Letters, October 8, 2010
Recognition of Israel as a Jewish state
A COUPLE of weeks ago, Israeli PM Binyamin Netanyahu acutely observed that he is hearing a lot about two states for the region as the basis for peace talks, but not much about two states for two peoples. Palestinian rejection of a Jewish state in the Middle East is, of course, the root cause of the ongoing conflict, as the Palestinians could have negotiated their state years ago if they had been genuinely interested in doing so.
The churlish tactics of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in threatening to walk out of the peace talks unless Israel extends the partial settlement freeze is transparently intended to shift the blame for any failure onto the Israelis, and only indicates that nothing much has changed.
If this is the Palestinian concept of meaningful dialogue, Netanyahu should offer to extend the freeze for a short time, but only on the condition that Abbas recognise Israel as the state of the Jewish people. Otherwise Netanyahu should not participate in the process. It’s also time President Barack Obama started applying pressure to the Palestinians on this issue to obtain a signal that they are truly ready to talk tachlis (speak frankly) about peace in the Middle East.
Alan Freedman
St Kilda East, Vic
Government is selling off our land
THE Jewish National Fund (JNF) Blue Box, a staple of Jewish communities around the world since the early 20th century, has symbolically allowed Jews to contribute to the ownership of the physical land of Israel. These contributions mean that, until today, the whole Jewish people own the land in the Jewish State rather than private individuals. This supports both the vision of Eretz Yisrael outlined in the Torah, in which land is a divine asset, as well as Theodor Herzl’s dream for a modern Jewish state. Herzl himself famously stated at the Zionist Congress of 1901 that “the philanthropic colonisation did not succeed, but the national one will”.
Through the privatisation of 800,000 square kilometres of Israeli land, the Netanyahu Government is eroding the important Zionist principle of the Jewish nation’s collective ownership of Eretz Yisrael. This proposal will allow land to be privately bought and sold as a commodity, as opposed to currently, where land is a valued public asset, owned jointly by the State of Israel and the entire Jewish people (via the JNF). This reform has been deviously introduced to the Knesset through a series of bills, rather than one piece of legislation, and thus it has been given little media attention or public scrutiny.
Apart from undermining an important Zionist ideal, private land ownership will serve as another potent symbol of the economic divide within Israeli society, a country where the gap between the richest 10 per cent and the poorest 10 per cent remains the widest among all western countries. This is undeniably a backward step for a liberal Israeli society.
As a community committed to fighting for a secure Jewish state, Australian Jews should follow the lead of both progressive Zionist and religious political parties in voicing their opposition to the Israeli Government’s plan to undermine the essential Zionist principal of public land ownership. Eretz Yisrael belongs to all Jews, not only to those who can afford it.
Praying for peace in the coming year
THE world is still full of blind hatred and bias from politicians or institutions against Israel.
The hard propaganda by the Israel haters may achieve a temporary boycott by some trade unions or institutions, but we can also note that many countries have also openly confirmed their help and commitment to Israel in the future.
We are also happy that the alliance of Australia and Israel has been strongly confirmed by both major parties, hence some opposition from splinter groups and other parties or individual politicians.
We all hope that one day there may be a resolution bringing peace to the Middle East. However, as long as one side is not willing to even accept the existence of Israel and threatens to wipe Israel from the face of the earth, no American president, peace envoys or the meek efforts of the UN will have a chance of success.
We Jews have always survived with optimism, so we hope that 5771 and 2011 will be happier for Israel and for all in the world than previous years.
Tom Sinclair
Bondi Junction, NSW
Speaking out against book burning
HOW on earth someone could consider the protests against the burning of the Koran to be political correctness hyperbole, except when it comes from Paul Winter (AJN 01/10), is beyond me.
Surely, even the most conservative members of our community would see it as an abhorrent act fit only for right-wing extremists who proved capable of burning our Torah scrolls.
Political correctness nothing: the very idea of burning someone else’s holy books is an insult to the memory of those who were thrown into the ovens of Auschwitz soon after the Nazis burned their books. It appears Winter would rather play copycat with our enemies than shine a light onto the nations.
The hidden truth about aliens
I EAGERLY turned to page 13 of my copy of The AJN (01/10) as soon as I saw the photos of UFOs featured on the front page, in high hopes that, at last, some authority is dealing with the subject that has been kept under wraps for so long. But no. Only speculation by accepted, so-called experts and more reports of SETI (search for extraterrestrial intelligence) sending out radio transmissions into the universe in hopes of getting a reply. While blithely ignoring the thousands of reported sightings of machines that are obviously sent and governed by highly intelligent beings.
I suspect that Orson Welles’ famous radio broadcast, which created such an overwhelming panic in New York, has something to do with the universal denial by officialdom of the reality of UFOs. I mean, what government would be brave enough to admit to their existence when we have no defence against them should they take it into their heads to invade us?¬† Not that this is likely. Invading is a whole different exercise to visiting and reconnaissance by a few vehicles.
The fact is that they have been coming here and investigating us for a long time. We have read about abductions in which people were reportedly taken aboard the vehicles and given thorough physical examinations. According to these reports, the occupants are able to disrupt our electricity transmission and even interfere with our brainwaves (electrochemical processes), but we do not know of any real harm that has been done apart from the crop circles.
It seems I will still have to wait for official recognition and reports, but it doesn’t look as if this will happen any time soon.
Proof of life in outerspace
I READ with interest Zeddy Lawrence’s feature on the Jewish view of aliens (AJN 01/10). While it did not reach a definitive answer as to whether intelligent forms of extraterrestrial life do actually exist, reading another of Mr Lawrence’s articles seemed to clarify the point, namely his humorous piece a week earlier on the symbolism of Succot.
Although it was very amusing, I couldn’t help but ask myself “what planet is he on?”
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