Israel Matzav

Anti-Semites from 'Peace Now' try to turn a mezuza into an international incident

For those who do not know what a mezuza is, I suggest going here before reading this post.

As many of you know, mezuzot or mezuzos (that's the plural in Hebrew) are typically affixed to any entryway that has two posts and a lintel. Thus, for example, there are mezuzot affixed to most of the entrances to the Old City of Jerusalem.

The IDF is considering disciplinary action against an IDF Rabbi who affixed a mezuza to the doorpost of the casbah, the marketplace in Hebron earlier this week. Apparently the act of affixing something Jewish in Hebron has so infuriated the Jewish anti-Semites at Peace France Now! that they are trying to turn it into an international incident.

The rabbi of the IDF Yehuda Brigade, Capt. Eliyahu Peretz, joined several soldiers, Jewish residents of Hebron and Chabad followers and entered the Hebron "casbah" - the city's old marketplace and off-limits to Jews - to affix a mezuza on a wall of a structure which they claimed used to belong to Jews.

In response, Peace Now issued a statement condemning the event, insisting that "those who participated in this illegal political ceremony should be put on trial."

The Hebron casbah is defined as a "closed military zone" and security forces forbid Israeli civilians from entering it.

Sources in the Central Command said Yehuda Brigade Commander Col. Yossi Fuchs was investigating the incident. The mezuza has been removed. They also said that Peretz had been in his position for only one month and had affixed the mezuza in the volatile area unaware of the potential fallout.

Rabbi Yossi Nachshon, a Chabad emissary in Hebron who helped organize the ceremony, said he did not understand the IDF's extreme reaction.

"The media and the IDF have totally blown the whole thing out of proportion," said Nachshon. "We affixed the mezuza in a place where IDF soldiers are stationed near a Jewish neighborhood. We do these types of things all the time. On the same day we affixed mezuzot in various settlements around the Hebron hills."

Nachshon said that according to Jewish law there was no obligation to affix a mezuzah near the casbah. However, he added that a mezuza was believed to offer protection against physical dangers.

Nachshon said that a Jewish settler had been killed near the scene of the contentious mezuza.

God forbid Jewish soldiers stationed in Hebron should believe that God is protecting them - eh?

But this is not the first time such an incident has happened. Here's a story about a similar incident many years ago (the article was written in 1972):

There is no mezuza on the Old City of Jerusalem's Damascus Gate (Shaar Sh'chem). And it is important that every Jew understand why other major entrances to the Old City, such as Jaffa Gate, DO have mezuzot while this one does not; why there once WAS a mezuza at Shaar Sh'chem (it was taken down by Arabs and never replaced by Mayor Teddy Kollek),and why Meir Kahane demanded that he be allowed to put up the mezuza, was refused permission, and as a result a number of his supporters were arrested.

The Old City of Jerusalem is surrounded by the famous wall that is such an attraction for all tourists. Entrance to the Old City is through a number of gates, of which Jaffa and Damascus are the two most famous and heavily travelled. After the 1967 War, mezuzot were placed on all the gates, includ ing Damascus (or Sh'chem); Arabs PROMPTLY ripped off the latter one. The Israeli government preferred not to notice and allowed the desecration to remain unanswered. Why? The answer to this is also the answer to Kahane's making such an issue out of a gate which may very well - due to the majority of Arabs living within the Old City - be free from the religious obligation of a mezuza, in the first place. The Israeli government has followed a careful policy since the 1967 War of not "aggravating" the Arabs. This has involved Israeli refusal and failure to assert Jewish rights as well as a willingness to, de facto, accept Arab demands that run counter to those Jewish rights. Part of that policy includes the refusal to allow Jews unlimited settlement anywhere in that part of Eretz Israel liberated after 1967; refusal to allow Jews to live anywhere except in certain parts of the Old City of Jerusalem; and, of course, refusal to declare that the liberated areas of 1967 are formally part of the Jewish State. It has also manifested itself in such things as kid-gloves policy and collaboration with notorious Jew-haters such as Hebron's Mayor Ja'abari (whose part in the Gush Etzion and Hebron massacres ranges from ugly to murky), as well as government financing and support of an Arab university on the West Bank that will produce the Arab terrorist and nationalist leaders in the next decade.

Read the whole thing.

The Rabbis tell us that since the Holy Temple was destroyed, prophecy was given to fools and children. Rabbi Meir Kahane HY"D was not a child and he definitely was not a fool, so I will not call him a prophet, but the predictions in this article written thirty-five years ago are devastatingly accurate. Take this, for example:

The refusal to place the stamp of Jewishness on the public sectors of the country is an effort not to rouse the Arabs too much and to have them feel that they are equal citizens of the State of Israel. This, too, is a short-range success but a long-range disaster - not to mention its obvious dishonesty. No matter what the clever propogandists say, the Arab is NOT equal in Israel so long as Israel remains true to the Zionist dream that created it as a JEWISH state. So long as the original rationale for the return to Israel holds true (and if it does not, then we have no right at all to Israel); so long as Israel is ours because it is the home of the Jewish people where they can live free from physical holocaust and spiritual- cultural assimilation; so long as Israel has a Law of Return which applies only to Jews and not to Arabs, then Israel is a JEWISH state (and not one that disregards nationality and religion) and the Arab is NOT equal.

The Arab knows this and his placid acceptance of Jewish rule is not an indication that he is happy and has made peace with the situation. It simply means that five years is a very, very short time in the Middle East; that the Arabs are making a little money now; that a generation of young Arab intellectuals who place nationalism and ideals over money has not yet fully ripened; and that we face a terrible Northern Ireland- type confrontation in the years to come. And on the Arab side will be ranged thousands of Jews who will back the Arabs because Moshe Dayan - in his short-sighted cleverness - chose not to assert Jewish rights immediately. What a difference it would have made had Israel - immediately after the 1967 War - when the whole world stood solidly behind her, knowing that she had almost gone under and miraculously survived, declared: All this land is ours, historically; it is Jewish from the times of the Bible; it is officially ours and it will never be abandoned. How much greater the moral and legal hold than the present sly, diplomatic game! But we did not do it.

We did not and we still do not say to the world: Israel is a Jewish State, the home of the Jewish people where Jewish sovereignty reigns and where Arabs can live as individuals, as a demographic and cultural minority. And that is why Kahane wants a mezuza on Shaar Sh'chem. Not because there are no other things that are as important or more so. But because the reason for the lack of a mezuza is the underlying mistake of Israeli policy: We do not want to alienate the Arabs, we do not want to declare blatant Jewish sovereignty over a Gate that is in a totally Arab part of the city. We do not want to affix a mezuza and Jewish sovereignty - both! And that is at the heart of Kahane's intention. Not only the affixing and the stamping of a mezuza, but the fixing and stamping of the word "Jewish" on the city of Jerusalem.

He wrote those words in 1972.

Yes, I know, if Kahane's right placing a mezuza is (or can be) a political act. But were those soldiers and their Rabbi thinking of it as a political act? I doubt it.

Oh and the case at the top, isn't it stunning? Google Images says it came from Hazorfim, and if you happen to buy one from them, please suggest to them that they should give me one because I'm sure I can't afford it and it is beautiful! As to the parchment, sorry, I have no idea who wrote it.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 1:42 PM