The Jewish Family: Building Block of the Jewish Nation

After his fiascos in last week's Torah portion, Bilaam understands that his spiritual powers alone are not enough to "force" G-d to cooperate with him and curse Israel.

"And Bilaam saw that it was good in the eyes of G-d to bless Israel and he did not use sorcery as in the previous times and he turned his face to the desert." (Numbers 24:1).

Bilaam forgoes his dark-side sorcery and instead searches for Israel's weak spot. He realizes that he must sabotage the Jewish family; the building block from which the Jewish Nation is built.

Bilaam looks at the tents of Israel, convinced that in his wisdom he will find the breaches so prevalent in non-Jewish families. From those cracks that he was convinced that he would find in the families of the Children of Israel, Bilaam was sure that he would be able to destabilize the foundation of the nation and destroy it.

To his surprise, Bilaam found no such breach. As opposed to his previous attempts to curse Israel, when the Torah writes that G-d put the blessing into his mouth, this time, the blessing flows forth from Bilaam spontaneously. Bilaam was amazed; every tent was positioned so that nobody could see into the entrance of his neighbor's tent. "How lovely are your tents, Jacob, your dwellings, Israel," Bilaam blesses.

This brings us to the turn of events leading up to what is described in this week's Torah portion, Pinchas. Bilaam did not manage to curse Israel, but he did understand how a nation is built. "Let me give you some advice," says Bilaam to Balak, like a professional who did not manage to do the job correctly but whose dedication to the goal (the destruction of Israel) is greater than his professional pride.

Bilaam gives Balak a priceless tip: "The G-d of Israel hates lust," he advises. "Send your daughters to entice them, destabilize the family unit and all the rest will fall into place." This time, Bilaam actually does succeed - until Pinchas arrives on the scene, stops the plague and merits the covenant of peace.

Shabbat Shalom,

Moshe Feiglin

Rabbi Meir Kahane, z”l - by Paul Eidelberg (The Jewish Press) 11-9-1990

He told the truth, and he died for the truth.  He told the truth about the implacable Arab-Islamic hatred of the Jews and of Israel.  He told the truth about Israel’s government, that this government is the greatest enemy of the Jewish people.  He told the truth about the many Reform and Conservative and Moderdox rabbis who feared the truth and prevented him from appearing and speaking the truth at their temples and synagogues.

It was because he told the truth about the Arabs, who now applaud Saddam Hussein and scream “Itbach al-Yahud” – “Slaughter the Jews” – that he was called a “facist.”  It was because he told the truth about the many rabbis who betrayed Torah Judaism for the baubles of popularity that he was called a “Khomeini.”

He told the truth, and he died for the truth.  He told the truth about the countless Arabs, including Arab citizens of Israel, who keep not one of the Seven Noahide Laws of Universal Morality.  He told the truth about Moslems who blaspheme against the G-d of Israel, who worship blood and glory in bloodshed, who murder and rape and mutilate each other, as well as Jews.

He told the truth about a government that lacks the courage to protect its own people from the stones and firebombs and knives of Arabs.  He told the truth about a government steeped in falsehood, a government that speaks peace, peace with a people that knows only war.  He told the truth about a government that enacted a law making it illegal to tell the truth about that people.  For this reason only was he barred from the Knesset – yea, with the help of a High Court of Injustice that allowed PLO spokesmen to remain in that miscreant assembly.

He told the truth, and was vilified by liars.  He spoke with courage, and was attacked by cowards.  He was barred from universities that welcomed PLO propagandists.  He defended Jews and justice, and was treated as a pariah.  His voice in the Knesset was a voice in the wilderness, but his words reached beyond its walls and enlightened the minds of honest Jews.

He worked tirelessly for Klal Yisrael .  He helped countless Jews in Israel and abroad.  He spoke words of Torah and brought Jewish souls back to Judaism.  His gifted articles – alas, we shall have them no more – illuminated events obscured by official darkness.  He articulated the hopes and sentiments of normal people.  He lifted their hearts, he rallied them to a cause, and he died for that cause.

He suffers no more.  But we who mourn our loss, we who feel the emptiness created by his passing, we who were strengthened by his words, let us keep his faith and carry on the struggle for which he died – the struggle for Truth.
Editor’s note:  Paul Eidelberg (Ph.D. University of Chicago), is a professor of political science at Bar Ilan University and the author of many books.

The Holocaust Yet to Come - Moshe Feiglin

This article is not about the Holocaust that happened. It is about the Holocaust that is liable to come knocking on our door. If you are weak of heart, stop reading now. But if you are staying with me, please take a deep breath, forget about secondary political issues and internalize what I am writing. The trains to Auschwitz did not have separate cars for Right and Left, Haredi and secular.

It is popular to pontificate on the lesson of the Holocaust. Every person takes the Holocaust to the place that is comfortable for him. I would like to discuss a very basic lesson that I have never seen disproved: The Western world will not try too hard to close down the gas chambers. Not only that. It will even indirectly stoke them.

True, after the Holocaust, in a rare moment of good will, the world voted to partition the Land of Israel and to recognize the fledgling Jewish state. But this recognition had no practical implications. Seven Arab armies invaded the tiny area allocated to Israel. The world did not lift a finger. The Egyptian army got to within thirty kilometers of Tel Aviv, murdering and destroying every person and settlement in its path. They cut through the Negev and reached Beit Lechem. The Jordanians were just twenty minutes away from Israel's coast. The Syrians captured Mishmar Hayarden – and destroyed it, of course.

Three years after the Holocaust, the Western world waited once again for the Arabs to finish off the dirty work. It did nothing to help Israel. But then, with G-d's loving grace, the situation turned around. The nascent IDF stopped the Arab armies. On the southern front, Yigal Alon commanded over some brilliant maneuvers that more or less eliminated the Egyptian army. The IDF forces got all the way to El Arish inside Egypt.

When that happened, Britain threatened that if the IDF would not retreat, it would invade Israel. America pressured, Ben Gurion gave in and the new norm was set: When the Jews are in danger, the world waits patiently. When they start to win, the world stops them.

The Western world – upon all its beauty and advantages – will always act as a static anvil for the murderous hammer descending upon the Jews from above – be it the Nazi hammer, the Arab hammer or any other murderous, anti Jewish hammer.

The time when we will have to decide if we are willing to entrust our fate to the very same West that will always be happy to be rid of the "Israel Problem" is rapidly approaching. We see ourselves as an inseparable part of the Western world. It is difficult for us to accept that the West, our cultural patron, will simply close its eyes with relief when six million Jews in Israel will once again be facing wholesale slaughter.
But that is precisely the direction that events are taking. The only difference between 1948 and today is that then we were a rabbit that thought it was a lion and today we are a lion that thinks it is a rabbit. In 1948, our physical weakness invited invasion. Today, our mental weakness invites invasion.

What invasion am I talking about? If we were not living in denial, the media would be abuzz about Samantha Power, head of the National Security Council, who advocates taking the funds that the US now invests in the IDF and investing them instead in the 'Palestinian' army. In no uncertain terms, she discusses a possible US invasion of Israel – to keep the peace, of course. When that goal is accomplished, Power advocates leaving us here to enjoy the loving kindness of the righteous souls in Ramallah.

As surrealistic as all of this sounds now, it is most important to remember that only terror organizations and Arab states used to deny Israel's right to exist. Now this concept is coffee table talk throughout Europe. The denial of the right to exist always precedes physical annihilation. That is another important lesson of the Holocaust.

Tony Blair, the European Union's envoy to the Mid-East, recently said that Europe would accept the Hamas as a negotiating partner, refusing to make that contingent on Hamas recognition of Israel's right to exist. When officials of the stature of Power and Blair make these statements, they are charting the course for Western policy.

After the UN will recognize a Palestinian state at the 1967 borders, the Arabs will demand an Israeli retreat. To make sure we know they mean business, they will punctuate their demands with missiles on Israel's cities. Israel will be forced to respond and the international coalition will rev up its motors to come save the peace.

All signs point to the fact that Israel is currently building the foundations for a Palestinian state and is planning an instant, southern-Lebanon-style retreat from Judea and Samaria. Something like, 'Get on the buses now and we'll explain later.'

But the Arabs don't really want a state. All that they want is to end Jewish sovereignty in Israel. Their demands will intensify after Israel's retreat from Judea and Samaria as per the Gush Katif aftermath model. They will demand the Jewish neighborhoods in East Jerusalem, right of return for their 'refugees', compensation payments, an international peace keeping force and what not. In the meantime, they will continue to bombard us with missiles. Israel's military response will serve the West with its excuse to intervene. At this point, an exhausted Israel will have to decide: Either open the Ashdod port to the US Navy forces or fight against the entire world.

All of Israel's 'enlightened' elites will unequivocally support opening Israel's gates to the
'Peacekeeping' forces. From the President all the way down to the writers in the major newspapers, they will have no other solution. "And what is better?" they will ask. "Living in the shadow of the West, or fighting a war being forced upon us by Jewish fundamentalists?" The patriotic declarations being sounded today in the Likud will turn into 'pragmatic' rhetoric. The West is the very air that we breathe and the lesson of the Holocaust will be ignored.

The last thing that the policy-makers are capable of thinking is that we are a nation in our own merit, a nation that relies on its own ethical code. They will never come to terms with the fact that we are not Western or Eastern; we are simply Jews who, as opposed to 1948 – are not weak at all. We are a formidable economic and military power and are capable of extracting a terrible price from any country in the world that will threaten our sovereignty.

We will never even think that the entire problem does not exist in reality, but only in our minds. In other words, our psychological dependency on the West actually invites this scenario. No Western country would challenge our sovereignty if it had the slightest fear of an Israeli response. We are a lion that thinks it is a rabbit. But knowing this country, I do not expect that we will respond to threats on our sovereignty in the manner that any normal nation would respond. Instead, Israel will open its gates to the 'Peacekeeping' forces. The IDF will be disbanded and the rest of the story has already been experienced by the Jewish People throughout its long and painful history.

As a believing Jew, I pray that our Father in heaven will perform a miracle and that one year from now, you will be able to take this article and laugh at me. I am a great believer in the Nation of Israel and anticipate that unexpected energies will emerge in the nick of time to prevent this scenario.

As Independence Day approaches, we must say loudly and clearly: There is life after America. The struggle is not for the settlements. The danger is much more existential and all-inclusive. It is not military danger. It is not economic danger. The danger is our total collapse in a process that is all-too reminiscent of the fall of Czechoslovakia. The moment that a state entrusts its existence to other states that have other interests, its existence becomes transient.

It is urgent to cut the psychological ropes binding us to the West. We are not Americans. We are Israelis and we have an independent and strong faith and culture from which we draw our own existential legitimacy – not from the West.

There is life after America. Put it on stickers. Blog it. Write it on your social media. Broadcast it at rallies and wherever you can. We do not need American aid. All that we need is to return to our tried and true Jewish identity.

Chag Pesach kasher v'sameach! May we witness miracles in our times as we did when we left Egypt. Remember Moshiach may not be here yet...but he is cetrtainly in the neighborhood!

The existential anxiety experienced by many of Israel’s citizens....

The existential anxiety experienced by many of Israel’s citizens is the product of a traumatic history and the all-inclusive draft. A professional volunteer army would release pent-up stress and make it easier for everyone to breathe.

There are situations in life when we must be prepared. Our muscles instinctively tense and our survival mode takes over. The problem begins after the danger has passed and our muscles remain tense from the memory of the fear. The trauma leaves us anxious and stressed, which in turn wastes energy. More than anything else at moments like these, we need someone to tell us that we can relax; that we are already on solid ground.
True, Israel has experienced difficult periods in our past and recent history. We had to protect our lives and we were almost annihilated. But the situation has changed considerably in the last years and today’s Israel can be a bit more relaxed and confident.
Constant anxiety affects the pace of our days, the shortness of breath and intensity of life in Israel. In India it is common to meet Israeli backpackers who have completed their army service sitting in a guest house and smoking drugs: The tension and intensity of life in Israel fade away in India with a little help from chemistry and good friends.
Israeli society can be defined as high-strung. Army service is not exclusively to blame, but it is definitely a major factor in our stress. It’s all inclusive imperative highlights the difficulties and tension in our lives. Sometimes, it also hinders our ability to make balanced decisions. The compulsory draft law is a remnant, like a muscle still flexed because of emergencies that we experienced in the past. Compulsory draft is not only a product of our anxiety, but it perpetuates it. By repealing the compulsory draft we can free the public of its existential anxiety. ”
A closer look at our Jewish sources also shows sensitivity toward personal freedom and rights – even during war. The Torah explicitly prohibits the compulsory draft of soldiers for medical or certain personal reasons. (More on this in Jewish Inspiration).
The pressure that we are under prevents us from thinking of totally different possibilities to improve the IDF. Statistics show that the army is urgently in need of revamping. Even if it is possible to implement far-reaching reforms without repealing the compulsory draft, it appears that this step has greater potential to achieve the desired result. We are certain that many superb young people would enlist for volunteer professional army service. A state for which its citizens are not prepared to fight will not survive.
The time has come to begin to think about replacing the compulsory draft with a professional volunteer army. It is time to relax a bit and to let people live. It is time to begin thinking like a normal country, because for a long time now, we really are a normal country.

With G-d's help, next year most of the Nation of Israel will be in the Land of Israel - before next Pesach.

Shalom to everyone. On the Seder night, the Hagaddah begins with the negative and ends with praise. In this short message, we will do the same.

*

This past week, we once again had a painful reminder of the fact that the State of Israel cannot exist for a long time when it is disconnected from its Jewish foundations. The last round of fighting against the Hamas in Gaza ended with the score of 2:0 - in favor of the Hamas. On one hand, every bus within five kilometers of the Gaza Strip has now become an easy and accessible potential target, while on the other hand, Israel will not dare to carry out targeted assassinations or the abduction of senior Hamas terrorists when those measures mean that all the residents of Ashkelon and Be'er Sheva must stay in bomb shelters.

The military solution is essentially non-existent because the only way to triumph is to capture the Gaza Strip and to establish real Israeli sovereignty over the region. But he who is disconnected form his Jewish foundations cannot see this solution as an option. He is incapable of accepting the fact that Gaza is simply the Land of Israel and that our roots in the city and surrounding area are no less deep than our roots in Tel Aviv. From the mighty Samson through Rabbi Yisrael Najarah and until the 1930's when the Jewish community in Gaza was destroyed, there had always been a Jewish community there.

Are you familiar with the Shabbat songs Yoducha Ra'ayonai or Kah Ribon olam v'olmaya? You've heard them. The next time you hear those songs, remember that they were written in Gaza and that their composers are buried in the Jewish cemetery there.

He who sees only the here and now, he who is disconnected from our past and our destiny in this Land - also has no present. He finds himself running to bomb shelters or to sophisticated protective systems.

It is not only Gaza that we cannot capture without our Jewish foundations - we cannot even justify our presence in Haifa and Be'er Sheva without them. Just one generation after the Holocaust, Europe is no longer inclined to apologize. Our security-based claims sound to them - and in no small measure, justifiably so - like the tears of the Robbed Cossack. When is the last time that you heard an official Israeli representative simply say, "This is our Land"? If we also admit that we occupied a land that is not ours, how can we complain that our children are in danger?

The negation of Israel's legitimate right to exist is spreading like wildfire in the West, IDF officers and Israeli politicians are afraid to leave the country to which they themselves do not understand their connection.

O.K., we also have to leave some time for the positive.

The good news is that despite the confusion, the Nation of Israel is upward bound. As individuals we may be confused, but as a nation we are displaying unbelievable vitality. The birthrate among Jews in Israel is the highest in the Western world - even without the religious factored in. All the Western nations are shrinking and by us, construction of new apartments does not meet growing demand. Israel today is one of the most modern and developed states in the world. We export more to the US than we import - and that is even though we buy more from America than Brazil or India, with its population of a billion. The Western economies are collapsing - while the Israeli shekel is the most stable in the world. Our foreign debt is small and unemployment in Israel is relatively minimal. True, the lack of a balanced Jewish culture of modest spending and loving kindness is currently preventing the wealth from filtering down to all layers of the population, but as we connect to our culture, that will also work out. We're talking about the positive now, remember?

With G-d's help, next year most of the Nation of Israel will be in the Land of Israel - before next Pesach. This demographic status has not occurred since the era of the First Temple!

So what is happening here? On the one hand the physical aspect of our nation is flourishing, while on the other hand we are experiencing spiritual weakness that threatens our continued existence. How can we change this situation? How can we progress? How can we take advantage of our national sovereignty and the great abundance that our Father in heaven is showering upon us and not lose them, G-d forbid?

The answer is leadership. To emerge from our state of mental subservience to genuine national liberty, we need Jewish leadership that will know how to stabilize our national structure on the foundations of our Jewish heritage.

How will we do it? How will we deal with the Arabs? How will we explain it to the Jews? How will we stand up to American pressure? We have answers to all those questions and more.

You can start by reading our articles, arranged on the Jewish Leadership website by categories . Check out Tomorrow Magazine for more details on various issues. And most important of all, get our ideas out through your own blogs and social media outlets.

We are entering Pesach 5771 with great hope. With G-d's help, we will greet Jonathan Pollard, Gilad Shalit and all our other captives this year. All the wounded and sick will completely recover and all of our dreams will be realized in the very best way.

Reality is nudging our nation into a new consciousness - Jewish consciousness. We are building an alternative and with G-d's help, we will soon lead our nation and complete the journey that our ancestors began in Egypt 3,013 years ago - on the Temple Mount.

I wish you a happy and kosher Festival of Freedom.

Can Israel Withstand the Mounting International Pressure?: By Moshe Feiglin

3 Nissan, 5771
April 7, '11

It is worthwhile to watch this film clip of Samantha Power, a senior director on the National Security Council, one of the most influential people in the Obama administration. The two main points that Power makes in this interview, no holds barred, are the necessity to establish a strong army for the "Palestinians" (instead of "investing billions" in the Israeli army) and the necessity to enforce the political solution that she suggests with "massive" force.

As hallucinatory as Power's words may seem now, it is worthwhile to remember that the negation of Israel's right to exist, which was once the rhetoric of terror organizations and Arab states alone, has now become a central and legitimate topic throughout Europe. When a person of Power's stature speaks like this today, she clearly charts out the strategic course for the US and Europe tomorrow.

This week, Tony Blair, the Quartet's official envoy to the Middle East, announced that Europe would accept the Hamas as a negotiating partner. He refused to make that contingent on the terror organization's recognition of Israel's right to exist. Simply put, first we will take whatever you give us and then when you are helpless, we will swallow up the rest.

Shimon Peres, of course, rushed to join in the chorus and after his meeting this week with the US President announced with no small measure of identification that "Obama wants progress - not just another show." Our honored president has begged for a meeting with Obama for a long time and was willing to pay the price: adding his own voice to the international pressure being weaved around Jerusalem. Peres does not need much coaxing. His dream of a new Middle East perfectly complements Power's declarations.

Time and again Israel's public relations representatives have emphasized the fact that there is no connection between the uprisings in the Arab world and the Israel-Arab conflict. The world, though, is not interested in the facts. But we must at least understand that it makes no difference how much we will give to placate the Arabs and the world. As long as one grain of sand in the Land of Israel remains under Israeli sovereignty, they will not be satisfied.

"He said that the Arabs are not afraid of our expansion. They negate our very presence, as a foreign implant. 'The question is,' he said, 'will you be able to muster forces to establish the state larger than the forces that we will concentrate to prevent it?'"
(Abba Eban reports on his conversation with the secretary of the Arab League, Azzam Pasha, September, 1947).

Nothing much has changed since 1947. We are not engaged in a border conflict with the Arabs. They are totally unwilling to accept our sovereign existence in the Land of Israel. It is not despair at their lack of sovereignty that motivates the Arabs against us. On the contrary. It is their hope to negate our sovereignty here that keeps them going. That is why every small piece of land that we give them adds fuel to their bonfire of hope. It intensifies the conflict and the international pressure that invariably comes on its heels.

Both the Western and Arab worlds are weaker today than ever before. They will be at our throats only if we open the gates of Jerusalem to them. Israel's problem is not the military danger or the economic sanctions that a Western coalition will likely institute against us. We are fully capable of protecting our interests and emerging from this sort of crisis with an improved international standing and deterrence. Our problem is inside. Are we capable of relying on our internal sense of justice, on our ancient culture, on our faith in G-d? Or do we still worship America?

Experience has proven that we do not have the ability to speed up the maturation of consciousness enveloping Israeli society. We won the Gush Katif referendum and the race for the Knesset, but it didn't help. We must understand that until the public consciousness reaches a vital critical mass, no technical victory will change reality.

That is why Manhigut Yehudit is focused now on introducing a new, Jewish way of thinking into Israeli society. We are still in politics and will continue to do all that is necessary to win. But in order to get elected, the public must understand that there is a viable and attractive alternative for which it can vote. We must be perceived by the public as the solution - and not as part of the problem. We must remain accessible and relevant, ready for the moment that the Nation of Israel will seek out authentic faith-based leadership to lead it into the new, G-dly world reality.

Israel's Requirement from HaShem

Why do we have so many splintered ideas? Our outline is Torah. Our King is HaShem.
What we need to do is clear. Why do we as a people not speak out? What are we afraid of?
They didn't bomb the trains. The pogroms were allowed to happen. Blood libel is never punished.
Moneychangers and scapegoats, the hurdles we were given to simply have the opportunity to speak out and defend ourselves...but most importantly defend HaShem. That is all this about.
The Reform movement is getting anew "Head Rabbi" - Jacobs....and he is board member of J STREET!
OMG, they are nuts. I was born to a Reform family and Temple. These guys are exiting Judaism. There kids marry out and their children wear crosses! Scary!
We are pressuring the wrong people. Instead of fighting the Arab/Moooslim/Goyim Propaganda....we need to pressure Bibi and the Knesset to do the right thing. We need to create social action groups in the Galut to help the Right in Israel make Israel the Jewish state and give up the humanist nonsense.
We need to consolidate our bond drive money and tree money and all of the $$ we send to Israel and use it to control some results...The Israeli Government is the problem. They are weak, secular politicians. We need to get Manhigut Yehudit in power with Feiglin or National Union or.... Whomever will enforce the will of the Israeli people, directed by Torah and HaShem.  Take back the Temple Mount - retake Gaza, Judea and Samaria, annex them. Start expelling Arabs and deporting all displaced "Refugees" with passports to their country of origin (Jordan).
World opinion is irrelevant, it is all Goldstone and Moooslim. The problem is we don't stand up for Israel in the Galut. All we ever do is try to motivate Jews to justify Israels right to exist. Enough of this weak effort to be accepted, it is far past time to only listen to HaShem and clear the land already! Get rid of the thorns!
No more smooth, nice talk. No more money need be accepted. Don't tell the US anything...just do what needs to done and ignore monetary threats. Build our own Merkava's and Jets! Enforce the laws without preference to not causing the Arabs trouble! No more foreign Arab workers!
Kahane Tzadak!