Steve Ornstein
Consider the following:
The health and security of our nation depends directly on how we can mange the needs of our poor and disadvantaged.
1. Domestically we need to take care of our poor and those struggling to make it in a technologically oriented world. We need to promote education and encourage projects that meet these ends. Taking in refugees from African States is commendable. But government policy needs to be clear so that it doesn’t create further hardships for the “refugees” and their host communities.
2. We need to stop extortion by the Charedi – Ultra Orthodox factions whose sole purpose is too fill their coffers giving back little or nothing to the state except insane declarations that hurt and victimize our citizens. These so called “leaders” tend to make proclamations that incite and infuriate a growing public who is tired of their questionable loyalty and outright hostility toward the State.
3. The Government must take control of determining “who is a Jew”. Civil marriages need to be approved by the State. Religious marriages performed by all branches of Judaism need to be legal and fully accepted by the State.
4. Foreign policy needs to be more focused and expressed in a more cohesive framework. Not a hodgepodge of conflicting statements made by every self-serving idiot that happened to “buy” a seat in the Knesset.
5. There are those who wish the Jewish State would disappear and work vigorously for that to happen. They engage in anti-Israeli demonstrations, boycotts, de-legitimization efforts and support the idea of a Bi-national State that will ultimately undermine the Jewish State of Israel. While Jews abroad have the right to share their views about Israeli policy ultimately we in Israel need to make our own decisions.
6. The “settlements” are not the obstacle to peace. Those who want to undermine the Jewish State will use the settlement issue to promote Anti-Semitism in order to justify Palestinian violence. The European Union spokespersons with their hatred of Jews make bold statements and threats to Israel in a smug attempt to remove their guilt for the Holocaust.
7. We need to make decisions that are in our interest and not accommodate ourselves to the wishes and desires of those who would destroy us. To do so would be a recipe for disaster.
To conclude I would like to quote Yehuda Avner, from his latest book The Prime Ministers, An Intimate Narrative of Israeli leadership.
“Meet the Press, where Bill Monroe of NBC News kicked off by asking him (PM Begin), “Tell us, Mr. Prime Minister, how did your talks with President Carter go?”
“Before I respond to this very important question, answered Begin, I would like to say a few words about this day on which we meet, because of its universal importance. Today, in accordance with our Jewish calendar, is the ninth day of the month of Av. It is the day when, one thousand, nine hundred and seven years ago Roman legions – the Fifth and the Twelfth Legions – launched their ultimate onslaught on the Temple Mount, set the Temple ablaze, and destroyed Jerusalem, subjugating our people and conquering our land. Historically, this was the beginning of all suffering of our people, who were dispersed, humiliated and ultimately, a generation ago, almost physically wiped out. We forever remember this day, which we call Tish b’Av, and now we have the responsibility to make sure that never again will the Jew become homeless and defenseless. This in truth, is the crux of the problem we face in the future – making sure it will never happen again. And that in a nutshell, was the underlying theme of my talks with President Carter.”
“In a closing discussion Menachem Begin read from Herzog’s profound philosophical anthology, A People That Dwells Alone:
The theory of classic Zionism was national normalization. What was wrong with the theory? It was the belief that the idea of a people that dwells alone is an abnormal concept, when actually a ‘people that dwells alone’ is the natural concept of the Jewish people. That is why this one phrase still describes the totality of the extraordinary phenomenon of Israel’s revival. If one asks how the ingathering of the exiles, which no one could have imagined in his wildest dreams, came about, or how the State of Israel could endure such severe security challenges, or how it was built up such a flourishing economy, or how the unity of the Jewish people throughout the Diaspora has been preserved, one must come back to the primary idea that this is ‘a people that dwells alone.’ More than that, one must invoke this phrase not only to understand how the Jews have existed for so long; one must invoke it as a testimony to the Jewish right to exist in the land of their birth. “So there you have it,” concluded Begin snapping the book shut. “Cease dwelling alone and we cease to exist. What a conundrum!”
