Tag: Six Days War

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Navigating The Coming Chaos and Understanding Israel’s Direction

The political stalemate in Israel continues to drag on, with most people assuming there will be a third round of elections. What is going on and how does the root of this current crisis stem from the creation of the State?

There is no question about it, the present political quagmire between the so called right-wing block and the left-wing block is directly rooted in the way Israel’s political system was designed from the outset. The challenges in Israel are systemic and understanding this will enable real change and rectification across the national fabric.

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We understand that the vessels for the Redemption of the Jewish people and in return the entire world were meant to manifest in a particular manner as to enable the Divine light of the Infinite to flow into the universe, thus rectifying and repairing the world. When those of us who were meant to take hold of these vessels passed up on the opportunity, the vessels fell into the wrong hands.

These hands belonged to the socialist wing of the Zionist movement who succeeded in building the beginning of the bureaucratic apparatus of the state in a way which allowed them to remain in control. With the six million Jews of Europe burnt up and the Jews of Middle Eastern origins broken once they moved to the transit camps within the State, permanent control seemed to be inevitable. However, something miraculous happened along the way.

In 1967, Israel won the Six Day War receiving the Biblical heartland of the Jewish people. This reinvigorated the Religious-Secular debate and inspired the real beginnings of Israel’s Jewish renaissance. A few years later, another unforeseen event took place: The Likud’s Menachem Begin of the Irgun together won a sweeping election after the near disaster of the 1973 Yom Kippur war. This brought the Left’s most “hated” enemy into the premiership for the first time. Worst of all for the Left, the Sefardim (Jews of Middle Eastern origin) who had been economic slaves to the Socialist elite, broke ranks and supported the rightwing camp. This political partnership has for the most part stayed intact.

This ended the Left’s overt control of the State. However, the Israeli Deep State is run by the Left’s bureaucratic control of the military and courts.

Where Are We Now – A Third Revolution?

With Jews returning to a traditional lifestyle increasing year in and year out as well as the Arab-Israeli peace initiatives floundering due to a realization that “Land for Peace” does not work, the Begin revolution that upended Israel has now led the political super structure into proverbial brick wall.

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Ultimately, the traditional blocks of the Left and Right are now implacably butting heads as the Israeli Arab parties have essentially required someone to shift one way or the other. Traditionally, this has been Avigdor Liberman’s role. However, since the Palestinian-Israeli peace plan appears to be frozen indefinitely, Liberman’s views on Secular-Religious issues have become the new divide in the political landscape.

Chaos Leads to New Order

Israel’s present situation is untenable. While there are many long term solutions to reconfiguring the political structure, none of those will be implemented in the current climate.

Iran is surrounding Israel, while the State budget cannot be past in a caretaker government. The IDF needs upgrades and no new foreign policy initiatives can be undertaken. There will be a war sooner rather later. With the vacuum in politics, coupled with an external threat, the chaos coming will lead to a new paradigm.

The current vessels of the State were built within the darkness of the Bundist and self-loathing Jewish socialist leadership at the beginning of the State. This leadership was vicious and determined to root out any vestiges of Jewish roots of Israel’s raison d’etre. The coming chaos provides a unique opportunity to rectify the vessels of sovereignty and redemption, uplifting from the darkness from which they came.

Expect many surprises along the way.

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FINAL WAR BEGINNING: The UN is Coming…Again

In what appears to be a major move by the UN, the international organization sent 150 Israelis companies a warning letter that they risked losing international business due to their dealings with companies that worked out of Judea and Samaria. UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein personally sent the letters two weeks ago and has already received two responses that affirmed their break in doing business with companies from Israel’s Biblical Heartland.

The Arab countries and their supporters have had a solid hold on the UN  Human Rights Council (UNHRC) for some time, but the move by the organization is literally unprecedented and seemingly part of a wider diplomatic war against Israel .  With UNESCO already erasing the Jewish connection to its holiest sites and cities, the UNHRC move seems natural.

All of this appears to be crossing into dangerous ground as the UN is laying a deeper trap for the Jewish State.  Ultimately, by disregarding the Jewish connection to the Land of Israel as well as a firm campaign backing the BDS movement, the UN seeks to ultimately weaken Israel as its enemies gather against it.

An unnamed western diplomat told Haaretz that more than half of the companies that received the warning letter were Israeli, about 30 were from the US and the remainder from countries including Germany, Norway and South Korea. The diplomat added that Hussein also sent copies of the letter to foreign ministries of several countries who are home to companies which may be added to the blacklist.

According to the report Israeli companies on the list include pharmaceutical giant Teva, the national phone company Bezeq, bus company Egged, the national water company Mekorot and the country’s two largest banks, Hapoalim and Leumi.

The US has threatened to withdraw from the council if the entire list is published.

Before one assumes the worst, Israel was in far worse shape at the time of the Six Days War and we all know how that ended.  With that in mind, reality is how one perceives it.  The UNHRC has very little teeth, yet its bite still has power.  At the end of the day, Israel’s market is small and businesses can make the calculus that it is far better to stay away from the political intrigue than pull in some extra money from Israel.

Once again the aim here is to weaken and divide the State of Israel as it contends to deal with a plethora of unprecedented security challenges. The focus for Israelis should not be to despair, but rather know that with deep faith and a yearning to survive they will make it past this as well.

As Rebbe Nachman says: “There is no despair at all.”

After all, if we’ve made it this far then the rest should be within our grasp as well.  No outside force can move the will of the Creator.

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REVISITING THE SIX DAY WAR

Even secular non-believing Israelis considered the hand of God in this war.

June 5th, 2017 will mark the 50th anniversary of the 1967 Six Day War in which Israel vanquished the Arab armies arrayed against it.  Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon were the main combatants, but large contingents from Iraq, Morocco, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, Kuwait, Pakistan, Sudan, and the P.L.O. also took part in the war as auxiliaries, by lending aircrafts, tanks, manpower, and logistics.  I was then a young draftee facing a war on an Israeli airbase.

In 1967, Israel had a small population of 2.7 million, while Egypt’s population alone amounted to 31 million.  Syria’s population was at the time 5.76 million, Jordan’s 1.32 million, Lebanon’s 2.175 million, and Iraq’s about 9 million.  The Arab confrontation states alone accounted for about 50 million.  The Arab armies had approximately 465,000 troops, more than 2,800 tanks, and 800 planes.  Israel fielded its regular army of 50,000 in addition to its reserve force for a total of 264,000, almost 10% of its total population.  Israel threw into the fight about 800 tanks and 300 combat aircrafts…just about a third of the Arab aircrafts, and a similar proportion of tanks.

Monday, June 5, 1967 was an unforgettable day.  The Jordanian’s began bombing our base with heavy artillery and mortar fire right after midnight, as we tried to sneak in an hour of sleep between the around-the-clock work, readying our planes for combat.  Their firing positions were eventually silenced by our fighter pilots.  Israel kept radio silence throughout the early hours of June 5th, while squadrons from our airbase and other bases around the country were in route to destroy the Arab air-forces.

At noontime on that fateful Monday, we were ordered to assemble at the parade ground of the airbase. The base commander moved slowly to the microphone, while the tension was mounting among the assembled ranks.  He opened up with “Airmen and women, this is a dramatic day in the annals of Israel’s history. As of this time, the Arab air-forces do not exist.” The moment was unlike any other we had experienced as young adults…the relief, excitement, joy, and euphoria enveloped us all.  We threw our berets up to the sky, much like college kids do at graduation time.  We hugged each other, and silently thanked God for our deliverance.

When the day was over, Israel controlled the skies over all the battlefields in which it fought.  The next day was no less dramatic. Israel consolidated its capture of the Sinai Peninsula.  Tuesday gave way to Wednesday, June 7, which turned out to be the most dramatic and historical event yet.  It was the day Israeli paratroopers liberated the Old City of Jerusalem and the Western Wall, a remnant of Solomon’s Holy Temple.  Ironically, the Israeli government had no intention of moving against Jordan, much less to capture Judea and Samaria and the Old City of Jerusalem.  Israel conveyed a message through the UN to King Hussein to stay out of the fighting.  Nevertheless, Hussein had been persuaded by Nasser, the Egyptian dictator that Egyptian forces were on the outskirts of Tel Aviv.  Nasser pointed to radar dots that showed fighter-planes flying toward Israel, alleging that these were Egyptian planes, and not Israeli planes returning for refueling.

As the fighting in Jerusalem ceased, thousands of Israelis, secular and religious, crushed through the Mendelbaum Gate that separated the Israelis from the Jordanian part of Jerusalem, on their way to the Old City and the Wall.  For the first time in 19 years, Israelis had access to the Old City and the Wall.  And for the first time in over 2,000 years, Jerusalem was once again under Jewish control.

Thursday and Friday, June 8 and 9, 1967, saw fierce fighting on the Golan Heights.  Maj. Gen. David Elazar, head of the Northern Command, begged Defense Minister Moshe Dayan to lift once and for all the persistent Syrian menace against the low lying Kibbutzim along the Sea of Galilee.  Syrian planes attacked Israeli villages in the Galilee, and were summarily downed by Israeli fighter-planes.  Israeli infantry forces (Golani Brigade) moved against well-fortified bunkers and tunnels the Syrians dug on the high ridges of the Golan overlooking the Sea of Galilee.  Bitter hand-to-hand fighting ensued, and the highly motivated Israeli soldiers prevailed over the Syrians, whose officers fled and left some of their soldiers literally tied to their positions.

On Saturday, a day of rest, cease-fire was declared and observed.  The Golan Heights were under Israeli control, as well as the entire Sinai Peninsula, the West Bank and Gaza, and the Old City of Jerusalem.  The miracle of the Six Day War had occurred.  Even secular, non-believing Israelis considered the hand of God in this war.

Our squadron had been confined to base since the early days of May, and it was an incredible, around-the-clock effort on the part of every airman and woman that made the victory possible.  We were exhausted but euphoric nevertheless.  We had seen a miracle in our lifetime.  A week after the war, our squadron, with numerous commandeered army trucks, moved up to Jerusalem to touch the most sacred monument in Judaism – the Western Wall.  We proceeded to Bethlehem and the Church of the Nativity, and then further on to Hebron and Machpela Cave, where Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Leah and Rebecca were buried, an equally sacred place for Jews.

Although each of us carried Uzi sub-machine guns, we did not threaten the Arab population who feared retribution from us.  Had it been the other way around, the Jordanian army would have massacred our civilians and soldiers as they did in Gush Etzion, in 1948, assisted in that task by the Palestinian-Arab mobs.

When our unit finally got passes to leave base, it was an extraordinary scene on the crossroads.  Drivers stopped to give us lifts, and sometimes they competed as to who could pick us up first.  At the same crossroads, high-school girls and their mothers handed out sodas, cakes, and fruit to all uniformed soldiers.  The euphoria in the country was infectious, and it lasted for a while.

Howard Sachar, author of  A History of Israel: From the Rise of Zionism to Our Time, quoted Yitzhak Rabin, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief-of-Staff during the Six Day War, explaining Israel’s victory in that war: “Our airmen, who struck the enemies’ planes so accurately that no one in the world understands how it was done and people seek technological explanations or secret weapons; our armored troops who beat the enemy even when their equipment was inferior to his; our soldiers in all other branches…who overcame our enemies everywhere, despite the latter’s superior numbers and fortifications—all these revealed not only coolness and courage in the battle but…an understanding that only their personal stand against the greatest dangers would achieve victory for their country and for their families, and that if victory was not theirs, the alternative was annihilation.”

Originally Published in FrontPageMag.