18 May 2022

Is the "Great Reset" happening NEXT WEEK??? plus how this might apply to ISRAEL and her covenant with HQB"H

17 Iyyar 5782, a Shmitah (God's Reset) Year | י"ז אייר ה"תשפ"ב שנת שמיטה

32nd Day of the Omer | ל"ב לעומר

UPDATES BELOW

What kind of reset do we want this Shmitah year?

I hope I'm only panicking. Somehow, I doubt it.

There doesn't seem to be any news directly from the WEF or any other media that is bound to them, but the opposition seems quite alarmed about what they see as nothing less than the handing over of what amounts to national sovereignty to the World Health Organization during their upcoming meeting on 22-28 May 2022 by no less than the President of the United States...

Not only the sovereignty of the United States, but of the whole UN constituency of 193 nations, no less.

This currently includes Israel.

(I feel betrayed as both an Israeli citizen ...and an American citizen. How could "the land of the free and the home of the brave" hand almost 100% of the world over to the "dictatorship of the oligarchy"??? My thought: If this handover goes through, the USA wasn't as advertised. God, help us.)

Snippet from HERE:

How It Became Official

On January 18, 2022, with no public awareness, officials from the Biden Administration sent the World Health Organization these extensive amendments to strengthen WHO’s ability to unilaterally intervene into the affairs of nations merely suspected of having a “health emergency” of possible concern to other nations.⁴ The U.S. amendments cross out a critical existing restriction in the regulations: “WHO shall consult with and attempt to obtain verification from the State Party in whose territory the event is allegedly occurring…”⁵ By eliminating that, and other clauses (see below), all the shackles will be removed from the Director-General of WHO, enabling him to declare health emergencies at will.

Declaring health emergencies at will is no laughing matter. We have seen a prime example of that already, and have witnessed the taking over of issues far from health concerns with the plandemic.

These were temporary, but what's coming up is threatening to be permanent, if we don't ACT RIGHT NOW.

[NOTE: If you find any better evidence before next week, please let me know in the comments. Also, translation to HEBREW will be very helpful, even though the highest-up in our government do speak (and possibly read and write?) English. Israelis, whether English-language-haters or simply couldn't grasp English, need to know. It just takes me too long. Thanks in advance!]

If this is absolutely true, then our government has a choice it must make, and FAST:

Either give in to America and stay tied to her for practically eternity, or quit the UN immediately, before the vote.

If it's not willing to do the latter, we have no choice but to take down the foreign system of governance we have been subjected to for at least the last 74 years, and make room for our own Great Resetters:

God and His Mashiah.

NOW.

ABBA, HELP!

***

According to Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhaki) in our current parasha, Behuqothai בחוקותי, we can spot those (both regular people and authorities above us) who intend to annul God's covenant with Israel.

It takes seven steps, the ones referred to in the text of Vayikra (Leviticus) 26:15-18 that say:

...and if you will consider My statutes revolting, and if your being rejects My ordinances, so as not to perform all My commandments, to annul My covenant — then I, too, will do this to you: I will assign over you panic, and the wasting away, and the fever, causing your eyes to pine and your souls to feel anguish; you will sow your seed in vain, and your enemies will eat it. And I will direct My face against you, you will be struck down before your enemies; those who hate you will subjugate you — you will flee but there will be no one pursuing you. And if during these you will not heed Me, I will increase tormenting you, seven for your sins.

In particular, the summary of the following commentary is on Vayikra (Leviticus) 26:15, the "seven for your sins," specifically on the words to annul My covenant.* I have added the content in (parentheses) and put some text in CAPITAL LETTERS to clarify what I see to be issues in understanding.

What are the sins?

1. They do not study Torah (and how to perform it).

2. They do not perform Torah.

3. They hate those who (seek to) perform Torah.

4. They hate the (real) Torah scholars.

5. They prevent others from performing Torah (to any meaningful extent).

6. They renounce the commandments.

7. They renounce that which is ESSENTIAL, denying BELIEF IN GOD.

* Source: The Torah: with Rashi's commentary, translated, annotated and elucidated, Leviticus, The Artscroll Series, Mesorah Publications, Fifteenth Impression, January 2015, p. 354.

WHAT KIND OF WORLD DO WE WANT? AND WHO DO WE WANT RUNNING IT?

PEOPLE WHO THINK THEY'RE god...OR THE REAL GOD AND HIS REPRESENTATIVE???

(...and isn't it funny-strange, all this occurring during the OMER count of a SHMITAH year? Hint, hint.)

***

UPDATE:

The event in question is the Seventy Fifth [75th] World Health Assembly: Strengthening WHO preparedness for and response to health emergencies. The file with the proposed changes that will hand over the world's nations' sovereignty to the WHO from the hand of Joe Biden is within the Proposal for amendments to the International Health Regulations (2005):

Provisional agenda item 16.2 (13 pp.)

Read, note the changes and pray. They need to be shown that they are not the world's Sovereign, and we need to see His glory before it is too late.

No, I am not panicking. This is real.

***

UPDATE 2:

MUST READ From Moshe Feiglin (h/t to Neshama):

Communism, Progressivism, and the Corona Revolution (English)

It doesn't seem to have been published in Hebrew. If I find it, I'll link it, be"H, b"n. It might be that the Hebrew one is a separate article on the same topic.

It turns out that Neshama and I have picked two separate articles: in her case, to repost and in mine, to link to.

UPDATE 3:

A PUBLIC INVITATION

Fifth Annual Convention...Agudas Kedushas Tzion invites you to its yearly convention to thank HaShem for the great miracles He has done for us in these times, and for returning us to additional regions of His beloved Land and its holy sites.

Program in Hebrew. Advertisement attached. Entrance free of charge.

* There will be a women's section

This Thursday, 25 Iyar / May 26th | 18:30
Shirat Yerushalayim | Kanfei Nesharim 64, Yerushalayim

* Among rabbonim, admorim, and others, we just got confirmation that Jonathan Pollard is planning to attend!

Thanks to Devorah Chayah...

06 April 2022

"Pesach Haggadah" — from the compilation of divrei Torah on Parashath Tazri'a by R' Pinchas Winston

5 Nisan 5782 | ה' ניסן ה"תשפ"ב

"Don't Be a Slave" — Source

Pesach Haggadah

(Read the whole compilation HERE. Emphases mine. -HDG)

IT IS A curious thing. Each year we sit down to make a Pesach Seder to commemorate an event that the vast majority of the world thinks is fictitious. But we do it anyhow, even Jews whose lives reflect their disbelief in the very origin of this time-honored tradition.

We are not the only people to do this. Various different religions and cultures also continue to celebrate long-ago historical events, the spirits of which are often contradicted by the present-day lives of their celebrants. That’s the power of tradition: it can keep alive even that which, for all intents-and-purposes, is actually dead.

Is it hypocrisy? A lot of times.

Perhaps this is part of what is bothering the Evil Son. He’s the main antagonist in the Haggadah because he dares to ask the question: “What does this service mean to you?”

And though we break his teeth for asking such a question, and wag a proverbial finger at him saying, “Had you been there, you certainly would not have been redeemed!” his question is indeed a good one. In fact, it is one the Haggadah each year asks us all to answer by the end of the evening, for the right answer is not only liberating, it is freedom itself.

The problem with the Evil Son is not his question; it is his answer. His question is his answer because for him it is rhetorical. He may have phrased his words as a question, but he was really making a statement: Though this service may have made sense back in the days of Egyptian slavery, it is meaningless today.

Okay. For making fun of tradition we break his teeth, metaphorically-speaking. However, if he is in agreement that once-upon-a-time all of this was necessary, then why do we tell him that had he been in Egypt at the time of the redemption, he would have been one of those who did not go out?

Because he has missed the point of the Haggadah, of the Pesach-Offering, of the entire concept of redemption.

Sure, we no longer worship Egyptian gods, and therefore no longer have to parade through the streets with lambs to prove that we do not fear them or adhere to their religious values.

But that was not the entire story of the Korban Pesach, just a part of it. After all, when Kayin and Hevel brought their offerings to God (Bereishis 4:3), it was on the fourteenth day of Nissan. They had brought Pesach Offerings. And, as the Brisker Rav points out, Avraham Avinu ate matzah on the fifteenth of Nissan, hundreds of years before there was even an Egyptian exile!

This begs the question: Do we eat matzah because there wasn’t enough time to bake bread, or was there not enough time to bake bread so that we would eat matzah? Because, contrary to the Evil Son’s thinking, mitzvos are eternal. They supersede our daily reality and are never the result of circumstance. If anything, they make circumstances possible, such as the leaving of Egypt in Moshe’s time, and the leaving of exile at the End-of-Days.

It is the Chacham, the wise son in each generation who understands this. Hence, the Haggadah’s response to his question is the opposite of the one given to his evil brother:

You, in turn, shall instruct him in the laws of Pesach, [up to] “one is not to eat any dessert after the Pesach lamb.”

The Wise Son is the person who understands one of the most important ideas of Creation, and yet one of the least-known: Redemption is a de facto state of existence. To understand this, it is important to first understand the concept of exile.

When we think of the first exile, we think of the Jewish people in Egyptian bondage. However, the Egyptian exile was really the result, and in many respects, a replication of the original exile of all of mankind. In the beginning, man was created into a state of redemption. Immediately after being formed by God, Adam HaRishon was placed in the Garden of Eden where he lived an idyllic existence. The life of the first man is the one that we all dream of living if we merit to make it to Yemos HaMoshiach—the Messianic Era.

Eating from the Aitz HaDa’as Tov v’Ra—the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil—changed all of that. The bottom line is that within one day of being created and placed into Paradise, mankind was forced to leave it, and the question is, why? The answer is, the transformation of man:

The creation of Heaven and Earth and their components was with the Supernal Light, and they existed on a very elevated and awesome level, specifically man who was higher than all of them. However, after the sin of the Tree of Knowledge and Good and Evil, he and everything else descended and was transformed from skin made of light to human skin.
(Hakdamos uSha’arim, Sha’ar 6, Ch. 10)

Though man has always consisted of a body and soul, before the sin they both existed on a much higher spiritual plane. A human body once more closely resembled a soul than the body we now have, made of divine light rather than of opaque skin. Sin resulted in skin, and the distancing of man from God. That is the very definition of exile, and the Pesach Seder comes to reverse that. To be continued…

Rabbi Pinchas Winston
Thirtysix.org

***

04 April 2022

Until the next time we say Tachanun...

BS"D

light of 4 Nisan 5782 | אור ד' ניסן ה"תשפ"ב

Who gets credit for this picture? I don't remember where I got it from!

Nisan is the Jewish people's birth month. In our Rosh Hodesh prayers, which fell on this past Shabbat this year, we call it Rosh Roshei Hodashim ראש ראשי חודשים, the first of the first of months. You can find reference to the establishment of this month in Exodus 12:1-2.

This year, it also coincides with a time when other nations make a lot of trouble for us, especially our neighbors (meaning the Arabs, led by the Muslims)...because it coincides with Ramadan (which was called Ramadam by a local media personality as a portmanteau including the Hebrew word for blood). Some Israelis comment on the regularity of this phenomenon. It happened during May last year, which was, for the most part, our Iyyar, spilling over into Sivan. In fact, it tends to spill over from the last days of Adar to the beginning days of Sivan.

***

We are commanded to keep Pessah (Passover) in the spring; we accomplish this by adding an extra month according to the calendar that we were given at the beginning of this soon-to-be concluded exile, be"H, nearly 2,000 years ago by Hillel II. How he did this without computers...I'm not the address for that.

He meant it to last until the Jewish year 6000. That's still 218 years away.

Leap years generally happen 7 times during every 19-year period. The next one will be in 2024/5784. Yes, two years from now!

***

Because we are face-to-face with our enemy again, I'm not sure why, at this very dangerous time in human history, we can't plead and cry out all year long for the leadership and government we're supposed to have. I'm not any kind of leader, so no one has to take my opinion seriously.

But, honestly, doesn't it seem that our government can turn the terrorism on and off at will? Why is our ongoing war so predictable (every Ramadan, even before and after, for example? It's not the only time annually...) there's even a blog by that name? We can set our clocks by it, practically. Why is our ultra-expensive security fence now in shambles, despite claims that the proper authorities have been informed, over and over again?

Why have we been in emergency measures without letup ever since Israel officially became a state in 1948???

All attempts to bring this about ourselves have failed until now.

I guess it depends on who the government considers to be "the people" that they are responsible to defend. The arabs, mainly the muslims, have plenty of countries that are responsible to defend them.

The Jews have ONLY ONE COUNTRY, and it seems our leadership defends the arab/muslim population over and above the Jewish one.

The people — whether they have Jewish mothers or not — who benefit from the system we have now, cobbled together like a Frankenstein monster from Ottoman and British law and other unethical, despicable parts that should have been rendered null and void decades ago — whether they serve it or just hold it to be the hope of our people for whatever reason, should understand that we're not here to serve them and their nefarious purposes, which have become more and more obvious over the years, culminating at this point with a government dependent on Arab good will to survive — which may be their death knell.

Let it not be ours as well, Abba sh'baShamayim! Let Your righteous government be established instead!

***

R' Alon Anava has given us something to do this month. Find out here and pray the Tehillim he recommends, while considering what else to do.

***

I'd like to balance this post with several positive thoughts:

*The root of this month's name, Nisan, ניסן, as a Hebrew name adopted from Babylonian, comes from nes, נס, miracle. This is considered a hint that the final redemption will come in this month. (With the ending "-an" — the Hebrew equivalent of -er in English ("one who does") — I have interpreted the month's name as meaning "miracle worker". I know someone who seems to live up to that a lot. Not the Mashiah; but you never know.)

*There is no bad in the world...that will last beyond geulah shlemah גאולה שלימה (the complete redemption). We'll all understand (including me!) what the seemingly bad was all about in the end; and evil will be wiped out. G-d didn't make the world in order to keep evil in it.

*We'd better make sure we're not on the side of evil in any way. All the bad in the world is to wake us Jews up to how we've been following foolishness, in one way or another.

*Not every human in authority has our best interest at heart — so we have to take back our trust from them, if we ever had it to start with. This will be good for us. We need to separate ourselves emotionally, mentally and spiritually from a system that punishes regular Jews similarly to the gentiles or worse, if not in the exact same way.

*It would be a good time to consider a Torah state versus what we have now. Something to ponder:

The fact of a planned depopulation around the world is now well-known. This is the step we seem to be at now: a planned worldwide famine, starting in the US and spreading all over the world. (Of course it should be during Israel's shmitta year...but see national food bank Leket's call for donations in order to save food that might be thrown out in Israel on Going Home...To Yerushalayim. Also you might want to check out Leket's Food Waste and Rescue Reports, going back as far as 2015.)

It seems that the US government, by contrast, doesn't want to rescue their food, but to do the opposite.

The people behind this evil plot want 95% of the world gone by a date only a few years from now. Whereas, HaShem's worst scenario depicts two-thirds of the world gone, with the strong possibility of only one-third. Which do you like better?

Of course, we'd all like it not to happen at all; but H' is serious about wanting things His way, despite His having hidden Himself from the world for thousands of years; and He is the only one who has the right to demand it, as our Creator!

***

By the way, the next time we say Tachanun after the month of Nisan begins will be after Rosh Hodesh of the following month, Iyyar, which includes the last day of Nisan this year. So, Tuesday, 3 May on the business calendar.

Happy 3,334th Birthmonth, Am Yisrael! May our deliverance come this month!!!

***

15 March 2022

A warning for the next month or so — and a miracle...or two

12 Adar 2 5782 | י"ב אדר ב' ה"תשפ"ב

The first bus I wrote about below was similar in structure to this one from Singapore, with the double doors in the middle. I lost the link...sorry about that!

Ed: Tomorrow Jews the world over mark Ta'anit Esther (Esther's Fast), the day before Purim. I live in Jerusalem, where we celebrate Shushan Purim, the day after.

***

A warning

It came to my attention while finishing up my last post that the Muslim month of Ramadan comes in when Nisan, our upcoming month, comes in. Meaning, we need to prepare now for a really nasty month ahead. Or, if G-d will have abundant mercy, our prayers now — and especially tomorrow — will prevail and we will be spared something like what we had all over Israel last Iyyar (Islam does not have leap years of any kind, so their years go all the way around our calendar and those of others who adjust their days or, in our case, our months; as you see above, the Jewish month is Adar 2 (or Adar Bet).).

A friend of the family who has a lot of experience, having lived in Morocco for a time, implored me to warn everyone clearly. Since our days start at sunset, Nisan and Ramadan come in on Friday night, 1 April.

Here is some news about it. Click or tap:

"Palestinians" anticipate more violence | Between Land Day in the Negev and Ramadan in Jerusalem: Efforts to Prevent Security Deterioration

Here's a snippet:

Israeli Minister Zeev Elkin’s intention to resume planting in the Negev, including in areas where violent clashes took place two months ago, is already receiving attention on the PA side, but the fear of escalation stems from a series of further developments, including the diverted global attention from the PA issue in the wake of the crisis in Ukraine, pressure on the Palestinian Authority to freeze security coordination with Israel, tensions between Fatah and Hamas, and due to Israel’s intention to approve the construction of housing units in Jerusalem.

In eastern Jerusalem, which was at the center of events last May that led to Operation Guardian of the Walls, Arabs are warning against Jews ascending the Temple Mount on Purim and the Passover holiday, in parallel with Ramadan. Sheikh Akram Tsabari, a preacher at the Al-Aqsa Mosque and head of the Supreme Muslim Council, called on Muslims on Sunday to increase their presence in mosques in the east of the city “and to repel the attacks of Jewish worshipers.”

Sheikh Tsabari also called for the prevention of Purim ceremonies on the Temple Mount, and explained that “such comic ceremonies hurt the feelings of Muslims.”

Land Day occurs on 30 March...the day before the new month. It's their day to proclaim their "ownership" of the land of ISRAEL; so, things might get started early.

Because the whole world's attention has been on Covid-19 and the war between Russia and Ukraine, it means that Israelis must pay attention to what is happening right here, right now. No one else in the world has as much at stake on this issue as we do.

Furthermore, the Ukranians who are here because of the war might become disoriented, at the very least, because of events here.

Tonight and tomorrow (the fast begins at sunrise tomorrow) is the most appropriate day to appeal to G-d ahead of time, not to act like a dog that bites the stick that is beating it, but like a Jew who knows his G-d is behind everything.

***

A miracle...or two

The day before yesterday, 10 Adar Bet, I had gone to see a friend in a nearby city. On the way home two things happened that were very scary for me and for the others on the buses I was riding on.

The first was on the way to the Giv'at haTahmoshet light rail train station, where the bus had to negotiate a winding road down a large hill, or a small mountain, depending on how you look at it, in the rain.

The middle double doors somehow opened up while the bus was moving, and people could have fallen out of the bus through them and even gotten run over by other cars. There was one woman who ran to a pole and got a seat just in time to keep herself from falling out. I looked around, and I shudder to think what would have happened if someone had fallen out. Someone screamed towards the driver to close the doors. It took him about a minute to completely close them because they kept flying open...while he was driving the steep downhill curve!!!

I started singing to myself the last part of the Hallel prayer — Please, G-d, save us; please, G-d, forgive us! — knowing that if the driver took his mind off of either driving the curve or shutting the doors, a disaster was waiting to happen.

THANK G-D THE DISASTER DID NOT HAPPEN.

The second one was another bus, nearing my neighborhood, taking a right hand turn onto its main street...and a little child (I'm still under the impression it was a boy) started to cross the street...Some of us screamed, the driver hit the brakes hard, and stopped just in time. People who weren't seated were thrown about a bit, and got scared, especially the women with baby carriages...with the babies inside.

THANK G-D THE DISASTER DID NOT HAPPEN.

Neither inside, nor outside, the bus.

Here are some of the things that can happen...and have.

***

I'm convinced that G-d, the same One who saved all of us on those buses, is willing to save all of Israel from the impending disaster of Ramadan...if we are willing to give Him His due ahead of time.

Let's not make the same mistake many of us (led by our authorities) made after the Six-Day War.

What was that? Not giving HQB"H the credit due Him for the miracles that occurred then, and those that have occurred before and since then, as well.

***

If you haven't had enough yet, watch this video, thanks to SG:

Purim's Association to the Geulah

Also: Sign a petition to Say NO to a Nuclear Iran.

13 March 2022

Celebrating the Belief in Providence by Rabbi Eli J. Mansour...and more

light of 11 Adar 2 5782 | לאור יא אדר ב' ה"תשפ"ב

Borrowed from a neighbor...here

Ed.: This week, we celebrate the reversal of events in the Book of Esther, which we call Purim...and which we pray will occur in our times as in those. May Mashiah be revealed now!

***

Shabbat Zachor: Celebrating the Belief in Providence
by Rabbi Eli J. Mansour

On Shabbat Zachor (the Shabbat preceding Purim), we read a special section in the Torah (Debarim 25:17-19) about the Misva to remember the vicious attack launched by the nation of Amalek against our ancestors in the wilderness. The story of the attack, which appears in the Book of Shemot (17:8-16), is read on the morning of Purim.

Following the war against Amalek, G-d announced to Moshe, "Ki Yad Al Kes Kah, Milhama L’Hashem Ba’Amalek" – "For a hand is raised [on oath] over G-d’s throne, that a war will be waged by G-d against Amalek" (Shemot 17:14). The commentators explain that G-d here is referred to as "Kah" – the letters "Yod" and "Heh" – because His Name is incomplete as long as the nation of Amalek exists. The complete Name, of course, is formed by the four letters "Yod," "Heh," "Vav" and "Heh," but with Amalek in the world, the final two letters – "Vav" and "Heh" – are missing, as it were, from the divine Name.

It has been explained that this teaching is rooted in the verse in Tehillim (96:11), "Yismehu Ha’shamayim Ve’tagel Ha’aretz" – "The heavens shall rejoice, and the earth shall exult," the first letters of which are the letters of the divine Name – "Yod," "Heh," "Vav" and "Heh." This verse expresses the fundamental tenet of providence, that although G-d is in heavens, He is intimately involved in the earth, as He governs, oversees and exerts full control over everything that transpires here in the world. Both the heavens and the earth "rejoice" – because both are under the control of the Almighty. The nation of Amalek battled against this fundamental belief. In the section read on Shabbat Zachor, Amalek is described with the verb "Karecha," which is associated with the word "Mikreh" – which denotes coincidence, or happenstance. Amalek argued that all events are coincidental, unfolding randomly, without any rhyme or reason. They believed in "Yismehu Ha’shamayim" – that G-d is in the heavens, but they denied "Ve’tagel Ha’aretz," that G-d governs the events down here on earth. And thus G-d proclaimed that as long as Amalek exists, His Name consists of only "Yod" and "Heh," representing the words "Yismehu Ha’shamayim," but without "Vav" and "Heh" – the words "Ve’tagel Ha’aretz" – because Amalek denied the belief in G-d’s providence over the events in our world.

Read the rest HERE.

***

Some goings-on in the run-up to our holiday, Purim, where defeat turns to victory...

Zelensky is disappointed by Israel's response | Letter to the editor: search term "not even once" | Nisan this year is their Ramadan..."Palestinians" anticipate more violence | Insights and advice from R' Itamar Schwartz for women on Purim | The Key Question is Why...Israel gets dragged into the middle | Keep your eye on the Covid ball | A Message from [a citizen of] Russia | Biden admin offering $1M for groups delegitimizing Israel |

03 March 2022

Esther Yocheved's Three Questions...a few thoughts

30 Adar Alef 5782 | ל' אדר א' ה''תשפ''ב

Happy End of the Month | סוף החודש שמח

*********************************

With more and more truth coming out about more and more people, places, things and events, wouldn't being able to distinguish real Jewish values from the false ones that have been going around, be part of this all-important pre-redemption process?

I have really taken what I hope is a more precise view of this important question, having heard Esther Pollard a"h's explanation to her husband, Jonathan, just before she went to her place in Olam haBa. It was about questions she used all her life to find out what kind of individual she was dealing with, as appropriate. (Video below, just in case you haven't seen it yet, or just want to review it.)

I wrote down the three questions that Jonathan gave his fellow mourners so that I could put them here and, using them as a guide, make a list of things we should try to accomplish regarding the Land before Mashiah arrives. (All right, so we aren't allowed to rely on miracles...but they do happen all the time! Thank G-d.)

It seems to me she came up with a very simple test, which others, including me, might have, or should have, come up with before. It might have been one of those tasks that was saved for her to express as needed. A lot of it has to do with the Jewish heart and its connection with fellow Jews, or expressions of the lack thereof, such as when someone is defending the presence and claim of ownership that Arabs might have against us here in Israel.

We (and especially I!) need to apply them in such a way as to form a closed circle around ourselves — the wall Yehonatan told his audience about in the video below, to sustain purity of spirit and heart, the purity that is expected of real Jews in the face of the worst adversity.

Jonathan gave a specific example of an event he and Esther went to in New York before they came here, somewhere in the middle of the video. A man who calls himself a rabbi was defending the Arab presence in Israel, and Mrs. Pollard called him out on it, using specific examples.

The line of questioning was as follows:

1. Do you feel the pain of your brothers? Do you really feel it?

Note: Jonathan mentions that in her thoughts Esther includes our sisters too; but the question is about the Jewish People as a whole.

If you are a Jew and have no skin in the game — not living in Israel — you have no right to criticize Jews in Israel.

If you live here and still act like you have no skin in the game and want to hand over your people's lives for the sake of political correctness or anything else, in the end it will be all the worse for you.

And no, I'm not asking whether you put your time in the army here, because until now it serves to preserve an Israel that holds nothing special for — or sacred to — the Jewish nation and that does not take into account our myriads of sufferings of many different types, over millennia. A "state for all its citizens" here actually cheats the Jews because our government favors certain non-Jews here. Why would a Jew serving as a spiritual or a governing leader do such a thing to his people? Everyone else has somewhere else to go, except us.

We don't want to be "governed" in this manner. We just want our own sovereign homeland, without enemies living among us whose only goal is to plague us and preferably rid the world of us.

The portion of the list applicable to this question contains at least these action items. There may be more that readers may post in the comments:

1. Putting others' values, whether real or pretend, ahead of our own is disastrous. Let us look around and see what happens when countries have no clear understanding of the reason for their existence. We have a clear mandate from the Holy Torah to be here in the Land of Israel, from which we must draw the courage of our convictions.

Everyone who has a bible and reads it knows that, too.

People who oppose our Biblical mandate to be in the Holy Land ought to take their bibles out from their homes and burn them in the nearest public square. Let 'em show us their hatred in burning flames! Then let's see what happens to them.

The people, not the bibles.

2. Letting our government punish our brethren over those who would actually throw us out on our ear if they had the chance...is simply wrong. We must protest this policy every chance we get.

Take the Negev Bedouin, for example, who are allowed to run wild while Jews cringe in fear because our so-called GOVERNMENT rendered itself powerless to stop it...

And the constant "shooting ourselves in the foot" phenomenon. For decades, Israel's foreign policy has been to give in to those in our land who are backed up financially by rich nations and organizations around the world, such as the EU, the UN and the New Israel Fund), legitimizing him and delegitimizing us.

This also relates to how our government has handled our public relations from our earliest days as a renewed state until now. It is all due to false values, labeled Jewish by people who seek to sway us toward self-destruction. A great summary of this can be found here.

(But the one outstanding exception I am aware of is Daniel Seaman, former director of the Israeli Government Press Office (GPO) among other positions. He gave everything he could to defend us through the written and spoken word. Search | Wikipedia | Tablet | A7)

Do we seek to relieve our brothers' pain by acting appropriately against these things, or do we seek to destroy their presence, or allow them to face unnecessary destruction, in our mutual homeland without protest?

Do we seek to hurt our fellow Jews in Israel by keeping them constantly in danger, constantly fighting issues that would have been solved long ago if they had been dealt with properly, as any other nation would do and not be chastised for their actions???

The loyal, faithful Jew does not seek to destroy our presence here, whether he lives here or not, even despite our government. He (and his Jewish wife — this includes genuine converts to Judaism) seek to support our return to the land to which G-d promised us He would return us, and even return themselves. Which brings us to our next question...

2. Do you feel the pain of the Land of Israel? Do you know that the Land is alive, that it's Eretz haKodesh?"

The portion of the list applicable to this question contains at least these action items. There may be more that readers may post in the comments:

1. Realize why the land was as good as empty for many hundreds of years before Jews began coming back en masse. We still have pictures of those days until relatively recently. Mark Twain gave excellent testimony to that face when he was there in 1867.

2. Make the inclusion of lands that were won in the Six Day War and that the world still doesn't consider legitimate (Judea/Yehuda, Samaria/Shomron and other lands as they come to us) as a part of Israel Proper a prime priority. Extend sovereignty, already! We don't need to wait for the president of the USA or any other country to do it for us.

3. Do you feel the fear of our children when they're running to the bomb shelters? And they're told they have 10 seconds?

The portion of the list applicable to this question contains at least this action item. There may be more that readers may post in the comments:

1. We must make Jewish children our top priority. No other country would allow their children to be subjected to the kinds of danger and violence that ours are exposed to on a daily basis. No other country's children associate BALLOONS and KITES with bombs and other violence. No other nation's children must go through sirens and strictly timed reactions on a regular basis...and they're not fire drills.

Not to mention having their parents murdered in front of them, or other atrocious things.

2. We citizens need to stop considering what we have been going through a normal way of life, especially if we're not going through it directly ourselves (I'm looking at you, government leaders!).

I don't think that people living near the Gaza border think it's normal for their homes to be shot at all the time; neither should those of us who have the power to change things.

There are plenty of news items and blogs that have more of this information, with links.

These questions can be adapted to any kind of situation our child is confronted with. Another way of demanding an explanation is as Esther said it, putting the onus on us adults:

"Do you feel the fear for our future, because our children are our future?!"

When it comes to our children, we need to be responsible and demand explanations that these purveyors of un-Jewish values would be uncomfortable giving. People with Jewish mothers, who say 'no' to all three, are not true Jews; they are not loyal to their own.

(It's like that other test that we hear about a lot: Does a person show mercy and compassion (rahmanut רחמנות), shyness and humility (bayshanut ), and display lovingkindness and sharing from what they have (g'milut hasadim)? These are qualities associated with Jews with true Jewish values.

I got this from HERE.)

As Esther did, and showed us: If they don't display the signs, or feel the pain of their people from over the centuries of persecution, exile and murder, we must doubt their loyalties and even their lineage, no matter how high their stature or important their title. It's crucial and even consequential for the next war that is coming up.

My hope is that even those of us who don't feel comfortable asking such questions will be able to stand on our ground better and more accurately.

After all, we do need to know whether we are confronting a real problem precisely, or falsely accusing someone of being a danger to themself* and others through their values.

And finally, we need to solve the problems that have stood in the way of our redemption for thousands of years. May Mashiah be revealed quickly, with mercy and lovingkindness.

*Thanks to R' Pinchas Winston for introducing me and my family to this Canadian term through his writings.

16 February 2022

Israel's Freedom Convoy: "Take Back the (Steering) Wheel"

15 Adar Alef 5782, Shushan Purim Qatan | ט''ו אדר א' ה''תשפ''ב, שושן פורים קטן

Source

I didn't post on time for the first day of the convoy protesting Israel's COVID-19 mandates and all that goes with them, but they're still there...so here's some of the record:

Arutz Sheva: Israel Freedom Convoy heads for Jerusalem.

Reuters: Israelis mount their own COVID "Freedom Convoy"

Jewish Press: Freedom Convoy: Israel

JNS: Israeli COVID 'Freedom Convoy' takes to the streets

Adina Kutnicki: Israelis Join Freedom Convoy

Israel Video Network: 20,000 Israeli Trucks and Family Vehicles Take Part in Global Freedom Convoy

HaAretz (in a rare non-premium article): Israeli 'Freedom Convoy' Blocks Main Highway in Protest of COVID Measures

US News and World Report: Israelis Mount Their Own COVID 'Freedom Convoy'

And this one, which I think is the clearest one of them all:

Freedom Convoy Israel 2022, published on two sites: United Pushback | Brownstone Institute

Many of these articles list the goals of the convoy in Israel. They are:

The termination of the government’s Covid policies
The return to normalcy for all Israeli citizens
The opening up of all businesses
Full transparency in the disclosure of all government contracts and protocols- including the infamous Pfizer Covid vaccine contract.
Respect for indivdual privacy (arising from the scandal of the government and police using the spy software, Pegasus, to spy on ordinary citizens)
Reaffirmation that all human beings are equal and have constitutional rights

***

No one has explained what the "wheel" in the slogan refers to, so I put it in the title. Another term can be helm.

Like this one, a nice mix of old and new: