THE ISRAELI DEMOLITION DERBY CONTINUES WITH A VENGEANCE: NEWLY BUILT SYNAGOGUE NEAR ITAMAR DESTROYED BY ORDER OF THE BIBI/BARAK DUO, USING ARAB WORKERS TO TEAR APART THE HOLY ARK.
By: Helen Freedman
Readers of Arutz Sheva, and followers of AFSI, know that the AFSI Chizuk mission was in Israel, Nov. 13-22, with one of our express purposes being the dedication of a Torah scroll at Itamar, which had been rescued from the Shoah. We began the festivities with great joy and celebration, greeting young and old who had come to the social hall in Itamar at the invitation of Mayor Moshe Goldsmith, his wife, Lea, and heads of the Shomron Regional Council. With the help of the scribe, we completed the restoration of the parchment. Then, with musicians in the lead, we rejoiced in dancing and marching with the Torah scroll to the newly completed synagogue in Givat Aryeh, built in response to the brutal butchery of five members of the Fogel family by Arab terrorists from the nearby town of Awarta.
The synagogue, on the hilltop in Givat Aryeh, was a simple, one-room building. People crowded into it to dance with the Torah scroll. Young children sat on the shoulders of their fathers as they circled happily, rejoicing in this life-giving response to Arab terrorist hatred. Night had fallen by the time we left, but the memory of that afternoon and evening was a bright fire that could never be extinguished.
This morning, Dec. 1, I was alerted to the fact that during the night, at 3 A.M., the Israeli and Arab demolition experts arrived at the hilltop, attacking and demolishing the few little tents, expelling the residents after confiscating their telephones so they couldn't call for help, and destroying our modest, but beautiful synagogue. A wail of disbelief emerged from my heart. What purpose could be served by such senseless cruelty and self-abasement? Would this appease our Arab enemies? Our European enemies? Our UN enemies? Others? Will this bring us closer to peace? The answer is clearly, NO!! It empowers our enemies and strengthens the Zionist zeal.
Below is an open letter to PM Benjamin Netanyahu, drafted by Glenn Richter, from the members of the AFSI Chizuk mission who were present at the Torah dedication. Anyone who chooses to write a similar letter to him, with a cc to Ehud Barak, is encouraged to do so. The email addresses are: memshala@pmo.gov.il; bnetanyahu@knesset.gov.il, pm_eng2@it.pmo.gov.il. Defense Minister Ehud Barak's email is: pniot@mod.gov.il.
Dear PM Netanyahu:
You weren't there on the late afternoon of Tuesday, November 15th when 25 members of Americans for a Safe Israel/AFSI, who had assembled from all over the U.S., joined the community of Itamar in dedicating a Sefer Torah in memories of Sam and Rita Ross, and of Ruth, Udi, Elad, Hadas, Yoav of Itamar, brutally butchered by Arab terrorists a few months ago. However, you were there in the Fogels' home at the time of the shiva, vowing to their surviving 12 year-old daughter that you would fight terror. How your recent actions have betrayed that promise!!
You weren't with us when this special Torah,which survived the Shoah as did Sam and Rita, and was lovingly carried to Israel by their son Jack, a member of our Americans for a Safe Israel mission, was joyously danced down the hill from Itamar under a raised tallit and up the hill to a just-built synagogue in the new neighborhood of Gal Givat Aryeh. Gal Givat Aryeh was the classic Zionist response to Arab terror -- where they destroy, we build.
You weren't with us when the Torah was kissed and placed with great care in the holy Ark of the synagogue, to accompany two other Torah scrolls. A photo taken shows that moment. Light is beaming out from the synagogue onto the darkened Gal Givat Aryeh hilltop and to the surrounding Jewish communities and hostile Arab villages.
But somehow you managed -- through either your direct command or assent -- to be there exactly two weeks later, when your Israeli police and Civil Administration workers brutally bulldozed into wreckage the new synagogue and two other buildings on Gal Aryeh. You left two families and five singles homeless, and confiscated the Torah scrolls. You used Arab workers, possibly from the same village of Awarta which spawned the murderers of the Fogels, to gleefully destroy the synagogue and small tents, erected specifically to memorialize the Arab butchery.
In some way you might have thought, Mr. Netanyahu, that this unconscionable act will encourage the Palestinian Authority towards peace. The opposite: this act of cowardice completes the work of the Fogels' murderers and only incites more terror.
Mr. Netanyahu: hang your head in shame. And tomorrow, grow a spine; rebuild Gal Aryeh, remove the threat of demolition from other Shomron communities that you are menacing, and allow the Jewish communities of the Shomrom to thrive, as you had promised to do when elected.
Mournfully,
Helen Freedman, Executive Director, Americans for a Safe Israel/AFSI
Dorothy and Ken Brooks, Hannah Cohen, Nancy Duong, Dr. Paul and Lorrie Fein, Jan Fenster, Carol Flatto, Henry Gerber, Henry Jentes, Cheryl Jacobs Lewin, Melanie Marmer, Ira Nosenchuck, Teddy Pollak, Glenn Richter, Gila Rollhaus, Phil Rosenblatt, Jack Ross, Irvin Schmutter, Ann Stacy
Americans For a Safe Israel 1751 Second Avenue (91st Street) New York, NY 10128 Contact: Helen Freedman, Executive Director Dec. 1, 2011 |
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