel did not even exist until 1977, but the fact that it did not exist did not facilitate peace. And again, he added, Israel destroyed its settlements in Gaza four years ago, but nothing changed.
The only way to achieve peace, he said, was to come to permanent status solution and deal with the settlements within that context. The issue of settlements, he said, was "purely symbolic."
Meanwhile, a number of settlement heads met in Ma'aleh Adumim on Tuesday to protest a de facto settlement freeze already in effect, noting that Netanyahu has not authorized a single new construction project in the West Bank since taking office at the end of March.
The settlement leaders plan to launch a campaign against both the de facto freeze and any freeze that may be agreed upon with the Americans. They plan to hold protest vigils outside Netanyahu's residence and to call on right-wing parties to leave the coalition if the current refusal to authorize new projects continues.•
This article can also be read at http://www.jpost.com /servlet/Satellite?cid=1249418582658&pagename=JPArticle%2FShowFull
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