David Mark, Author at Israel Rising

May 26, 2016December 16, 2016

Is the Israeli Government Empowering Islam’s Disregard for History?

“Israel is not the problem on the Temple Mount; Israel is the solution,”Bibi Netanyahu said back in October 2015. “We’re keeping the status quo, we’re the only ones who will do it, and we will continue to do this in a responsible, serious manner.”

Over six months after those tense fall and winter months, when it looked like all was about to unravel under an increasing terror wave from Palestinian radicals, the spring seemed to bring an odd calmness. Even the Temple Mount, the supposed heart of the conflict saw a growing amount of Jews being allowed up.

To many, the Prime Minister’s approach seemed to have worked and yet we see, like always what the real reason is for the reprieve in Palestinian violence in connection to Jerusalem.

With the help of Regavim and other activists, a situation came to light concerning the Muslim Waqf’s intention to alter the status quo by harming the walls of the Temple Mount in order to facilitate increased access for Muslim worshipers in time for Ramadan in June. The site in question is on the Mount’s South side and would irrevocably damage a declared antiquities site.

In March 2016 the Israel Antiquities Authority filed a lawsuit against the Muslim Waqf in the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court that petitioned the court to give a permanent injunction prohibiting the continued work of the illegal site and restitution. The injunction was in fact granted, yet one day later the Prime Minister’s office intervened and the injunction was lifted.

This is Bibi’s style. He talks tough and behind the scenes gives the Palestinian Arabs some gifts in order to remain calm. This particular gift is set to be explosive and would be the first time since the Waqf dug up ancient artifacts on the Temple Mount that they would be allowed to completely alter the status quo.

In early May the Antiquities Authority sent a message to the court insisting the government appeared set on settling the matter through discussion with the Waqf. In fact, the political echelon admitted that they wanted time to have a dialogue and asked for an extension that would lead until July.

“In the meantime, and during the period in which you are active on the political level and try to finish the matter through dialogue with the Waqf, the illegal construction at the archaeological site continues, in violation of the order to stop work against them with total disregard for their obligations according to the law and instead attempt to talk with them,” lawyers for the Antiquities Authority charged in written statement. “The construction works are expected to be completed at the archaeological site with the start of Ramadan in about two weeks. The experience of our client says that as soon as work on the toilets will begin, it will be difficult for future enforcement actions.”

This week right wing NGO Regavim issued the following the statement: “This week, we issued an urgent letter to the prime minister, the mayor of Jerusalem and Minister Regev that the (IAA) is under her wing. We are also preparing a petition on the matter to the Supreme Court. This destruction of Jewish History can not continue on the Temple Mount.”

The question of status quo is constantly pushed to frame actions by Jews on the Temple Mount as encroachment, while actions by Muslims and their supporters are merely restoring that which the Jewish presence altered. The real question for the government is at what cost do we incur by letting the Muslim Waqf radically change our holiest site in exchange for some quiet. Giving up on the Temple Mount sets the stage for the rest of Jerusalem and so forth. The government would be wise to admit to itself and to the public that the farce of a “status quo” is just that, a lie and if the Waqf cannot uphold its part of the agreement, we no longer need to as well.

May 24, 2016September 9, 2016

King Ayi: We Have a lot of Work Ahead

The first thing one notices when they meet King David Ayi, is a deep sense of personal humility. It is this humility which caused him to shy away from his royal lineage after being sent to America in 1987. Despite his yearning to be left alone, destiny caught up to him. In 1994 he was crowned King of the Ayigbe people of the Ivory Coast, Ghana, Togo, and Benin. The seat of this Kingdom was in Togo, although most historians confirm it started in Accra, Ghana.

“We always refrained from foods deemed forbidden in the Torah,” the Kings says with his big eyes staring at me as I listened. Circumcisions were also performed on the 8th day, in addition to upholding the Laws of Niddah and celebrating Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year.”

This has been a whirlwind eight weeks for King Ayi, his sixth trip to Israel. He has dropped Christianity and embraced the religion of his forefathers. In the past he has met with Rav Kanievsky and Rav Shmuel Auerbach. This trip he garnered the support of the Beit Din (Rabbinic Court) of Bnei Brak as well as the nascent Sanhedrin.

The three times I met with King Ayi, I witnessed countless people come and speak with him, seeking confirmation that there is in fact a Jewish King from Africa. Some asked for blessings and others just wanted to feel part of something amazing.

Jews of the Gold Coast

Most Jewish history centers around Europe, North Africa, Ethiopia, and the Middle East. Most people have long disregarded Jewish Africa as a fairy tale. However, more and more information keeps surfacing to support claims that Jews were in fact partly involved with all three famous West African Empires, the Songhai, Mali, and Ghana.

More than this, there is ample evidence that many of the lost tribes as well as well as the Judean exiles that followed Jeremiah into Egypt made their way West across the Sahara and finally to the Gold Coast of Africa. This applies to the Igbo nation of Biafra in South East Nigeria and seemingly the Ayigbe people. Many of these tribes have various levels of parallel Jewish traditions and yet centuries after slave traders, colonialism, and war, have nearly erased direct traces of Israelite ancestry.

Targeted for Destruction

“The Europeans and Muslims purposely targeted our people in West Africa,” King Ayi says. “They knew what they were doing and worked together with non-Jewish tribes to not only destroy the Jewish tribes of the Gold Coast, but force our people to adopt Christianity.”

Over 60% of African Americans have Igbo blood in them. Many are descended from the Ayigbe as well. Ultimately history belongs to the conquerors. Any historical records have long been wiped out and yet echoes of the past remain. From circumcision to reverence for the Shabbat, this past is now reawakening and King Ayi wants to help nurture the homecoming, transforming himself into its standard bearer.

“We have a lot of work ahead of us. I want to bring 400 Kings and Queens from Africa to Jerusalem during Succot and scream Shema Yisrael at the Western Wall,” the King exclaims. “We want to bring Jews from all over the world and proclaim to our Father in Heaven that his children have returned!”

May 20, 2016May 20, 2016

Regavim Ready to Go to the Supreme Court to Defend Bedouin Rights

When the Begin-Prawer Plan, officially known as the Bill on the Arrangement of Bedouin Settlement in the Negev was passed in September 2011, advocates for the bill believed it would bring much needed reforms to the Bedouin communities of the Negev.

According to the PMO official press release, the bill is based on four main principles:

Providing for the status of Bedouin communities in the Negev;
Economic development for the Negev’s Bedouin population;
Resolving claims over land ownership; and
Establishing a mechanism for binding, implementation and enforcement, as well as timetables.

Segments within the Bedouin communities had long benefited from a sense of anarchy and lawlessness, yet many more Bedouins were left without real zoning and local organization to advance their communities.

Proponents of the bill argued that it was necessary to integrate the Bedouin communities more closely to Israeli society. With successive Israeli governments putting an emphasis developing and settling the Negev, the bill became threaded into the region’s broader narrative.

Implementing Bedouin Land Reforms Hits a Surprising Snag

Five years after the Begin-Prawer plan El Sayed, one of the villages in the El Ksom Bedouin Region that has been accepted by the State to be recognized as a community still awaits a new access road, yet the Bedouins are not the road block this time. The local branch of Leumit Medical Insurance Company, located in an old building blocks the proposed route of the new access road.

Regavim, an organization typically focused on illegal Arab building has stepped into to help.

“One of the most important projects in the Negev is the community of El Sayed and therefore we are investing a special effort”, says Amichai Yogev, coordinator of the Southern District for Regavim. “We are dealing with a big settlement that the access road to it was through a narrow dirt road and distorted . The authorities wanted to promote a normal pavement of the road, so we were surprised to discover that it was the very structure of Leumit that had remained standing like a sore thumb on the route of the road, and is one of the last obstacles that prevent the construction of the access road to the settlement.”

Despite the fact that there is an existing judicial demolition order that was supposed to go into effect in the beginning of 2016, the local authorities have not rushed to start the demolition. In recent months, Regavim has conducted extensive correspondence with the regional council, and is considering appealing to the High Court in the event the illegal building is not demolished in the near future.

In the last two years the Authority for regulating Bedouin settlements, has finalized the main access road design for the community. In order to pave the road, trees were uprooted and several illegal structures that were on the planned road were evacuated. The only structure left on the road is an illegal structure where Leumit operates.

“Along with the consistent and systematic requests by us that the Bedouin citizens be citizens with equal obligations, Regavim makes sure that their rights are also taken care of,” says Yogev. “Since the Leumit structure is illegal, and the residents of El Sayed deserve a proper wide road with proper safety standards, we will continue to apply pressure until the business at hand is taken care of.”

May 17, 2016May 17, 2016

Why does UNESCO Insist on Rewriting Israel’s History?

“UNESCO ignores the unique Jewish connection to the Temple Mount, the site of two temples for 1,000 years, and the place to which Jews prayed for thousands of years,” Netanyahu said in a statement last month.

No one should be surprised by UNESCO’s resolution, passed April 11th, yet politicians across the spectrum in Israel have reacted angrily towards a UN organization that has catapulted itself into the complicated political quagmire that is the Middle East. After all, Yair Lapid expressed the outrage by explaining how the most recent decision goes against UNESCO’s charter.

“This resolution was an utterly irresponsible intervention in one of the most complex places in the Middle East. UNESCO prides itself on promoting tolerance, interfaith and intercultural dialogue, yet it passes resolutions which erase the Jewish people from the historical narrative,” Lapid said.

The resolution in question takes Israel to task for preventing Muslim access to the Temple Mount and even the Kotel. These two sites, holy to Jews around the world are named as Muslim/Palestinian holy sites Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif and Buraq Plaza.

The resolution at one point says: “Further deplores the Israeli decision to approve a plan to build a two-line cable car system in East Jerusalem and the so called ‘Liba House’ project in the Old City of Jerusalem as well as the construction of the so called ‘Kedem Center’, a visitor centre near the southern wall of the Mosque, the construction of the Strauss Building and the project of the elevator in Al Buraq Plaza ‘Western Wall Plaza’ and urges Israel, the Occupying Power, to renounce the above-mentioned projects and to stop the construction works in conformity with its obligations under the relevant UNESCO conventions, resolutions and decisions.”

Another paragraph states: “Calls on Israel, the Occupying Power, to stop violations against the Waqf properties east and south of Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif, such as the recent confiscations of parts of Al Youssefeyah cemetery and Al-Sawanah area by banning Muslims from burying their dead in some spaces and by planting Jewish fake graves in other spaces of the Muslim cemeteries, in addition to the dramatic change of the status and distinctive character of the Umayyad Palaces, in particular the violation of the continued conversion of many Islamic and Byzantine remains into the so-called Jewish ritual baths or into Jewish prayer places.”

With this sort of language, the government has essentially lost control of a process that began a long time ago. The process of international delegitimization began by an Arab world seeking the help of other UN member states, has systematically attempted to erase Jewish history in Israel for the sole purpose of rendering Israel’s existence just one long occupation based on historical fabrications.

The question isn’t why the Arab world is engaging in such profuse insanity, but rather why is the rest of the Western world going along with it? After all, by supporting UNESCO’s denial the Jewish connection to the Temple Mount or even most of the Land of Israel, many countries in the Christian world have in fact undermined the roots to their own history. So why the rush to support such erroneous claims by the Islamic countries pushing these sorts of resolution?

“Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past.”

In his book 1984 George Orwell penned what has now become one of his most famous quotes: “Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past.” The UN and its associated organizations like UNESCO understand full well that history supports Jewish claims in their entirety to all of the Land of Israel. More than this, history shows that is was not only the Roman Empire and later the Byzantines that contributed to the injustices of the Jewish people in their historic homeland, but the Arab world by and large finished off through forced colonization whatever fledgling community of Jews remained in the Land of Israel.

Dr. Harry Mandelbaum noted the following in an article he wrote for Think Israel:

The historian James Parker wrote: “During the first century after the Arab conquest [670-740 CE], the caliph and governors of Syria and the Holy Land ruled entirely over Christian and Jewish subjects. Apart from the Bedouin in the earliest days, the only Arabs west of the Jordan were the garrisons.”
In year 985 the Arab writer Muqaddasi complained: “the mosque is empty of worshipers… The Jews constitute the majority of Jerusalem’s population” (The entire city of Jerusalem had only one mosque?).
In 1377, Ibn Khaldun, one of the most creditable Arab historians, wrote: “Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel extended over 1400 years… It was the Jews who implanted the culture and customs of the permanent settlement”

These are uncomfortable facts if you are trying to paint the opposite picture.

In order to perpetrate a future dismantling of the 3rd Jewish Commonwealth in its historic boundaries, the claims of the Jewish people must be returned to the realm of myth. Does this in fact cut away at the roots of Christianity? It does, but Constantine through the Council of Nicea in 325 showed that he and the Church were perfectly comfortable in doing away with Christianity’s roots by reworking history and projecting that rebuilt history back onto the past.

UNESCO is in a sense doing what the Council of Nicea did centuries ago; attempting to permanently control the future by controlling the past. The irony is that today’s Church has by and large made peace with the idea that the Judaism serves as their religion’s roots. Despite this acceptance, their overtures to the Jewish people came about precisely because of the Jewish Nation’s return to its historic homeland, which destroyed one of the major tenets of early Church philosophy known as the wandering Jew.

The assumption by the Church, was the exile of the Jewish Nation came about due to a rejection of Jesus, proving covenant between the Jews and the Almighty to be null and void. According to the Church this exile would continue forever. Aurelius Prudentius Clemens said as far back as 400 CE: “From place to place the homeless Jew wanders in ever-shifting exile, since the time when he was torn from the abode of his fathers and has been suffering the penalty for murder, and having stained his hands with the blood of Christ whom he denied, paying the price of sin.” The Church was forced to dismantle this tenet upon the Jewish people’s return. By reversing this sort of doctrine, the Church is essentially accepting the veracity of the Mosaic covenant.

For the world, this history, the history of the Nation of Israel and its connection to its land has become a burden.

Supporting UNESCO or at least remaining silent stems from the inherent need to deny a national connection the Holy Land for the Jewish people. For the world, this history, the history of the Nation of Israel and its connection to its land has become a burden. After all, it is far easier to deal with the Jewish burden than the Muslim one and perhaps, just perhaps that tenet of the wandering Jew, so vital to the Church and many Christian theologians, will be reinstated in a very careful way.

The nefariousness of all of this is of course obvious, but what is perhaps more telling is that the Israeli government has assumed this is just some sort of mistake or lack of knowledge. It isn’t, and the faster it understands this, the faster it can start pushing back successfully.

May 15, 2016

Trump, Israel, and the Need to Navigate the Global Chaos

Whether one likes Donald Trump or not, everyone agrees he has forever changed the landscape of American politics. The Donald’s scorched earth policy on his adversaries has not only worked to ensure he becomes the Republican nominee, it has upended the political and donor class of the US two party system.

No amount of will or force will be enough to give Americans what they crave. The world has changed.

Americans have more or less opted to back a candidate who “will get things done,” rather than pay homage to the constitution and the framers’ vision of an exceptional nation. The rest of the world has for many years seen things this way, yet for the US it has clung to a notion that it was different and special. In truth, with spiraling debt, a waning military influence, and a generation of distracted spoiled youth, America may have in fact seen its best days behind it. Of course this is what many out there, outside the beltway and big cities fear and this is exactly the type of fear Donald Trump draws his energy from.

No amount of will or force will be enough to give Americans what they crave. The world has changed. The emerging economies of the East and Africa, coupled with innovation engines like Israel are changing the global dynamics overnight. It’s true Americans need a President that will get things done, but the Donald’s notion that one just needs to be a good manager and force a populist agenda will increase the chaotic downward spiral that American’s feel they are in.

Trump Ensures that Israel will Pivot Away from America

With Obama’s flip flopping on everything to do with foreign policy, especially when it comes to the Middle East, Israel has increasingly turned elsewhere for new partnerships. Israel has grown closer to India and China as well as the Eastern African countries like Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, and Rwanda. Relations are growing with a host of Eastern European countries as well as former Soviet Block nations like Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan.

Israelis crave stability and the last few years has put a monkey wrench in their country’s desire to carve a stable environment for their economy and populace to thrive. Obama’s weak foreign policy has thrashed old paradigms, while creating a host of new challenges. Trump’s chaos is too much for many Israeli leaders and his ascendancy may well drive Israel further towards China and even Russia. In an environment with increased instability, the Israeli government finds itself in an unenviable position in having to decide on putting stock into an America in decline versus positioning itself as the most reliable country in the Middle East with a neutral foreign policy.

Trump’s rhetoric, although welcome by many in Israel after eight years of a post American foreign policy approach by Obama, is far too erratic and unbalanced to be trusted to force a re-calibration of America’s interests. More likely it will help entrench those very forces Israel is now dealing with.

Surviving the Coming Chaos Requires a New Paradigm in Partnership Building

Whether we like it or not, the world seems bent on heading into a period of tremendous chaos and instability. Trump’s ascendancy is only part of the reason for this. Other reasons include increased technology usage in developing nations, Islamic fundamentalism, a rising East, an imminent EU collapse, as well as others.

The situation does not have to be dire. Israel needs to continue to build reliable partnerships with countries like India, China, and Kenya.

If we create a partnership between Israel’s inventive capability and China’s manufacturing capability, we will have a winning combination.

Increasing trade ties between China and Israel have now led to discussion concerning a free trade agreement. Already back in 2013 Prime Minister Netanyahu said, “Israel is not as big as China. We have eight million residents, approximately one-third the population of Shanghai. But we manufacture more intellectual property than any other country in the world in relation to its size. If we create a partnership between Israel’s inventive capability and China’s manufacturing capability, we will have a winning combination.”

Israel is seen by many in Sub Saharan Africa as a reliable military and trading partner, with budding relationships mimicking the same trajectory that occurred between Israel and India over a decade ago.

The government will have to figure out what to do about Russia. They are not going away and Putin may be the best suited to help Israel put pressure on Hezbollah and Iran. Whether it is Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton, Israel’s traditional geopolitical and economic relationships are permanently resetting. These newer partnerships Israel has been cultivating become an important part of creating a far more stable world order.