tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17102287984157033032024-03-14T03:03:15.824-04:00Toronto to Ra'ananaArticles and information from a Torontonian living in Ra'anana, Israel.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger313125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-65023614641136845352023-12-27T10:14:00.004-05:002023-12-27T23:50:24.961-05:00Israel Wrap Up Update 2023<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwS0xg_GXBdfQ8dJyFSCvo-qN2_9DBa7N-GibMKghyphenhyphenwnoGgBYnK5whyrCib41EDeUxe49V5bS-01v4srHeE61idZT6_rL_tMatvbll3mCR5D2Q7bZ0raODbWPX4brMSxfb7Pm6SPEpE8imIVhKgCVXpaXvAeJdBtNEA3WW2mwmm_RkuOJV_RpJY5BHhik/s900/Greenglick.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="458" data-original-width="900" height="136" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwS0xg_GXBdfQ8dJyFSCvo-qN2_9DBa7N-GibMKghyphenhyphenwnoGgBYnK5whyrCib41EDeUxe49V5bS-01v4srHeE61idZT6_rL_tMatvbll3mCR5D2Q7bZ0raODbWPX4brMSxfb7Pm6SPEpE8imIVhKgCVXpaXvAeJdBtNEA3WW2mwmm_RkuOJV_RpJY5BHhik/w220-h136/Greenglick.jpeg" width="220" /></a></div><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Fallen Soldiers</b></p><div style="text-align: justify;">Captain Shaul Greenglick z"l was killed this week in northern Gaza. He was 26 years old. He was an officer in the Nahal brigades, unit 931. He was from Ra'anana. Just a few weeks ago, he participated, in uniform, in Israel's reality singing contest "<a href="https://www.ynet.co.il/entertainment/article/h1crbfud6">Kochav Nolad</a>" ("A Star is Born") and passed into the next round. He impressed the panel of four judges with his rendition of a Hanan Ben Ari song, "Blind Bat." After performing, he returned to Gaza to fight with his unit. He was killed along with 26 year old Captain Shay Shamriz. In total, six soldiers were killed on Monday. The IDF has just announced three more names of soldiers killed yesterday, including Eliezer Chitiz z"l, who was also from Ra'anana. In total, 164 Israeli soldiers have been killed since the start of the ground operation in Gaza and a total of 498 soldiers have been killed since the start of the war on October 7, 2023.</div><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Captain Greenglick's funeral was today in Ra'anana. We joined thousands of Ra'anana residents to line the streets and wave Israeli flags as the military hearse drove by, escorted by several security vehicles. I would think the same scene will take place again tomorrow in Ra'anana for the funeral of Eliezer Chitiz, who will also be laid to rest in the military cemetery in Ra'anana, which is two blocks away from our home.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Military Situation - State of the War</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Israel is in a very dangerous phase of the war now. The country's military forces are fighting actively (to different degrees) on seven different fronts. One area of heavy fighting is in Gaza, where thousands of Israeli troops are fighting Hamas guerillas in many different locations. The Israeli army has gone into the tunnel network in various locations and has been fighting in many different areas in northern and southern areas of Gaza. Since the temporary cease fire deal ended, the casualty rate for Israeli soldiers has spiked dramatically. I have not heard any reports to suggest that the fighting is close to a conclusion.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">In the north, Israel is fighting on two fronts. On the Lebanon border, from Israel's west coast to the point where Lebanon, Syria and Israel all meet, Israel is fighting a very active and very difficult war against Hezbollah. Hezbollah is stationed right at Israel's border and has been launching anti-tank missiles against civilian and military targets, unmanned suicide drone attacks, weaponized, controlled drone attacks and other military and terrorist campaigns. Israel has been defending against these attacks and launching its own counter-offensive measures on an ongoing basis. Many Israeli soldiers have fallen in these northern battles.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">In the northeast, Israel is fighting against Syria and Iraq, with Hezbollah and other Iranian backed military groups launching attacks from Syrian territory. Israeli has responded to these attacks in many different ways, some of which have been reported in the media - reaching as far as the Damascus area.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Israel is also fighting against Hamas-backed groups of terrorists in areas of Judea and Samaria (the "West Bank"). Some areas have seen particularly heavy fighting including Jenin and the Tulkarem area.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">In the south, Israel has had to deal with proxy attacks from the Houthi rebels, an Iranian-sponsored military organization situated in Yemen that has vowed to attack any and all ships travelling through the Red Sea Strait en route to or from Israel. The Houthis have fired several long-range, Iranian-supplied missiles at Eilat and other places in Israel. To date, these missiles have been shot down by U.S. or Israeli defence forces using anti-missile systems.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The big "mastermind" behind all of this - and the main enemy is, of course, the Republic of Iran, which has armed, trained, sponsored and, largely, controlled all of these forces. Iran is using Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, and other groups as proxies to attack Israeli while, to date, avoiding any direct attacks on Israel. As recently as yesterday, Iran threatened to begin direct attacks against Israel soon. Iran has, for several years, called for the destruction of Israel and is certainly the most hostile country in the region towards the State of Israel. Iran has also been the sponsor of virulent anti-Semitic propaganda including Holocaust denial and other poisonous forms of anti-Jewish bigotry.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">To get to seven fronts, you can separate the Syrian forces from the Iraqi forces - though attacks and activity from these two groups are largely originating from the same place.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Now with that all in mind, calling for an "unconditional cease fire" is tantamount to calling for Israel to surrender to these various enemies, which Israel certainly will not do. The Hamas leadership, in interviews since October 7, 2023, has stated that they plan to carry out the same types of attacks "over and over again" until "Israel is destroyed." Iran has made similar threats. Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah started this war and they have not offered any proposals or concessions that would form the basis for a short or long term cease fire.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">For now, the prospects of all of this ending any time soon seem bleak. At this point, it seems unfathomable that Israel will conclude the war in Gaza without destroying the Hamas leadership or coming to a deal whereby the Hamas leadership leaves Gaza (like the Lebanon war deal in the 1980s in which Arafat and the PLO left Beirut and went to Tunisia). Israel will also need to insist on a deal whereby Hezbollah moves back, several kilometres, from the Israeli-Lebanon border and the Israeli-Syrian border. If there is no deal with Hezbollah, there may will be a full-blown war with Lebanon, that could start any time now.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">As for Iran, I don't believe that Israel is about to launch a major attack on Iran, though there are certainly scenarios in which Iran could draw the U.S. into the conflict and provoke U.S. operations against Iran. This does not seem too likely as of now, but the Middle East is quite unpredictable.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Israeli Appreciation towards Soldiers</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">One of our family members was home for a break from reserve duty in Gaza. We went to grab breakfast before he had to return. He was in uniform. As we were sitting in the cafe, some Ra'anana residents came over to talk to him. They thanked him for his service and insisted on paying for whatever he wanted to order (as well as anything his friend and fellow soldier ordered). Of course we would have been happy to pay the bill but this was such a nice gesture. It is something that happens all over Israel wherever civilians see soldiers in uniform, especially these days.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Hostages</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">According to current reports, there are still about 133 hostages being held by Hamas who were taken into captivity on October 7, 2023. Some were soldiers, some were residents of the various Kibbutzim and communities near Gaza that were attacked and some were concert-goers attending the Nova music festival. Some very young children are still in captivity, assuming they are alive. No list has been provided by Hamas or the International Red Cross - or anyone else. We really don't know how many of these hostages are still alive, what condition they are in or where they are being held. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Based on information we have received from released hostages, we know that the hostages were being held in very difficult conditions with very little food and water provided each day. Some of the women were separated out and kept in different areas. There are reports (from the released hostages and others) about widespread sexual abuse. Some of the other hostages were quite elderly, in their 80s, with various medical conditions. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Israelis have been demonstrating in support of the families of these hostages and demanding that the government take all appropriate steps to return the hostages home. But so far, there is no available deal on the table that would bring this about. There are rumours of different negotiations taking place, brokered by Egypt, Qatar or others - but I have not heard any reports that a deal is close.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Civilian Deaths</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Israel is obviously facing a difficult situation trying to extricate Hamas from Gaza while they have embedded their fighters in civilian populations and launched attacks from schools, mosques, hospitals and other crowded areas. Even the Hamas leadership is apparently now using groups of hostages as human shields to avoid being killed or captured.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The Hamas Health Ministry has been reporting more than 20,000 Gazans as having been killed. But there are a few things to remember.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">First of all, the numbers are not verified and Hamas has notoriously exaggerated or fabricated numbers of casualties (remember the hospital incident early this year). </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Secondly, Hamas does not announce the numbers of fighters who are killed. By Israel estimates, the numbers of Hamas fighters killed are 1/2 to 2/3 of the total number killed. In other words - the actual Hamas numbers of total casualties my be anywhere from 10,000 to 20,000 - we just don't know.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Of those, the number of Hamas fighters killed is between 8,000 and 12,000, according to different Israeli sources.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Suffice it to say that the civilian casualty numbers are therefore much lower than the numbers that are simply accepted and printed by publications and news media around the world.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">This is not to say that anyone in Israel is happy to see high numbers of civilian casualties in Gaza.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">But at the same time - we are dealing with an enemy that is trying to kill as many of us as possible- civilians and military personnel. In that circumstance - Israelis feel that we are better off killing our enemies than being killed ourselves. This is the same type of reaction that the Allies had when dealing with Germany - or Japan in World War II - or that any nation has when confronted with an armed conflict started by an enemy.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The Israeli army would rather protect the lives of as many Israelis (soldiers and civilians) as possible, even if that means that there are civilian casualties while fighting Hamas. That's unfortunate but it is a by-product of war. Certainly the civilian casualties in Gaza or far lower than the casualty numbers in conflicts involving Russia, Syria or even the United States (see Afghanistan, Iraq or other places).</p><p style="text-align: justify;">To call the Israeli war against Hamas a "genocide" is nothing less than a morally vacuous blood libel. Yet that is the language coming from Turkey, Iran, Hamas-sponsored university groups across the United States and Canada and other places.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Volunteers and Visitors</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Amidst all of this, people are still visiting Israel, as difficult as it might be to get here (with El Al and Emirates being the only airlines that are currently flying to Israel). One of our friends arrived last week and is volunteering with "Sar-El" a group that stations volunteers for two-week periods at army bases around Israel to help pack supplies, equipment, food and assist in other ways. Another friend has been visiting and volunteering to pick fruit and vegetables at various sites around the country. Israel normally relies on labour from Thailand, Judea and Samaria, some Gazans and other foreign workers for much of the seasonal agricultural work. Very few workers from any of these places are available. Farmers around the country have been begging Israelis and others to come help out - sometimes on a paid basis and sometimes as volunteers. Israelis and people from all over the world have been answering the call.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Many synagogues from across North America and other places have been bringing "missions" to Israel. A group from the Park Avenue Synagogue in New York came earlier this month. In mid-January, a group will be visiting Israel from Beth Tikvah Synagogue in Toronto. Just today, some friends told us that they will be arriving in mid-January for a 10 day trip - including some time volunteering in different places.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">In short, there are lots of volunteer opportunities and I think Israelis are very grateful for the help - both from non-Israelis - who have shown up to volunteer - and from Israelis - many of whom are volunteering in different ways.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Of course, many other tours have been cancelled - including the various birthright groups. Some friends who were planning to come cancelled - and others postponed their trips. I think the short term future of tourism to Israel is very much up in the air - like so many other things for Israelis now including academic programs, social events, work and so many other parts of a normal routine. So many of our young people are cancelling all of these events to serve in life and death missions in Gaza, Israel's north, or wherever else they might be stationed.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Getting Here</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">As I mentioned above, only El Al and Emirates (as well as the Emirates subsidiary "Fly Dubai") are flying to Tel-Aviv now. El Al is flying to several cities in the U.S. - so if you are flying from New York, Boston, Chicago, Miami or some other cities - and don't mind flying El Al - there are still available flights.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">In my case, as I have written in different articles in the past, I tend to stick with Star Alliance airlines, flying Air Canada as often as I can. So I have been joining Air Canada flights with El Al flights. They don't have a baggage sharing arrangement - so I have had to collect my bags, go through immigration and then re-check-in to drop off my bag. It is very cumbersome. If you are doing this, you need to allow about four hours for a transfer.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">For my flight back to Toronto, I flew through Amsterdam without a checked bag. This was much better than flying with a bag since I did not have to go through immigration, security or anything else. I was just able to make my way over to the Air Canada gate with lots of time to spare and even managed to spend time in the lounge in Amsterdam (which was nothing exciting).</p><p style="text-align: justify;">On my way back to Israel, I flew Air Canada to London. That part of the flight was fine. I then had to collect my bags and walk quite a long distance to the subway system to take a train to terminal 4. This took quite a while and was a bit of a pain since I had a suitcase with me - along with a carry on bag and a knapsack. There were lots of escalators, moving walkways, corridors and other parts to this journey - which took close to an hour in total.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Once I arrived at terminal 4 - things were fine - though the El Al gate was not even open yet. So I wound up sitting around in a coffee bar waiting for the El Al desk to open.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Overall, it was certainly better than Amsterdam but it was not fun. At least the immigration line was efficient.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">I haven't found the ideal arrangement yet though I will have to go back to Toronto in mid-January. My current plan is to travel again through Rome. (El Al to Rome and then Air Canada to Toronto).</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Although some airlines have announced a resumption of service to Israel, scheduled for mid-January, I don't believe that these flights will begin again until there is a cease fire of some sort. I guess we will have to see.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Entertainment</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Throughout all of this, Israeli TV has continued to broadcast episodes of "Eretz Nehederet" ("It's a Wonderful Country") which is the closest thing Israel has to Saturday Night Live. The show is replete with satirical sketches involving impersonators of many of Israel's political leaders and other public figures. Eretz Nehederet has aired some sketches in English poking fun at the BBC's coverage of the war, the U.S. college campus situation and other world events. Much of the humour is very dark - but they are trying to bring a bit of levity to a very difficult situation. The skits are hit or miss. Some are extremely funny, some not so much. Isn't that the case with any satirical show?</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Last week's show included an impersonation of Tzvi Yehezkeli - an Israeli commentator who is fluent in Arabic and has been on Israeli TV continuously, providing interpretations of Arabic news releases and statements. The Eretz Nehederet version was quite spot-on, making fun of Yehezkeli's explanation of Arabic phrases and idioms. At one point - the impersonator provided a sentence in Arabic - and then offered the translation - "The world is like a cucumber....one day you are holding it in your hand - and the next day it is stuck up your butt." I'm not here to interpret these things - I am just passing on what I heard (and laughed at, I have to say).</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Last night, Eretz Nehederet aired a <a href="https://www.mako.co.il/tvbee-tv-news/Article-9554a7d5db7ac81026.htm?sCh=d050c865ef6ac510&pId=25483675">very serious sketch</a> involving a traumatized soldier showing up to watch his family arguing about politics as usual. This one was tear-inducing and difficult to watch. The skit was done with an overlay of the song "Kama Tov She'bata Habayta" - ("How great it is that you have come home") - sung originally in 1971 by the late Israeli singer Arik Einstein. The song was originally written as a group effort by Yankele Rotblitt, Shalom Hanoch and Itzkhak Klapter. The original version was written welcoming someone back after returning from a long trip abroad. Eretz Nehederet changed the words somewhat. Not sure if there is a translation available yet - but if your Hebrew is up to it - and the link works wherever you are - you can use the link above to watch it. Even without the Hebrew translation, you can probably get the mood from the sombre tone and the scene itself.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The other Israeli show that has been airing twice a week is "Zehu Zeh" ("That's that") which is also a satirical show but a very different format. I think I have written about it in the past. They have also been airing skits making fun of the Houthis - implying that they are launching rockets at Israel from Yemen because they are bored. Zehu Zeh usually features two songs each episode, one with a guest singer. Over the past few weeks - many different guests have appeared including Eidan Reichel, Chava Alberstein, and others. The music has generally been excellent. The comedy sketches - hit or miss.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Israeli singers have continued to travel the country performing for soldiers all over - whether in bases near Gaza, Gaza itself - or in different places in the north. Some stand-up comedians have also been entertaining soldiers. As you might have seen, Jerry Seinfeld showed up in Israel last week as a gesture of support - though I am not sure that he entertained troops anywhere.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>December Holidays in Israeli</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">As you might know, Christmas is largely a non-event in Israel, outside of pockets of Christian communities. It is a regular workday, everything is open. It is quite something to see - for someone who is used to being bombarded with Christmas music in restaurants, shopping malls and everywhere else for two months before the holiday in Canada.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">I have nothing against people celebrating Christmas - I wish all of my friends the very best in enjoying their celebrations. And if I am in Toronto and invited to a party or a dinner, I am certainly happy to join them.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">At the same time, it is a season where, when I am in Toronto, I am constantly reminded how I differ from everyone else - how I stick out as a minority - and how I don't belong. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Even though Israel is a majority Jewish state, the malls are not generally decorated with any particular holiday's decorations - and there is no time of the year where Jewish holiday-themed music is on the radio 24/7. On the actual holidays, everything is closed. But it seems to me it would be a lot less "in your face" than the way Christmas is celebrated in North America - even though Canada is not supposed to be a "religious" country by definition.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">In Toronto this year, the local Second Cup starting playing Christmas music right after Canadian Thanksgiving ended (in October). I would have thought that even people who celebrate Christmas would be happy with two to three weeks of Christmas music at most. But maybe I'm wrong.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Anti-Semitism Around the World</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">One of the major effects of this war has been a massive ramp up in anti-Semitism around the world. The U.S. Ivy League schools (many of which receive huge donations from Qatar) have been at the forefront of anti-Israel demonstrations - many of which have blended into anti-Jewish hatefests. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">In Canada, the universities have not been much better. Metropolitan University (formerly Ryerson) has been the source of some of the most vitriolic anti-Israel - and anti-Jewish hate speech. York University has not been far behind. University of Toronto's "Varsity" publication has been spewing repugnant disinformation. CUPE (the Canadian Union of Public Employees) has a leader who "rejoiced" the day after the October 7th massacres and has engaged in an outrageous smear campaign against Israel.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Through all of this, Canada's Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, was the proud recipient of thank you video put out by one of the Hamas leaders - obviously an ignominious and dubious honour. I think that Australia and New Zealand also received this fine mention from Hamas - and perhaps Ireland as well.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">There have also been demonstrations across Europe and around the world, chanting "from the River to the Sea..." which is a call for the destruction of Israel. As a result, there is quite a feeling of isolation here right now. Israel seems to have very few real friends - the United States, Germany - and some days Britain Maybe a handful of others.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Interestingly, there was a poll published last week in Israel - in which Israelis were asked "who is a better friend of Israel - Trump or Biden?" Far more Israelis went with Biden - which was a new phenomenon for Israelis, many of whom had viewed Trump as one of the best U.S. Presidents that Israel ever had as a friend in the White House.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">But really - aside from all of this - for those European Countries that are wavering, and others, the situation is not that complicated. You have on the one hand an axis of Russia, Hamas, Turkey, Qatar, Hezbollah, Iran and a handful of others. On the other hand - Israel, the U.S., Germany, Great Britain and some others. I don't even think one needs to say more than that. For the countries supporting the Hamas-Qatar-Iran group - unfortunately, they will probably wind up next on the list soon enough. And frankly, this is probably a very real warning to Trudeau and his government who want to bring hundreds of thousands of Hamas sympathizers to Canada. All I can do here is quote President Biden - "Don't!....just don't!..."</p><p style="text-align: justify;">And I think that is about it for now. I wish everyone a happy and healthy 2024 and hope that it will be a much more peaceful year. Best regards from Israel.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-59699693249319226842023-12-01T08:11:00.005-05:002023-12-01T10:30:33.970-05:00Fighting Renewed In Israel After 7 Day Pause<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_kY_wq4b6GF6Lw7aW6qFSa-vrG98pMCPf3tQXtV8D1ajkrGC-lTY4NYHOAR03wNRFTo-9q69F6Jx5MC3z2J6OuRii8l9MpC5G22Gz6Qh4QKiUm3hbiLIqd8mxYK3b6yCQ259QiSkwvwzSm4R6nhYmBQG-pAbjRKsz4mYV8ge6gtqGTwFBbwXduyKI_V8/s298/Israeli%20hostages%20Released.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="169" data-original-width="298" height="169" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_kY_wq4b6GF6Lw7aW6qFSa-vrG98pMCPf3tQXtV8D1ajkrGC-lTY4NYHOAR03wNRFTo-9q69F6Jx5MC3z2J6OuRii8l9MpC5G22Gz6Qh4QKiUm3hbiLIqd8mxYK3b6yCQ259QiSkwvwzSm4R6nhYmBQG-pAbjRKsz4mYV8ge6gtqGTwFBbwXduyKI_V8/s1600/Israeli%20hostages%20Released.jpg" width="298" /></a></div>After a 7 day "pause," Israel's war with Hamas has resumed this morning. Over the course of the 7 day pause, 110 hostages were released by Hamas including some young children, many senior citizens and several foreign workers (mostly Thai) who were working in Israel. In exchange Israel released more than 300 prisoners from its jails. To correct my previous post, some of these Palestinian prisoners were being held under "administrative detention" and my not have actually been convicted in a proper court process. However, the vast majority were involved in an actual or attempted attack on Israeli civilians or soldiers. They were released by Israel for civilians who were kidnapped from their homes or from the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023.<p></p><p>According to press reports, Israel was willing to continue the current pause for at least three more days since Hamas had claimed that it still had about 30 senior citizens, women and children that it was willing to release in exchange for 3 prisoners each. Hamas was required to provide a list of at least 10 hostages that it would be releasing by midnight to ensure another day of pause. But last night, instead of providing a list of hostages, Hamas sent some missiles. The Israeli army responded by indicating that operations against Gaza had resumed.</p><p>It is very difficult to predict how this war is likely to develop and how or when it might end. </p><p>On the one hand, various countries are making extensive efforts to negotiate further pauses in the fighting to allow for additional prisoner/hostage exchanges and discuss possible conditions for a longer term cease fire. From my understanding, Israel would be prepared to make extensive concessions to obtain the release of the remaining hostages - approximately 139 of them - according to Ynet News. In exchange for Israeli soldiers - and other remaining hostages, Israel is apparently prepared to release some of the most hardened terrorists that it is holding - which creates its own moral dilemmas.</p><p>On the other hand, after the massacre of October 7, 2023 and the accompanying declaration of war by Hamas, the Israeli government determined that its war objectives included defeating Hamas and eliminating it as the governing power in Gaza. As well, its objectives included destroying as much of Hamas' underground tunnel network as possible. If Israel does not make significant progress towards these goals, the war will be seen as a major victory for Hamas. This would keep all Israeli border settlements in a state of continued ongoing risk, would create regional deterrence problems for Israel in the region and would leave Israel simply waiting for another attack. Those outcomes are unacceptable and dangerous.</p><p>From reports I have seen on the various Israeli channels, Israel has degraded approximately 20-25% of the Hamas forces, primarily in northern Gaza. Most of the remaining forces, including two of Hamas' "elite units" are in Jabaliya and Khan Yunis. I don't expect this war to end without significant fighting in those areas. This war may take a while.</p><p><b>A Word about Civilians</b></p><p>Before the pause, the "Hamas Health Ministry" claimed that more than 20,000 Palestinians had been killed and alleged that the majority were civilians. As of now, the same "Ministry" is claiming that just over 14,000 were killed. That is still a very large number, no doubt. However, there is simply no reason to accept anything that Hamas says as having even a kernel of truth to it. As we know from the hospital incident early on, Hamas claimed that Israel had killed some 500 civilians. It later turned out that it was an "own goal" - a missile fired by the Islamic Jihad - and less than 50 Palestinians had been killed.</p><p>More importantly, Hamas has not indicated how many of the alleged 14,000 alleged deaths have been Hamas fighters. Contrary to what one might read or hear in some western media - including places like the BBC, the Toronto Star and other illustrious media outlets, Israel is primarily fighting Hamas militants and is not randomly killing civilians. If Israel were trying to kill civilians deliberately, the death toll would be hundreds of thousands (like what Assad did in Syria). Instead, Israel urged civilians to leave the north before attacking, which probably allowed thousands of Hamas fighters to leave along with the civilians. Based on reports in the Israeli media, it is almost certain that a very high percentage of the Palestinians who have been killed are Hamas fighters. </p><p>That is not to say that civilians in Gaza are not suffering. They are and many have been killed. But it is their government that launched a war and there is a very high level of support for this Hamas war among Gazan Palestinians. They were cheering and distributing candies when they heard news of the October 7 massacre and now they are reckoning with the consequences of supporting that regime. People around the world are calling for a ceasefire - which is like people who may have called for a ceasefire during WWII instead of a victory by the allies. People who really care about the Palestinians should be calling for a Hamas surrender now not a ceasefire. </p><p>Some of the released hostages have been providing information about who was holding them in captivity. One prisoner was being held in the attic of the house of a senior UNRWA official (UNRWA being a UN funded organization devoted to continuing Palestinian refugee status perpetually). Another returned hostage was being held in the house of a Palestinian doctor. There are many similar stories. In other words, many of the hostages were distributed to and being held by "civilians."</p><p>I have spoken to some soldiers who were in northern Gaza going house to house looking for Hamas fighters. They found hidden weapons caches in the vast majority of homes they entered. In some cases, rocket launchers and rockets. In other cases, Kalashnikovs, grenades and other weapons. Sometimes these were in children's bedrooms, in plain sight or in closets or under beds. Other times, in basements, attics or under trap doors. I saw videos from several of these houses. The soldiers told me that from what they saw (and their video evidence), they entered very few homes of "innocent civilians" who were uninvolved.</p><p>Despite all of this, it is clear that a growing proportion of world leaders are beginning to pressure Israel to end this war, using the concern about civilians as the main basis for taking these positions. President Biden and Secretary of State Blinken seem to be moving down this path. But at this point, it seems to me that Israel will have to resist these calls for now - until it is at least able to accomplish some of its primary war objectives.</p><p>There is also a question of "what happens next." On this, I haven't yet heard any sensible and workable proposal from Israel, the U.S., or anyone else. Essentially, Gaza needs some sort of outcome that is comparable to the Allies' defeat in WWII. A complete victory by Israel or a surrender by Hamas. Followed by a plan to rebuild Gaza, focusing on education, health care and economy - while keeping the area demilitarized. </p><p>One precondition is that Hamas has to be defeated or has to surrender. This could take weeks, months or even longer. But I don't see how Israel can accept anything less than one of these two outcomes.</p><p>A second precondition is that the Palestinians have to be prepared to live under this type of arrangement. Again, I have no idea how to implement that, who would police it and keep it demilitarized and whether it could even work. But a Hamas government on Israel's border, after the massacre and all of the other wars is just not feasible.</p><p>So for now, while we may soon see another pause or two - and some additional hostage deals, I expect that we are in for an extensive period of fighting, especially in southern Gaza. The landscape will have to change significantly before a long term arrangement can be reached.</p><p><b>Stories of Captivity</b></p><p>There are so many stories being circulated from the various Israeli hostages who were released - and they are available on many different sites and publications.</p><p>A few items caught my attention in particular.</p><p>The hostages were almost all underfed and undernourished. Not visited by the Red Cross or anyone else. No one really knew if they were dead or alive. Some released Thai workers said in an interview that they were so hungry they resorted to eating toilet paper.</p><p>One hostage, Rony Kriboy, age 25, a dual Russian-Israeli citizen, was taken hostage at the Nova music festival. Somehow he managed to escape from captivity. But he had nothing with him. No food, no money, no phone, no water. He spent four days trying to get out of Gaza, while scrounging for food. Eventually, he was caught by Palestinian civilians and turned over to Hamas again. Miraculously, they didn't kill him. He was released with the reported intervention of Putin as part of one of the exchanges. </p><p>Another released hostage, Mia Schem, had a severe arm injury. Hamas brought a veterinarian to operate on her arm. She is now undergoing treatment in an Israeli hospital. She had been forced to make a video while in Hamas captivity claiming that she was being treated well.</p><p>Eitan Yahalomi, age 12, was forced to watch videos of the Hamas massacres over and over while in captivity. He was held by Hamas for more than 50 days. He was threatened with weapons repeatedly.</p><p>9 year old Emily hand was released this week. She returned to her father to learn that her mother had been killed on October 7. She will only speak in whispers now after having been traumatized by Hamas for more than 7 weeks.</p><p>Some 139 hostages are still being held by Hamas. Even though it was part of the "pause" deal that the International Red Cross would be able to visit the prisoners, Hamas did not honour the deal and did not allow any visits. We still do not know how many hostages are alive, what condition they are in or how they are being held. </p><p>Israel is still hoping to reach some type of deal to release as many as possible if not all of them. But so far, it has not been able to reach a deal with Hamas through the bargaining agents - Qatar, Egypt and the U.S.</p><p><b>Conditions in Israel</b></p><p>During the brief 7-day pause, many things came back to life in many parts of Israel. Restaurants were full, bars and pubs in Tel-Aviv and other places were bustling - and many soldiers were able to get a bit of a much needed break. We were able to host 7 of them for big dinner earlier this week. Some soldiers had not been home for 30 days or more and had been living and sleeping "in the field."</p><p>Of course thousands of Israelis are living in uncertain temporary arrangements since whole communities were destroyed on Oct 7. Others have been temporarily evacuated from their homes in the north due to the ongoing threat from Hezbollah. Some are staying in hotels. Some are staying with friends and relatives. But there is an enormous amount of work to do to return all of these people to any semblance of normalcy.</p><p>We had a few days of very heavy rain but the sun returned and the past few days have been like late August days in Toronto - sunny and beautiful - and during a "pause" - even calm in parts of the country.</p><p>But yesterday was anything but calm. Three Israelis were killed and several others injured in a shooting attack in Jerusalem. Hamas took responsibility and that was during the "pause." </p><p>The day before, terrorists had opened fire and killed two soldiers and wounded others.</p><p>Even so, people were waiting with anticipation yesterday to see what would happen and whether the pause would be extended. Instead, we woke up to news that the fighting would continue intensely and no other hostages would be released. And we are back to a situation of uncertainty, concern and worry. As they say in Yiddish - on <i>shpilkes</i>.</p><p>We were planning to host some close friends in early January. They have had to cancel their trip. Understandably. Cloudy with a chance of missiles is not the best forecast for a vacation. Another friend is planning to come and volunteer in late December. So far, that is still going ahead. And one other friend, with family members living here, arrived for a visit earlier this week. People are still flying to and from Israel, mostly on El Al. So our "hotel" is open and you are welcome to visit - even during a war. We have an on-premises safe room (with extra thick concrete walls, designed to withstand a direct missile hit) though we hope that will never have to find out if it actually works.</p><p>I have to travel to Toronto again for a short visit. Once again, I will have to mix and match some crazy flight schedules. I have a trip through Amsterdam coming up - with El Al to Amsterdam and then Air Canada to Toronto. I am not looking forward to it after the nasty experience I had on the way to Israel. But I couldn't change it - other than to move the Air Canada leg to a later time to allow more time.</p><p>Coming back, I am still looking at options. Considering a change in London, Frankfurt or some other places. I am trying to stick with the Star Alliance as much possible since I get such a great benefit from flying on Air Canada or other partners. But no Star Alliance airline is currently flying to Tel Aviv. So anyone flying to Israel via a Star Alliance flight must switch over to El Al. </p><p>If you don't care about which airline you are taking - the easiest way to get to and from Israel now from Toronto is clearly El Al from New York with a connecting flight on Delta or American. One friend of ours recently completed a fairly last minute booking for less than $2,000 (Canadian) (about $1,100 USD) - using El Al and Delta.</p><p>Chanukah is fast approaching. For Israelis, that means eating doughnuts - or <i>Sofganyot</i>, as they are called. The big fat jelly-filled, icing-sugar-coated calorie bombs. Personally, they have never done anything for me. I always associated Chanukah with potato latkes - whether they were being made by my mother, one of my two dear late grandmothers - or anyone else. I still love latkes. But somehow, in Israel, Chanukah is much more likely to be associated with <i>sofganyot</i>. Of course, I do my part to swim against the tide. I certainly plan on making a bunch of latkes - using whatever I learned from watching my two bubbies and my mom. Not that much healthier than the doughnuts, I suppose, but once or twice a year - I really enjoy having a few....(or more than a few). </p><p>That's about it for now. It will probably be two to three weeks before I put together another blog, unless I manage to find the time to put together another one sooner. For now, I wish everyone a Shabbat Shalom and Happy Chanukah. We continue to hope and pray for the safe return of all of the remaining hostages, for the safety of all of our soldiers, security personnel and all of the residents of Israel, across the country. I probably have to add that we also hope and pray for the safety of Jews everywhere, throughout the diaspora, as we have seen some really crazy threats and attacks on Jews around the world. Finally, I hope that we will see an end to the war soon with Israel achieving a significant proportion of its war aims so that we can try to usher in a new period of hope, relative peace, stability and security. Perhaps that is only a dream - but we have to hope - and try.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-25992065859745158702023-11-25T18:37:00.005-05:002023-11-26T04:24:43.084-05:00Israel-Hamas War - and Hostage Update - 7 weeks of War<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh19ESzv7gduqIHFPoNKDBHczQtZdkpVVLgXi5lTRNQiaCBeLGdnvHT_Zf30Gbzb79Xwc_onJVgZmgWPyb-8436NljDJCg6NLwelH6SCamLXCwbWFVMR-kZLftC7ktOG8TrrVXrsQIC0xu2lCevgjYLOtHo6rIXGPndU3khm4cZ2Atalg5zYkjveuIASN0/s284/Israeli%20Hostages.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="177" data-original-width="284" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh19ESzv7gduqIHFPoNKDBHczQtZdkpVVLgXi5lTRNQiaCBeLGdnvHT_Zf30Gbzb79Xwc_onJVgZmgWPyb-8436NljDJCg6NLwelH6SCamLXCwbWFVMR-kZLftC7ktOG8TrrVXrsQIC0xu2lCevgjYLOtHo6rIXGPndU3khm4cZ2Atalg5zYkjveuIASN0/s1600/Israeli%20Hostages.jpg" width="284" /></a></div>I arrived back in Israel earlier this week in time for a temporary cease-fire which went into effect yesterday morning at 7 a.m. Certainly, from the Israeli side, there are no plans to turn this "pause" into a permanent cease fire unless something changes dramatically. First of all, Hamas is still holding more than 165 Israeli hostages, along with approximately 30 foreigners. There will definitely not be any kind of long lasting cease fire until all of these hostages are returned.<p></p><p>But the much larger issue is the ongoing threat to Israel from Hamas. It has been an Israeli war aim to end Hamas' reign over Gaza (and, specifically, its ability to launch attacks against Israel). In my view, Israel will either need to reach that goal or accept a Hamas surrender of some sort. It seems very unlikely that Israel will agree to a cease fire that would simply allow Hamas to launch the same type of attacks weeks, months or years from now.</p><p>The third issue is that steps will need to be taken to ensure that Hezbollah stops attacking Israel from the north. If there is a negotiated agreement that moves Hezbollah back from the border as per the existing U.N. resolution, an all out war with Hezbollah / Lebanon may be averted. But if Hezbollah remains on the border, that may be the next all-out war that Israel is forced to fight. </p><p><b>Hostage Deal</b></p><p>Tonight is the second day of the temporary cease-fire deal between Israel and Hamas, negotiated by the U.S., Qatar and Egypt. According to the deal, Hamas is supposed to provide a list of 10-15 hostages to be released by 10 p.m. each day. Israel then provides a list of 3 convicted prisoners for each hostage to be released. In addition, Israel has apparently agreed to allow 200 trucks of aid and fuel into Gaza and to one full day of a "pause" in fighting. The hostages are supposed to be released by 4 p.m. each day. </p><p>Yesterday, the first day, Hamas delayed release of the hostages by approximately 2 hours. Today, Hamas announced that the deal would be delayed "indefinitely." Qatar, Egypt, Israel and Hamas were involved in urgent talks with Israel apparently telling Hamas that if the deal was not honoured by midnight, Israel would end the pause and restart attacks. Eventually, Hamas gave in by about 1030 p.m. As I am writing this, today's hostages have been released, 13 Israelis including 8 children, one of them - a three year old. Three children from one family were released - but the mother was killed on October 7th and the father is still being held hostage by Hamas. Apparently, 14 were on the list to be released but one was inexplicably not released - the mother of some of the released hostages.</p><p>Note that more than 30 of the hostages being held by Hamas are young kids, including babies. Many of them lost one or both of their parents in the October 7th massacre. Israel is trading convicted criminals for these hostages. The Israeli held prisoners are not "political prisoners." They are convicted terrorists who have carried out attacks or attempted attacks against Israeli civilians, police or army forces and are being held in Israeli jails. </p><p>A clip has been circulating from Sky News where the interviewer suggested that Israel valued Palestinian lives at a "lower value" than Israeli lives - since it was trading one Israeli hostage for 3 terrorists. The logic is shocking. Obviously, Israel would be happy to trade one Palestinian criminal for all of the Israeli hostages that Hamas is holding. Interestingly, Hamas was insisting on 1000 prisoners for each hostage early on - then several hundred as the war went on. Only because of the ground invasion of Gaza, the number has gone down to 3 criminals for one hostage. Here is the clip in case you a<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lGmwJa33xU">re interested. </a> </p><p>The hostage deal is causing a great deal of debate in Israel. Many political and military personnel are concerned that the deal will endanger Israeli soldiers in the long run and will give Hamas time to rearm, restock and regroup for the upcoming battles in Khan Yunis, Jabaliya and other areas of Gaza. There is also concern that these types of deals give Hamas further incentive to try and kidnap other Israelis. Weighed against that, it is a primary value for the State of Israel to try and return any and all captives, including civilians and soldiers. The Israeli government had a heated debate over this issue. Ultimately, only the "National Zionist Party" - led by Itamar Ben Gvir opposed the deal. The deal was supported overwhelmingly by the current Israeli government.</p><p><b>Other Items</b></p><p>The war has been going on for more than 50 days since Hamas declared war on Israel on October 7th and massacred more than 1200 Israelis. Hundreds of thousands of Israeli reservists were called up to the army (including several of our family and extended family members). Israelis of all ages, men and women, reported to bases across the country, and were stationed in and around Gaza, in the north near Lebanon or Syria, in the east, in or around the West Bank or near Jordan. Some were sent to the south to protect Eilat. We have one friend who is 51 years old who insisted on reporting for duty - even after being rejected initially.</p><p>I saw a program here discussing the large number of Israelis who made immediate arrangements on October 7, 8 or 9th to fly to Israel from Canada - from Vancouver, Toronto, Winnipeg and Calgary - and to report to duty. These were people who have been living in Canada for anywhere from 1 to 15 years but felt the obligation to report. When the Israeli military issued calls for reserve soldiers to report to duty - the response rate was more than 130% - which means that a very large number of reservists reported to duty who had not even been called up yet.</p><p>Israelis who are not in the army have been volunteering in so many different ways. Many are volunteering for an organization called "Sar-El" which determines where volunteers are needed and sends them to different places. Some might be helping to pack or sort equipment or pack meals for army bases. Others have gone to farms to help farmers pick fruit and vegetables. Others are finding ways to help the displaced families - bringing food, entertaining kids, fundraising or in other ways.</p><p>A few women in Ra'anana decided to start baking personal challahs for soldiers to deliver them on Fridays before Shabbat. At first, there were 3 or 4 women - and they made between 150 and 200 challahs. This week, we helped to collect and deliver some of the challahs to the "central" location in Ra'anana for distribution. For this week, they had a much larger list of women helping out and distributed more than 1500 challahs to soldiers in the field. One of our family members was quite happy to receive one - along with other members of the unit. They used them in conducting a <i>Kabbalat Shabbat</i> service with kiddush and challah - in Gaza yesterday. They hope to be up to 3,000 challahs delivered by next Friday. </p><p>I watched an amazing and incredibly moving clip on the Israeli show "Zehu Zeh" this week. Singer Idan Raichel appeared on the show. He brought a guest. The guest was a teenage survivor of the massacre from Kibbutz Be'eri. This brave boy had lost several family members. He is a percussionist. He wrote to Raichel and asked him if he could accompany him to visit and sing for soldiers around the country. Raichel met with him and quickly agreed. And then brought him to <a href=" https://youtu.be/Kkh4AD_HT5g?si=Ir27RmWLxY-Verif">perform on TV.</a> Raichel could not keep from crying when introducing him. </p><p><b>Travel</b></p><p>As you might know, Air Canada is not currently flying to Israel and El Al stopped flying direct more than a year ago (or so). So travelling back and forth has been a bit tricky. </p><p>If you are thinking of going to Israel (or flying from Israel to North America), the easiest thing to do is to take El Al with a transfer (from Canada) on American, Delta or Porter. These flights can be booked through El Al and baggage can be sent through seamlessly. They might be a bit costly - but I guess convenience can be expensive.</p><p>Since I am trying to maximize my Air Canada Aeroplan miles - I decided do something a bit more circuitous. On the way to Toronto (for an in-person hearing that I had to attend), I flew El Al to Rome and then Air Canada from Rome to Toronto. This was a bit cumbersome but quite frankly, it wasn't that bad. I arrived in Rome and went through a reasonably quick and efficient immigration line. They have a fast line for certain passport holders - which includes Canada, Israel and the U.S. After that, I had to go pick up my suitcase and then head over to the Air Canada check-in counter. Air Canada was efficient and quick - and directed me to a priority security line. I had to go through exit immigration but it was fairly quick and efficient. I finished everything in about an hour and 15 minutes and still had plenty of time to enjoy a great cappuccino and some fresh fruit in the lounge. Overall, I am happy to recommend Rome if you need to change somewhere in Europe and are not on an El Al flight all the way through.</p><p>On the way back to Israel, I went through Amsterdam. That was a disaster. After we landed, it took 40 minutes until we pulled up to a gate. Then I had to go through an insane and inefficient immigration line up. No special treatment for Canadian/U.S./Israeli passports. The line up said "expect a 45 minute to 1 hour wait." There were only two or three electronic picture taking machines - and two officials. Some of the machines were out of service. It was even worse than Newark airport. Sorry to offend any New Jersey readers.</p><p>After that, I had to go find my luggage. Then it was off to a frighteningly long line up at the El Al check-in counter, where my bag was deemed to be overweight...No excuses accepted - I would have to pay. Of course the security was thorough, which was fine. But now it was back to personal security and then, an equally brutal immigration line up (for exiting the country). By the time I finished everything - I was able to get to the El Al gate about 10 minutes before boarding. No time for a lounge in Amsterdam - or a visit to the famed whisky shop. I had left a four-hour window in between flights and it was still a close call. So unless you are flying KLM or something else that is seamless through Amsterdam, I would definitely not recommend blending Air Canada and El Al - under any circumstances through Amsterdam. Unless you don't mind wasting four or five hours at the airport in line-ups.</p><p><b>Final Comments</b></p><p>Israeli news is reporting on all kinds of anti-Semitic incidents from all around the world since the October 7th massacres. As you know, some of these have been in Toronto and Montreal - and others from cities across Europe. Israelis are starting to think that despite the war, they are safer than Jews in many other places.</p><p>There has been some very lopsided press coverage - which is probably very different from what the coverage would have looked like if it had been Canada, the U.S., Great Britain etc., that was attacked. One of the big issues is civilian casualties. Although Hamas has reported numbers in the 15,000-20,000 range, there is no way to verify those numbers. But more importantly, by Israeli accounts, a very large percentage of the Palestinian casualties are Hamas fighters. Civilians have also been killed, mainly those who have been used as human shields. Yet the press simply throws out whatever number Hamas gives them - leading to crazy outbursts, like the one by Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau who declared that Israel "had to stop killing Palestinian children." He must have known better but was probably trying to score some political points with some of his voters. Unfortunately, this type of disinformation by a western leader foments attacks on the Canadian Jewish community. The same can be said about French President Macron.</p><p>I note, for example, that there was a great deal of concern about the Shifa hospital. One BBC report stated that Israel was arresting doctors and killing patients. BBC later corrected the report and indicated that Israel had brought doctors with their units to help the patients. BBC apologized for "falling short of our standards." But ultimately, Israel found, as expected, large supplies of weapons at the hospital, and tunnels under the hospital - with rooms, washrooms, weapons storage facilities, electricity, water and gas hookups. Israel also found video footage at the hospital showing Israeli hostages being brought into the hospital - through the main doors. There was more than ample evidence showing that the hospital was being used a Hamas centre during the war. </p><p>Israel is facing a difficult situation - trying to fight Hamas while minimizing civilian casualties. But Hamas is fighting from residential areas, hospitals, mosques and schools. In several cases, Israeli forces found arms caches in school classrooms - or through doors adjoining the classrooms. One Israeli unit uncovered a large underground tunnel in a mosque with a huge room full of all kinds of weapons.</p><p>It is unclear how things will develop but as of now, it certainly looks like this war will continue for some time, likely at least several months.</p><p>Continuing to hope and pray for the safe return of all of our kidnapped hostages, the safety of our soldiers and - yes - a minimum number of civilian casualties in Gaza - but the destruction of the Hamas forces and the replacement of Hamas with some type of stable governing body that will prefer to rebuild Gaza and focus on health care, education, employment, and infrastructure rather than military conflict.</p><p>I am not sure that this is likely or possible at this time but the status quo from pre-Oct 7 simply cannot and will not be allowed to continue.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-42702515333851049412023-10-31T07:55:00.001-04:002023-11-06T10:10:44.524-05:00War Update - 24th Day of War in Israel<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicMDrFK5TMIeHc4uP9SsPq6Q9L6YhnR7C_qGw6IgxxDna4P4ijYJjIJqvnb5K84NMBCQF2JcROMx1UWyorqOWcHM28Vg61mtzp0kbQWMVqcwAF50e6FBPWMRNX2UV86tBQcUYQ2kNomdxrYcHYNiIs3la2nD5ZjkbU9wdxpPcnxlG1QqXDoNGQIV1esLw/s300/Rescued%20Hostage.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="300" height="112" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicMDrFK5TMIeHc4uP9SsPq6Q9L6YhnR7C_qGw6IgxxDna4P4ijYJjIJqvnb5K84NMBCQF2JcROMx1UWyorqOWcHM28Vg61mtzp0kbQWMVqcwAF50e6FBPWMRNX2UV86tBQcUYQ2kNomdxrYcHYNiIs3la2nD5ZjkbU9wdxpPcnxlG1QqXDoNGQIV1esLw/w200-h112/Rescued%20Hostage.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;">We are in the 24th day of war - a war that was started by Hamas on October 7th, 2023, with a surprise attack on more than 20 communities near the Gaza border. The Hamas terrorists murdered more than 1,400 Israelis - men, women, children, babies - in gruesome fashion. People were burned alive, cut into pieces, decapitated, tortured. The horrific stories are shocking. Much of it was captured on video by Hamas terrorists who were using their cell phones or Go Pro cameras to record what they were doing. In some cases, they took cell phones from victims - and recorded torture and murder scenes on the victim's cell phones - in several cases, posting these videos to Facebook live or other social media.</div><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;">This was all accompanied by a "declaration of war" on Israel from Hamas, which runs and controls the Gaza strip.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">What would any country do in response? Ask for a cease fire? I don't think so.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">As of now, Israel reports that more than 1,400 Israelis have been killed and more than 240 have been kidnapped and are being held in Gaza. More than 4,600 Israelis have been injured.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Israel has responded in force to this declaration of war. It has called up more than 300,000 reserve soldiers, mobilized its army on its northern, eastern and southern borders and moved ahead with a military plan to defeat Hamas. Initially, Israel used its air force to attack a range of targets. It is now moving ahead with ground invasion of some sort.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">I cannot dispute that this is a disaster for Gaza and its civilians. And it is not the first such disaster. Since Israel disengaged from Gaza in 2005, the Hamas regime has initiated 5 rounds of fighting prior to 2023. These battles have seen Gaza fire rockets and missiles at Israeli civilians, inviting Israel to respond with air attacks and other military manoeuvres. Nothing has been gained by Hamas in any of these attacks other than Hamas being able to terrorize its population into allowing Hamas to continue to maintain power in Gaza. And of course growing the massive personal wealth of several Hamas leaders.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Meanwhile, the world has poured money into Gaza. With all of that money, one might have thought that Gaza would build infrastructure, industry and other necessities and improve the standards of living for Gazans. Instead, the vast majority of the money was used to stockpile rockets, to build a vast underground network of tunnels and to amass other weapons, all while maintaining the poverty and squalid conditions for the residents of Gaza. At the same time, the Hamas leaders including Khaled Meshal, Dr. Musa Abu Marzook, Ismail Haniyeh and others have attained great personal wealth. </p><p>This Hamas leadership is dedicated to nothing less than the destruction of Israeli. It is not interested in a "two-state solution" or some other arrangement that results in peaceful coexistence. It runs Gaza with an iron fist and routinely executes suspected collaborators, political opponents, homosexuals and others.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">That is the regime that has declared war on Israel. At this point, I would say that there seems to be near unanimity, even on the left, in Israel that this war must be fought until Hamas is destroyed or unconditionally surrenders. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Contrary to the suggestions from many columnists in the New York Times, such as the column by Megan Stack on October 31, 2023, this is not about Israeli "revenge" or the random murder of civilians. There is no way that Israel would agree to any kind of cease fire now without changing the current reality. Not only would a cease fire mean more attacks from Hamas in weeks, months or some other time period, it would leave Israel in a state of constant and ongoing danger, in which civilians can be attacked at any time.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">At this point, I think Israel's war aims will include a number of key points. For one thing, and near the top of the list, Israel must insist on the return of all of the hostages held by Hamas - whether through military operations or negotiations. Although there are apparently some ongoing discussions, to this point, only 2 hostages have been released and one was freed by Israeli forces yesterday, in a daring but successful operation. Her photo is included in this blog, above.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Secondly, Israel intends to destroy the vast majority of the underground tunnels - including the stockpiles of weaponry in these tunnels, the communication systems, the command centres and other facilities. This will not be an easy task, especially since many of these tunnels are under mosques, hospitals and other civilian buildings. For example, the largest Hamas command centres are located at or under the Shifa hospital, where more than 30,000 Hamas guerillas are apparently hiding. One way or another, I don't see how this war will end until those command centres are completely destroyed.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Israel also intends to capture, kill or otherwise neutralize most of the key Hamas leadership. Some are living outside of Israel. Their time will come later. But for now, Israel will need to hunt down those terrorist leaders who are situated in Gaza.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">So short of a lengthy war, is any type of cease fire possible? Well, if Hamas were to surrender unconditionally, the war would end. This was the goal sought (and obtained) by the allies in WWII. Although the scale is much smaller, and I don't buy the propaganda lines that "Hamas are Nazis" - Hamas is nevertheless a terrorist organization, (like ISIS) intent on committing the worst type of atrocities. Hamas must be destroyed and removed from the region. Israel cannot end the war and continue to have a militarized Hamas on its doorstep.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">I hope that the army has a proper plan that it can implement to attain these objectives. I don't think Israel has too many other alternatives. So this might be a lengthy war.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Worldwide Reaction</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">As you know, the worldwide reaction has been astonishing. All kinds of people coming out of the woodwork arguing that the massacres and crimes perpetrated by Hamas were legitimate forms of resistance. It is a sick world indeed if that is your definition of legitimate resistance.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">We are reminded that there are only about 15.3 million Jews in the world and more than 2 billion Muslims. There are 50 Muslim majority countries and one Jewish country. Just from sheer numbers alone, it is no surprise that we are not very popular.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">But in many places, we have also seen the massive hypocrisy of some "progressives." On campuses across the U.S. and Canada - and in many other places around the world, so called "progressives" are chanting slogans like "Free Palestine" which is essentially a call for the destruction of Israel. We have seen signed letters supporting Hamas actions. We are seeing professors (even in disciplines totally unrelated to Mideastern studies) attacking Israel. By openly supporting terrorist groups and rationalizing terrorist atrocities, these groups are, effectively, openly endorsing the same type of violence against Jews everywhere. It is simply shocking. And it is resulting in security incidents and concerns for Jews all over the world.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">To his credit, U.S. President has withstood this "progressive" pressure so far and has stood with Israel. By sending two aircraft carriers to the Middle East, the U.S. has maintained a strong deterrent against the prospect of Hezbollah or Iran widening the war and turning it into a full-blown regional conflict. The U.S. has also fought off U.N. attempts to enact anti-Israel security council resolutions at the U.N. I am not sure that President Biden will maintain the resolve to continue supporting Israel until Israel has defeated Hamas but I certainly hope he will. To do otherwise would render all of his efforts to date meaningless.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Other Fallout</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Even as the war progresses, the political situation in Israel is tenuous. Prime Minister Netanyahu spent years portraying himself as the only leader who could maintain security and deterrence in Israel. In one series of election ads, he argued that he was uniquely able to stay on top of intelligence and "sniff out" any potential security threats even before they could occur. Just a few election cycles ago, Bibi used giant billboards of himself standing alongside Putin and Trump - his "friends." </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Even as Russia attacked Ukraine and many Israelis urged the government to take a more pro-Ukraine stance, Bibi's policy was to placate Russia and stay as neutral as possible. At this point, however, Putin has completely turned against Israel and Russia is working closely with the Iranians, who fund and support Hamas. Bibi's relationship with Turkish leader Erdogan has fared even worse. Erdogan has been spouting some of the most anti-Israel venom of any leader in the world. He even rivals the Iranian leadership in that category.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Oddly enough, Bibi's closest friend has been President Biden. This after all of Bibi's efforts to turn Israel into a partisan issue in the U.S., by attacking Obama, supporting Trump and other Republicans - and interfering outright in U.S. elections. All of those efforts by Bibi have been exposed as a failed policy. Some of Bibi's current cabinet ministers launched vicious attacks on President Biden and his government prior to the war. A few have since apologized. But long term, it is a disastrous policy to disregard the Democrats and cultivate only the Republican party for pro-Israel support - especially looking at long term U.S. demographics.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Aside from foreign policy issues, Prime Minister Netanyahu is embroiled in all kinds of political issues at home. He put together a coalition of far right ultra religious parties and idealogues who had limited practical experience and even less expertise. As a result, when this war started, Bibi's government was exposed as one with few, if any, capable ministers. For most Israelis, the government seems to have gone AWOL. There are few ministers appearing on TV or taking visible action in the circumstances. Despite all of the pressing needs, the government just does not seem to be responding to the situation.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The army is responding, for sure. But that seems to be the only competent organization currently functioning. </p><p>In one of his first press conferences since the war started - in which Bibi agreed to take questions, he refused to take any direct responsibility for the current war. Later that night, at about 1 a.m., he doubled down and sent out a tweet attacking the heads of the army, intelligence, and other organizations - as being the ones responsible for this whole debacle. The reaction was unprecedented. Even ministers in his own government called for him to retract his venomous tweet and apologize. The next morning, Bibi deleted the tweet and apologized. There were statements made that "should not have been said," he proclaimed. Although he apologized, the damage was done and it will be very hard, if not impossible, for Bibi to fix this situation. </p><p>Obviously, it is hard to predict how and when the war will end. Perhaps a very successful outcome will somehow save Bibi's political future and legacy though given the damage that Israel has suffered, it is hard to imagine that any outcome will be viewed as a great victory. I would think that if there were an election today, Bibi would suffer a massive defeat.</p><p><b>Women in the Military</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Under the current far right government that Bibi assembled, there were calls from some of his coalition partners to limit the number of women in combat roles in the Israeli military and to prevent women from being accepted into certain units. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">But various articles in the Israeli media have been written about so many heroic efforts by women in combat roles fighting off Hamas terrorists on October 7, 2023 and at other times throughout the war. As one commentator noted in <i>Yediot Ahronot</i>, the events of this war will almost certainly put an end to any discussions suggesting that women are unsuited for combat at the highest levels.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Judea and Samaria - the "West Bank"</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Part of the Hamas plan, apparently, was to trigger the involvement of Palestinians from Judea and Samaria to jump into the war and open up a new front. Although there have been fights with Palestinians, particularly in Jenin, this type of full Palestinian involvement has not materialized. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">At the same time, there have been reports, in Israeli media of Jewish residents of these areas attacking Arab Palestinians. Obviously, in my view, this is totally unacceptable. It must be condemned in the strongest language and the Israeli police and military forces must take all required steps to stop these attacks and arrest any perpetrators.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">This is a major challenge with far right activists like Ben-Gvir and Smotrich in the government but hopefully Israel will wind up with a more balanced and sane government once this war ends. </p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Other</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">On a personal note, we have been lucky so far that there have been very few sirens in Ra'anana and few if any missiles have actually landed in our city. Many other cities have had to grapple with much more difficult situations.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">But the overall situation in Israeli is very challenging and stressful right now. When asked how they are doing, a common response from Israelis these days is "the same as everyone else, I guess..."</p><p style="text-align: justify;">We are worried about the safety of more than 240 hostages, about our soldiers, and about civilians everywhere. We have a great deal of uncertainty as to whether Hezbollah and Lebanon will enter the war and maybe even Iran. And we have no clear anticipated resolution that will lead to peace and security for Israel and for the region.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">I am planning to fly to Toronto for a short period later this week. El Al is now almost the only airline flying regularly out of Tel-Aviv, so I will have to fly to Europe or the U.S. on El Al and then transfer to Toronto.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">This is very difficult with family members in the army, ongoing missile attacks, and so much uncertainty. But maybe things will change dramatically soon and we will see an end to this war sooner than anticipated. I am not particularly hopeful but it can't hurt to try and be optimistic.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p> </p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-17093244535614027912023-10-22T11:05:00.006-04:002023-10-22T15:03:37.230-04:00War in Israel - Day 16 - Update<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxFcZtMKJdvx8Z8CuM0zszxq1p5clcb2mT3pyiYawIQDwEZ3ISzmcUiRwLjJ4wiqBk2CVtzys_RD-GhE9cJ46SLir2-ywZjVNcEQ_DKLeF99q669r7kpBsblEMUT9tzqI2bb9AK_8MEDrmCewmMd4o2iAVTMZgV1YV_MIPugscQW030RNazCacDTagG6A/s2048/Lebanon%20Israel%20Border.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxFcZtMKJdvx8Z8CuM0zszxq1p5clcb2mT3pyiYawIQDwEZ3ISzmcUiRwLjJ4wiqBk2CVtzys_RD-GhE9cJ46SLir2-ywZjVNcEQ_DKLeF99q669r7kpBsblEMUT9tzqI2bb9AK_8MEDrmCewmMd4o2iAVTMZgV1YV_MIPugscQW030RNazCacDTagG6A/w200-h133/Lebanon%20Israel%20Border.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>We are in day 16 of war and there are no signs that we are anywhere near any kind of cease-fire. On the contrary, there are significant signs that this war will expand very soon. It is evident that Israel is fighting a war against Iran, to this point, against Iran's proxies - Hamas, Hezbollah, Syrian-based fighters and now, the Houthis, in Yemen. Many different articles, including articles in Reuters and other places (often pro-Hamas) have quoted Iranian sources as all but admitting that Iran is pulling the strings and controlling the extent to which Hezbollah, the Houthis, and others, will be involved. </span></div><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Iran has stated many times, for years, that it would like to destroy Israel and plans to so. To that end, it has armed Hamas, Hezbollah and other forces, and worked on developing nuclear weapons, with the primary intention of carrying out attacks against Israel. If Iran views this war as the opportunity it has been waiting for, it may join the war directly. That would almost certainly mean fighting directly against the U.S. On the optimistic side, it is far from clear at this point that Iran is ready for or interested in that entanglement.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">With that opening, I would like to cover a few different areas in the limited scope of this blog. Call it news or items that jump out at me since I could not possibly write this as a comprehensive blog. Even in non-war times, the task would be Herculean. In times of war it would be impossible.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Fall Out from October 7 - Simchat Torah Massacre </b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">As of now, the Israeli government reports that Hamas and its allies are holding 212 hostages in Gaza - the majority of whom are civilians including young children, senior citizens, men and women of all ages. Some soldiers are also being held captive. More than 1,300 Israelis were killed in the attacks on October 7, the vast majority of whom were civilians. More than 3,000 were injured. More than 300 are still in the hospital and at least 50 of those are in serious or critical condition.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Since October 7, extensive information has emerged about what took place, about Hamas' preparations, plans, weaponry and goals. The details are often too gruesome to recount. Victims were burned alive, often tied together with wires before being set on fire. Some of the bodies have not yet been identified. Infants were murdered and in many cases decapitated. Whole families were tortured and then murdered. Civilians of all different ages were murdered in horrendous fashion.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Investigators found Hamas instruction booklets carried by many of the terrorists with detailed plans. The plans specifically noted where the schools, nurseries and synagogues were with instructions for murdering everyone in those places. These Hamas terrorists also brought with them extra blood supplies, food provisions, medicines and sufficient provisions to last for one to two months. They also brought large quantities of captogen (fenethylline), a psychostimulant, which is mainly produced in Syria, a drug that was also used by members of ISIS. The plans that Hamas terrorists were carrying included instructions for massacring civilians in Ashqelon and Kiryat Gat.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">This mass terrorist attack has devasted most of the Israeli communities that were situated near the Gaza strip. Whole neighbourhoods were destroyed, the homes were burned down, everything nearby was set aflame or destroyed. The survivors have been placed in hotels in different places in Israel - or with other communities or Israelis in different places. Israelis across the country have organized groups to help with supplies, fundraising, food and every other possible type of help. </p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Israel's Reaction So Far</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">How is a country to react to this type of attack? Since Israel disengaged from Gaza in 2005, Gaza has been controlled and run by Hamas, a terrorist organization, which acts as the Gaza government. Hamas has dedicated itself to building up weaponry, tunnels, military forces and it has repeatedly called for Israel's destruction. It has fostered hatred of Jews in its schools, training camps and throughout the Gaza strip. This is our neighbour.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Israel has fought several wars with Gaza during which Gaza has launched rocket attacks at civilian targets across Israel and targeted Israeli civilians in every way possible. On each occasion, world leaders have called for "restraint" and "proportionality" while Israel has tried to get to the source of these attacks by going after Hamas and Islamic Jihad forces - while trying to minimize civilian casualties. That is a challenging task since Hamas sets up its headquarters and its munitions depots in densely populated centres including schools, mosques, hospitals and underground beneath residential areas.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">But the scope of this 2023 attack is on an entirely different scale. More than 1,400 people killed in an attack in Israel is an unimaginable number. On a per-capita basis, this would be the equivalent of an attack on the U.S. from a neighbouring country that killed more than 40,000 people (in gruesome ways) in several different cities - and injured more than 90,000. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">It is also worth noting that at the time Hamas carried out these attacks on Israeli communities, it announced that it was "declaring war" on Israel. Contrary to some reports you may have read, Israel did not just go ahead and launch a war on Hamas. Rather, it responded to Hamas.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">When a country is faced with a murderous, terrorist regime next door, that carries out these types of attacks, it should be fairly evident that there are few alternatives. Israel has no alternative now but to fight to destroy and overthrow the Hamas regime, much in the same way the Allies had to rid the world of the murderous Nazi regime or the Japanese leadership during World War II. Israel will target the entire Hamas leadership, its military infrastructure, its tunnel systems and its military arsenals. I think it is unlikely that this war will end until the vast majority of this has all been destroyed. Anything short will leave Israel fighting these wars over and over and over, every two or three years.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">What are the alternatives? Around the world, some Hamas allies, supporters and other apologists are calling for an immediate "cease fire." What would that mean? It would pretty much be a surrender for Israel and would allow Hamas to rebuild its arsenal and prepare for the next attack. This is not happening. Israel cannot function with this type of regime continuing to threaten and carry out attacks repeatedly.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Political Solution? There isn't really one at this time. Although many Israelis are hoping that it will be possible to reach a political deal with the Palestinians, especially those currently living in Judea and Samaria (the "West Bank"), there is no possibility of reaching a deal with a terrorist group like Hamas, dedicated to destroying Israel. Ultimately, the regime will need to be replaced with some other form of government, with careful controls to keep the area demilitarized - and a build up of economic infrastructure and opportunity, rather than military infrastructure. Alternatives might include another Palestinian leadership, some type of international coalition or some other arrangements. If the Palestinian people in Gaza are able to install a government that is focused on economic, health care, infrastructure and other initiatives, rather then on destroying Israel, there may be a chance for future, peaceful co-existence.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Since 2005, Israel and Egypt have both controlled different parts of the border to Gaza. Palestinian advocates are constantly arguing that Israel should "open its borders" and let Gazans into Israel to work, travel etc., But look at what happened now. For one thing, Hamas has spent years building up weaponry, rockets, all kinds of military equipment, while planning its attacks. Nothing about what Hamas has done since 2005, and especially in these attacks, provides any reason for Israel to open or ease its border with Gaza.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">There were many workers from Gaza with permits to work in Israel, who were crossing into Israel to work regularly. We now know that many of these workers were cooperating with Hamas - taking pictures, providing information about military bases, security arrangements in communities and detailed drawings and plans of places in Israel. Much of this information was used by Hamas in its attacks. I do not see a situation in the near future where Gaza residents will be crossing into Israel, for any reason after this war ends. If one of the supposed "reasons" for this Hamas massacre was to "open the gates," this type of terrorism will certainly set back any discussion of looser borders.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Other Conflict Areas</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">As I mentioned above, it is quite clear that much of the current anti-Israeli activity is being controlled by the Iranian regime, which is the primary sponsor of Hamas. Iran also sponsors, equips, trains and controls the Hezbollah regime, which is the largest non-state military actor in the region and which controls Lebanon.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, Hezbollah has been making all kinds of threats against Israel. As well, Hezbollah has been launching increasingly severe attacks against Israel from the north. They have launched rockets, drones, anti-tank missiles and artillery fire at Israel, killing several Israelis and wounding many others. Israel has responded with attacks that have killed several Hezbollah fighters and that have corresponded to the intensity of the Hezbollah attacks. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">There is a growing sense that Israel will soon be embroiled in a full scale war with Lebanon. Israel has ordered the evacuation of many of its northern cities, including Metullah. The U.S. has moved two aircraft carriers to the region. Canada has announced an evacuation of its citizens from Lebanon. Israel has called up a massive number of reserve soldiers and has an enormous number of troops ready to fight on its northern border. It is all up to the leaders in Iran - to give the signal to Hassan Nasrallah, the Secretary General of Hezbollah - to launch a full scale war. The U.S. has, thus far, indicated that it will not put "boots on the ground" in Lebanon - but it may well be that aircraft from the U.S.S. Gerald Ford or the U.S.S. Eisenhower would become involved if Israel were to be attacked by Lebanon.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">It seems unlikely that Israel will launch a pre-emptive strike on Hezbollah, even though some Israeli military leaders now believe that would be better for Israel than waiting to be attacked. But President Biden seems to be urging Israel to refrain, with the hope that Hezbollah may ultimately choose to stay out of the conflict. It is really hard to predict at this point. But if Hezbollah goes all in for a full military conflict with Israel, that may well spread to include Iran and the U.S.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Iran also has armed forces in north eastern Syria that have been arriving from Iraq. Israel has already launched some defensive actions against some of these forces as they progress towards Israel.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">On Thursday night - the Iranian backed Houthis, a Yemenite group, loyal to Iran, launched several drones at Israel, destined for Eilat. These attacks were reportedly thwarted by the U.S. navy - but we now have an indication that another Iranian proxy, the Yemenite Houthis, want to become involved as well. I don't think they were really on Israel's radar - and the Houthis have had enough problems fighting their own civil war in Yemen. But here we are, adding in another possible party to the conflict. As a breaking news addition to this update, just before I complete it, the Houthis have just announced that if Israel begins a ground incursion into Gaza, the Houthis will launch an all out attack on all Israeli ships in the Red Sea. I would imagine that Israel and/or the U.S. would strike the Houthis very hard if they carry out these threats.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Overall, it is quite evident that Israel is now fighting a broad, regional war, sponsored by Iran and its proxies, which has become more of an existential threat than what I might have previously described as a more localized but large-scale Hamas terrorist attack. The war is still simmering in some places but it may boil over soon and the scale of this war may be unfathomable. </p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>The World</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">This past week, leaders from around the world visited Israel, including President Biden, French President Macron, British Prime Minister Sunak, German Chancellor Scholz. For the most part, these leaders were sympathetic to Israel, aware of the situation - and at the same time, trying to do whatever they can to limit the spread of the war and to minimize civilian casualties. Israelis were particularly comforted impressed by President Biden who showed extraordinary leadership. He sent two aircraft carriers to the region immediately. He visited Israel during war time, in dangerous conditions. He met with families of hostages and with Israelis who acted heroically to save others. Further, President Biden delivered three speeches, two of which were exceptional (the two speeches he gave in Israel). </p><p style="text-align: justify;">As a side note, President Biden's second speech in Israel included a mini "dvar-Torah" - a Bible-related discussion - during which he spoke about the holiday that the Jewish people were celebrating the day of the Hamas massacre. He mentioned the tremendous loss that the Jewish people faced when Moses died at the end of the last book of the Torah. The President spoke about how the holiday marks a point in the year where the Jewish people conclude the annual reading of the Torah, by reading the final chapter, with all of its sadness, and then somehow move on to a new beginning, by starting the reading of the Torah over again, right away. I thought was very well done, whether it was written by the President himself, one of his speech writers or hired rabbi somewhere. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">All of this support and empathy stands in enormous contrast to the U.S. stance 50 years ago, during the Yom Kippur War, in which President Nixon and Secretary of State Kissinger were reluctant to support Israel in any way at the war's outset. The U.S. initially turned down Israel's requests even though the U.S.S.R. was providing airlifts of military equipment to Egypt and Syria, the countries that had launched the 1973 war. President Biden still has to deal with some in his party who would prefer a less "pro-Israel" stance but for now, in my view, just as he has done in the case of the Ukraine, President Biden has shown some real leadership. </p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>The Press</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">The war is just over two weeks old but we have already seen some examples of outrageous reporting. The New York Times reported on an alleged Israeli attack on a Palestinian hospital just minutes after it occurred, promptly blaming the Israelis and claiming that Israel had killed more than 500 civilians. As we now know, the attack was from an Islamic Jihad missile, aimed at Israel, that misfired. This has been verified by U.S., French, British, Israeli and even Canadian intelligence (the Canadians took the longest time to confirm). The rocket landed in the hospital parking lot and killed less than 50 people. So it wasn't Israel targeting a hospital, it wasn't an airstrike and the rocket, sent by the Islamic Jihad, killed less than 50 people and not 500. How does the New York Times get something like this so wrong? And how do they repair the damage they caused? The NYT headlines and those of media outlets around the world led to Arab demonstrations around the world, in Jordan, Egypt, Turkey and other countries. We should expect more from the New York Times and other media outlets. Is it too much to ask for the truth?</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The CBC in Canada continues to avoid calling Hamas members terrorists. Instead we get "fighters," "gunmen" or "militants." Surely those are the right labels for these types of attacks including burning people alive, rapes, hostage taking, beheadings, torture and other atrocities. Even though the UK lists Hamas, officially, as a "terrorist organization," the BBC has, to date, refused to call Hamas members "terrorists," preferring "Hamas Fighters" and other labels. Needless to say, all of this is shameful.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">There are a great many other points to cover over worldwide media issues, but I will leave this for another blog. I would just say, for one, I have seen and read some outstanding speeches and articles over the past few weeks that have made the case for Israel very well, including some talks by Michal Cotler-Wunsh, Rabbi Cosgrove of the Park Avenue Synagogue and many others. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">I have also read about the backfire against the Harvard students who are upset that they have been "doxxed" and "outed" for making statements supportive of Hamas after its brutal attacks. They claim "freedom of speech." But I really don't think that freedom of speech means anonymously supporting terrorist attacks and remaining free of any accountability or consequences. If these people were lauding other terrorist attacks (like 9/11) or promoting attacks against blacks, women, other minorities, etc., they would almost certainly be sanctioned, in some cases, dismissed from their jobs or they would face other consequences. Anyone who has any justification to offer for these obscene and outrageous crimes against civilians obviously has other motives. </p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Other</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Most international airlines have suspended their service to Israel, though El Al and a handful of other airlines continue to fly. I was scheduled to fly to Canada this week but all Air Canada flights have been suspended at least until October 31, 2023. Looks like I will have to fly El Al to leave the country in early November (and change somewhere in Europe or the U.S.) to attend to different matters that require me to be in Canada. Will have to see what things look like at that point in time.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">We supplied about 160 soldiers (one of whom was a family member) with <i>Jachnun</i> for Shabbat along with the usual accompaniments - hard boiled eggs, grated tomato sauce, hot sauce etc., The soldiers were thrilled. They have food and are not short of supplies. But they are always happy to get something special, especially for Shabbat. Israel is a small country and the distances are manageable, so many parents make food deliveries to bases where there children are stationed - when that is possible. I won't give a detailed description of "Jachnun" other than to say that it is originally a Yemenite Jewish food, eaten on Shabbat, that has become a Shabbat morning delicacy for Israelis everywhere over the years.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Our drive to meet up with the soldiers was a bit nail-biting, even though it was uneventful, thankfully.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">For now, Ra'anana has been relatively quiet. We have had several sirens go off, which require us to go to the "secured room" - a form of bomb shelter. But I'm not aware of anything landing in Ra'anana so far. If Hezbollah joins the war, things may be very different.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Many businesses are still open around Israel but this war is very different from anything I have seen here since my first time coming to Israel in 1982. There is a real concern that this has been, and will be, one of the most difficult wars that Israel has fought. We are mourning for the more than 1400 victims of this Hamas massacre. Some of the bodies have not yet been identified and many funerals have not yet taken place. We are hoping and praying for the safety and well being of our soldiers and civilians, for the return of all of the hostages and for the full recovery of all those of who have been injured. We also hope for a speedy victory over Hamas with the lowest possible number of civilian casualties among Israelis and innocent Palestinians and a real opportunity to change the reality in this region when this is all over. I cannot say that I am too optimistic at this point but we have no alternative but to hope for the best.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-2086302597601478452023-10-15T11:42:00.001-04:002023-10-15T14:48:17.635-04:00Day 8 of War - Increasing Escalation<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXaUhBYt85Ji5AkuG2w0nEooeAhJoMJnmh_1RsmIi0f1-HNpQ8Dxvf0e4Ewjg7zwjs-6ymEoJERqtRjaZd5MU9YDlTX7O-cNCDw5ysMJweYTRQmwKCsShNfnGvFJ8p7pHr727CQmsPYm-fDCr_NGBTw9L-Agol5crCzbOygA3Z2Cbfytc8AG4dcV2gDGY/s870/Israel%20Lebanon%20Border.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="489" data-original-width="870" height="113" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXaUhBYt85Ji5AkuG2w0nEooeAhJoMJnmh_1RsmIi0f1-HNpQ8Dxvf0e4Ewjg7zwjs-6ymEoJERqtRjaZd5MU9YDlTX7O-cNCDw5ysMJweYTRQmwKCsShNfnGvFJ8p7pHr727CQmsPYm-fDCr_NGBTw9L-Agol5crCzbOygA3Z2Cbfytc8AG4dcV2gDGY/w200-h113/Israel%20Lebanon%20Border.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>We are the midst of day eight of a war with Hamas/Gaza, which is a really a war with several parties, including Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, Syria and the Palestinian Authority, even though parts of this war have not yet started. I don't write this as a scare tactic but rather as my best assessment of where we are currently.<p></p><p>I am not going to recap in this blog the full extent of the massacre conduct by Hamas terrorists last week. I will say that over the past week, we have learned more and more details of the extensive planning that went into this attack with the clear aim of murdering civilians, taking hostages, looting and other outrageous acts. More than 1,300 Israelis were murdered and more than 3,000 were injured - all of this conducted by the official government that runs and controls the Gaza strip - Hamas - which announced its actions as a "declaration of war" on Israel last week.</p><p>Since last week, Israel has launched extensive air raids on Gaza and has killed several of Hamas' senior military commanders. Hundreds of thousands of Israeli troops have been called up and many are massed at the border of Gaza, prepared to enter if and when they receive the order to do so.</p><p>Although Israel has warned residents of northern Gaza to leave and take shelter in the south - and has threatened to begin a ground option "at any time" - the extent and nature of the pending Israeli operation is yet to be determined. It is clearly a top priority for Israel to destroy the entire network of Hamas tunnels, weapons and communications facilities and everything else that Hamas has built up underground across Gaza. How exactly Israel plans to do this remains to be seen. However, Israelis across the political spectrum are largely unified and view the complete destruction of Hamas' military capabilities as an imperative and the key war aim for Israel.</p><p><b>Other Fronts</b></p><p>As we know, Hamas is funded, trained and supported by Iran as well as Qatar and to some extent, Turkey. Hamas also works closely with Iran's proxy, Hezbollah, which controls Lebanon and parts of Syria. Hezbollah has pledged, at least in some form, to support Hamas in this war. It may well be that Hezbollah and Hamas have a detailed plan as to how and when Hezbollah will get involved. Or perhaps Hezbollah is playing it by ear. </p><p>Since the war began, Hezbollah has been slowly increasing its involvement - just enough to avoid starting a full scale war. They have fired unmanned drones, missiles, rockets and other weaponry at Israel but in small quantities. Today, Hezbollah stepped up its attacks. In the morning, they fired an RPG that killed one Israeli and injured five others. Later this afternoon, they fired another RPG that killed two more civilians. As I have been writing this blog, Hezbollah has fired 7 more RPGs at Israeli troops. Israel has answered these attacks with air strikes and other retaliatory measures, though still on a relatively restrained scale. However, at this point, it now seems to be a question of when, rather then if, Israel will be in a full scale war with Hezbollah and Lebanon. This may well erupt completely today or tomorrow.</p><p>Lebanon has a massive storehouse of missiles, drones, rockets and all types of other weaponry. Hezbollah has thousands of Hezbollah fighters gathered near the border and it seems very unlikely that they will decide to stay out of the war. The US has two aircraft carriers in place, one in the Mediterranean off the coast of Israel. It is unclear what role the U.S. will play in a fight between Israel and Hezbollah, but President Biden's speeches suggest that the U.S. is likely to use its air power if Israel is attacked by Hezbollah/Iran.</p><p>To the east of Lebanon, thousands of troops are now ready in Syria, some from Syria and some from Iraq. So far, these troops have fired a few times towards Israel. There are suggestions that Hezbollah would rather attack Israel from the east - and have Syria serve as the war theatre rather than Lebanon. However, Israel is not buying this. If Israel is drawn into an all out war with Hezbollah, Israel will almost certainly flatten parts of Beirut and other areas in Lebanon. That threat may be the one thing that is restraining Hezbollah so far.</p><p>Palestinian areas in Judea and Samaria including groups in Jenin are also threatening to get involved, all to help spread the army thinner. Right now, this does not seem to be a major threat but it may develop into one.</p><p>The major player behind all of this is clearly Iran, which is controlling the strings of everything that is going on. It is unclear whether Iran is interested in joining this war, though it has threatened to destroy Israel for many years. The U.S. aircraft carriers may be a deterrent here but we simply don't know what Iran has planned as part of this war.</p><p><b>Stories of Bravery<span> </span></b></p><p>There are hundreds of stories of incredible acts of bravery that took place last week by police officers, soldiers, civilians and others. I wanted to mention a few.</p><p>In the kibbutz of Nir Am, the leader of the Kibbutz's Readiness Forces, Inbal Lieberman (26), received an early notification of an impending attack. She sprung into action, got all of the forces up and ready and developed an action plan and spread the forces (12 of them) to different stations across the Kibbutz. With her direction, the Kibbutz forces held off and killed waves of Hamas terrorists - until Israeli enforcements were later able to arrive and engage the remaining Hamas forces further. No civilians were killed at Nir Am, one of the few developments that suffered no civilian casualties and was not destroyed by the terrorists on Saturday October 7, 2023.</p><p>Another story involves Yair Golan, who is a former Knesset member for the left wing Meretz party. He is also a retired Major General in the IDF. He is 61. He received phone calls from different people early Sunday morning about kids who were trapped at the Nova party - and were reporting that Hamas terrorists were massacring people. Described as a "one-man army," Golan wasted no time. He grabbed a weapon, got into his car and sped to the area. In what sounds like scenes from a Mission Impossible or James Bond movie - he raced to locations provided to him by trapped party-goers, using their cell-phones. Along the way, he killed several Hamas terrorists. He loaded up his car, drove the kids to safety and went back to pick up other groups. It is unclear how many he brought to safety but the stories are simply astounding. Earlier this year, Golan was being called a "traitor" and "anarchist" by some Likud members since he opposed Netanyahu's attack on the judiciary. Now many of those same members are saluting his bravery and thanking him.</p><p>I also want to mention the story of Moran Tagdi, a police officer who took control of a dangerous situation involving a group of Hamas terrorists fighting from the rooftop of a two story complex in one of the Kibbutzim. A group of officers and soldiers were involved in an intense gunfight with Hamas terrorists who had grenades, RPGs and other weapons. Tagdi came up with a plan - and told the other officers to continue to occupy the attention of the terrorists. She sent Whatsapp messages to her kids, telling them that she loved them, since she didn't know if she would survive. She took two fighters with her. They snuck around the rear of the building, made her way up the stairs and killed the three terrorists. </p><p>There are hundreds of other stories but the stories I have cited caught my attention his week. Many stories didn't turn out as well. One Israeli commando apparently killed more than 40 Hamas terrorists himself over a period of three hours before he ran out of ammunition and was killed himself. Another group of Kibbutz Readiness forces tried to fight back but were hit with rocket launchers by Hamas and were all killed - and unable to stop Hamas pillaging, murder and hostage-taking in their kibbutz. More than 250 Israeli soldiers and more than 40 police officers were killed fighting back. </p><p>It is evident that even in the face of a massive surprise invasion by terrorists intent on carrying out all kinds of heinous crimes, there were many points of light in the form of brave police officers, soldiers and civilians who acted quickly and saved lives.</p><p><b>Hostages</b></p><p>As you probably know, there are more than 140 hostages in Gaza, of all different ages, taken by Hamas. We have very limited information about them or their whereabouts. It may be that the IDF is trying to rescue some as we speak - though so far - Israel has only managed to retrieve some bodies of hostages who were either killed in Hamas captivity or whose bodies were taken by Hamas for negotiations. We have not heard about any efforts by the Red Cross or any other "humanitarian" organizations to try and release these hostages. President Biden met personally with family members of some of the hostages. While Israel always makes it a key priority to rescue its hostages, it is facing major challenges in the context of this current war. I have to believe that the army is taking whatever steps it can but this is a very difficult situation.</p><p><b>Personal</b></p><p>We appreciate the many warm messages we have received. Things are extremely stressful here. The war is threatening to spin out of control and grow into a much wider regional conflict. We are concerned for the safety of family members, friends, neighbours, community members and others - and there is a great deal of uncertainty how long this might go on. It could be several months or longer.</p><p>Israel is determined to remove Hamas from Gaza as a threat and to ensure that Gaza cannot threaten Israel militarily. It is also determined to capture or kill all of those who were responsible for the heinous terrorist acts committed last week. Both of those goals may take a while and may lead to months and months of fighting - while Israel may also have to fight one or two additional fronts at the same time. </p><p>We hope and pray that this will all end quickly and successfully for Israel, however one might describe "success" in these circumstances, given what has taken place so far.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p> </p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-73976925477801663792023-10-12T07:36:00.003-04:002023-10-12T09:47:56.128-04:00Day 6 - Israel's War with Hamas: Some Comments and Updates<p>We are in the 6th day of Israel's war with Hamas - that was launched by Hamas on Saturday October 7, 2023. Israel military and political spokespeople are talking about a "lengthy war" that it is still in its very early stages. Israel has been talking about completely limiting the military capabilities of Hamas as a war aim - in other words, the destruction of the organization. The key to Hamas' military and communication capabilities is its massive network of deep, hidden, tunnels under Gaza. Israel would need to destroy most of this network including the munitions being stored there and the leadership hiding there.</p><p>One question is whether Israel can actually accomplish this objective and if so, what the cost would be - in terms of lives of our soldiers, civilian casualties on both sides and other costs. We would like to think that between the U.S. and Israel - there would be remote weaponry that we could send - drones, robots, whatever, to do much of this work. But I am concerned that sending large numbers of our young soldiers to booby trapped tunnels will cost us a very heavy price in young lives. I hope that our military leaders have appropriate plans, using the newest technologies available that make sense. </p><p><b>Extent of Saturday's Disaster</b></p><p>When I first wrote an update on Sunday, the extent of the atrocities that had been perpetrated by Hamas was not yet clear. We are still finding bodies, gathering information and learning about what took place.</p><p>I am not going to get into great detail here as the information is now available in many different places including extensive articles in the New York times, the Jerusalem Post, The Israel Times, and many other news outlets. But I want to mention a few things.</p><p>As you probably know by now, Hamas terrorists crossed into Israel by breaking through security fences in twenty different places. There are estimates that more than 2,000 terrorists crossed into Israel and this number may be closer to 4,000. (As of yesterday, Israeli authorities report that they have more than 1,500 bodies of dead Hamas terrorists in Israel)</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXRRgHST2jBJiH_aO-eD-_v0edfDi0XHzzvLIsHjBa6aSyTW4_EPtfvBLl0HxA-S7NJLY5g5L2exKEJgnQHtdAFr5EFiwlEtGHMAA_jBoWf62fwEQni50ZIIClrMJXuPYkOE9LSCoAmTqt-NNxGoiDlRy3TWdDIau_VXwQR_9yDB7PK2DnWLdnhkvcZFk/s275/Kfar%20Aza.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="183" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXRRgHST2jBJiH_aO-eD-_v0edfDi0XHzzvLIsHjBa6aSyTW4_EPtfvBLl0HxA-S7NJLY5g5L2exKEJgnQHtdAFr5EFiwlEtGHMAA_jBoWf62fwEQni50ZIIClrMJXuPYkOE9LSCoAmTqt-NNxGoiDlRy3TWdDIau_VXwQR_9yDB7PK2DnWLdnhkvcZFk/s1600/Kfar%20Aza.jpg" width="275" /></a></div>The terrorists spread out and went to several destinations. One group of at least four white SUVs, loaded with terrorists and weaponry, including RPGs, grenades, and mass quantities of ammunition went straight to the Nova music festival - an outdoor music festival being attended by more than 2,000 young people. They opened fire from four different directions and began massacring concert goers. Many tried to get into their cars and leave. Some succeeded but many cars were destroyed by terrorists by gunfire, grenades, RPG fire and other means. Others tried to flee by foot. Some tried to hide in nearby Kibbutzim, buildings or different places. The terrorists spent hours hunting down these young concert-goers. There are reports of rapes, mutilations, and other unspeakable horrors. More then 260 people were murdered and many were taken prisoner, though we still don't have an exact count.<p></p><p>Some of the people who hid themselves managed to survive and others managed to escape in vehicles. But when the army was later able to get control of the area - the scenes of carnage were horrific. Bodies everywhere, burnt out cars, many with people who had been shot. Unspeakable horrors. Many young people were taken prisoner, some injured, loaded on to vehicles and taken to Gaza.</p><p>Other groups of terrorists went directly to the 22 towns, settlements and Kibbutzim that are nearest to Gaza. Many of these places have some defence forces in place but they were overwhelmed. With standing forces of 12-15 soldiers, they could not hold off arriving groups of 100-200 armed terrorists at each location. The terrorists began going from house to house murdering the occupants, setting fire to the homes, and looting property. In some cases they took hostages. In most cases, they murdered all of the occupants including young children, elderly, men and women. In some cases, people were hiding in their bomb shelters, which are supposed to have impenetrable doors. Where the terrorists could not get in, they tried to use explosives to break down the doors or they set fire to the whole house. Some people died of smoke asphyxiation. Some opened the doors to get air and then were attacked. Most of these communities had Whatsapp groups and people were sending messages to each other warning them. But nothing could be done to save them.</p><p></p>From what we now know, it took the army eight hours, if not more, to take control of these towns and kibbutzim. But by then, it was far too late. The damage had been done. The people had been massacred. The towns and kibbutzim were completely destroyed. It was nothing less than a slaughter and an unmitigated disaster for all of those communities, for the army, for all of Israel, for Jewish people everywhere - and indeed, for all people of goodwill who oppose violence and terrorism. <p></p><p>We now know that more than 1,200 Israelis have been killed since Saturday by Hamas and more than 3,000 have been injured. The civilians who were killed range from infants to seniors in their nineties. More than 150 have been taken captive of all ages. We do not know exactly how many captives there are and we do not know how many are still alive. </p><p>Included in that number are 222 Israeli soldiers as of this morning and more than 50 police officers. Most of the soldiers are young people between 18 and 21 who were serving as conscripted soldiers. Some were killed in a training base near Gaza while they were still in their beds. </p><p>Today there are reports that aside from murdering and massacring civilians, the terrorists also looted homes and stole credit cards and bank cards which they have now been using to make purchases. Israeli banks are taking immediate action to stop this after receiving numerous complaints.</p><p><b>Israel's Response</b></p><p>At the time it launched these attacks, Hamas "declared war" on Israel. Hamas is the governing authority of Gaza and controls all aspects of life in the Gaza strip. This is really the equivalent of one neighbouring country declaring war on another and Israel has little alternative but to fight this war.</p><p>Israel has stated its objectives as eliminating the military capabilities of Hamas, tracking down and eliminating those responsible for these attacks and atrocities and taking steps to ensure that there will be no more attacks on Israel from Gaza. Israel has called up more than 330,000 reserve soldiers to add to its standing forces of more than 170,000. These forces are not all destined for Gaza. Israel has used some of these forces to strengthen its northern border (with Lebanon/Hezbollah) and some to strengthen its Northeastern border (with Syria). Other forces have been sent to Judea and Samaria (the "West Bank"). Israel's initial response has been a massive air force campaign to attack military and strategic Hamas targets from the air.</p><p>Israeli forces have sprung into action and have still been fighting pockets of terrorists in and around the Gaza strip - included suspected reinforcements from Gaza that may have been sent through tunnels or in other ways. Many soldiers have fought for their lives to fend off Hamas terrorists, protect and rescue civilians and take whatever action is needed to help defend their country. And sadly, many have been killed in action.</p><p>At some point, Israel will need to attack the Hamas underground. I am not a military strategist and I have no idea as to how and when they will move to this next phase but I am praying for the welfare of our young soldiers - who are - all of us. Our family, our extended family, our friends' children, fellow synagogue members, residents of our city - the army is made up of everyone in Israel - the people - and these brave young people are the ones supporting us, risking their lives and fighting for the future of this country.</p><p><b>Hostages</b></p><p>We also know that Hamas is holding at least 150 hostages and the number may be as high as 200. We do not know how many are being held, how many are alive, what condition they are in or where they are. Israel has always made the rescue of hostages its highest priority and I believe they are looking at all possible options including negotiations, rescue attempts and other efforts. They also believe that Hamas believes that the hostages are "assets" and will want to keep them alive to trade for Hamas prisoners later. For obvious reasons, I think Israeli officials are saying little about their actual efforts, which, I assume, should not be taken to mean that they are ignoring this pressing challenge.</p><p><b>What Now?</b></p><p>It is unclear what may develop in coming days or even coming hours or minutes. Yesterday, we were glued to the news for most of the day. At about 8 p.m. Israel time, there were reports that Hezbollah had unleashed a large number of unmanned drones that were headed to different targets across the country. It appeared that we were about to open a second massive front with Hezbollah. According to many commentators, this will mean thousands and thousands of missiles sent to Israeli residential areas, all at the same time in an effort to overwhelm missile defence systems. It turned out to be some type of false alarm.</p><p>Hezbollah has apparently floated some test balloons. Some Hezbollah fighters were sent over the border in the North on Tuesday. Israel killed five of them. In other incidents, Hezbollah has fired RPGs, artillery and other weaponry at Israel but in isolated incidents. Some commentators have speculated that they are doing the "bare minimum" to show that they are "supporting" Hamas but not enough to enter the war. We simply don't know if Hezbollah plans to enter this war or not. If it does, Israel will have no choice but to attack and destroy targets all over Lebanon - and that will be a very heavy price for the country. Hezbollah may not care - and Iran (which controls Hezbollah) may care even less about the fate of Lebanon but we must hope that Hezbollah does not see this as a worthwhile action. That being said, as of now, it seems to me that there is a fairly high probability that Hezbollah will be involved in the coming days or weeks - or any minute, really.</p><p><b>World Support</b></p><p>President Biden gave a speech on Tuesday in which he spoke about the horrible acts that Hamas had perpetrated. He tied these acts to the long history of anti-Semitic acts and massacres that the Jewish people have faced throughout history. He was empathetic and emotional. He pledged full U.S. support for Israel to defeat Hamas and he backed up his pledge by sending immediate assistance including the U.S.S. Gerald Ford to the area and a pledge of various military equipment and supplies. By most accounts, it is the strongest U.S. statement of support for Israel ever during war time. Israelis (including Israeli politicians) across the political spectrum have thanked President Biden for this show of support and in some cases, have stated that they were wrong about the way they viewed Biden. Secretary of State Blinken also delivered an outstanding address this morning, which was empathetic, emotional and unwaveringly supportive. I would recommend watching both of these statements, though I don't have the links handy.</p><p>By contrast, the Israeli media is showing clips of former President Trump, from an event yesterday, attacking Prime Minister Netanyahu, Israeli defence minister Gallant, the Israeli army, Israeli intelligence and ridiculing Israel's preparedness. Among other things, Trump claims that this "never would have happened if he was still President" but cannot point to anything specific he would have done (or not done) that would make this a true statement. I would also recommend that you watch these comments.</p><p>Sorry - it is not my intention, generally, in this blog to delve into U.S. politics - but I am writing about how these things are being reported from an Israeli perspective. </p><p>From Canada, we hear that one of Canada's largest unions - CUPE (Canadian Union of Public Employees), which represents 700,000 public service employees - has been releasing statements that can only be viewed as justifying and supporting Hamas attacks. Quite appalling. The president of CUPE Ontario, Fred Hahn, has doubled down following the criticism, On Saturday, Hahn issued tweets about the Hamas massacres of civilians using "#resistance" in his Thanksgiving message. How anyone could imagine that support for the wanton massacre of civilians is legitimate or "resistance" is simply mind boggling - and frightening. Sickening.</p><p>We have heard very little from Prime Minister Trudeau, other than a handful of statements that sound like the statements he and his government issue after any events involving Hamas. On the other hand, it was heartwarming to see so many Canadians gather in Toronto for a pro-Israel rally and there were some very powerful speeches at that rally. There have also been pro-Israel rallies in cities all over the world.</p><p>At the same time, Israel is in a very difficult situation. While faced with the imperative of clearing out and defeating Hamas terrorists, the terrorists have significant support in the Gaza strip which is densely packed with civilians. This is expected to be a fight against guerilla warfare - and the effect on civilians in Gaza will also be devastating. There are bound to be large number of civilian casualties and at some point, that will shift world opinion against Israel. Israel needs to find a way to destroy the underground tunnels and Hamas storage and command facilities as quickly as possible while minimizing the civilian casualties - and that is a major challenge. Even if Israel is successful, there will be a vacuum in Gaza and it is unclear what would happen next. But this is all for a later conversation.</p><p><b>Volunteering</b></p><p>Israelis across the country have sprung into action - donating blood, putting together packages of supplies for soldiers, helping others in all different ways and, in general, answering calls to help in whatever ways might be needed. We also see that people around the world are offering financial and other forms of assistance. Magen David Adom, the UJA, the Association for the Welfare of the Soldiers of Israel and so many organizations are seeing a swell of financial support. As well there are private initiatives to raise money directly to help groups of soldiers and supply them with more modern and update equipment, food deliveries and other necessities. All of this is heart warming.</p><p><b>Political - Israeli</b></p><p>After four days of negotiations, Prime Minister Netanyahu announced a deal last night with Benny Gantz to form a limited duration war-time cabinet. This meant bringing in some experienced military leaders to Netanyahu's coalition and that should add some much needed input to the decision-making process and operational capabilities. I am not aware of all of the details of what has been agreed upon. So far, Yair Lapid and his party have not joined this coalition, nor have other opposition parties. The war cabinet may well expand in coming days. For now, this first war time cabinet arrangement does seem like it will offer a significant increase in competence and reason to the current government.</p><p><b>Personal</b></p><p>Needless to say, this is all very difficult, on everyone here. The macabre nature of these attacks is sickening and devastating. So many lives were lost - so many people massacred - while at a music festival - or in their beds or in shelters in their homes. The reports are gruesome and hard to process. The psychological effect on all of us is overwhelming and difficult to process. Many of us are looking for ways to deal with this mixture of feelings of loss, anxiety, frustration, anger, guilt and apprehension. Some people are sending around suggestions. </p><p>We are extremely concerned about all of our brave soldiers and the dangers they are now facing. They are our family, our friends, our neighbours. They are defending our homes. We hope and pray for their safety.</p><p>And of course there is the stress of not knowing if and how this war may escalate. If Hezbollah gets involved, we will be in a full blown two front war that will unquestionably cause major damage in Israel, even if the damage in Lebanon is much worse. There is also concern about Iranian threats, which seems more remote - though Iran has repeatedly threatened to "wipe out" Israel over the years. The U.S. aircraft carriers in the region may help deter this type of escalation - or they might provoke it. </p><p>Air Canada has suspended flights to Israel until at least October 18, 2023 and most other world airlines have done the same. El Al is still flying, though they cancelled all of their direct Canadian flights some time ago (well before all of this began). Emirates, Fly Dubai, Bluebird Airways (Greek) are still flying out of Tel-Aviv and today's departure list shows Austrian Airways and Lufthansa operating flights as scheduled.</p><p>Of course I am also trying to get some work done. My Canadian clients do not know where I am (some do but most don't) - and a Zoom or Teams call can be interrupted by a sudden missile alarm, requiring me to move to a safe room. These are small problems, of course, next to what so many people in this country are facing. I appreciate that. But I am simply mentioning that all of this affects people in so many different ways.</p><p><b>How to Survive - Logic of a grandmother</b></p><p>A woman and her husband managed to survive after being held hostage all day by five Hamas terrorists in Kibbutz Ophakim. The terrorists entered the house and started yelling "Allahu Akhbar" ("God is great") and told her and her husband to go upstairs. She decided to try to talk to her captives. She offered them coffee or tea. She asked them about their families. She says that she figured if they were hungry, her chances would be worse - so she asked if she could make them some food and offered to cook them whatever they wanted. At one point, they pointed guns at her and her husband. She started saying "Shema Yisrael" and told them they would be better off keeping her and her husband as hostages. She asked them their names, ages, what they do. She then offered to teach them a song by Lior Narkis, an Israeli singer. She continued to distract them in all different ways until, almost 8 hours later, her son, (a commando officer) arrived with a group of other commandos, entered the house, by surprise, from the roof and the back door - and managed to kill all of the terrorists. Rachel and her husband were taken to the hospital but survived unscathed. Obviously, most stories in Israel from Saturday did not end as well as this one. Rachel, her husband and her son have been interviewed a few times on different channels explaining how this lucky and quick-thinking grandmother was able to survive and save the lives of herself and her husband. I guess it helps to have a commando son with friends but they had to remain alive for quite a long time until they could be rescued.</p><p><b>Thanks</b></p><p>I want to say that we appreciate all of the messages of support - calls, emails, Whatsapp messages from friends and family near and far. These are stressful and dangerous times but we are hoping for the best. I am still hoping to attend a family Bat-Mitzvah on Saturday Oct 21, 2023, though the prospects are not looking great. For now, I am here with my family, friends and the people of Israel, hoping that we can win and end this war as quickly as possible - while realizing that we may be in for a long-haul fight.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-7409472216081420622023-10-09T07:20:00.003-04:002023-10-09T08:00:02.079-04:00Day 3: Israel War with Gaza - Limited Update<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOW1ns2VZW1sm_WNJFIlQlvT6sajgcU9uhtxqINsotcaOWCn-Og8Gi1_JxEYjaaFtlhoZshEZDtK3Z0Iu1PGdegOiZmMUbRdx0HeuIq2s2NTY3YUuuGwP9IeLCigxWqzMyfW-2k2t0RkMjX3elKgVlBjllro0n1gQazmMVZEy0y-mnN77e4FNY0DWRtbo/s275/Damaged%20Cars.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="183" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOW1ns2VZW1sm_WNJFIlQlvT6sajgcU9uhtxqINsotcaOWCn-Og8Gi1_JxEYjaaFtlhoZshEZDtK3Z0Iu1PGdegOiZmMUbRdx0HeuIq2s2NTY3YUuuGwP9IeLCigxWqzMyfW-2k2t0RkMjX3elKgVlBjllro0n1gQazmMVZEy0y-mnN77e4FNY0DWRtbo/s1600/Damaged%20Cars.jpg" width="275" /></a></div>It is day 3 of the latest Israeli war with Gaza. I am not a full-time reporter so there is a limit as to how much time I can spend writing these updates. But I wanted to share a few items. <p></p><p><b>Numbers Update</b></p><p>First of all, as you might have read, the Israeli government is reporting that more than 700 people have been killed and more than 2300 injured. Included in this number - more than 260 young people were murdered at a "Nature Party" early on Saturday morning. Hamas and Islamic Jihad claim that they are holding more than 140 prisoners in Gaza. It is unclear how many of these people are alive, how many are injured - and if injured, how seriously. This includes young children, elderly, and others.</p><p>In response, Israel has been launching significant air force attacks on the Gaza strip - which reportedly includes a range of military targets including Hamas bases, weapons store houses and other facilities. Gaza authorities report more that more than 400 Palestinians have been killed. However, Hamas sent, by its accounts, some 1000 terrorists to Israel to carry out these attacks. Israel has killed or captured more than 250 of them. In short, just because a press service reports that a certain number of Palestinians were killed, that certainly does not mean that they were civilians - even though some civilians may have been killed.</p><p><b>Israeli Areas - Surrounding Gaza</b></p><p>The cities surrounding Gaza - 22 different towns and cities - suffered severe and devasting damage and losses. Israeli authorities report that all of these areas are now in Israeli control. However, there are still isolated Hamas terrorists and groups of terrorists hiding in unknown places. Israeli forces are combing these cities, door by door, to look for terrorists. They are also looking for civilians who may still be hiding or injured. Sadly, they are still finding bodies of those who were murdered. The army reports that some mines and other delayed timer devices were left in some places in these towns and cities - so they are being very cautious. Since Saturday morning, Hamas has apparently sent additional reinforcements and Israeli forces have fought and defeated these groups wherever they have encountered them. </p><p><b>Missiles</b></p><p>Hamas continues to fire thousands of missiles at civilian areas across Israel. We had one alarm this morning and spent some time in the shelter. We heard a very loud noise - that sounded like one missile made it through the Iron Dome system but it is unclear where it landed. Later, Hamas fired another barrage of missiles and one was a direct hit on a house in Ashdod. There are reports of injuries from that hit. As I write, missiles are being fired by Hamas at locations all over the country though, fortunately, few of them are hitting targets.</p><p><b>Preparations</b></p><p>More than 300,000 reserve soldiers have been called to report to duty. Israel is in a state of mass preparedness outside of Gaza, on its northern border, in Judea and Samaria (the "West Bank") and other areas. Just about everyone we know between the ages of 21 and 30 who are eligible for reserve duty have been issued an "Order 8" - and order to report too duty. It is truly frightening.</p><p>It is unclear at this point what military decisions will be made. A massive ground assault on Gaza is a definite possibility but Israeli officials will have to weigh carefully whether they can actually win this type of war against guerilla forces that are hidden among civilians in densely populated areas.</p><p>Israel is also making military calculations with respect to the possibility that Iran-backed Hezbollah might open up a second front against Israel from the North. This would be a massive escalation of the the conflict and would lead to tremendous damage in Israel and across Lebanon. It may also involve Syria and Iran. We certainly hope that things will not head in this direction, but Israel must be prepared for this possibility.</p><p><b>Political</b></p><p>I don't really have very much to report here. There was apparently a meeting between Benny Gantz and Prime Minister Netanyahu this morning to discuss some type of expanded government - but nothing has been resolved. It is too early to discuss any type of resolution and it appears that we are likely to be in for weeks, if not months, of fighting before any resolution is possible. There are few countries with the ability to influence Hamas - other than Qatar and Iran - and to a much smaller degree, Egypt. But Hamas has nothing to offer now, other than the return of the prisoners that it is holding. They have launched a self-defined "war," killed more than 700 Israelis, mostly civilians, and injured more than 2300. Israel will certainly proceed with a massive response of some sort.</p><p><b>Prisoners and Hostages</b></p><p>This is a very difficult situation for Israel. The government would like to take every possible step to rescue every single one of the hostages - and hopefully most if not all of them are alive. But faced with the potential loss of thousands of additional lives if steps are not taken immediately, the government is faced with some extremely difficult decisions. We hope and pray that all of the prisoners are returned home safely as quickly as possible.</p><p><b>The Streets</b></p><p>The homeland authority in Israel is advising people to remain in their homes and stay near bomb shelters. Many stores, especially supermarkets and pharmacies, are still open - but many other places are closed. Highways are fairly deserted. The airport is still operating but fewer and fewer airlines are flying to Tel-Aviv. As of this morning, El Al, Turkish Airlines, Emirates and a few others were still flying. But most European, North American and Asian airlines have suspended their service. On a personal note, I now have no idea when I will be back in Canada. I was supposed to fly this Thursday.</p><p><b>Psychological Impact</b></p><p>This attack has had a severe psychological impact on Israelis across the country. With such high numbers of casualties, almost everyone seems to know someone who was killed or injured. Beyond that, there is a sense of disappointment, anger and frustration at the apparent failure of intelligence, preparedness, operations and defence. Further, the Prime Minister and senior leadership continue to be AWOL. Prime Minister Netanyahu has not held any press conferences or taken other steps to address the public - other than one brief statement. None of his senior cabinet ministers have filled in. For many Israelis, it feels like the ship is moving along without a captain.</p><p>Israelis are glued to news stations to stay updated and most of the news is not very good. So that also has a significant impact on people.</p><p>That being said, the military leaders have shown great determination. Other Israelis, including Prime Minister Bennett and other former members of the government have been actively assisting the army, visiting people in hospitals and helping in other ways. Despite the current lack of political leadership, there is a real sense that Israelis will pull together and deal with this massive threat.</p><p><b>Summary</b></p><p>I do not plan on doing this every day - and there are numerous news sources out there for up-to-the- minute updates. Since today is Canadian Thanksgiving, work issues were less pressing and I had a bit of time. I will try to provide further comments and updates in the coming day though that will depend on being able to find the time. </p><p>We thank everyone for the warm notes of support and kind wishes. We are hoping for a quick but decisive end to this situation though we are realistically prepared for something that will take a while. I wish everyone all the best and hope and pray for the safety of our soldiers and civilians in this difficult period.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p> </p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-29266480977231363582023-10-08T07:16:00.004-04:002023-10-08T13:06:29.972-04:00Hamas Launches Surprise War on Israel from Gaza<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiim50Hq0xV-HruY2qFmM5IUry1am81eHv608O0nZ7epvsZnwLn8828JOK9YUmNzUMdcrnKeiit5fQ9qMMjMbhcrApkCgOhm1llNXkZJMKpOJGYP890n5it6e4Y6EQFXFRTyXkOnKU25FVSIZmAEgRlB5UCoih73Rm_5WnukDUUgp2ccoWNvSwOTdelqRU/s300/Gaza%20War.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="300" height="112" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiim50Hq0xV-HruY2qFmM5IUry1am81eHv608O0nZ7epvsZnwLn8828JOK9YUmNzUMdcrnKeiit5fQ9qMMjMbhcrApkCgOhm1llNXkZJMKpOJGYP890n5it6e4Y6EQFXFRTyXkOnKU25FVSIZmAEgRlB5UCoih73Rm_5WnukDUUgp2ccoWNvSwOTdelqRU/w200-h112/Gaza%20War.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>It is very difficult to write anything today but I think it is important to provide some kind of update from my perspective, here in Israel. There is still a great deal of uncertainty - about everything that happened yesterday, about what is happening today and what is going to happen in the coming days, weeks and even months. I am not going to be able to address much of that uncertainty but here are a few of my comments. Whatever I am writing now is based on information as of Sunday morning, October 8, 2023 at noon - or 5 a.m. EST. Information is likely to updated throughout the coming days and beyond.<p></p><p><b>The Hamas Surprise Attack</b></p><p>As you have probably heard, Hamas, the terrorist group that runs the Gaza trip, launched a major surprise attack against Israel yesterday morning. It was <i>Simchat Torah </i>in Israel - the day of "Rejoicing of the Torah" - one of the happiest days on the Jewish calendar, when observant Jews are in synagogue - singing, dancing and marking the end of the fall Holy Day period (which runs from Rosh Hashanah until the end of Sukkot).</p><p>From available information, the Hamas attack was carried out in several different ways. One part of the attack was to launch thousands of missiles directed at civilian areas across the country. Secondly, waves of Hamas fighters broke down border fences and crossed into Israel and drove towards 22 different Israeli towns and small cities surrounding or nearby Gaza. Other Hamas groups used paragliders and landed in different locations from the air. Still others arrived from the sea.</p><p>The goal of these attacks was to target civilians primarily and to kill or take hostage as many people as possible.</p><p>Some groups of these Hamas terrorists arrived at a "Nature Party" where hundreds of young Israelis were our partying. Mostly teenagers and others in their early 20s. The terrorists opened fire on these unarmed kids and killed many of them. Several were injured, many severely. Some were taken captive by Hamas and apparently brought back to Gaza. There is video footage of some of the murders, some of the hostage taking - posted by Hamas personnel. We don't yet know exactly how many people were killed at this gathering, how many were taken hostage and how many are still in the hospital. Many are missing - and their parents, family members and friends are doing everything possible to try and find them. (Since the time I started writing this, a group of these people was found hiding - more than 30 - who were thought to have been killed or taken hostage - they seem to be fine, physically. Most of them are apparently foreign workers from Thailand).</p><p>Other Hamas groups went to most of the 22 different towns and cities and began going from door to door, breaking in to homes and killing civilians. In some of these towns, police and reserve soldiers grabbed their weapons fought back. In one case, a father grabbed his weapon (he was a reserve duty soldier) and killed two terrorists in his living room). Many police officers were killed in these exchanges. Some people went and locked themselves in their bomb shelters - which have extremely thick, inside-locking doors. Many civilians were killed as well as some soldiers and police officers. A large number were also taken hostage, again, apparently brought to Gaza.</p><p>Some Hamas groups attacked certain military bases - including, in particular, one training base, where several military personnel were killed including at least one new recruit. </p><p>Other terrorists may have hidden themselves somewhere. We still don't know exactly how many entered Israel, how many are still here, or what else they have planned. Israeli official reports indicate that more than 250 terrorists have been killed and many more captured.</p><p>As of now, Israeli reports indicate that between 400 and 450 Israelis have been killed, the vast majority civilians. More than 2000 people have been injured, many of whom are still in serious or critical condition. At least 100 Israelis have been taken hostage and brought back to Gaza.</p><p>There were three different hostage situations within Israel that took all day to resolve - including one where more then 50 people were being held in a Kibbutz dining hall. In another situation, terrorists had occupied and were holding the Sderot police station. According to reports this morning, all three of those situations were resolved and the hostages were released.</p><p>For Israel, this was one of the harshest days Israel has had to deal with in its history. Some 50 years ago, Israel faced a surprise attack on Yom Kippur. It was devastating and it was an existential fight for the country. At the time, Israelis were genuinely worried about being overrun completely. The fighting, however, in that war, primarily involved Israeli soldiers fighting against Syrian and Egyptian soldiers. Ultimately, in that war, the army prevented large scale attacks against civilians.</p><p>In 1948, Israeli also grappled with an extremely harsh and difficult situation, which was also genuinely existential - and included attacks on and massacres of civilians.</p><p>Yesterday's attack was quite different from those situations. For one thing, so far, the primary target, initially, has been civilians. The attack was intended to show Israelis that the army cannot protect them from Hamas terrorists. Although Hamas "declared war" on Israel yesterday in an "official statement" - it has no illusions that it can pose an existential threat to Israel. However, it can and did cause severe damage to civilians, to morale and to Israel's military "deterrence." </p><p>Hamas leaders, over the past few months, apparently met with Hezbollah and Iranian leaders. It may be that Hamas is hoping that this war will be expanded and that Hezbollah and Lebanon from the north will get involved - and perhaps even Iran. So far that is not the case, but Hezbollah has a vast array of sophisticated missiles waiting in Lebanon and if Hezbollah becomes involved, with the backing of Iran, Israel will face an unprecedented type of war.</p><p><b>How Did this Happen?</b></p><p>Hamas carried out a well planned surprise attack. However, it would seem that Israeli forces are generally geared up to prevent exactly this type of attack. There are drone and satellite patrols along the border fence with Gaza. There are constant marine patrols in the water aided by satellite and drones. And there is constant monitoring of the airspace.</p><p>Moreover, there are countless military bases nearby with soldiers ready to spring into action. </p><p>One rumour making the rounds alleges that Iran launched a cyber attack and shut down our military intelligence systems at the time of the attack yesterday morning. I have seen nothing to corroborate these claims. In any case, cell phones and other communication systems were apparently still working.</p><p>I still do not understand how the army was not able to deploy large numbers of troops, immediately, to the cities and towns that were being attacked. For hours, residents of many of these cities were making calls on their phones, trying to get military help while hiding and trying to protect themselves from the terrorists. It took several hours for help to arrive. I am sure that this will be the subject of examination and inquiry in coming weeks, months and years.</p><p><b>What Next?</b></p><p>Israel is facing many severe challenges. There are more than 100 captured Israelis who have been brought to Gaza - and it must be at the highest order of priorities to rescue as many of these people as possible. They are likely to be dispersed in different places in Gaza and this will be no easy task. </p><p>Israel is still working to ensure that all of the 22 cities that were attacked are cleared of terrorists. From reports this morning, there are still some terrorists hiding in these cities - and some who have travelled elsewhere. Finding and neutralizing all of these terrorists is another one of the highest priorities. </p><p>A third priority is securing the land, water and air borders with Gaza to ensure that more terrorists cannot continue to enter Israel. The security fence is being rebuilt and large numbers of troops are bolstering the border.</p><p>Beyond these immediate steps, Israel is dealing with a "declaration of war" from Hamas and will need to launch a full scale offensive to defeat Hamas. This may take some time to plan and execute, but we would have to anticipate one of the largest scale operations that Israel has ever seen - likely to be launched in the coming days or weeks, if not in the coming hours.</p><p><b>Loss and Tragedy</b></p><p>TV, radio and social media are filled with footage, photos, videos and stories of loved ones who were murdered, injured and taken prisoner. More than 350 people have been killed - including at least one high ranking military commander, a mayor, more than 25 police officers and many sons, daughters, spouses, parents, grandparents, and children. The grief is incalculable - as is the anger, frustration, upset and disappointment from so many Israelis. The hospitals are working around the clock to deal with overwhelming numbers of injured. People are frantically trying to find out what has happened to loved ones who are missing - and to figure out if they have been hospitalized, taken hostage, or murdered - or maybe they are still hiding somewhere and their phone batteries have died.</p><p><b>Resolve</b></p><p>I would like to say that we have heard or seen reassuring messages from the current Israeli leadership but generally, members of the government have gone AWOL. There was a brief statement from Prime Minister Netanyahu yesterday - but otherwise nothing. The government will need to pull itself together and show resolve and determination very quickly. Opposition leaders, including Ganz and Lapid, have offered to join a temporary "War Cabinet" with Netanyahu - however, so far nothing has come of it. There is quite a bit of concern that Netanyahu is running a government with a range of inexperienced and incapable ministers - from his own Likud party (from which many of the most experienced and capable leaders have left over the past few years) as well as from two ultra-religious parties (with no military experience) and one ultra-nationalist party (with limited military experience).</p><p>Benny Gantz's party (sitting in opposition) includes several experienced military personnel as well as other experienced former Likud members. Lapid's party (also sitting in opposition) also includes several experienced personnel. For the sake of the country, it seems that it would make quite a bit of sense for Netanyahu to try and work with these experienced personnel rather put the country at the mercy of his current incompetent and extremist team, who do not seem to have the capacity or capability to manage this properly.</p><p><b>Personal</b></p><p>We were planning to go to shul yesterday for <i>Simchat Torah</i>. At 6:30 a.m., we were woken up by sirens and had to go to the bomb shelter. We don't usually open the TV on Shabbat or Holy Days but decided to do so and see what was going on. We soon began to see the scale of the attack. The government asked people to refrain from gathering in large groups. The mayor of Ra'anana went from shul to shul, early in the morning, letting people know about the situation. I think it is one of the only times that I have missed going to synagogue on <i>Simchat Torah</i> other than due to the Covid outbreak.</p><p>A missile landed on the street where one of our family members lives. She was in a shelter and is fine but others were seriously injured and a building was destroyed. Another missile hit and destroyed an apartment where a cousin of ours used to live. The current tenant was in a shelter and is fine - but the place has been destroyed. Another family member updated us - to let us know that one of her good friends - just married last year - was killed in battle yesterday. </p><p>Unfortunately, we are likely to hear many of these stories in the coming days.</p><p>Many airlines have announced suspension of flights to and from Israel, including Air Canada. So my status at this time is a bit up in the air. I was supposed to fly to Toronto this week but I will have to see how things develop and what if any flights are available - and whether it makes sense to go. I have some specific occasions that I am hoping to attend as well as some work that would best be done in person. But in the circumstances, my plans may have to change.</p><p>I have to add that I saw a completely obscene message from the current Mayor of Toronto, who above all referenced "Palestinian Pain and severe loss of life" in her statement about the attack yesterday. This is the type of statement she puts out on a day on which hundreds of civilians were massacred, many at point blank range, by terrorists? By way of contrast, President Biden offered his complete support for Israel to take whatever measures necessary to deal with the situation. Prime Minister Trudeau offered a much more "lukewarm" statement condemning the attacks. Israel received more helpful messages of support from France, Germany and several other countries.</p><p>Despite Biden's reassuring words, there is quite a bit of concern that the ongoing arrangements between the U.S. and Iran, including the recent release of large amounts of money, have emboldened Iran to ramp up its support for Hamas and Hezbollah. We may hear more about this down the road but a policy of isolating Iran and boycotting it would be much better for the worldwide fight against terrorism than a policy which in any way bolsters and emboldens this extremist Iranian regime.</p><p>I'm not going to add comments about other events and stories at this time as it just wouldn't be fitting. Instead I am simply going to add that we are hoping and praying for the safety of our soldiers, our security forces - and everyone else - as we head into a very uncertain and challenging period that we have now entered. </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-73260732280265090242023-09-27T11:32:00.003-04:002023-09-28T02:29:54.232-04:00After Yom Kippur 2023 - 5784<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx3byWEzqr7KyoCuzFvgk6UDeH8767gVabTRB4xlykSOXMP9C0QR9l7PhY4YCsA-WHG1N9hv0Rz6F2EzZ1l7jiHNWLclhQT0BfaPySOX6kxJDkE1E19ZrRalKb6EnmcIFq48xh_QZdjqdl3_R2ecfbuHaORyYFYBEq3h_4JeSs0LGdtCsclmSVjFY-yK8/s300/Yom%20Kippur%20Photo.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="300" height="112" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx3byWEzqr7KyoCuzFvgk6UDeH8767gVabTRB4xlykSOXMP9C0QR9l7PhY4YCsA-WHG1N9hv0Rz6F2EzZ1l7jiHNWLclhQT0BfaPySOX6kxJDkE1E19ZrRalKb6EnmcIFq48xh_QZdjqdl3_R2ecfbuHaORyYFYBEq3h_4JeSs0LGdtCsclmSVjFY-yK8/w200-h112/Yom%20Kippur%20Photo.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>Shana Tova and "almost Chag Sameach." Yom Kippur has come and gone and we are now gearing up for the holiday of Sukkot, which starts on Friday night. I didn't get a chance to write a blog before Yom Kippur - and much has happened since then - so I thought I would put this together and cover off a variety of topics.<p></p><p><b>Yom Kippur in Israe<u>l</u></b></p><p>I suppose we are not supposed to think of Yom Kippur as a "fun" holiday - after all how much fun can it be to fast (no food or water) for 26 hours while spending 7-8 hours in Synagogue (even more for some), much of that standing up? But Yom Kippur is really a special day - wherever we might be observing it - and all the more so here in Israel. Here in Israel, pretty much all traffic stops across the country, other than emergency vehicles and some non-conformists (it is not "illegal" to drive). The airports are closed - and just about everything else is closed.</p><p>For the past 15 years or so, we have been participating in a small community service. It has been held, at different times, at different people's homes, at a shul we have rented out (that shul itself rents out a school gym because it has too many people to fit in its building). Usually it is a five or ten minute walk from our place in Ra'anana. This year, that meant spending about 10 minutes each way 6 times, in 31-34c heat - with high humidity. As we were walking through the streets, we passed by many different people on their way to shul, many dressed all in white, from head to toe. Very few actually wearing suits, which is a good thing in light of the heat. </p><p>Of course we also saw hundreds of kids with their bicycles, some accompanied by parents or other adults, many on their own, taking advantage of the car-free streets to ride around the city - or even to go and ride on empty highways. For those who are observing Yom Kippur in a religious way and for those who "observe" in a non-religious way - it is a special day for all.</p><p>For Israel, our service is somewhat unique. Although we cover most of the traditional liturgy, including the Torah readings, haftarah readings and different prayer services, using traditional tunes ("nusach") our service is a fully egalitarian, Conservative ("<i>Masorti</i>") service. While egalitarian is the norm in most Conservative and Reform congregations in the U.S. and Canada, it only represents a small minority of the shul-going public in Israel. Here the vast majority of synagogues follow Orthodox traditions and are decidedly non-egalitarian.</p><p>With the higher than normal heat, an outdoor service - and the fact that I was the one leading Kol Nidrei and Neilah this year - as well as as assisting with the morning services, I have to say that I was a bit thirstier than usual this year. But we made it through, I was able to get a reasonably decent sound from our Shofar at the end - and we enjoyed a tasty community break-fast with our fellow congregants.</p><p>As we were walking home, we could already hear the sounds of clanging metal bars as people were starting to assemble their <i>Sukkot</i> - temporary booths for the festival of <i>Sukkot</i> which starts only four days after Yom Kippur.</p><p>Now on a side note - even though I should have been all "shul-ed out" by this point - I decided to turn on the Park Avenue Synagogue stream and watch the PAS Neilah service. (Sorry to my Toronto Beth Tikvah community...). That was about 12:30 a.m. at night here - well after the holy day had ended in Israel. Although musical instruments in a shul are not necessarily my thing (I don't really know of many, if any other conservative shuls that use them other than PAS), I have to say that it is a real pleasure to watch Hazan Azi Schwartz. It was really a musical treat.</p><p>In addition, Rabbi Cosgrove ran a flawless service. I was particularly moved by his near closing discussion of the <i>Unetaneh Tokef</i> prayer, which forms part of the Musaf service in the morning of Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah. <i>Unetanah Tokef</i> is the "centrepiece" of the Yom Kippur Musaf service - and, among other things, the source for Leonard Cohen's "who by fire." In very short - I think you could probably still watch the service on the PAS site if interested - Cosgrove - explained that the final lines of the prayer "Prayer, Repentance and Acts of Charity can cancel the harshness of the decree" is intended to mean that by doing great things with the time we have in this world - we can lessen the harshness of the reality that our time is limited and there is a great deal of uncertainty - even if we can't change those facts themselves. I hope that does some justice to Rabbi Cosgrove - but I thought it was really a wonderful and meaningful discussion near the very end of Yom Kippur.</p><p><b>Some Current Events</b></p><p>As usual, there is a great deal going on here in Israel, and I will just comment on a few things.</p><p><b>Tel Aviv Yom Kippur Incident</b></p><p>I could write a whole blog about this one but here is my very short version. A group called "Rosh Yehudi" - the Jewish Head (Probably taken from a <i>Yiddishe Kop</i> ) - announced that it wanted to run an Orthodox prayer service in Dizengoff Square. The Tel-Aviv City council authorized the service provided that there was no <i>mehitzah </i>put up - i.e. that there was no physical barrier erected between men and women - which is a normal feature in an Orthodox shul. The Tel Aviv City council noted that there are some 500 shuls in Tel-Aviv, mostly Orthodox and that the City Centre is a public place, open to all, without barriers. <i>Rosh Yehudi</i> tried its luck in court and lost. The court upheld the ban on erecting a <i>mehitzah </i>in a public square. Well wouldn't you know it, <i>Rosh Yehudi</i> and its Rabbi (who has gotten himself into all kinds of trouble with a torrent of homophobic comments) decided to show up and run the service with a <i>mehitzah </i>anyways, in Dizengoff Square - the heart of Tel-Aviv. Many people in the square decided to sit wherever they pleased and disregard the <i>mehitzah.</i> It turned chaotic and became a huge disruption. TV and radio stations are discussing it around the clock. And now Itamar Ben-Gvir, cabinet member from the Religious Zionist party (and current Minister of National Security in the Netanyahu government) has announced that he is going to bus in hundreds of worshippers and run a service with a <i>mehitzah</i> in Dizengoff Square in defiance of the court order on Thursday night. Even some of his coalition partners, including Simcha Rotman (who is fairly extreme himself) and Bezalel Smotrich (who is an off the charts fanatic) are calling Ben-Gvir's plan "provocative" and "unnecessary." If Ben-Gvir goes ahead - things may get completely crazy in Tel-Aviv on Thursday night. Some Ben-Gvir supporters called "the Family" (as in the Mafia family) have announced they will come and "participate." Among other things, Ben-Gvir is really trying to ignite a religious war - there is no other objective way to look at it. **Breaking news update - Ben-Gvir or his spokespeople have announced that he has cancelled his proposed event for Thursday night. I would imagine that for Ben-Gvir this amounts to a tactical delay rather than any kind of change in policy.</p><p><b>US Visa Waiver Program</b></p><p>As you might know, Israelis have generally required visas to visit the U.S. unless they have another passport that is part of the Visa Waiver Program. It can be notoriously difficult for Israelis to get their U.S. visas and can often take months if not years to set up appointments and get through the process. Over the past few years, U.S. Ambassadors to Israel have been working with Israeli politicians including Bennett, Shaked, Lapid, and now Netanyahu to get Israel into the VWP. One challenge is that Israel would be required to treat all Americans equally when they arrive in Israel - including Palestinian Americans living in the West Bank and in Gaza - even those who might be a security threat. Nevertheless, Israeli officials announced this week - that the program will come into effect as early as October 2023 - and Israelis will no longer need visas to visit the U.S. U.S. officials have called the announcement premature - but it looks like it is coming. Maybe we will now run into some fellow Israelis when visiting New York City?</p><p><b>Israeli-Saudi Arabia Normalization</b></p><p>Prime Minister Netanyahu is on an all-out blitz campaign to try to bring about a peace deal and "normalization" with Saudi Arabia - at as low a cost as possible. Certainly, some Israelis have already been showing up in Saudi Arabia for events - and planes are flying over Saudi Arabia from Israel as we speak. </p><p>We do not know all of the details of what is being negotiated. But the Saudis have apparently been demanding that Israel make significant concessions towards the Palestinians and that the Saudis are able to develop a "peaceful" nuclear program. Netanyahu's coalition partners have stated quite clearly that they will oppose these concessions. So Netanyahu is in a bit of a spot - as he tries to juggle U.S. pressure to agree to a deal with domestic pressure to get a deal without giving up anything. I'm not convinced the deal will happen that quickly - but it would be a major foreign policy accomplishment for Netanyahu and for Biden.</p><p><b>Canada's Parliament Honours a Nazi War Criminal</b></p><p>Canada made the news around the world this week - especially in Israel (as well as Russia and Poland and other places) when the Canadian speaker of the house dredged up a Ukrainian war criminal (former member of the SS - volunteer Ukrainian brigade) and introduced him in the Parliament as a "war hero" while President Zelensky was visiting from the Ukraine. Quite sickening really - one would have thought somebody would do a background check. The truly sad part of the story is why Canada admitted so many war criminals after WWII and failed to prosecute them or extradite them. Very embarrassing. And Sad.</p><p><b>Yom Kippur War Commemoration</b></p><p>As you may now, this year marked the 50th Anniversary of the Yom Kippur war, in which Egypt and Syria launched a major surprise attack against Israel - causing massive casualties in the Israeli armed forces - and leading Israel to fear for its existence, especially in the early days of the war. Only after several days of fighting, Israel managed to turn things around in the Golan and in the Sinai. By the end of the war, Israel had a strong upper hand - even though the Americans and USSR stepped in and prevented Israel from inflicting serious damage to the Syrian and Egyptian armies. Israel lost close to 2,700 soldiers in that war, its second highest total number of casualties - after the Israel War of Independence in 1948.</p><p>Needless to say, there have been quite a large number of TV shows, movies, radio shows and other media discussing and analyzing different aspects of the war. I watched one show on Monday night which was put together by Yehoram Gaon, a well known Israeli singer. It focused on musicians who spent the 1973 war entertaining troops near the front lines, not knowing whether the soldiers they were entertaining would ever return. The show included footage of Canadian singer Leonard Cohen z"l, who flew to Israel when the war broke out and spent close to a month singing for soldiers during the war. It also included footage and interviewers with a whose-who of the Israeli music industry - Gidi Gov, Shlomo Artzi, Chava Alberstein and many others played prominent roles. There have been many other shows - about Golda Meir and Moshe Dayan, about all of the losses that Israeli suffered, about the link between 1973 and the subsequent peace deal with Egypt and about many other topics. Unfortunately, I am too busy to watch all of it - but there are some really interesting angles and discussions being presented.</p><p><b>Other Movies</b></p><p>Of course that was an intentional segue. As you will recall if you read my last blog - I mentioned two of the "Jewish-themed" movies that were being released. I hadn't seen them at the time.</p><p>I had a chance to watch <i>Golda</i> late Saturday night - a day before Yom Kippur. It is a very dark movie. It is not a biopic about Golda. Rather it only deals with how she handled the Yom Kippur war in October 1973 - and how she responded to a commission of inquiry in Israel a year later. Helen Mirren does an excellent job of bringing Golda to life - which seemed to be quite an authentic portrayal. </p><p>Many of the scenes show Golda Meir smoking - just about everywhere - in meetings, in her bed, while speaking to doctors - or while receiving treatments for cancer. There are many close ups as things seem to have been frozen in time at key parts - perhaps to emphasize the existential importance of some of the decisions Meir had to make. I don't think it is fair to say that the movie dumps the blame for the war on Meir - certainly Moshe Dayan, and other army officials seem to have made some disastrous errors - the film suggests. The movie also suggests that Meir laid the groundwork for a future peace deal with Sadat by insisting on recognition and face to face meetings to end the conflict. Overall, I thought it was an interesting film, even though it has its flaws.</p><p>One criticism has been that there are scenes in the movie with background Arabic and Hebrew discussion and no sub-titles. Maybe that will be corrected. I understood the Hebrew but I can certainly see how that would be frustrating. Another criticism is that it is ultimately a war movie, but with little or no war footage. In any case, as a time-limited character study of Golda and how she handled a serious crisis, I thought the film did a good job.</p><p>It would take quite a stretch to tie in this blog to the other recent movie I saw - Adam Sandler's "You are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah." I am generally not a huge Adam Sandler fan - and I have to admit I was tempted to turn this off after about five minutes. The target audience is probably 11 to 15 year old girls and I guess that is not quite my category. But as they say, I wanted to see what all the <i>yichus</i> was about - so I stuck it out and watched the whole thing.</p><p>There are quite a number of cringey scenes, Sandler humour (often not in the best of taste - but maybe suited to 11 to 15 year-olds) - and lots of scenes of the stereotypical bar and bat mitzvah "spectacles" - of the type that one might find in some very wealthy communities particularly in the U.S. I thought the crazy Israeli DJ - "DJ Shmuly" was a character that I have seen before at bar and bat mitzvahs while my kids were doing a version of the circuit in Toronto. The Rabbi was also an interesting character - trying to find new and "hip" ways to appeal to the kids. </p><p>I actually thought that the ending was fairly good, if predictable (I won't spoil anything) and the movie wound up being "not as bad as I thought it might be" at the start. Sandler himself was pretty good as a father and some of the other characters performed well. I wouldn't really want people watching this movie as their only exposure to bar and bat mitzvahs and thinking that this is what it is all about - but the reality for many Jews whether in North America or in Israel - is that many of these events are all about the party.</p><p><b>Sports</b></p><p>Israel is aiming to make it into the FIFA 2024 Euro Soccer championships. They have a reasonable shot and play some huge games on October 12, 2023 vs Switzerland and October 15, 2023 vs. Kosovo. So still a few weeks to go - but these are some enormous soccer matches for Israel's national team. </p><p>In other interesting news, Israel has been chosen to host the World Under 19 Soccer Championship Finals in 2027. That should be very exciting.</p><p>I have been staying up late this week watching the Blue Jays try to secure a spot in the MLB playoffs. So you know where to find me at 3 a.m. Israel time - at least for one or two more days. Hard to watch those games here - without a proper streaming service, though I do have one that seems to work most of the time.</p><p>That's about it for now - time to go and put up the new "downsized" sukkah - for a much smaller crowd this year. Forecast in Israel is for some very hot weather until at least Monday or Tuesday and then some nice Sukkot rain - scheduled to start even before we say the annual "prayer for rain." </p><p>Wishing everyone a joyous, fun Sukkot holiday and a Shana Tova!</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-57511102077748745832023-09-13T09:59:00.005-04:002023-09-13T17:37:49.011-04:00Pre-Rosh Hashanah Blog 2023/5784- From Israeli Supreme Court to the Israeli National Soccer Team<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUey0KjEU4xtJxzmqYBt9dX_Jg_A7cS9DhYVGEzD5SaloAwOPsApQm_yofr19FTIZd6A8ykz1h9BXsOLQ4EAdSr9CYRFtL1GWna3trq36VWGsLr8odo4lkfmMG04qG7lc6lWd0QB9kTl-KZHtd6k8goYUnVvFSkmv9XufuHQ9iGRd9j8FnP-XwrPAcHuE/s1880/israeli-supreme-court-1880x1104.jpg.webp" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1104" data-original-width="1880" height="188" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUey0KjEU4xtJxzmqYBt9dX_Jg_A7cS9DhYVGEzD5SaloAwOPsApQm_yofr19FTIZd6A8ykz1h9BXsOLQ4EAdSr9CYRFtL1GWna3trq36VWGsLr8odo4lkfmMG04qG7lc6lWd0QB9kTl-KZHtd6k8goYUnVvFSkmv9XufuHQ9iGRd9j8FnP-XwrPAcHuE/s320/israeli-supreme-court-1880x1104.jpg.webp" width="320" /></a></div>There are so many things going on in Israel that it is difficult to keep up. It would be nice to leave my law career and become a full-time blog writer - but things are busier than ever in my real world - so don't hold your breath waiting for that to happen. That (and maybe some travelling) explains the limited number of articles that I have written lately. But as Rosh Hashanah approaches - I just could not avoid writing about yesterday's Supreme Court hearing - one of Israel's most monumentous days in its 75 year history - from a legal point of view. I will try to keep my discussion of the hearing reasonably short and touch on a few other topics as well before wrapping up with some Rosh Hashanah thoughts.<p></p><p><b>Supreme Court of Israel Hearing on "Reasonableness"</b></p><p>It would probably take a 10 page blog, at least, to cover this properly but here is the relatively short version.</p><p>The Israeli Supreme Court consists of 15 judges. In most cases, only some of the judges sit in panels for hearings. The Chief Justice, along with other members, selects the number of judges, in odd numbers to hear cases. Usually, it is not more than 11 judges, for very serious issues. So for example, earlier this year, 11 judges sat together to decide whether Aryeh Deri, the thrice convicted fraudster, could serve as a cabinet member in the current government. The ruling was 10-1 against Deri.</p><p>As I understand it, yesterday was the first time in Israeli history where all 15 judges took part in a hearing. For those interested in legal issues - this was like a national championship event of Supreme Court advocacy. Don't worry I will tie in the sports analogy a bit later.</p><p>As you might recall, maybe even from reading one of my previous blogs, the current Netanyahu government passed a "Basic Law Amendment" which removes the power of the Israeli Supreme Court to quash (void or nullify) government actions and decisions on the basis of extreme unreasonableness.</p><p>There is a long history about how the Supreme Court of Israel came to have this power but it has been a part of Israeli jurisprudence since the 1950s. As you may know, Israel does not have a written constitution but does have a series of "basic laws." The short version of all of this discussion is that the Israeli Supreme Court, over time, expanded its jurisdiction to conduct "judicial review" of other legislation using the "basic laws" which it elevated to quasi-constitutional status. This means that the Israeli Supreme Court decided (led by then Chief Justice Aharon Barak) that it had the power to cancel laws or decisions put forward by the Knesset if they violated the basic laws. One of the main tests was whether the law or action proposed was "extremely unreasonable." This has been part of the Israeli legal landscape for more than 20 years and maybe closer to 30. The Supreme Court views this power as one of the checks on the power of a Knesset majority government - which could, otherwise, effectively enact any laws or measures, including those which might trample on the rights of minorities.</p><p>But unlike the situation in Canada, for example, where there is a written constitution that gives the Supreme Court these powers expressly, the Israeli Supreme Court accrued these powers over time, through precedent, or "took them" as opponents might say.</p><p>So the current Netanyahu government decided to try and "set the clock back" or, in other words, overturn 30 years of judicial precedent by enacting a law to reduce the powers of the Court. They called it a "Basic Law Amendment" to try and give it quasi constitutional status.</p><p>Opponents of the legislation brought a petition to the Supreme Court to strike the law. In another bizarre historical first, the Israeli AG is supporting the petitioners and the government retained its own private lawyers.</p><p>So yesterday, the Supreme Court conducted a marathon 13 hour session to hear arguments about what they should do. </p><p>As you might know from reading my blogs - this type of constitutional, academic, political, philosophical hearing - is the type of hearing that I would have loved to watch and hear (if not participate in) in its entirety. Alas I was swamped with other deadlines - and could only watch and listen to parts of it. But it was riveting! </p><p>Some of the questions being discussed....</p><p>Where does the Israeli Supreme Court derive its power to overturn government legislation?</p><p>How are the rights of minorities protected in Israel?</p><p>How can the Basic Law be amended? </p><p>Where is the proper balance in a modern democracy between the legislative arm and the judicial arm of government? </p><p>If you weaken the judiciary - is it only the voters that can "oversee" the legislature?</p><p>My "short" summary is that I have no idea what the Court will do with this. It is extremely difficult and complicated and there is no easy answer. One popular prediction is that the Court will send it back to the Knesset with a need for "amendments" but won't strike it out entirely. I do think it will be a split decision and we may wind up with as many as five or six different opinions. It is almost certain that there will be several hundred, if not thousands of pages to read. </p><p>Apparently, we can expect a decision within two months, so maybe I will write a longer blog analyzing that when in comes out. I could go on and on about the hearing but it would take me a full day and I'm not even sure you would want to read all of it. Some of you might...</p><p>One of my "mentions of the day" which has attracted quite a great deal of press attention in Israel - is the Netanyahu government's lawyer Ilan Bombach, who asserted that Israel's "hastily drawn Constitution" does not give the Supreme Court the rights it has exercised over its history. That led to a heated and fascinating exchange. There is a bit of truth to what Bombach asserted but far more rhetoric, exaggeration and spin than truth, in my view. We will see if his advocacy approach was effective. In my experience, one has to be cautiously assertive, even forceful, while trying to avoid insulting the judicial panel hearing the case outright - but then again, I'm not the one appearing at the Supreme Court.</p><p><b>Sports News</b></p><p>On the same day that the Supreme Court had its hands full - the Israeli National Soccer team played a huge game against Belarus - in its ongoing campaign to earn a spot in the 2024 Euro Soccer Tournament. A few nights before, Israel had eked out a tie against Romania. Israel still has to play four more games - two relatively "easy" ones - two more difficult. Sometimes the "easy" ones are the hardest to win. The games will be played in October and November - and will determine whether Israel earns a spot in the June 2024 tournament. From my research, it looks like Israel has not actually played in a major world soccer tournament since 1970. There is still a long way to go but Israel's late goal victory over Belarus yesterday was a huge step forward for the Israeli side. So the Israeli soccer team was playing some of its most meaningful soccer ever while the Supreme Court was hearing one of its most consequential cases. Did that tie it in enough?</p><p><b>Entertainment</b></p><p>I was hoping to watch the latest "Jewish Double Header" that so many people are talking about - "Golda" and "You are so not invited to my Bat Mitzvah." I wanted to include discussions of both movies in my blog - but that will have to wait until next time. Very different types of content, of course, - but I'll let you know if there is a way to tie the two together - other than temporal proximity of their respective release dates and the fact that there is some type of Jewish theme or content to both movies. If you have seen one or both, I welcome all comments.</p><p><b>Podcasts</b></p><p>I used my subway and airline travel time rather productively in June and July and into August and listened to all 70 episodes of an Israeli podcast called "The Party of Thoughts." This is a political, philosophical podcast that addresses contemporary (and not so contemporary) issues in Israel including the nature of the country as a Jewish and democratic country, competing philosophical ideas about modern democracy, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and many other issues. It is led by Micah Goodman, a research fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute, and Efrat Rosenberg Shapiro, an excellent and very experienced moderator. In Hebrew, it is called "<i>Mafleget Hamachshavot</i>" and is available on Spotify. Goodman and Rosenberg try to explain different sides on many different issues and try to present a wide range of viewpoints with empathy, understanding and respect. They are both self-described Orthodox Jews but many ideas are discussed with a very liberal bent. Different podcasts examine ideas of Jewish religious leaders - from Biblical times through Rambam, Hassidic Rabbis, and more contemporary Jewish thinkers from Rabbi Avraham Isaac Cook to modern day Rabbis. Others deal with Israel's legal development and history including Israel's current constitutional status. Many other issues are addressed.</p><p>The podcast is all in Hebrew - so you should only try to tackle this if your Hebrew is up to the challenge. If you are interested, Micah Goodman has given a number of lectures in English on YouTube and some are very good. I wouldn't say that I agree with everything on these podcasts - but I found many of them to be thought provoking, reasonably balanced - and filled with all kinds of references and discussions - of historians, philosophers, theologians, political scientists and others. This is not confined to Jewish thinkers or ideas - but includes discussions of far Eastern ideas, Plato, Marx, Rousseau, Hobbes, Locke as well as many other philosophers and other thinkers. I learned quite a bit and really enjoyed it. Thanks to my daughter for the suggestion. It is apparently a very popular podcast in Israel, listened to many different people, including many on different sides of the political spectrum.</p><p>Ultimately, Goodman and Rosenberg propose various types of compromises - for dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian issue, the current constitutional crisis in Israel - and other issues. Again, I'm not saying I agree with their proposals but they are very interesting.</p><p><b>Holidays</b></p><p>I supposed it is now time to get into High Holyday mode. I have been a bit slow off the mark because of general busyness with my work - and some travel and family occasions (happy events). I don't have any particular role for Rosh Hashanah (in the past, I have often read some or all of the Torah readings or lead services) - other than to make a few dishes - including a honey apple cake - thanks to Tori Avey's delicious recipe.</p><p>For the following week, I will be leading Kol Nidrei and Neilah tefillot at our community services in a friend's backyard - so if you (or anyone you know) happen to be in Ra'anana and would like to join an egalitarian liberal service - let me know. </p><p>That's about it for now - I wish everyone a happy and healthy New Year - with hopes for good health, peace, less political tension, more moderation - and lots of laughter. Shana Tova.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-41748030463759681942023-07-24T15:38:00.004-04:002023-07-24T22:21:18.890-04:00First Step in Israel's "Legal Revolution" - "Reasonableness" Bill Passes<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxjccwKMNpVis5Sk9NffqAtEq5JuKvss_LoLE0OdAT2Xe3BvoBoeCGEmFEfjeLnT5W0zDTYEW88x3ZSIWZ8j8qHnvEAyHnxV24EN3hU8g5iv2Ta8HP0w9ECK4AWFSUuvkounRAUxl3yBsvQy_FuktK5UTv_moJ_ON6B3-831_sJ0-_FPIR9IHirccLl1g/s4000/20230724_132239%20Unreasonbleness%201.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="4000" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxjccwKMNpVis5Sk9NffqAtEq5JuKvss_LoLE0OdAT2Xe3BvoBoeCGEmFEfjeLnT5W0zDTYEW88x3ZSIWZ8j8qHnvEAyHnxV24EN3hU8g5iv2Ta8HP0w9ECK4AWFSUuvkounRAUxl3yBsvQy_FuktK5UTv_moJ_ON6B3-831_sJ0-_FPIR9IHirccLl1g/w200-h150/20230724_132239%20Unreasonbleness%201.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>There is much to write about today's events in Israel. Unfortunately, none of it is good news. The Israeli Knesset today passed the third and final reading of a bill - called the "reasonableness law." This was the first major bill that is a part of a collection of proposed laws put together by the current Justice Minister Yariv Levin. The laws are intended to weaken the power of the Israeli Supreme Court dramatically, reduce its independence and enable the Knesset to override decisions of the Supreme Court (even after the party in power has hand-picked the justices). <p></p><p>The right in Israel calls this all "judicial reform" while everyone else, from centre-right to left calls it a "legal revolution" or even a "coup." </p><p>I have read various articles attempting to explain away these various proposed changes. Some commentators have used the United States as the barometer for analyzing the changes and claim that if it only moves the Israeli legal system towards the system in the U.S., it must be a good thing. Given the recent news about influence peddling in the U.S. Supreme Court, as well as the types of decisions the U.S. Court has been releasing, it seems hard to imagine that anyone who is sincerely interested in an independent and robust judiciary would be using the U.S. as a model. Sorry to offend my U.S. readers.</p><p>Others have argued that changing Israeli judicial precedents through legislation is only a way of "restoring balance" to the system and balancing out the power of the judiciary against the power of the other branches of government. But the Israeli Supreme Court has actually interfered with the government on relatively few occasions. For the most part, Prime Minister Netanyahu and the various right wing governments that he has led have enjoyed a great deal of freedom of action and have seen relatively little practical interference from the Israeli Supreme Court even though members of the current government that he leads argue that the country is "ruled" by the Supreme Court. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiTv9teUNNnf9Z5prDDTRt5ZjGw_rgw9KNBymN3YRXRTfCwGxQz7uSKGJu1T45SPAT2-glTeyv-P--0uhOHKkII1lwbnIFm5nDZI9eFvsdzA7hwmir94x1bjwrv1SzM6AcISBZFXYEFSb2J21KNGj_HEO2ZE_mFeh0fXVWPs66kKMrQKKRrAwclRiHvdA/s4000/20230724_132305%20unreasonableness%202.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4000" data-original-width="3000" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiTv9teUNNnf9Z5prDDTRt5ZjGw_rgw9KNBymN3YRXRTfCwGxQz7uSKGJu1T45SPAT2-glTeyv-P--0uhOHKkII1lwbnIFm5nDZI9eFvsdzA7hwmir94x1bjwrv1SzM6AcISBZFXYEFSb2J21KNGj_HEO2ZE_mFeh0fXVWPs66kKMrQKKRrAwclRiHvdA/w150-h200/20230724_132305%20unreasonableness%202.jpg" width="150" /></a></div>But the concern in Israel - and the impetus behind the demonstrations is not one particular bill or law. If the only law being proposed by the current government was this "reasonableness" law - (which is intended to change Israeli common law and bar judges from using "unreasonableness" or "extreme unreasonableness" as a grounds for judicial review of legislation of governmental action), then the Israeli public might not be so riled up. <p></p><p>But the current government has 64 seats. 15 of those seats are from the Religious Zionist Party which is mostly made up of xenophobic, homophobic, fascists who would like turn Israel into an Iranian type regime, run according to their version of <i>halacha - </i>Jewish religious law.</p><p>Another 17 Knesset Members are from ultra-religious parties. While these members are mainly interested in obtaining financial support for their religious institutions and their constituents, most of them would also like to see a State ruled by <i>halacha.</i></p><p>Of the remaining 32 Likud members in the current governing coalition - there seem to be several more who are supportive of these extremists. Yariv Levin, the current Minister of Justice, is one of these members. His presentation in January 2023, that I have written about previously, was nothing less than a proposal to disembowel the Supreme Court of Israel and leave it with little power to serve as an independent judicial arbiter.</p><p>Just yesterday, the leader of one of the Religious Zionist parties, and the current Minister of Internal Security, Itamar Ben-Gvir stated that this "reasonableness law" was only the first step - the appetizer - and that the whole main course was yet to be served. Last night - he said "the salad bar is open." </p><p>Surely, of all people, Israelis know what can happen to a democracy when fascists start passing laws. It can happen quickly and dramatically. And a sizeable number of Israelis recognize this and are out in the streets demonstrating and protesting. In fact, they have been demonstrating since January 2023 when Levin first announced his plans - in a press conference that reminded me of a scene from one of the <i>Batman</i> movies where the villain announces his plans to take over the world.</p><p>Some have characterized Prime Minister Netanyahu as the "adult in the room" and argued that he would not let Israel become undemocratic. But Netanyahu has his own concerns. He is in the midst of a criminal trial and looking to end these proceedings and avoid jail time. So while some Likud members were pushing him to try and reach some kind of compromise - his right fascist flank was threatening to leave the government and cause it to fall if he were to agree to any kind of compromise. As a result the third reading of the bill passed 64-56. No Likud members dared dissent for fear of being the ones to bring down the government. The opposition Knesset members boycotted the third vote and the bill passed 64-0.</p><p>Senior members of Netanyahu's government are talking about next steps. They have many different plans. Firing the Attorney General and other non-political office holders in Israel without any concern about judicial interference. Dismantling the Israeli bar association. Putting the convicted criminal Aryeh Deri back into office as the Minister of Finance. Passing a law to allow the current government to appoint all of the judges instead of using a balanced committee. Passing a judicial override bill to overturn any decisions of the Supreme Court by a simple majority. And even these laws are only a few of the more than 82 laws that members of this government are proposing. Oh I forgot the proposed "discrimination law" that allows a company or an individual to refuse to serve others (LBGTQ+? Arabs? Secular Jews? Women?) because of "religious reasons." (Granted this type of law has been upheld twice in recent years by the current U.S. Supreme Court but I think that was related to my earlier point...)</p><p>As a result of all of this, hundreds of thousands of Israelis are protesting. Two days ago, more than 50,000 Israelis began a two day march from Tel-Aviv to Jerusalem - where they arrived in time to protest all day today in front of the Knesset along with hundreds of thousands of others. But the bill passed anyways - and there are more bills to follow. I anticipate that the protest movement will now ramp up the type and volume of protests.</p><p>One of the discussions has centred on military service. Israel has a "people's army" where everyone is conscripted (even though there are many exemptions). Afterwards, people serve in many different roles in a voluntary capacity. Many of the volunteers, including Israeli fighter pilots and many others, have announced that they will refuse to appear for purely voluntary missions. The number of military personnel sharing these sentiments has been growing. The right wing response is that the army should be totally separate from politics - and that soldiers should report for duty no matter what. In fact, some would like to pass a new law to deal with these issues and penalize those who refuse to appear for duty. But the social contract that binds the soldiers to the state and to reporting for duty is based on their understanding that they are reporting to a democratic regime. A large number of Israeli soldiers will refuse to report for duty if the perception is that they are serving an autocratic regime. </p><p>How and where do we draw the line? Israeli soldiers do not want to harm the state and want to defend it at all costs from external enemies. But they do not want to carry out illegal orders or serve as accomplices for a regime that makes illegal or immoral decisions. We may not be there yet - but in a government that includes 15 far right extremists, some of whom are cabinet members - soldiers are concerned that there may not be any judicial oversight to actions they are now asked to carry out. That has already started to happen to the Israeli police forces - which are now being overseen by Ben-Gvir.</p><p>This government's short-sighted legal "revolution," enabled by Netanyahu out of fear for his own freedom, is causing economic problems as well. Companies, including Israeli high-tech companies, are talking about leaving or reducing their investments in the country. Individual Israelis are talking about leaving and finding work elsewhere. The Israeli Shekel has sunk dramatically against other currencies (it fell by approximately 10% today). There is a great deal of uncertainty and it is likely to get much worse. Sadly, it appears that Netanyahu's legacy will be one of severe damage to Israel's unity and its fabric as a vibrant democracy - all in the interest of saving his own skin. One commentator called it "Hanina o Heres" - "Pardon - or Destruction" meaning that Netanyahu would either get himself a pardon or he would take down the whole society with him.</p><p>All of this comes just two days before Tisha B'Av, one of the saddest days on the Jewish calendar on which we remember and commemorate the destruction of the first and second temples in Jerusalem. The standard and traditional Jewish Rabbinical explanation - is that the Temples were destroyed (in 586 B.C.E. and then again in 70 C.E.) because of "baseless hatred" between different Jewish groups. In an address this evening in Israel, one of the opposition leaders, Benny Gantz, warned that we must learn from the lessons of Tisha B'Av and find ways to work out our differences rather than take actions that could lead the country to an ever greater crisis. Sadly, there is no sign, at this point, that Netanyahu's current government has any interest in approaching these matters reasonably.</p><p>I normally try to include some other comments in my blogs about different issues but I think I will leave that to my next blog. Unfortunately, I have probably been watching and listening to far too much news and that is not giving me a warm and fuzzy feeling to end on a humorous note.</p><p>For those fasting this coming Thursday, I wish everyone a meaningful fast and I hope that Jewish people everywhere, though especially in Israel, will take the time to think about where we are today and what we need to do to stop things from deteriorating further.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-11152880254666839392023-07-08T19:09:00.002-04:002023-07-09T00:01:31.378-04:00Impending "Balagan" in Israel<p>It is Saturday night, the 8th of July - and things in Israel are heading towards a very intense week - and likely even more intense months to follow. I haven't been writing too much lately even though there is definitely no shortage of material. But I thought I would cover off a few topics with a bit of my usual spin. I'll deal with the current legislation being advanced by the Israeli government, the protests against it, Bibi's trial, Jenin and maybe some more upbeat topics...like sports, travel and whiskey...</p><p><b>The "Legal Revolution" or "Judicial Reforms"</b></p><p>As you might recall, the current Justice Minister, Yariv Levin, held a press conference in January 2023 to announce that he was going to be putting forward a series of bills in the Knesset to "overhaul" the judicial system. I have discussed these bills previously. The short summary is that the combined effect of Levin's initiatives would be to reduce dramatically the power and independence of the Supreme Court in Israel, and the Israeli judiciary in general. Power would be transferred, effectively, to the governing coalition which would be able to advance legislation, make appointments and take other actions without concern about judicial review or interference. I am not going to rehash the full legal discussion here over each of the initiatives - perhaps that is a discussion for another day - though you can find numerous articles about the pros and cons of the different pieces of legislation on various online sites. </p><p>Much of the Israeli public was shocked by Levin's proposals. The proposals were not a major part of the Likud platform in the election campaign and this was not an announcement to convene a committee or begin a public consultation process as to how best to reform the judicial system. Rather it was a shot across the bow by Levin - announcing that he was simply going to proceed to eviscerate the current Israeli justice system.</p><p>Protests began across Israel, which ultimately led Prime Minister Netanyahu to put the Levin proposals on hold until after Pesach, Yom Hazikaron, Yom Haatzmaut, and other Israeli holidays and days of observance. Netanyahu agreed to a proposal to hold consultations under the auspices of the President of Israel, Isaac Herzog - to see if agreement could be reached on some changes to these proposals. However, it seems apparent that Levin and his supporters had no real intention of diluting the proposals. The "consultations" failed, as planned, and the governing coalition is now bringing the legislation back to the Knesset.</p><p>The first piece of legislation is the "reasonability law." In Israel, judges have developed a precedent for administrative review of legislation and/or governmental actions, where the actions taken can be challenged and overturned if they are deemed "extremely unreasonable." (Like the "patently unreasonable" standard for judicial review in Canada by a court in examining the decision of an administrative tribunal). The Levin proposal is to legislate the cancellation of this line of authority and bar judges from using "reasonability" as a grounds for judicial review of governmental action or authority. It is a major incursion into the sphere of judicial independence and it is intended to weaken the judiciary dramatically.</p><p>The other pieces of legislation are waiting in the wings. This "reasonability law" is more or less the same bill that Levin proposed back in January - despite the "consultation" process. </p><p>There is a great deal of opposition to this bill, which is seen by many as a major attack on the independence of the judiciary - and thus, a major attack on Israeli democracy, which, like any vibrant democracy, relies on an independent judiciary to remain democratic. The bill is scheduled for a first reading in the Knesset on Monday July 10, 2023. In response, the protest movement has called for massive demonstrations across the country including efforts to close highways, the airport, and other commercial activity if the bill passes its first reading. (Like in Canada, the bill requires three readings to pass). As of tonight, a range of companies and other organizations have started announcing that they will support the protests. Hard to predict what is going to happen, but it looks like it is going to be very chaotic.</p><p>The Netanyahu coalition is also planning to proceed with a piece of legislation that is even more outrageous. As you may have heard, the Israeli Bar Association recently held an election to elect its president. A candidate supported by Bibi and his Likud party was roundly defeated by a candidate who opposes the judicial changes. The Israeli Bar Association is the equivalent of the Law Society of Ontario (and other places) - an independent body, though a creature of enabling legislation - that governs lawyers and their conduct. In response to the loss of the election, the governing coalition announced that it was putting forward legislation to disband the Israeli Bar Association, set up a different organization - and appoint the President. Unfortunately, I am not making this up. Part of the Likud justification is that the Bar Association is allowed to nominate two candidates to sit on the Judicial Appointments Committee - and Bibi and Levin would rather have pro-Bibi committee members (even though they could not get them elected). But disbanding the Bar Association? Seriously? Unfortunately, this is reminiscent of legislation that one might find in 1930s Germany. If this bill passes a first reading in the Knesset, I would imagine that Israeli lawyers will pull out all the stops to fight this. We might see courts shut down, lawyers on a general strike - and all kinds of other protest measures.</p><p>Just these two pieces of proposed legislation are causing so much rancour that there is already a sense that all hell is about to break loose. But the government also has a whole series of other bills that it wants to pass. I am not going to go through all of them now - but the overall effect of the proposed legislation is odious.</p><p><b>The Demonstrations</b></p><p>Demonstrations against the current government's proposed legislation have been taking place since Levin's announcement. The demonstrations peaked just prior to Bibi announcing a temporary freeze of the judicial overhaul. Now that the legislation is being brought back, the demonstrations have been ramping up.</p><p>Early this year, things were almost uniformly non-violent. The Israeli police responded in fairly mild fashion. There were few arrests and very few incidents of violence, police brutality or major confrontations. </p><p>Since then, the extreme right elements of the current coalition have been calling on the police to expand the use of force against protesters (even though the protests have been non-violent). The police chief refused to accede to these orders and resigned. He was replaced by a police chief more sympathetic to the current government and the police have begun using water canons and greater force to disperse protests. There have also been incidents of pro-government supporters showing up at protests and attacking protesters. There were three incidents of car rammings this week by pro-Bibi supporters attacking anti-government protestors. Several protesters were hurt, some seriously. So far, none of the attackers have been charged.</p><p>The former police chief warned that police escalation in the use of force would eventually bring about increasingly widespread protests - which might even become more violent. I guess we will see what happens in the coming weeks. If the government proceeds with its plans to enact the "reasonableness law" and disband the Israeli Bar Association, I think things here are likely to get very crazy and unpredictable. I'm not actually convinced that even Bibi will actually proceed with all of these plans but he seems to want to get something passed to appease his far right coalition partners.</p><p><b>Jenin, Terrorism and Pogroms</b></p><p>Over the past few months, Israel has faced a dramatic rise in terrorist attacks on civilians, especially in Judea and Samaria (the "West Bank") but also in other areas. Much of this violence was tied to terrorist groups based in Jenin, a city and refugee camp in the Territories. As you may have read, Israel launched a fairly large scale military operation in Jenin last Sunday to fight back against this wave of terrorism. It was a short operation that ended Tuesday night. Large caches of weapons were confiscated. Several members of Hamas and Islamic Jihad were killed and some were arrested. It is unclear whether this incursion will have accomplished any of its goals but Bibi's coalition members were urging Bibi to take some type of action in the face of a widespread string of attacks.</p><p>Aside from Palestinian terrorism against civilians in Judea and Samaria - and in other areas in Israel, there have also been several attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinian civilians. Some of these attacks have involved looting of Palestinian villages, beatings of civilians and other violence. Many Israelis have called these attacks "pogroms" and have urged the Israeli police to arrest and prosecute those responsible. A small number of settlers have been arrested. I'm not sure what charges, if any, have been formalized.</p><p>Some of Bibi's coalition members, including Ben-Gvir and Smotrich in particular, but also others, have been sympathetic to the settlers and dismissive of any attempts to punish the perpetrators. This is also something that may escalate dramatically in the coming weeks and months - the level of violence in Judea and Samaria - going both ways. Extremist Palestinian groups are calling for a "third intifada" and settler groups are calling for increased use of force against Palestinians. Let's just say I haven't heard any rosy predictions.</p><p><b>Bibi's Trial</b></p><p>In the midst of all of this, Netanyahu's criminal trial has been plodding along. I have not been attending the trial and so I only have bits of information coming from released parts of testimony and the analysis of several commentators.</p><p>A couple of weeks ago, the judges hearing the case apparently called on both sides to try and negotiate a deal of some sort - and suggested that it would be "difficult" for the prosecution to succeed in proving bribery in at least one of the cases.</p><p>On the other hand, the key state witness, Arnon Milchen, gave testimony over the past couple of weeks about the various gifts that he gave to Bibi and what he got in return. Milchen seems to have suggested that he is still good friends with Bibi. He testified remotely in London - where Sara Netanyahu showed up to watch. Before the start of one day of Milchen's testimony, she gave him a big hug and a kiss - trying to show the judges that Milchen only gave the Netanyahus all the gifts because they were such good friends. </p><p>According to some analysts, Milchen was easily manipulated by Bibi's lawyers during cross examination and wound up giving dramatically different testimony than the evidence he gave investigators during the initial investigation. This is a problem for the prosecutors who have been relying on Milchen as a reluctant "state prosecution witness."</p><p>If there is no deal, this trial might still continue on for two or three more years, according to some analysts. It sounds very entertaining but hard to predict what will happen. I still stand by my original prediction that there will probably be some kind of deal before there is ever a final verdict - or Bibi's governing coalition will succeed in legislating his legal problems out of existence. That being said, Bibi's defence may have helped themselves quite a bit by taking advantage of this reluctant state witness - or perhaps, by working with him outright.</p><p><b>Sports News</b></p><p>As you might have heard - it has been a great year for Israeli football (soccer to those of us from the other side of the pond). First, the Under 20 men's team wound up taking 3rd place in the U20 World Cup. That was incredible - especially Israel's huge upset win over Brazil in the quarter finals. After that, Israel's U21 team made it to the semi-finals in the U21 Euros. The team was beaten soundly by England - but was a very respectable showing. As a result, Israel's national soccer team has made it into the Olympic games which will take place in Paris in 2024. Now that is exciting for Israeli football fans.</p><p>Aside from the odd football game - or soccer - whatever, I haven't really watched much in the way of sports, since it is off-season for ice hockey and NFL football. I did watch the Blue Jays this afternoon (night time in Israel) - as they were "no-hit" by the lowly Detroit Tigers. The Jays are doing reasonably well but I have not been watching very many games. Difficult to do with the time change. Perhaps I will have the chance to see a few games - or attend in person when I am back in Toronto next week.</p><p>I suppose the really big news in sports this year - which has nothing to do with my blog, is the play of generational superstar Shohei Ohtani. I haven't seen him play this year - but, as you may have seen or heard - he is among the league leaders in batting average, home runs, hits, pitching average, strikeouts,...There are very few players in baseball who pitch and also play regularly on the offensive side of the field. His accomplishments so far this year are super impressive and have led people to start comparing him to the great Babe Ruth. I think it is early for that - but that gives you a sense of how dramatic his statistics have been.</p><p><b>Israeli Whiskey</b></p><p>I am not sure if I discussed Israeli whiskey previously, but even if I have, I will mention the M & H Distillery once more. M & H stands for "Milk and Honey." This single malt distillery in Tel-Aviv has been making some terrific whiskey - including whiskies that have won worldwide whiskey competitions. I had a great time visiting their distillery recently - and I would strongly recommend a tour there on your next visit to Israel - if you enjoy some decent whiskey. The accompanying cheese and bread plate is also pretty tasty. It's a kosher place - closed on Shabbat of course. The actual whiskies are sold by the bottle and are not super cheap but the tour and tasting is priced reasonably and is lots of fun. And educational.</p><p><b>Other Travel</b></p><p>As you might know, there are several discount airlines that fly to different destinations in Europe from Israel. Many of these flights cost less than the price of one night in a hotel here. We recently flew to Rome, Italy on Wizzair. I can't say that the flight itself was an enjoyable experience. Wizzair is about as "bare-bones" as it gets - they don't even serve free water on the 3.5 hour flight - and a "basic" ticket only allows travellers on the plane with a small knapsack. If you want to add a trolley type carry on bag - you pay about as much as the cost of the ticket for the bag.</p><p>On the other hand, Rome is such a fantastic place to visit that the short flight itself becomes secondary. I should mention that there are quite a large number of Kosher restaurants now in Rome - including pizza and other dairy places, meat restaurants and even a "Lybian Kosher Restaurant" - called "Little Tripoli." Rome also has more than 10 active synagogues with daily minyans - and a Jewish museum. </p><p>We certainly visited all of the major tourist sites in Rome as well - and had some fantastic coffee, gelato, food and wine - all over the city - but there is quite a bit more going on now in terms of Jewish culture than there was the last time I visited - though I have to say that was quite a few years ago.</p><p>That's about it for now - I hope you have found some of this interesting - and I wish everyone a great summer. Back in Toronto shortly (if I can get out of the Israeli airport with all of the planned demonstrations) so I may not have another update for a while but I am sure that there is bound to be quite a bit of news coming out of Israel in the months ahead.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-8166182620191860752023-06-19T18:13:00.001-04:002023-06-19T20:38:47.432-04:00Beauty Queen of Jerusalem and Some News Comments<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5AmQhRE3-FTvJTLu_Y6dp-zqq5EQj7sYbsQHIbiGBPvDatIivvH4zPgP-Kl962CWlGPpoAB4UFjBcWqJbdOiI9JOJtZq_oJkQjcN8t8t_MltSutCDbSoF-YY5_i0j1iRGrI5ryL6LQTulo5q2VGnPcYtDjuFi5-RGpEI3c77ck026l0qsmmDUOESc3Vk/s266/Beauty%20Queen.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="190" data-original-width="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5AmQhRE3-FTvJTLu_Y6dp-zqq5EQj7sYbsQHIbiGBPvDatIivvH4zPgP-Kl962CWlGPpoAB4UFjBcWqJbdOiI9JOJtZq_oJkQjcN8t8t_MltSutCDbSoF-YY5_i0j1iRGrI5ryL6LQTulo5q2VGnPcYtDjuFi5-RGpEI3c77ck026l0qsmmDUOESc3Vk/s16000/Beauty%20Queen.jpg" /></a></div>We just finished watching <i>The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem Israeli Season 2. </i>Wow. It was intense. <p></p><p><i>Beauty Queen </i>is an Israeli historical fiction series that follows the Ermosa family - a Sephardi Jewish family living in pre-independence Israel. Part one of the series originally aired in Israel in 2021 - as a 44 part series. Each episode was about a half-hour long.</p><p>Over the first season, the show moved back and forth between earlier and later decades, which some viewers apparently found too confusing. The series was still a big hit in Israel and Netflix picked it up in late 2021. Netflix divided the first season into two season of 10 episodes each - of just under one hour in length - and of course added subtitles. At first, Netflix only released the first 10 episodes but I believe the "second season" was subsequently released. However, Netflix did not release it all over the world - only in certain countries.</p><p>Last year, we watched the first Netflix season, which made up one half of the first Israeli season - about 20-25 of the 44 episodes, which Netflix edited and turned into 10 episodes of about an hour each.</p><p>We were determined to see the rest so we found a way to watch the series on YesTV in Israel - but that meant no English subtitles. I guess my Hebrew got a chance to improve somewhat. In order to see everything - we had to start watching at about episode 18 and watched through the original 44. </p><p>The series is based on a book by Sarit Yishai-Levi. I have the book but I admit I have not read it yet, though I probably will very soon. The first full season - (the first two Netflix seasons) run from pre-World War I to approximately 1940. The cast is a who's who of Israeli acting including Michael Aloni (one of the main stars of <i>Shtisel</i>), Itzik Cohen (Captain Ayub in <i>Fauda</i>), and a range of other excellent actors including, in particular, Hila Saada (as Rosa), Swell Ariel Or (as the brilliant Luna), Irit Kaplan (as Mercada) and several others.</p><p>The series deals with a variety of themes and sub-plots. One constant is the historic backdrop. The series follows the development of the State of Israel before 1948 - while it was under Ottoman and then British control. At first, the Ermosa family, like everyone else in the Ottoman area, is seen managing and dealing with the Turks and Turkish authorities. Following World War I, this transitions to British rule and authority. By the end of Israeli series II (the latest parts), we are at approximately 1943/44 - and still under British control.</p><p>A key part of the series is the story of the Ermosa family - and its struggles as a family. Perhaps one might characterize some of this as "soap opera" type content, including infidelity, dysfunctional spousal relationships, love, parenting, the relationship to religion, gender equality issues and limitations in this time period. But we found it extremely compelling. The actors were sincere and believable. The drama was intense though some episodes were particularly violent. Others were emotionally draining. We couldn't stop watching.</p><p>This year, YesTV released the next 26 episodes. This will probably all make up about one season on Netflix when it is eventually released of perhaps 10-13 episodes of one hour each or so. For now it is only available in Hebrew so we had to watch it on "Yes On Demand," which we have as part of our cable package.</p><p>We finished it this week. It was simply intense, emotional, well-acted and thought provoking. For the newest season, YES changed the format and eliminated the back and forth. It is now mainly chronological and less confusing that way. The new season continues the old season themes but also deals with some very difficult issues - including domestic violence, the relationship between the growing Jewish community in Pre-Israel Palestine and the British (including some harsh looks at the "Lehi" group), Jewish-Arab relations during this time period, religious issues, and other related issues, all against a backdrop of World War II and the horrors taking place in other parts of the world.</p><p>I am not going to do a detailed plot analysis here or provide any spoilers but I would say that I think it ranks up at the very top of Israeli productions that I have seen. I will also say (and this is not intended to be a spoiler) that there are some scenes that are extremely violent, that there is a great deal of tension throughout the series. The show is emotionally wrenching and draining. But isn't that what you would want to say about a great production?</p><p><b>Israeli News</b></p><p>I don't intend to provide ongoing details of everything going on in Israel - I would have to become a full time news outlet to do that - and I do have another career....</p><p>But here are my few noteworthy items....</p><p>The Israeli army fought some of the biggest battles it has fought in recent times today in Jenin. It faced significant resistance from a range of armed Palestinian groups while seeking to arrest some alleged terrorists. Several Israeli soldiers were wounded, some seriously - and a number of Palestinian fighters were killed. This may well be the start of a significant escalation for both sides in the West Bank (Judea and Samaria). </p><p>The Israeli Bar Association is holding its elections tomorrow for a new president. This has been making quite a bit of news, partially because of the current political landscape across the country. Some 77,000 lawyers will be voting. The candidate, who is apparently the current front-runner, is Amit Becher, a staunch opponent of the Levin-Rotman proposals to "reform" the judicial system and someone who regularly speaks at protests in Tel-Aviv and across the country. Becher is the current interim leader. His opponent is a former head of the IBA, Efi Naveh. Naveh is a supporter of Levin and Rotman. He is also someone who has been convicted of border fraud - and charged with a range of other offences including criminal sexual harassment. (Those charges were dropped because some of the evidence came from an illegal wiretapping of Naveh's phone). Perhaps it is no surprise that someone who has been convicted of a criminal offence is out there running as the biggest supporter of a government that is full of convicts, politicians facing charges - and a leader in the midst of a major criminal trial. The good news (from my perspective) is that it seems likely that Naveh will suffer a significant loss. The polls could be wrong and I guess we will see soon.</p><p>The current Israeli government continues to flounder around - like a game of Whack-A-Mole. It seems that every few days, the government has to deal with a crisis emanating from a statement or action of one of its coalition members. Last week, the government faced a secret vote in the Knesset over who to appoint to the Judicial Committee (charged with appointing judges in Israel). Netanyahu decided to pull his candidates and have nobody elected. (To help his own political maneuvering) One of his own Likud party members Tali Gottlieb, decided to run anyways against Netanyahu's wishes. She failed to get the votes which was quite embarrassing for the coalition. On the other hand - the Yesh Atid (opposition candidate) Karine Elharrar won a seat, which means that several Likud members voted against their leadership in this secret ballot. Netanyahu reacted by barring any meetings of the committee for an indefinite period. So it is unclear when any judges will be appointed. The whole thing was a major embarrassment for this current coalition - though not enough to jeopardize its governing status.</p><p>Apparently, the government intends to push ahead with plans to bring back its "judicial reform." If they do proceed, I expect that we will see massive protests across the country.</p><p><b>Sports and Other Distractions</b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="text-align: left;">Just to finish off the news from my last post - as you might know, the Israeli national soccer team lost to Uruguay 1-0 in the semi-final of the U20 World Cup. Uruguay went on to win by beating Italy. Israel played a consolation game against South Korea and won 3-1, which meant third place and a bronze medal for the Israeli side. This was a huge accomplishment for the Israeli team and for the Israeli national soccer program in general. One of Israel's best international tournaments ever - if not the best.</span></div><p>I didn't really wind up watching much of the Las Vegas-Florida NHL finals or of the Miami-Denver NBA finals. From my perspective as a sports fan, it is a pretty low time of the year now with all of these playoffs having concluded. Sure the Blue Jays look pretty good some nights - but no NFL until September (real games I mean), no NHL until October etc., I guess this gives me the chance to catch up on my watching of some great TV series, read some books, get lots of work done - and maybe try to lose some weight. And of course play some games on the amazing site - boardgamearena.com - which has been expanding tremendously. My latest favourite games include ArkNova, Barrage and several others. I just wish they would add Brass Birmingham and a whole collection of Vital Lacerda games (Lisbon, Vinhos and others).</p><p>I should have time to come up with some interesting blogs in the coming months. Wishing everyone a wonderful summer.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p> </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p> </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-21838426335745771852023-06-07T22:26:00.004-04:002023-06-08T05:55:55.813-04:00Soccer Soccer Soccer - Israel in the U20 FIFA World Cup<p></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEpZwuhSGgyy0fHnrmRP-JZhPMxZ0gVUAXu2OFTFKSb1y5f_ayMmTCZZq8HGWTwqyZfE7kkrSt7rwjUX7xKH59SX1khhmf1zGwM67TQHZQ7ERn3MpxCQlSED2ssR2PKzs_iCDo67o5zFOogxRcpVIZ0Knkgmvh9z9QQG0jHUI1r5J_NNXkwPVaC86m/s275/Turgeman%20Goal.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEpZwuhSGgyy0fHnrmRP-JZhPMxZ0gVUAXu2OFTFKSb1y5f_ayMmTCZZq8HGWTwqyZfE7kkrSt7rwjUX7xKH59SX1khhmf1zGwM67TQHZQ7ERn3MpxCQlSED2ssR2PKzs_iCDo67o5zFOogxRcpVIZ0Knkgmvh9z9QQG0jHUI1r5J_NNXkwPVaC86m/w200-h133/Turgeman%20Goal.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dor Turgeman - Israel U20 Team<br /></td></tr></tbody></table>Thursday June 8, 2023 is a huge, historic day in Israel sports history. As you may have heard, Israel will be playing Uruguay in the Under 20 FIFA World Cup - in the Semi-Finals at 1:30 p .m. EST (8:30 p.m. Israeli time) The winner will play either Italy or South Korea in the championship game on Sunday at 5 p.m. EST. (Midnight Israel time). Israel has never been this close to a world championship. Israel's Under 19 team wound up in a runner up spot in the European tournament two years ago - but that was only Europe - this is the whole world.<p></p><p>Israeli national soccer teams face some exceptional hurdles in world tournaments. The Arab countries (and some other Muslim countries) refuse to play against Israel and FIFA (the international governing body of "Futbal" (soccer) more or less goes along. Since 1974, Israel has been forced to compete against European teams in a crowded, extremely competitive division instead of being able to qualify by playing against its neighbours. In short, it is very difficult for Israel to even qualify for world cup soccer tournaments, let alone advance. Israel has only been in the FIFA World Cup once - in 1970. That year, Israel qualified as an Asian team. They lost to Uruguay 2-0, tied Italy 0-0 and tied Sweden 1-1. That record of one loss and two draws was not enough to enable Israel to advance to the knockout stage. Since then, Israel has failed to qualify in 13 attempts - against European competitors.</p><p>This 2023 tournament is a bit different - it is only for players under 20 years old - the future stars of soccer, rather than the biggest stars. Of course, Israel had to play hard - and really well - to qualify. In fact, the tournament was originally scheduled to be held in Indonesia. The Indonesians assumed that Israel would not qualify. Once it became clear that Israel would qualify, Indonesia announced that it would refuse to permit the Israeli team to play in Indonesia. So FIFA moved the tournament to Argentina.</p><p>At the tournament, Israel's play has been stellar. They beat Japan with moments to go in the round robin section of the tournament to secure a spot in the knockout round. Then they beat Uzbekistan in the round of 16 (1-0) to advance to the quarter finals. Their next opponent was Brazil - a world soccer titan. In a miraculous win, this past Saturday afternoon, Israel outscored Brazil 3-2 in overtime and will now play Uruguay in the semi finals.</p><p>Two members of the Israel squad have each scored two goals - Dor Turgeman and Anan Khalaili.</p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhz0Renxzke-JJfx9Xe702gjUCKg7bo51WDAgurmMhNUOoAxrqqFCpZsz9LzB8klQXBEPp0SWni0Y6hcjAQAftHIh998DRZGc5iYkXkQuZ13SVLDOOz3IAut6Q62K6DIQ9nI-5tgsZxS-830Ch0uoYlstCAnCunxnlBq7OUGDgudKlBIZT-Nni6rPm8/s275/Khalili.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhz0Renxzke-JJfx9Xe702gjUCKg7bo51WDAgurmMhNUOoAxrqqFCpZsz9LzB8klQXBEPp0SWni0Y6hcjAQAftHIh998DRZGc5iYkXkQuZ13SVLDOOz3IAut6Q62K6DIQ9nI-5tgsZxS-830Ch0uoYlstCAnCunxnlBq7OUGDgudKlBIZT-Nni6rPm8/w200-h133/Khalili.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Anan Khalaili</td></tr></tbody></table><br /> Turgeman is 19 years old and was born in Ashdod, Israel. He is exciting to watch and happy to try all kinds of fancy footwork. Anon Khalaili is an Israeli from Sakhnin, Israel. He has also played extremely well and has scored two very exciting and timely goals. Both players are hoping to come up with some even bigger goals in an effort to propel the team to a win over Uruguay.<p></p><p>Personally, I am not normally a huge soccer fan, as you might know. I enjoy watching the big tournaments - the World Cup, the European Championships - and maybe some of the Champions League games. But regular season soccer games can often end in a 0-0 tie. To quote my dad - that can sometimes be as exciting as watching "paint dry."</p><p>But my year as a sports fan and spectator has fizzled dramatically. The Buffalo Bills went down with a thud, despite all of the high expectations. The Maple Leafs managed to win a round but then exited in rather pedestrian fashion against the Florida Panthers in the second round of the NHL playoffs. The Raptors were nowhere to be found in the playoffs. The Blue Jays are doing reasonably well but it's early in the season and it seems like they still have 300 games left to play. So not that much for me to cheer about, overall.</p><p>In fact, this U20 FIFA tournament was not even on my radar as an event to watch.</p><p>But when I saw that the Israeli squad had eked out a victory over Japan - I definitely became interested in watching the Israel-Uzbekistan match. I have to say, I felt little doubt that they would beat the Uzbekkies but it turned out to be a much closer match than I expected.</p><p>Against Brazil - well - I was just hoping it wouldn't be ugly or embarrassing. Sure, we were all dreaming of an Israeli win - but no one really predicted that Israel would be beat Brazil.</p><p>So here we are - all set for tomorrow and I will definitely be glued to the TV, watching with a VPN before heading back to Israel next week. The Uruguay team looked very solid against a strong American side on Sunday and will present quite a challenge. But given that Israel managed to beat Brazil, you have to think that anything can happen.</p><p>Stay tuned and if you have the chance - try to watch the big game. Back to regular scheduled programming shortly - political commentary, winery reviews and other random ruminations - not necessarily flowing together smoothly. Since I will be back in Israel, I am sure I will have a variety of topics to write about. For today, on this historic semi-final eve, it had to be soccer, soccer and soccer. </p><p>Go Israel!!!</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-82532403000727191492023-04-25T08:14:00.002-04:002023-04-26T12:54:47.148-04:00Yom Hazikaron 2023<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi0fChMeVLjrQSxDgpVmYzy8_8ebgVPggiAiNgGOiwFkVCFfJN8lGssXUKIhhWq9MubZDKxGApXW128f46aAZi0LLCmsYh6v26tXixODHcYLRBkIT7e8T4ooldJRk8eBIDQRQIjbmi1ysDW075AfucsojpnbqfLJx7cMqkrDV0SaUuZpVL9flalhqDT" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi0fChMeVLjrQSxDgpVmYzy8_8ebgVPggiAiNgGOiwFkVCFfJN8lGssXUKIhhWq9MubZDKxGApXW128f46aAZi0LLCmsYh6v26tXixODHcYLRBkIT7e8T4ooldJRk8eBIDQRQIjbmi1ysDW075AfucsojpnbqfLJx7cMqkrDV0SaUuZpVL9flalhqDT=w200-h133" width="200" /></a></div>One week after Yom HaShoah v'Hagvurah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) is commemorated, Israel marks Yom Hazikaron - national remembrance day for soldiers, victims of terrorism and other state service people.<p></p><p>Yom Hazikaron is commonly referred to by many people - as "K'dosh Kdoshim" - the holiest of the holies. For some Israelis, it is more meaningful then Yom Kippur. It is a day marked or observed by Israelis across the political spectrum, religious and non-religious, of different ethnicities, and all different ages.</p><p>According to official Israeli sites, 24,068 soldiers and security personnel have died since Jews first began modern efforts to rebuild Israel in 1860. In addition, approximately 4,216 Israelis have been killed in terrorist attacks. Following the founding of the State of Israel in 1948, Yom Hazikaron was established as a day to remember fallen soldiers, which would take place every year the day before Israel's national Independence Day. Over the years, Yom Hazikaron was expanded to include those who were killed prior to the establishment of the State and in 1997, the Knesset enacted a law to include remembrance of victims of terrorism on Yom Hazikaron.</p><p>Like with Yom Hashoah, which we observed last week, we walked over to the Ra'anana ceremony last night at 8 p.m. All of Ra'anana's stores and restaurants closed early (around 6 p.m.) last night, as they did across the country. We went early to be able to find seats. There were thousands and thousands of people. Large sections of seating were reserved for families of fallen soldiers. </p><p>The ceremony started with a two minute long piercing siren. Thousands stood silently thinking about those who had died and. bracing themselves for a difficult ceremony.</p><p>The commemoration itself was about 1 hour and 20 minutes. It included speeches from the Mayor of Ra'anana, a representative of the bereaved families, the city Rabbi, and others. There was a special emphasis on the Yom Kippur War, which took place fifty years ago, in 1973. Images flashed across screens of worshippers in synagogue the day the war broke out - suddenly hearing sirens and alarms across the country as Israel was attacked by Egypt and Syria on Yom Kippur. There were several stories about the lives of different soldiers who lost their lives fighting for the country and the names of every soldier, originally from Ra'anana, who had been killed, were read out. There were also several musical performances which were emotional, moving and exceptionally well presented.</p><p>We went back home and watched the tail end of the national Israeli ceremony. After that, TV stations broadcast musical performances for several hours by Israeli artists singing mournful loss-themed songs, much of this from a live performance in Tel-Aviv. This was all interspersed with interviews and stories about fallen soldiers, their families and their fellow soldiers who served with them.</p><p>Over the course of the day, Israeli TV programming is non-stop Yom Hazikaron programming. There was a second nationwide two minute siren at 11 a.m. There was a national ceremony at Mount Herzl and there are stories throughout the day of fallen soldiers and their families.</p><p>Yom Hazikaron is such a powerful day in Israel because of the nature of Israel's army and the role it plays in society. Since everyone is or can be drafted in Israel, the army is still very much a citizen's army. Israelis, young men and women, from all walks of life serve and units can be made up of people from different places, different backgrounds, different ethnic origins, economic circumstances and political views. They come together in the belief that it is necessary to defend the country. (I am not pretending there are no political issues here - including issues relating to who is required to serve - but I am deliberately avoiding those issues for now - that is for another post).</p><p>Israelis recognize that the army is there to protect Israel against very real existential threats. Two of Israel's wars, the 1948 War of Independence and the 1973 Yom Kippur War were very much existential wars in the truest sense of the word. In 1948, Israel was heavily outnumbered and had vastly inferior equipment to that of the array of surrounding countries that invaded, right after Israel declared its independence. In 1973, Israel suffered crushing losses during the first few days of the war, with Syria threatening to march towards Tel Aviv and Egypt threatening to march northwards. In both cases, heroic efforts by Israeli military forces led to eventual victory, at a heavy, heavy price.</p><p>In 1982, when Israel became involved in the first Lebanon War, Israel's north was under incessant attack from rocket fire from Lebanon. In 1996, during the Second Lebanon War, rockets from Lebanon hit Israeli targets (mostly civilian) across the country. More recently, Israel has faced barrages of rocket fire, targeting civilian areas, from Gaza and has had to defend the country.</p><p>And today, although things can seem relatively peaceful at times, there are serious threats to Israel from Iran, Lebanon, Syria, Hamas and Palestinians. The army must maintain a constant state of readiness, relying heavily on a wide range of intelligence operations, as well as the readiness of its well trained forces, in preparation for any possible outbreak of hostilities.</p><p>A common theme at Yom Hazikaron is the gratitude that we owe these fallen soldiers. It is because of them, their colleagues, their efforts and their sacrifices, that Israel was established and has been able to make it to his year's 75th anniversary.</p><p>The founders of Israel recognized that Israel's establishment and independence came at a great price. They determined that the only logical day on the calendar to mark Yom Hazikaron would have to be the day before Yom Haatzmaut - Israel's Independence Day.</p><p>They understood that Israel's greatest day of celebration, which is marked by fireworks, street partying, festivities across the country - could only be celebrated properly if it was preceded by a day honouring, thanking and commemorating those who made it all possible.</p><p>Yom Hazikaron will end tonight at sundown and Israel's 75th Independence Day - Yom Haatzmaut - will begin immediately after sundown. The country will demonstrate its resilience by moving seamlessly from grief to joy, from remembrance to celebration and from the country's cemeteries to national parks, musical stages, outdoor festivals and fireworks. It is a difficult transition. The message is that Israelis have no choice but to remember and thank those who were lost - while at the same time doing everything possible to get the most out of life and celebrate what we have.</p><p>To all those who we remember on Yom Hazikaron - Y'hi Zichram Baruch - may their memories be blessed.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-36968461569192107612023-04-18T06:06:00.002-04:002023-04-18T11:47:59.028-04:00Yom Hashoah v Hagvurah - Holocaust Remembrance Day 2023 <p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgqFnDQ0Cj7UoT7JyheX11ZqvqdjCiQ6_WfjXcp6TNjf5L9y5oEL7qRmijy8OZsymxN_b8e3Jz3k6hr9hDys46XiQTCiqKAQoWJ4PTvTbVb8qA_VLTa0iAjoBNim2zJRSkwCy40diSpzoSTHPVNlc-gziRFpaqb8FnZ-nXirnACgX4luueNrKIU0XlU" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1064" data-original-width="1600" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgqFnDQ0Cj7UoT7JyheX11ZqvqdjCiQ6_WfjXcp6TNjf5L9y5oEL7qRmijy8OZsymxN_b8e3Jz3k6hr9hDys46XiQTCiqKAQoWJ4PTvTbVb8qA_VLTa0iAjoBNim2zJRSkwCy40diSpzoSTHPVNlc-gziRFpaqb8FnZ-nXirnACgX4luueNrKIU0XlU=w200-h133" width="200" /></a></div>It has been a very busy month - between Pesach (Passover), several weddings, a funeral, and other events here in Israel - including family visits and work obligations. As well, as you probably know, there is quite a great deal going on politically in Israel. But I will come back to that in another blog soon.<p></p><p>Today is Yom Hashoah v'Hagvurah - the Day of Remembrance of the Holocaust and Bravery in Israel - and around the world and I wanted to write some reflections about this day.</p><p>Holocaust memorial day in Israel is one of the most important and one of the most sombre days of the year. In cities across the country, ceremonies are held in city centres and are extremely well attended. Restaurants, stores and shops close early on the evening of Yom HaShoah. People put on white shirts and walk over to the local commemorations.</p><p>We went to the Ra'anana commemoration. The theme this year was 80 years since the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. The one-hour event included a torch lighting by a survivor of the uprising. Teen participants in Jewish youth movements lit hundreds of candles to symbolize the millions of Jews killed in the Holocaust.</p><p>There were several readers - who read out diary entries, poetry and other writings from people who perished over the course of the Warsaw uprising - or others who somehow managed to survive. There were several musical performances as well which were powerful and emotional. The mayor of Ra'anana, Chaim Broido, spoke about his parents - who were Holocaust survivors - and others spoke about the horror of the events that took place in Warsaw. The memorial closed with the chanting of "El Maleh Rahamim" by a Ra'anana Hazan (cantor) and then the singing of Hatikvah, Israel's national anthem.</p><p>We walked back home - and turned on the TV. All of the Israeli stations show Holocaust programming on the evening of Yom HaShoah. We watched one program about a heroic French Nun, Sister Denise Bergon, who saved more than 80 Jewish children - and the story, in particular, about two French sisters who she managed to keep alive.</p><p>We watched a few other programs, including a moving interview with several Holocaust survivors and the way in which their children have made efforts to spread their stories to as many people as possible. </p><p>This morning, at 10 a.m., across Israel, there was two-minute long siren. Everything stops across the country. People who are travelling stop their cars and get out and stand next to the cars until the alarm is over. It is extremely powerful.</p><p>Later this morning, I watched the National Holocaust commemoration at Yad Vashem featuring Israel's Knesset members, various rabbis, Supreme Court judges, survivors, and others who all participated in different ways. The last part of the event was "the reading of names." Various participants, including Prime Minister Netanyahu, Chief Justice Hayat, cabinet members, opposition Knesset members and others - all took turns coming up to the microphone and telling the story of a few Holocaust victims - and reading out the names of these victims and others.</p><p>So many Knesset members and other Israeli officials told the story of their grandparents or great grandparents - or uncles or aunts - or other family members. So many people were affected by the Holocaust - and lost so many family members. I couldn't help but think about my family members who perished during the Holocaust as well.</p><p>My great grandfather, Moshe Yaakov and his wife Channa, were murdered on August 16 or 17, 1941 by Lithuanian Nazi sympathizers in the town of Kamajai, Lithuania. We were later told by cousins of ours, who miraculously survived the war, that it was the son of neighbours of my great grandparents - who actually murdered them.</p><p>On the other side of my family, my great grandparents Avram and Chaya were sent by train to Auschwitz-Birkenau. Their son, Gabriel (my grandfather's brother), was also sent there with his wife and two children. Gabriel was separated from the rest of the family and somehow managed to survive the war. He was eventually liberated from Auschwitz, emaciated, but alive. His parents, his wife and his two children were taken away from him. He never saw them again. They were all murdered at Auschwitz. After being liberated at the end of the war, Gabriel was sent to a displaced person's camp. He was able to find my grandfather and reunite with him in New York - and Gabriel eventually remarried and had one daughter (my dear cousin, who passed away just over a year ago). </p><p>On both sides of my family - there were many others who were murdered - and whose names we do not have. But for those whose names we do have - I wanted to state their names - in line with the well known Yad Vashem theme - "Each Person has a Name." </p><p>The Nazis and their collaborators not only sought to murder all of the Jews in Europe. They also sought to erase their identities and their memories. They gave each imprisoned person a number and seared these numbers onto the arms of the prisoners. My uncle Gabriel had a number like this burned onto his arm.</p><p>Many Jews in Europe were murdered - and in many cases - their identities were unknown. Many were buried in mass graves or murdered or otherwise vanished. And one of the key projects of Yad Vashem has been to try and collect as much information as possible about the victims - to dignify these people by finding their names, their identities and telling their stories.</p><p>To see the various Knesset members each coming up to the podium and recounting the names and stories of different victims was not only powerful and emotional - it was also another reminder of the importance of Israel as a Jewish state and as the only real defender, protector and haven for the Jewish people. For this one day - Knesset members from different sides of the aisle put aside their differences and all took part in remembering, dignifying and honouring the victims of the Holocaust - and recounting stories of many brave men, women and children who somehow fought back or otherwise survived.</p><p>May the memories of all of the victims be for a blessing - Y'hi Zichram Baruch.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-9610416577015617562023-03-26T17:15:00.000-04:002023-03-26T17:15:02.790-04:00Dramatic Escalations across Israel in response to Netanyahu Action<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGZkG5kiZ-j14HsnWcI8xuQXiw5ZA16EdspU_mCTimArvnIdhsHY0fQuvycJxy7DmsYAOAihkY0FRH6hR8hH5oGIzppEuVMsEmBNd007HKTFxVu4h4Px4xmGaBFkUpAZ3GQ036p-IRlOPAHsxRoPLkLZyeWf3D8zccraUKyPcA_S2FGZ51T-0qXjFj/s4000/20230325_232427.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="4000" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGZkG5kiZ-j14HsnWcI8xuQXiw5ZA16EdspU_mCTimArvnIdhsHY0fQuvycJxy7DmsYAOAihkY0FRH6hR8hH5oGIzppEuVMsEmBNd007HKTFxVu4h4Px4xmGaBFkUpAZ3GQ036p-IRlOPAHsxRoPLkLZyeWf3D8zccraUKyPcA_S2FGZ51T-0qXjFj/w200-h150/20230325_232427.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>I don't usually write two consecutive blogs in such a short period of time - but things have taken quite a turn in Israel - and it is very unclear where all of this is headed.<p></p><p>As I mentioned in my last blog, the Israeli Minister of Defence, Yoav Gallant, a stalwart Netanyahu supporter and high ranking member of the Likud party announced on Thursday March 23rd - that he was going to hold a press conference at 7:30 p.m. Supposedly he was going to announce that he was calling on Prime Minister Netanyahu to slow down the current "judicial reform" and meet with opposition members to try and negotiate an agreement. Netanyahu summoned Gallant to a meeting and apparently cajoled him into cancelling his press conference. Shortly afterwards, leaks appeared indicating that Gallant had told Netanyahu he would wait a few days to see how Netanyahu was dealing with things.</p><p>However, later that evening, Netanyahu held a press conference and announced that it would be full speed ahead and he would not consider slowing down at all.</p><p>As a result, Saturday night saw the biggest demonstrations to date across the country. Today, Gallant held a press conference and announced that he could not support Netanyahu's current legislative program and - that Netanyahu was endangering the country.</p><p>This evening, Netanyahu fired Gallant from the Minister of Defence position. As a result, tens of thousands Israelis took to the streets, blocking highways, roads and protesting in a wide range of places. Since the demonstrations started earlier this evening, police have estimated that numbers have exceeded 700,000 Israelis currently in the streets demonstrating across the country.</p><p>It has become especially clear over recent days, that Netanyahu will not stop at anything until his judicial coup is completed and he has his "get out of jail free card." Even though he was warned by a close ally that his policies were endangering national security, Netanyahu simply chose to disregard the warnings and double down on his proposals.</p><p>There have been some articles in different newspapers (including one in the National Post yesterday) arguing that this legislative agenda being proposed by Netanyahu and his allies is really no great concern to Israel as a democratic state. But try reconciling that thesis with one of today's announcements - Yariv Levin - the "architect" of the proposed emasculation of the Supreme Court wants to use his new legislation to fire the head of the Israeli Supreme Court - and appoint a hand picked buddy, a "professor" from a second tier Israeli law school - to take over as the President (the "Chief Justice") and advance Levin's extremist policies. Levin also wants to appoint other judges to the Supreme Court immediately to tilt the balance of the court.</p><p>Levin and his allies have also floated the idea of extending the period of time before the next election Further, Levin has stated that this is only his "first stage."</p><p>Hundreds of thousands of Israelis have been demonstrating to indicate that they will not give up their democratic rights. But it is not only demonstrators. Soldiers are starting to refuse to show up for duty. Police offers are supporting the demonstrators. There are major fissures going on - and Netanyahu is allowing the extremists to continue to drive the bus.</p><p>The government is planning to try and ram through the Knesset several pieces of legislation this week - including a law to reinstate convicted criminal Aryeh Deri to a ministerial position and another law to allow the Knesset to override any decision of the Supreme Court. But it is now becoming unclear that the Likud party will be able to get all of its members to support these extreme legislative initiatives.</p><p>If the legislation does pass, the civil unrest will become increasingly widespread across the country. The army will become increasingly fractured. The Supreme Court will face dramatic tests to the limits of its authority - as these pieces of legislation are challenged in that Court. And there will be strikes and demonstrations across the country.</p><p>If the legislation is put to a vote and does not pass - this government will almost certainly collapse.</p><p>So overall, the coming week - and indeed the coming months are likely to be extremely tense, dramatic and unpredictable. One can only hope that saner heads will prevail and responsible Knesset members will find a way to get things under control. Unfortunately, Netanyahu is showing no signs that he will be one of those "adults in the room." In fact, it has become completely clear that his own flagrant conflict of interest has made him entirely unfit to serve as the Prime Minister until his personal criminal issues are resolved.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-7765398016623554812023-03-25T18:46:00.001-04:002023-03-25T18:48:00.299-04:00Massive Demonstrations in Israel, some sightseeing and Pesach Preparations in Israel, some <p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9P5DznaBzdNBqvO-vwnzGRT4Iz19hG7zT5xT75zzb6vAb2ja6zyEsYnklK8G3IriLBOdo3-xK96obJy4kCsHvtQ0OlwFVKtRXshcfBWPyAWvb6Hx4WC9KN0tFTT-C1MS0O-M65LO0iStLW4BgtHVoyKnfzaqFYQ2zuq2zJo8F5cckZT0tjivoReQ5/s4000/20230325_232424.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="4000" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9P5DznaBzdNBqvO-vwnzGRT4Iz19hG7zT5xT75zzb6vAb2ja6zyEsYnklK8G3IriLBOdo3-xK96obJy4kCsHvtQ0OlwFVKtRXshcfBWPyAWvb6Hx4WC9KN0tFTT-C1MS0O-M65LO0iStLW4BgtHVoyKnfzaqFYQ2zuq2zJo8F5cckZT0tjivoReQ5/w200-h150/20230325_232424.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>We are about 11 days before Passover and Israel is in the midst of one of the most tumultuous periods it has ever seen. Police have estimated that more than 200,000 people attended demonstrations in Tel-Aviv tonight and tens of thousands of others protested in other cities across the country. In the photo on the left, you can see police deploying water cannons after protesters blocked off the main Tel-Aviv highway - the Ayalon - for more than two hours. As we are now close to midnight - police are stepping up the amount of force that they are prepared to use to disperse the protesters. Unlike what might take place at other demonstrations in other places - the police have, generally, been using very moderate levels of force. They are not (yet) coming at protesters with shields, helmets and batons. Many are on horseback - but many others are not even wearing helmets or unholstering any weapons. Instead they are trying to push, persuade, cajole - and sometimes arrest protesters. Certainly, some officers have become much more violent and there have been several instances of injuries to protesters. But by and large, from the reports and live videos, the police have been relatively patient and non-violent.<p></p><p>As you have probably heard by now, the protests are against legislation that the current Netanyahu government is trying to push through. I reviewed the essence of the legislation in an earlier <a href="https://www.torontotoraanana.com/2023/03/supreme-reforms-in-israel-and-other.html">blog, here.</a> Netanyahu and his allies call the legislation "judicial reform" whereas the opposition calls it a "judicial coup." The Likud member responsible for trying to pass a whole array of legislation is Yariv Levin, who has stated that is only the "first stage" of his "reforms."</p><p>Commentators from across the political spectrum from the far left to the centre right have characterized this whole legislative program as a dramatic change to Israel's legal status quo. In an nutshell, the laws that have been proposed would weaken the power of the Israeli Supreme Court dramatically, change the appointment process from a relatively non-political process to one that is almost entirely political, allow for the Knesset to override any Supreme Court decision and make other changes that would remove most backstops from the ability of the Knesset, with a bare 61-59 majority to pass just about any legislation.</p><p>With no judicial oversight, and a far-right wing government intent on enacting legislation in all kinds over areas, the prospects are frightening. But reaction from a wide range of Israeli citizens, institutions, businesses and other sources has been energetic, aggressive and powerful. Various army personnel have indicated that will refuse to serve the country in any type of voluntary capacity. Businesses have threatened to leave the country. Hundreds of thousands of Israelis have been demonstrating regularly.</p><p>For all of those protesting, they are not willing to see Israel turn into Turkey, Russia, Hungary or other countries led by military strongmen. Even within Netanyahu's Likud party, there are a growing number of dissenters, who are being pressured from all directions. If the number reaches 5 or 6 Likud party members who are willing to stand up and block the legislation - or at least abstain, the government could even face an existential threat (which didn't really seem possible or likely just a few weeks ago). Tonight, the Likud defence Minister, Yoav Gallant, held a press conference and announced that he would not support the legislative process. Shortly afterwards, several other Likud members expressed their support for Gallant.</p><p>Meanwhile, Prime Minister Netanyahu was in London for meetings and a weekend getaway. He has not officially responded to Gallant yet. On Thursday, Gallant had indicated that he was about to hold a press conference at 7:30 p.m. However, Netanyahu summoned Gallant to a meeting and Gallant cancelled his press conference. According to reports, Gallant gave Netanyahu some more time to try and work things out. As it turns out, Gallant wasn't willing to give the Prime Minister more than two days.</p><p>So now the question becomes whether Gallant has enough support behind him in the Likud party to stop the legislation. Since the Netanyahu bloc currently has a 64-56 Knesset majority, Gallant would need the support of 4 other Likud members to ensure that the legislation could be blocked. This would created a huge political fissure for the Likud party and could well lead to another election. It may also cause the party to split into two or more factions. </p><p>Very unpredictable. On the one hand, many moderate Likud members are not in favour of extreme legislation, which is all rather transparently designed to keep Netanyahu out of legal trouble . On the other hand, the Likud party members would like to stay in power. After finally winning an election, even though their "win" is only made possible with the support of extremists, they are not anxious to relinquish power. I think we are in for a very dramatic week and - in fact - very dramatic months to come in Israel.</p><p>Overall, it is comforting to see that hundreds of thousands of Israelis are not prepared to watch Israel turn into a <i>de facto</i> dictatorship beholden to extreme factions. Netanyahu supporters argue that he won the election and is now entitled to govern. While that is true, an election win does not give the winning party the right to change the ground rules and emasculate the judiciary. Even if there is room for discussion about adjusting the balance of power in Israel between the different branches of government, that type of change is one that must be undertaken carefully, with the input of wide range of stakeholders and not simply instituted by someone facing an array of ongoing criminal proceedings.</p><p><b>A Bit of Travelling</b></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSjr3KIkpZ9DNRO8l1H9MwR-asfAGvUFqzwAA_c8PBtlC_vxpXUqBp6M5ZsXDFAECCGVCKjW-ycRudTs44zCAVZSSsDLe2lxGSCoG6-jWWBXnjlBVO5v014Kw-1rl90WGr4zfFcKrZ6HW1L-x54Os_iRBXKhPH8PW539zmv698rBukdTrautDUSFdC/s4000/20230319_102947.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="4000" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSjr3KIkpZ9DNRO8l1H9MwR-asfAGvUFqzwAA_c8PBtlC_vxpXUqBp6M5ZsXDFAECCGVCKjW-ycRudTs44zCAVZSSsDLe2lxGSCoG6-jWWBXnjlBVO5v014Kw-1rl90WGr4zfFcKrZ6HW1L-x54Os_iRBXKhPH8PW539zmv698rBukdTrautDUSFdC/w200-h150/20230319_102947.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>On a completely different note, we recently managed to visit a few places in the south of Israel that were very noteworthy.<p></p><p><b>Yatir Winery</b></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnLsJNnaAFhZBPkQQU0DUVtdnUKlgGv54Kz9GXKgOjYEy1bxLHbWqv0M5uUcOhm-gyO0VUq9H3qkzOLjMZnTfCzQEBZyGHbdxh7pbnxs0G7HLMqQX1SIWHjlHqZHiZgjYrhPEHtfZKuXwXYwYpmQ0ySmjVFIfJAJvlg8Whnx0tcSivpA1_96f4MGJP/s4000/20230319_112115.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4000" data-original-width="3000" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnLsJNnaAFhZBPkQQU0DUVtdnUKlgGv54Kz9GXKgOjYEy1bxLHbWqv0M5uUcOhm-gyO0VUq9H3qkzOLjMZnTfCzQEBZyGHbdxh7pbnxs0G7HLMqQX1SIWHjlHqZHiZgjYrhPEHtfZKuXwXYwYpmQ0ySmjVFIfJAJvlg8Whnx0tcSivpA1_96f4MGJP/w150-h200/20230319_112115.jpg" width="150" /></a></div>Driving down to Eilat, we stopped near Arad at the Yatir winery. Yatir produces some of Israel's most acclaimed wines, including its flagship Yatir Forest, a delicious but costly blend that has won prizes at wine competitions around the world. We were able to join a tasting group and sample four different wines while enjoying a nice platter of cheese and vegetables. (No Forest was poured...) The wines were all quite good, the presenters were engaging and friendly and it was a worthwhile stop.<p></p>Yatir is near Arad - about 2 1/2 hours away from Eilat. Don't worry - we had a designated driver. We finished up at the winery and got back into the car to continue our drive south.<div><br /></div><div><b>Eilat</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>We don't go to Eilat very often. As you may know, it is pretty much the southern most point in Israel. During the summer, temperatures can reach 40-45C (104F-113F) but it is a "dry heat." Situated on the Red Sea (Probably the "Reed Sea" originally), Eilat offers some terrific snorkeling, scuba diving, and all kinds of other beach activities. It is all situated in a small area with a range of over priced hotels. Eilat is packed in April during Passover and throughout the summer. It is also packed over the high holyday season in September and October. </div><div><br /></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrSg4owXcz9W5jwioau0YR_9hymJOx0aPdVFAJ9jZlo_kie2xyp5q_NgzCO8UCMDXZELXFNOB87Nv6JAxDSRTqr08GhyVN8TuxcTN2aVktQTWwvwluRNHX_AMfcZXVwfb8cfDwJz6ikLLou3mHwpPYAtUkZ8n-7t8wo5DNZng5w8ozYffEbRTArMj0/s4000/20230319_170951.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="4000" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrSg4owXcz9W5jwioau0YR_9hymJOx0aPdVFAJ9jZlo_kie2xyp5q_NgzCO8UCMDXZELXFNOB87Nv6JAxDSRTqr08GhyVN8TuxcTN2aVktQTWwvwluRNHX_AMfcZXVwfb8cfDwJz6ikLLou3mHwpPYAtUkZ8n-7t8wo5DNZng5w8ozYffEbRTArMj0/w200-h150/20230319_170951.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Eilat, Israel<br /><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div>While we were there, it was only about 22-25C (72-77F) and the water was a bit chilly. I still checked it out - (since, after all, I am used to Ontario lake water) but not for very long. Eilat is a popular destination of Israelis for shopping since it is a "tax-free zone" for many products. So, for example, you can get a cell phone in Eilat for about 18% less than it would cost in other parts of the country. Many other items are also considerably cheaper in Eilat.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /><p><br /></p><p><b>Timna Park</b></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAWvKdV5kC63wly3Rup3li6w55nRb-dYZHXpcX3HWxkXkP9o8tW7oAYRUziv8256RvKIZyf-iFnIM_LAjCsav0GSCT08Angwr9f72_s6QTzd4CiN64hskYM_xLG0EnBWUl3eHTKsdDl8di2SdpzVGJ0I47q3C-Z1fcWr2oiV-BlRLAZml-l4AEm0Ea/s4000/20230320_144904.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4000" data-original-width="3000" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAWvKdV5kC63wly3Rup3li6w55nRb-dYZHXpcX3HWxkXkP9o8tW7oAYRUziv8256RvKIZyf-iFnIM_LAjCsav0GSCT08Angwr9f72_s6QTzd4CiN64hskYM_xLG0EnBWUl3eHTKsdDl8di2SdpzVGJ0I47q3C-Z1fcWr2oiV-BlRLAZml-l4AEm0Ea/w150-h200/20230320_144904.jpg" width="150" /></a></div>After spending some time in Eilat, we drove over to Timna Park - which is an Israeli National Park located about 20 minutes from Eilat. Timna is one of the regions largest copper mines - a site at which copper was mined from the 5th century BCE and possibly by King Solomon in the 10th Century BCE. The views were breathtaking and since it was March, the temperature was very moderate. We even had a bit of a breeze. <p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1eXuwgY_SQBsOKw_po2COU8ftlX2JVrubC1HHG9Q9Zthc1Uw6D0xiCCnSoLIC5c78DortJ4q43Q1PNRSFvfyY_F22XBdmiTT8kOZUarH6BKCm6Plkr0ZsC0GTWP-1y9vhhWctebxnK3u8-rb3-Sxy_ySQVWIeNX6Y-8OsJnlZqNReXV3MsJ0GqN1n/s4000/20230320_135920.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4000" data-original-width="3000" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1eXuwgY_SQBsOKw_po2COU8ftlX2JVrubC1HHG9Q9Zthc1Uw6D0xiCCnSoLIC5c78DortJ4q43Q1PNRSFvfyY_F22XBdmiTT8kOZUarH6BKCm6Plkr0ZsC0GTWP-1y9vhhWctebxnK3u8-rb3-Sxy_ySQVWIeNX6Y-8OsJnlZqNReXV3MsJ0GqN1n/w150-h200/20230320_135920.jpg" width="150" /></a></div>Visitors can drive from site to site within the park - and then do a mixture of hiking and driving. Alternatively, visitors can hike the whole park on a four to five hour trail. I would imagine that in July or August the heat would be unbearable but in March it was an amazing experience and one that I would highly recommend. We climbed up to the top of one of the mountains, saw some amazing ancient mining sites, some beautiful views and a variety of interesting birds. <br /><br /><br /> <br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf1te0WWxa9S-C3mXplT9OfLnsx7fvpZCLQQpNenhXKbUiNhLJZCMB2ouguSytwmf8QkkeSf70AGuFJhF3_DnFmMZUd3-NPWOdSvkLN2Yw4Q4gl8zkumG36eZeY08s-875lqMPYNgSulqpPweco8AClkzJj4orwVUArvjfMIsaL-sfrwW1tZiThm7b/s4000/20230320_140517.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="4000" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf1te0WWxa9S-C3mXplT9OfLnsx7fvpZCLQQpNenhXKbUiNhLJZCMB2ouguSytwmf8QkkeSf70AGuFJhF3_DnFmMZUd3-NPWOdSvkLN2Yw4Q4gl8zkumG36eZeY08s-875lqMPYNgSulqpPweco8AClkzJj4orwVUArvjfMIsaL-sfrwW1tZiThm7b/w200-h150/20230320_140517.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><p></p><p>There are a variety of landmark rock formations, all with the reddish colour due to the presence of copper in the rocks and surroundings. The park is very picturesque. At the end, there is a Visitors Centre, where visitors can make their own multi layered sand art in small bottles - or buy larger - pre-made bottles. We probably wound up spending about 3-4 hours at the park overall.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Beit Govrin-Maresha National Park</b></p><p>Our last stop was Beit Govrin -Maresha National park, which is about 1 1/2 hours from Ra'anana.</p><p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWm3Yhq1LT-xyCtqbkix4lYMorQf-KOM7Pg5VKJfgJHVWJycTT6oRJMWz0XE6eQQoyHQwxq-eRRAB67_gU8O1OAEebRY_TRWNWsguJYS8Taru1p-ggDeUXv5gkzy7tfLvrRymnKzTY13Bvr-UHU-UN8186cuu3R3q_0HoV8gpQGym0CgGWJ6eJgdQy/s4000/20230322_152057.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; display: inline !important; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="4000" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWm3Yhq1LT-xyCtqbkix4lYMorQf-KOM7Pg5VKJfgJHVWJycTT6oRJMWz0XE6eQQoyHQwxq-eRRAB67_gU8O1OAEebRY_TRWNWsguJYS8Taru1p-ggDeUXv5gkzy7tfLvrRymnKzTY13Bvr-UHU-UN8186cuu3R3q_0HoV8gpQGym0CgGWJ6eJgdQy/w200-h150/20230322_152057.jpg" width="200" /></a>The area, known as the "land of a thousand caves" features a large network of the "Maresha Caves" which were inhabited by the Phoenicians. There are ancient olive presses, columbarium caves for raising pigeons, burial sites, Roman baths, an amphitheatre and many other fascinating sites.</p><p></p><p>There are too many photos to include since we visited several different caves - including a limestone quarry, a water reservoir and some of the columbarium caves. Some caves were extremely deep and winding. They were well lit - and cavernously large. But if you are afraid of depths - this could be a bit frightening.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLV7sQAopcTI5V_tpfPka4iVXPiduGu0bM5madSVHxKeuSKtmetINlpZb5W2Ilz7M_IUFoNdB5roBu3onql4SO3JtU4veyYbrouAh7mfWf1tIHhf4QMeY5YK3cGAzLeIEmIzF4feAClRSrf4wwq0rLGedfnTZA02NYb1Bw0NqoDunXSU2udsh4mih9/s4000/20230322_154316.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4000" data-original-width="3000" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLV7sQAopcTI5V_tpfPka4iVXPiduGu0bM5madSVHxKeuSKtmetINlpZb5W2Ilz7M_IUFoNdB5roBu3onql4SO3JtU4veyYbrouAh7mfWf1tIHhf4QMeY5YK3cGAzLeIEmIzF4feAClRSrf4wwq0rLGedfnTZA02NYb1Bw0NqoDunXSU2udsh4mih9/w150-h200/20230322_154316.jpg" width="150" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>I thought it would be interesting to include some comments about these places to get away from the strict political news and commentary and cover some other topics.</p><p>Now it is back to Pesach preparation. As anyone who observes Pesach knows, getting everything cleaned up, changing over the whole kitchen, preparing food for large groups of guests and planning the Seder itself is all quite a bit of work. So there is no shortage of things to do over the next 10 days or so, while watching Israeli political news and also working regular hours....</p><p>I will probably provide one more update just before Pesach - and perhaps by then we will have some better ideas about where things are heading politically.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-27378106650026080192023-03-05T19:02:00.004-05:002023-03-06T17:49:04.267-05:00Supreme Reforms in Israel and Other Pressing (and not so pressing) Issues<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkzk7ffwLSrawGcEqz3DAgbk2T9Q6HVr_y4JrWxIgGh1lCVhvnFNVr9fkcgrfl76vnov-8vPB_gBSnSjYL0hfP9_nLE-Sn76Mk4UGO_5geWUQY77B4PZJXOHKR0gEDigM3-Tq9kxXvzVhWV_ebiXuV_7BMz5cBWWfcrvbgFhaab6x5FclbfCc-Q3oL/s640/Israeli%20Demonstrations.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="640" height="125" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkzk7ffwLSrawGcEqz3DAgbk2T9Q6HVr_y4JrWxIgGh1lCVhvnFNVr9fkcgrfl76vnov-8vPB_gBSnSjYL0hfP9_nLE-Sn76Mk4UGO_5geWUQY77B4PZJXOHKR0gEDigM3-Tq9kxXvzVhWV_ebiXuV_7BMz5cBWWfcrvbgFhaab6x5FclbfCc-Q3oL/w200-h125/Israeli%20Demonstrations.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>As we head into Purim 2023 (5783 according to the Jewish calendar), which starts tomorrow night - there is so much going on that it has been difficult for me to find the time to write some updates. I am back in Israel for a bit - and planning to read from <i>Megillah Esther</i> tomorrow night at our shul in K'far Saba. We will also have the chance to read Tuesday morning, followed by a festive meal in the afternoon - a "Purim Seudah." <p></p><p>Here in Ra'anana, it was hotter than 30c today (more than 86F outside). The streets of Ra'anana were closed for the "Adloyada" parade - with floats of kids in costumes, loud music, and all kinds of festivities. We took a walk and it was simply bustling and vibrant - with kids (and sometimes their parents) in costume starting the Purim celebrations. A nice distraction I suppose from everything that is going on politically.</p><p>I don't intend to dedicate this blog to a full and detailed analysis of all of the political events taking place here but I do want to spend some time dealing with a few major issues.</p><p><b>Israel's "Judicial Reform"</b></p><p>First of all, the headline event in Israel is the proposed "judicial reform." You may have read or heard a variety of opinions on this from different commentators - including a podcast by Elliot Abrams - or a Conrad Black article in the National Post. You can also read any of a number of different articles in <i>Haaretz </i>or other publications with other viewpoints.</p><p>The bottom line is that no matter what spin some of the right wing commentators might try to put on this, the current Israeli government's proposals amount to a dramatic weakening of the power of the Supreme Court - and the transfer of that power to any bare majority of the Knesset. </p><p>The proposed legislation, which has passed a first reading and may well pass second and third readings this week - involves four main proposals. </p><p>The first proposal is to remove the power from the judges to conduct a judicial review of legislation on the basis of certain grounds that have been defined under decades of Israeli law - including the ground of "reasonableness." Although Israel does not have a formal written constitution, Israel's "Basic Law" has developed quasi-constitutional status and has provided the framework for judges to overrule legislation if it is deemed to violate the basic law. The current governing coalition argues that this tilts the state's power into the hands of the judges rather than the elected representatives. The Netanyahu coalition would like to remove that power from the courts and, essentially, allow the government to pass any type of legislation it likes, with a bare majority and with no judicial oversight. They point to Canada's "notwithstanding clause" in support of this concept and the second proposal.</p><p>The second proposal is to allow the Knesset, with a bare majority of any type, to overrule any decision of the Israeli Supreme Court. As I mentioned, the proponents of this change cite Canada's "notwithstanding clause" as their source of inspiration for this legislative idea.</p><p>The third proposal is to change the way judges are appointed so that the government in power is able to override other stakeholders and install any judges that it wants to install. Here, the proponents of this idea rely on the American experience. Although the U.S. Senate can reject judicial appointments, it rarely happens. Trump is clearly the example of how, in one term, a President can completely reshape the court politically. The Netanyahu government is salivating at the prospect of installing a "yes" court of the type that Trump managed to install in the U.S.</p><p>The fourth proposal involves turning the Attorney General position into purely a political appointment and requiring appointed legal advisors to provide the advice and support that the government is requesting - rather than objective and legally supportable advice.</p><p>There are reasonable arguments about these proposals - especially when examined individually. </p><p>Defining the limits of "judicial review" in any democracy is an extremely important issue. Ideally, a country should have a written constitution to set these limits and Israel does not. But even in the absence of a specific written constitution, the common law system builds legal jurisprudence over time in the form of precedents. Judicial review in Israel has been defined and delineated by Supreme Court Judges for more than 30 years and, in some cases, since the 1950s. The idea of simply taking away power from the courts and overturning a wide range of judicial precedents, legislatively, does seem somewhat questionable. Especially if it is for a particular political goal.</p><p>The "notwithstanding" clause is less defensible. Sure Canada has one but nobody really points to it as one of highlights of the <i>Canadian Charter</i>. In fact, it is probably one of the key flaws, even though it was part of a political compromise used to reach agreement on the <i>Charter</i> in the first place. But over the past few years, its use has become ever more frequent. What use are a bunch of fundamental guarantees of rights if they can simply be overridden by a thin majority? Once the use of a notwithstanding clause becomes politically acceptable and common, protected rights lose their value. They are no longer "protected." Some members of the Israeli opposition - even some on the right - have proposed, at a minimum, a law that would limit the use of this "notwithstanding" clause to situations where 2/3 or 3/4 of the Knesset would support it. That would be better and might be the basis for a compromise on this issue but it is not currently being proposed.</p><p>There is also a reasonable argument about how judges are appointed. It is unclear which country has found the ideal approach to appointing judges. One would hope that they would be appointed because of their legal and academic qualifications and their experience and not simply because of their viewpoints on certain political issues. In Israel, 3 judges currently sit on the panel that appoints judges to the Supreme Court - and any appointment has to get past these three judges - since three members of the committee can veto an appointment. The Netanyahu government argues that this means the judges "appoint themselves" to the bench. This is simply not true. At the same time, there is a reasonable argument that judges should not have deciding power in appointing new judges to the Supreme Court.</p><p>The current proposals aim to Americanize the Israeli system and allow any sitting government to appoint the judges it would like to see on the bench. This is a marked departure from the way things have been done in Israel since the 1950s and would represent a significant degradation of the level of judicial independence in Israel.</p><p>There are also reasonable legal arguments about the role of the Attorney General.</p><p>But the bigger issue, aside from examining each of these proposals individually, is to look at the whole bundle of changes as one group of proposals and to assess the effects of these changes and the context.</p><p>You have a current Prime Minister, who is, himself, facing a series of criminal charges and an ongoing criminal trial that is still in progress. As the Prime Minister, he is forging ahead with a plan to weaken the court system, install new judges, limit the power of the court itself and then provide that a bare majority (which he now has) can override any decision of the Court. </p><p>Moreover, he is also looking to pass legislation to reinstall Aryeh Deri, a thrice convicted criminal, into a senior cabinet position in the Israeli government even after the Supreme Court ruled 10-1 that he could not serve as a cabinet minister because of these convictions.</p><p>In short, there is little argument that this whole "judicial reform" plan is a calculated effort to weaken the power of the courts, eliminate judicial oversight and allow Netanyahu and his government to take control over the courts, presumably as first step towards eliminating his own legal challenges.<br /></p><p>Having a strong, independent judiciary is one of hallmarks of a liberal democracy. For this reason, this power grab by Netanyahu and his cronies has caused so much backlash in Israel. It is a recognizable and transparent attack on Israel's liberal democratic character and the type of step that could move Israel along the path towards Turkey, Mexico, Russia or other autocratic countries.</p><p>As the Netanyahu government continues to advance these legislative initiatives, the number of protesters continues to increase. This past Saturday night, there were more than 200,000 demonstrators in Tel-Aviv and hundreds of thousands in other places across the country.</p><p>Despite some of the spin - this is not simply "sour grapes." Although Netanyahu and his supporters won the election and earned the power to form the government, they were not granted the power to gut the Israeli Supreme Court and pass legislation that would significantly erode the liberal democratic nature of the state. I would expect that the size of these demonstrations will continue to increase and that we will see other types of protests including general strikes and other disruptions.</p><p><b>Terrorism and Palestinian Issues</b></p><p>There has been a significant increase in the number of Palestinian attacks on Jewish Israelis in Israel and in the territories. But that increase, at this point, cannot be blamed on this relatively new government. There had already been a growing number of attacks under the previous government.</p><p>However, under previous governments, the response to these attacks was controlled by responsible members of government, even though there were certainly excesses from time to time. Israel now has extremists in position of authority, controlling the police and the army - or trying to, at least. (The lines of authority are not entirely clear in Netanyahu's cabinet).</p><p>Following an attack last week in which terrorists killed two Jewish Israelis, Israeli settlers went on a rampage and attacked the town of Huwara (the town where the terrorists were from), killing at least one resident of the town and injuring more than 100, some critically. The government and the army failed to stop or prevent the attack. Since then, two of the attackers have been arrested. But one of Netanyahu's Ministers, Betzalel Smotrich, said that the whole town should have been burned down. He later retracted his comments. </p><p>The attack was nothing less than a "pogrom" and must be condemned in the strongest of terms. Going on a rampage and attacking innocent civilians cannot possibly be part of the policies of any supportable government. </p><p>There are several other issues but I will leave some of them for a later blog.</p><p><b>And Now For Something Completely Different: A few Other Issues:</b></p><p><b>Sports</b></p><p>As you know from some of my earlier blogs, I do enjoy watching NFL football and I am big fan of the Buffalo Bills. A very promising season came to a disappointing ending, but I digress. I came across an interesting article about the issue of violence in football and how it meshes with Jewish values. I found it to be thought provoking, though I did not agree and still watched the game (which was a very exciting super bowl). Here is<a href="https://thelehrhaus.com/commentary/american-football-a-case-study-in-the-limits-of-halakhah-and-the-claim-of-ethics/"> the Article - entitled American Football: A Case Study in the Limits of Halakha.</a> Ultimately, my take is this. The learned Rabbi uses violence and the risk of injury to propose barring the watching of spectator sports from a perspective of Jewish law. But note that the Rabbi does not cite any alternative sports as a more gainful pursuit. He mentions hockey but indicates that he knows nothing about it. Ultimately, his main point is that observant Jews should simply spend their time studying Torah or engaged in other pursuits and presumably shouldn't waste their time watching any spectator sports.</p><p>Many sports involve the risk of injury - whether that includes Olympic diving, cycling, gymnastics, skating competitions or the major competitive sports like football, hockey, basketball and soccer. When competitors push themselves to the limit - in competitions that test the "Swifter, Higher, Stronger" motto, there are bound to be injuries. Sometimes, recognizing the fact that these athletes are out there on the edge is what makes their accomplishments so exciting and so compelling.</p><p>I take the point that the NFL may have more of an obligation to address long term injury including brain injury. I for one, would also support, for example, a rule that all hockey players have to wear full face protection. </p><p>But overall, I'm not sure that I am prepared to agree with the Rabbi that all spectator sports are intrinsically a waste of time - though he is not the first one to make this argument.</p><p>I would reject that argument, especially, as a Toronto Maple Leafs' season ticket holder - who continues to hope that the Leafs' Stanley Cup drought, which has been in place since 1967, will end eventually and the Maple Leafs will host a Stanley Cup parade. Ice Hockey is, of course, a religion of its own in Canada. As someone who has played, coached and attended hockey games since the age of 6, I am not prepared to conclude that involvement in hockey, as a whole, somehow clashes with any particular Jewish values. In fact, when our kids were growing up in Toronto, all of the Jewish day schools participated annually in a one day ice hockey tournament - with as many as 12-14 teams participating from different Jewish day schools. </p><p>The Toronto Conservative shuls, for years, also ran a shul softball league.</p><p>Finding ways for people to stay in shape, often by getting involved in different group sports is probably something that should be encouraged and in accordance with Jewish values, even though we might prefer those sports that are less likely to lead to serious injury. Often people who play the sports are also spectators of the professional versions. </p><p>From the perspective of a Torontonian, as you might know, the Maple Leafs made a host of trades and roster changes at the NHL trade deadline to try and improve their playoff chances. Unfortunately, they did not pick up a new goalie. Although I am hopeful that these changes will improve the team, the Leafs will have to play Tampa and Boston in the first two rounds (Boston only if they beat Tampa). I am not entirely optimistic that they will be able to beat Tampa, let alone Boston. But one can always hope.</p><p>This will involve some very late night viewing when I am in Israel. The games tend to start at 2 a.m. or even 3 a.m. Israel time. I guess I will have to keep Toronto hours, even while spending time in Israel.</p><p>I think that is about all I have the time or energy for at this point, but I will take the time to wish everyone a happy Purim and hope that you all get the chance to eat some really good <i>hamentaschen, </i>hear the <i>Megillah</i> and, yes, have a drink or two, despite the new Health Canada guidelines (which propose eliminating all alcohol consumption).</p><p>I will try to address some other issues shortly including Israel's perspective on the Russia-Ukraine War, other proposals of the Netanyahu government and whatever else comes to mind, including perhaps my take on this year's Oscar candidates (I have gotten through 9 of the 10 nominees). For now, as Torontonians emerge from 25-30 cm of new snow - I plan to enjoy the hot weather here in Ra'anana over coming weeks.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-578904100734196662023-01-18T18:59:00.005-05:002023-01-20T06:27:23.365-05:00Supreme Bombshell: Minister Aryeh Deri Removed from Office by Israeli Supreme Court<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6BbHDQ-_Xa_UgXjAaXOJbiJdYR9M6z9L3i2BpqIVjNksM-q3zAVdcaOGB9fgGshZFjxrbnPtWl1KxQ8dy7c0k8WKV8DEUwV6hL-xq1f59ARzDy7sAWVp0dE4kUWhMJBMhGonbvJ1jWfdvZfh__tiSUCLDcur_asJrmvH5a1P7x_GWFliqbtdB0Jyx/s630/Israeli%20Supreme%20Court.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="630" height="159" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6BbHDQ-_Xa_UgXjAaXOJbiJdYR9M6z9L3i2BpqIVjNksM-q3zAVdcaOGB9fgGshZFjxrbnPtWl1KxQ8dy7c0k8WKV8DEUwV6hL-xq1f59ARzDy7sAWVp0dE4kUWhMJBMhGonbvJ1jWfdvZfh__tiSUCLDcur_asJrmvH5a1P7x_GWFliqbtdB0Jyx/w200-h159/Israeli%20Supreme%20Court.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>On this day, January 18, 2023, the Supreme Court of Israel has issued one of its most consequential decisions in the history of the State. Released at 4 p.m. Israel time (9:00 a.m. EST), the Court decided by a vote of 10-1 that Rabbi Aryeh Deri, head of the Shas party, should be removed from his position as a Minister in the current government. While my intro sounds excessively dramatic, I may have even understated the situation. Israel is on the edge of a constitutional-judicial precipice and it is very difficult to predict what we may see next.<p></p><p><b>A Bit of Background</b></p><p>Before I get to the actual decision, I just want to cover a few points, as quickly as I can, some of which I may have addressed in my previous blog. But they are important context. </p><p>1. As you know, Israel has held several consecutive elections, which have mostly resulted in "stalemates" without a clear victory by the right or the centre-left.</p><p>2. In the most recent election, the Israeli right and far right - managed to win a total of 64 seats, including 11 seats for the ultra-orthodox Sephardi party, led by Rabbi Aryeh Machluf Deri.</p><p>3. Deri was convicted in 1999 of several offences including bribery, corruption, and breach of trust. These are referred to as his "personal offences." He was also convicted of "public offences" (essentially diverting public funds illegally to a charitable organization that he supported). Deri was sentenced to 4 years in prison and served a sizeable chunk of that time.</p><p>4. After being statutorily barred from office for 7 years under Israeli law, Deri returned to public life - and was eventually crowned, once again, as the head of the Shas party. Under a previous Netanyahu government, Deri again became Minister of the Interior almost 14 years after his original conviction (the position he had held in the 1990s when he committed the earlier offences).</p><p>5. While Minister of Interior this time around, Deri was again investigated and charged with a whole series of offences including bribery, corruption, breach of trust and other offences. </p><p>6. In 2021, Deri agreed to a plea bargain where he would plead guilty to tax offences and the other charges would be dropped. He appeared in Court and told the Court that he would be leaving public life. In exchange, the Court issued a suspended 12-month sentence and ordered Deri to pay a significant fine.</p><p>7. In Israel, convicted offenders are barred from serving from the Knesset if the conviction carries the designation of "moral turpitude." The Court did not officially designate Deri's latest offence one way or the other. According to Israeli law, he should have then gone to the National Elections Committee for a determination as to whether this offence involved Moral Turpitude. If it was categorized in that way, Deri would have been barred from serving as a Minister for 7 more years.</p><p>8. Despite Deri's conviction, he ran in the most recent election as leader of the Shas party and his party won 11 seats (in a Knesset of 120). He and his party were critical to Netanyahu's ability to form a majority coalition. As part of the coalition negotiations and eventual agreement Netanyahu agreed to give Deri two Ministerial positions and also make him deputy Prime Minister.</p><p>9. Knowing that Deri faced a serious risk of being ruled unfit for office by the courts, Netanyahu's new coalition government introduced legislation, even before they were sworn in as a government, to change Israel's "Basic Law" and state that convicted offenders can be Ministers as long as they do not serve jail time.</p><p>10. The appointment of Deri to Ministerial positions was challenged in the Supreme Court of Israel (you can bring this type of question directly to the Supreme Court). The new legislation was also challenged. There were a whole range of applicants - including members of the opposition.</p><p>11. The night before the hearing was held, the new Minister of Justice, Yariv Levin, announced a four point plan to reduce the power of the Supreme Court dramatically (which I discussed in my earlier blog). Commentators viewed this as "pointing a loaded gun at the Supreme Court on the eve of the hearing."</p><p>12. The Supreme Court hearing was broadcast live on TV and went on for about 6 hours. The decision was reserved.</p><p>13. Last week, the President of the Supreme Court, Esther Chayut, took the unprecedented step of giving a prime time, detailed speech opposing the proposed reforms by the current government. She warned that this was a major attack on the judiciary and would weaken Israeli democracy and judicial independence significantly. While her speech suggested hinted at what the Supreme Court would ultimately decide in its pending decision, she did not directly address the case that she had just heard.</p><p><b>The Decision Itself</b></p><p>This is not an academic blog, even though I try, at times to edge into academic discussions. It is also not a legal blog - even though, as you know, I have a Canadian law degree and some familiarity with Israeli law. As a result, I cannot promise (or deliver) a complete legal analysis of the decision. But I can make a few relevant comments. I apologize again for the length of this blog but I realized that it would take longer to cover this than originally expected.</p><p>First of all, the decision is about 124 pages long and was released in Hebrew only initially. I slogged my way through a chunk of it in Hebrew and then gave google translate a try - with a fair degree of success. Although my Hebrew is quite good, I have to say that it was much easier to go through the decision in English. </p><p>As I have mentioned, the main take-away is that the Court disqualified Aryeh Deri as being fit to serve as a Minister.</p><p>There were 11 judges hearing the case (out of a total of 15 sitting judges). As an aside, I wonder why they didn't simply have all 15 hear the case - but I'm not going to address that.</p><p>The Court heard three challenges to Deri's appointment that it was asked to adjudicate. I have edited or paraphrased the essence of these three challenges:</p><p>1. The first challenge was the new legal amendment to the Basic Law enacted by the incoming government. As I have discussed previously, up until December 2022, the law in Israel was that a convicted criminal could not not serve as a Minister in the government if the conviction carried as designation of "moral turpitude." Generally, criminal sentences that involve prison time have been considered to be in that category. Moreover, there was no distinction between suspended and non-suspended sentences. </p><p>Normally, if a person is convicted of a crime, they can appeal to the National Elections Committee for a designation of whether or not the offence carries this designation. If so, they could be barred from serving as a Minister in the Knesset for seven years. As outlined above, Deri received a suspended sentence (one year plus fines) for Tax offences and all of the other charges against him were dropped. He stated in court that he was leaving public office and it was on this basis that the plea bargain was accepted. Shortly afterwards, he announced that he was back in business and re-entering public life. He did not go to the elections committee to determine if his offence would be designated as a "moral turpitude" offence, since he did not want to be barred for seven years (which was a likely outcome). Instead he held a press conference to announce his self-proclaimed victory over a "rigged" justice system.</p><p>The law that the new government promulgated (as described above) to allow a convicted criminal to serve as a Minister as long as the person did not serve jail time was challenged in the Court by a variety of groups. From my review of the opinions of the 11 judges, it appears that only one or two of the judges were prepared to hold that the new law was void (<i>ultra vires)</i>. However, most of the judges held that they did not need to decide the issue. </p><p>I think they felt that they would be overstepping if they were to overturn this law - and they did not need to do so anyways.</p><p>2. The second challenge was based on an Israeli doctrine of, essentially, "patent (or extreme) unreasonableness." Here the argument was, that in exercising his jurisdiction to appoint ministers, Prime Minister Netanyahu had to take into account appropriate legal considerations and failed to do so in the extreme. The Court reviewed Deri's record of multiple convictions - noting that he has been convicted of three different sets of offences, in each case while serving in the government as a Minister. It also noted that he mispresented himself to the Court to secure his plea bargain deal, that he repeatedly showed (by words and actions) disdain for the legal system and that this was an extreme case in which the failure to consider these issues violated principles of Israeli law. Of the 11 judges writing opinions (and each judge wrote at least a few paragraphs - if not multiple pages), I counted 7 judges, including Chief Justice Chayut, who were prepared to disqualify Deri on this basis. Some commentators have suggested that only five judges in total upheld this ground - so perhaps I will have to go back and read some of these opinions again. Justice Chayut, the president of the Supreme Court, held that since she was making her ruling on this ground, she did not need to decide the other two grounds. Several of the justices agreed with her. </p><p>3. The third challenge was a bit more difficult to understand. Essentially, the argument was that Deri misled the Court when he entered into his plea bargain arrangement. In a nutshell, the basis for the plea bargain was a mispresentation, wrongful manipulation of the Court and an exhibited disdain for the Israeli legal system, making him unfit for service as a Minister. At least three of the judges ruled against Deri on this basis and some others were prepared to agree to this ground along with the ground of reasonableness. This is an interesting ruling because, apparently, this type of decision would not be affected by a governmental decision to change the law of "patent unreasonableness." In other words, one of the changes proposed by Justice Minister Levin is to strip the Israeli Supreme Court of the power to invoke "patent unreasonableness" as a ground for overturning governmental action. This finding of "misrepresentation" is not reliant on a need to invoke "patent unreasonableness." In fact, some of the judges using this ground to overturn Deri's appointment expressly stated that they would not agree to call the decision to appoint Deri patently unreasonable, even though they would overrule his appointment on other legal grounds.</p><p>Ultimately, no matter how you slice it, 10 of the 11 judges held that Deri should be ruled unfit for office and removed from his position as Minister. It is unclear that the Knesset can easily overturn this decision, though it sounds like the current government will certainly try.</p><p>One judge, Justice Elron, dissented. According to Justice Elron, the decision is premature and Deri should be forced to go the National Elections Committee and get a determination as to whether his offences are such that they would attract the "Moral Turpitude" designation. Despite the spin from commentators on the Israeli right - Justice Elron did not rule that Deri was fit for office or dismiss the appeal outright. This was primarily a procedural decision - even though Justice Elron did note that Prime Minister Netanyahu should be given much more latitude than the other judges of the Court are prepared to grant.</p><p>Commentators have also noted that Justice Elron was the one non-Ashkenazi judge in this group of 11 - and that Deri is of Moroccan origin. The Shas party has attempted to portray this as a racist ruling by 10 non-Sephardi judges - even though five of them are considered "conservative" or "very conservative" judges. Many are trying to use this lone judge's dissent as a call to attack the court as racist, elite, prejudiced and unrepresentative of Israeli society. Although it would certainly make sense to have greater Sephardi representation on the Israeli Supreme Court, I really don't buy the argument that these judges were all ruling against a serial criminal because of his ethnic origin.</p><p><b><u>Now What?</u></b></p><p>We are hearing about all kinds of possible steps that the current government might now take in response.</p><p>Here are a few possibilities.</p><p>1. The government may simply press ahead with its dramatic attempt to weaken the Supreme Court. Levin's multi-part proposal is only the first step in his unrevealed plan. (As he has stated). He has indicated that the government will start by passing a law allowing it to overturn any decision of the Supreme Court by a mere majority in the Knesset. The government also plans to take away the Supreme Court's ability to use "patent unreasonableness" as a grounds for overturning governmental decisions. The government intends to change the way justices are appointed so that it can appoint more judges favourable to the political party that is in power. After pressing ahead with these changes, the government may then overrule the Supreme Court's Deri decision and reinstate him. This could then be appealed to the Supreme Court. Good luck predicting what will then happen. It would be a major jurisdictional war between the legislative and judicial branches of the state.</p><p>In the meantime, this type of legislative attack on the courts will almost certainly cause a significant increase in the number of Israelis taking to the streets to demonstrate against the government. Estimates from last Saturday night's rallies were in the range of 80,000. If the current government proceeds with plans to attack the Supreme Court, we may see demonstrations of hundreds of thousands of Israelis - and we may also soon see road blockages, general strikes and other types of civil disobedience.</p><p>2. Netanyahu might find some other creative compromise - such has appointing Deri's son (don't laugh - that is being proposed) to these Ministerial positions while keeping Deri around in a position that he is still legally able to hold.</p><p>3. Netanyahu could re-open the coalition talks and give the Shas party a range of new concessions to appease the party and Deri, though it is unclear what would be acceptable to Deri short of being cleared to serve.</p><p>I think it is very difficult, if not impossible, to predict, as of right now, which path Netanyahu will choose and what he will come up with. His coalition partners seem determined to emasculate the Supreme Court. Historically, Netanyahu has been supportive of a strong independent judiciary. But since a weakened judiciary could also benefit Netanyahu (as he struggles to get out of his own criminal proceedings), Netanyahu may well agree to use the "nuclear option" and declare all out war on the Supreme Court by enacting all of Levin's proposed changes.</p><p>Unless there is a mediated solution of some sort, this "war" between the current government and the Supreme Court could go on for quite some time and may not be readily resolvable. If the Supreme Court rejects some of the government's proposed amendments, as violating Israel's "Basic Law," we would be at an impasse. </p><p>We are in for some very interesting times indeed. In my view, much of this situation stems from the fact that Netanyahu is currently entangled in his own criminal proceedings and willing to entertain any type of coalition arrangement if it might help him extricate himself from the possibility of conviction. </p><p>Stay tuned - as there will undoubtedly be some wild developments in the coming days and weeks, if not months - or even years. As I said at the outset, the impact of this decision on the Israeli judicial and legislative system is enormous, even immeasurable. I hope that all of this will be resolved reasonably at some point, though I am very concerned about whether that is possible.</p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-51485189514244393752023-01-07T15:43:00.003-05:002023-01-08T02:02:19.596-05:00Supreme Chaos in Israel?<p></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-nrWuP0GeMKQsqT73rrT9JA6VBIH799V4zgnZlP1q425eFnetYATjDzHHNcVFPstD_LDnJwPzYFiuBGs-mS-stMhFJL2aUnEqPbWFm3-6kbJ8VKchAHtVfO2VRxaQ2uExr0_0fo0hgPiYMZFt_zGgJBfwNZPl_u2ZO-i6nwW-wLe-641jngJ713VH/s1024/Hayat.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="575" data-original-width="1024" height="113" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-nrWuP0GeMKQsqT73rrT9JA6VBIH799V4zgnZlP1q425eFnetYATjDzHHNcVFPstD_LDnJwPzYFiuBGs-mS-stMhFJL2aUnEqPbWFm3-6kbJ8VKchAHtVfO2VRxaQ2uExr0_0fo0hgPiYMZFt_zGgJBfwNZPl_u2ZO-i6nwW-wLe-641jngJ713VH/w200-h113/Hayat.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Esther Hayat, President of Supreme Court </td></tr></tbody></table>Shavua Tov and happy 2023. I am writing this week about the legal situation in Israel. We just finished one of the most challenging weeks in Israeli legal history - and this promises to mark only the beginning. I wanted to review some of the key events of the week - and add a bit of colour to the debate over these issues. According to some commentators, we are seeing the start of a legal "revolution", a coup or a dictatorial take-over of the courts by the Israeli Knesset. Others view the proposed changes as a shift of power from an unelected Supreme Court to the Knesset - the elected body. I intend to address this.<p></p><p>First, a bit of background. As you may know from reading the news (or maybe from reading one of my blogs), the current government coalition includes the appointment of Aryeh Deri as a Minister. Deri has been installed as the Minister of Health and the Minister of the Interior - as well as the Vice Prime Minister as part of the coalition agreements that fomed the current government. He is the head of the Shas party, which won 11 seats in the recent elections.</p><p>Deri, as you may also recall, was convicted of bribery, corruption and breach of public trust in 1999. According to Israeli law, he was then barred from serving as a Minister for 7 years. After spending some time in jail - and then doing whatever else he was doing for several years - he returned to politics as the leader of the Shas party and eventually became, once again, the Minister of the Interior as part of a Netanyahu government. Deri was previously the Minister of the Interior at the time his original offences were committed. He had now been "rehabilitated" and was able to return to the scene of the crime (in the very same position).</p><p>While serving as Minister of the Interior the second time, Deri came under investigation for a new series of offences. This led to several criminal charges. Ultimately, in 2021, Deri reached a plea bargain agreement at which he was convicted of tax fraud and given a suspended sentence along with a fine. At his plea bargain hearing in court, Deri stated that he was leaving public life and willing to "accept his punishment." The Court accepted the plea bargain arrangement and it was formalized. All of the other criminal charges were dismissed.</p><p>The Court did not decide whether this conviction would bar Deri from serving as a Minister for 7 years - that decision was left to a future court. However, just days after his conviction, and his promise to stay out of public life, Deri announced that he was returning to politics and would lead the Shas party in the next election. He referred to his pledge in court to leave public life as a "misunderstanding." Following Shas' successful campaign, Deri and his Shas party negotiated terms of the coalition agreement that included the appointment of Deri to two Ministerial positions and the position of Deputy Prime Minister.</p><p>Knowing that the appointment would likely be overturned by the Supreme Court, the new government also passed a new law (now known as the "Deri Law") stating that a criminal conviction without actual jail time does not bar a person from becoming a Minister. That law passed three readings and became law in lightning fast time. Shortly afterwards, a petition was brought to the Supreme Court, challenging both the law and the appointment of Deri as a Minister. The law was challenged on a number of grounds including the "reasonableness" of the appointment itself, the violation of Israel's basic laws (Israel's closest thing to a constitution) and some other grounds. The hearing was scheduled for, and took place on Thursday January 5, 2023.</p><p>The night before the hearing, the newly appointed Justice Minister, Yariv Levin, held a press conference at 8 p.m. to announce his intended legislative reforms to the Supreme Court and its power. Levin set out a four point plan, which he referred to as "the first step" of his proposed changes. His plan included the following:</p><p>1. Enacting an "override" clause that would allow the Knesset, with a simple majority, to override any decision of the Supreme Court that had nullified a law that had been passed. Some supporters of the law pointed to the Canadian <i>Charter</i> as an example of a constitutional system that includes the power of the legislative body to override a judicial decision. </p><p>2. Changing the appointment system to allow the ruling party to have a greater say in the appointment of judges. Currently, judges are appointed by a judicial selection committee that includes representatives from the Knesset, the Israeli bar association and the judiciary. Levin has proposed changing the numbers so that the politicians have the greatest say over who gets appointed to the country's highest bench.</p><p>3. Cancelling the concept of "reasonableness" as a grounds for judicial review of a particular governmental decision. This has been a part of Israeli jurisprudence since the 1950s, though there is a reasonable argument that the use of "reasonableness" as a grounds for judicial review of governmental decisions was greatly expanded much later in Israel's history, without a legislative initiative to create a foundation for this jurisprudential expansion. Unlike Canada or the U.S. - or many other countries- Israel does not have a written constitution. Judges do rely on the common law, including principles from other countries - and sometimes principles of Jewish law - to ground their decisions. </p><p>4. Ensuring that "legal advisors" appointed to advise the government are essentially government agents, appointed by the particular government in power - rather than independent legal advisors. Essentially, the idea here is that any decisions made about ongoing judicial issues - will be made in a way that is consistent with the government of the day's particular aims.</p><p>The timing of this press conference was particular troubling. It has been described by some commentators as placing a "loaded gun" on the table, next to the Supreme Court, just before the hearing starts. The Court was about to commence its hearing - that involved questions of reasonableness and judicial review - and here was Levin telling the Court that he was about to take away the Court's power to review decisions on either of these grounds. When combined with Levin's tone, which I would describe as generally threatening, the overall picture was a major threat to the independence of the judiciary in Israel. Quite frankly, the scene reminded me of a scene in one of the Batman movies, where the villain is announcing his plan to take over the world. </p><p>Of course that is an exaggeration (I hope). I am not saying that none of these proposed reforms have any legitimacy. In some of the cases, there is definitely room for discussion and change. For example, there is a reasonable argument that judges should not be appointing other judges. After all, the judges might be inclined to appoint judges who agree with their viewpoints exclusively.</p><p>There is also quite a bit of room for a discussion about the limits of "reasonableness" as a ground for challenging a government decision. If the proposed judicial review of an enacted law or a governmental action is grounded in the violation of another law - or a the violation of a general principle of the common law, it may well be appropriate. But if the Court has the power to determine that a governmental action is simply "not reasonable," that can be highly problematic.</p><p>But even though there is plenty of room for discussion about judicial change, this government is not proposing a dialogue. Instead, it is quite clearly threatening to reduce the power of the Court drastically. It is announcing a plan to limit the power of the Court to reign in governmental action (legislative and executive). On the eve of a key Supreme Court hearing involving these very questions, the government is threatening to install its own judges, take away the power of the judges to judicially review decisions, give the government the power to override the decisions in any event - and appoint legal advisors who will simply help the government to do whatever it wants.</p><p>When viewed as an overall package - in the context of the appointment of a recently convicted criminal as a Minister in the government - and while the Prime Minister is struggling to extricate himself from his own criminal proceedings, this package of "reforms" and the timing of the announcement can only be viewed as a noxious proposal to disembowel the Supreme Court of Israel and enable the present government with its 64-56 majority to pass just about any law it chooses to promulgate. </p><p>The hearing proceeded on Thursday before a panel of 11 Supreme Court judges. As a Canadian lawyer (and someone who has passed all of the Israeli bar exams but not been called to the bar in Israel), I find these types of proceedings incredibly interesting. We heard all kinds of arguments, biting questions from the judges to counsel from all sides and blistering arguments. Ultimately, the case was reserved and we await the decision of the judges. It is unclear when the decision will be released. It could be sometime this week, it could take many more weeks - it could even be months, though I am sure the judges appreciate the urgency and importance of the decision.</p><p>If the judges decide to rule that Deri cannot serve as a Minister, the current government will almost certainly exercise the "nuclear option." They will pass the "override law" and then pass a law to override the Court's decision. The "override law" itself and possibly the subsequent piece of legislation, would then make their way to the Supreme Court for a hearing. This is the definition of a constitutional -legal crisis - as it would involve a tug of war between the legislative and judicial branches of government without any clear document that spells out how these disputes are to be resolved. </p><p>On the other hand, if the Court rules that Deri can serve as a Minister and it decides not to intervene, it will be, in my view, a sign that the Court has been browbeaten into submission by Levin's hearing- eve threats. The Court may decide that if it refuses to get involved, it will forestall, temporarily or permanently, the further attacks on the Court's authority. It is far from clear that this tactic will work.</p><p>In the Israel version of "Meet the Press," which was broadcast Saturday night after Shabbat, several panelists appeared to discuss these matters. Some of the strongest opponents of Levin's proposals included former Chief Justice Aharon Barak and former Minister of Finance Avigdor Lieberman. Barak stated that these proposals were an unquestionable attempt to weaken democracy in Israel and called for Israelis to protest in every legal way possible. He warned that if these changes were implemented, Israel's legal system would start to look like the systems in Hungary, Turkey and, eventually, Russia. Lieberman stated that Netanyahu was behind all of these changes, which were all intended to lay the groundwork for Netanyahu to end his own legal proceedings.</p><p>To his credit, Levin himself showed up on TV and gave a spirited defence of his proposals, which he stated that he has been planning for more than 20 years. He was happy to take on any questions. The only questions he dodged were about the "next steps" in his plan - which was especially troubling since he had stated earlier that these four initiatives were only his first step.</p><p>As I mentioned above, there are some reasonable arguments over some of the proposed changes and Levin did a good job in presenting those defences. But, ultimately, the take-away, even from Levin's well-rehearsed appearance, was that since the voters elected this government, it should be able to do whatever it wants and not worry about judicial scrutiny. While Levin calls this a "strengthening of democracy," it is really a recipe for "tyranny of the majority" and a demonstration of why democratic, rule of law countries require a constitution and a robust judicial system. It is the courts that act as a backstop to uphold the rule of law and to protect the rights of each individual in a society, including those who are most powerless. Without any kind of judicial safeguards, it is frightening to imagine what laws might be enacted, especially by a government that is beholden to several extremist parties with high ranking ministerial positions. Unfortunately, we may soon find out.</p><p>The new Netanyahu government is not only planning to set its sights on the judicial system. Another proposal that has been floated, though not yet formally proposed, is to close some of Israel's public broadcasters. Many commentators have argued that this is an effort to minimize governmental criticism and is a blatant attack on freedom of the press. As one of the Meet the Press commentators pointed out this evening, the government is starting with attacks on the press and the judiciary - which are generally the two major sources of criticism and accountability for any particular government.</p><p>For some, alarm bells are sounding everywhere and the fire has already started. For others, there is still a "wait and see" component, with a hopefulness that cooler heads will prevail. The organization "Free Israel" held a major demonstration in Tel-Aviv tonight (which several of my friends attended) and there is every reason to believe that the number and size of demonstrations will continue to increase as this government begins to enact increasingly questionable laws.</p><p>I do believe that the Supreme Court's decision on the Deri law and the reaction to it will be a major milestone. If the Court overrides the Deri appointment, which many expect, we are likely to see this relatively localized fire turn into a five-alarm blaze. I am not sure what will happen next, though some Israelis are hoping that there are some more moderate Likud members who might start to think about putting the interests of the country above the interest of keeping Netanyahu in power at all possible costs.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-86150034373100084862023-01-03T09:46:00.002-05:002023-01-04T06:30:09.194-05:00Israeli Government Update January 2023<p>The new Israeli government has been sworn in, just in time to mark the end of 2022 and the start of 2023. As widely reported and discussed, this is the furthest right wing government that Israeli has ever had. The government includes 32 members of the right wing Likud party along with 14 members of the far right Religionist Zionist party, 11 Ultra Orthodox Shas party members and 7 Ultra Orthodox United Torah Judaism representatives. </p><p>The proposed agenda of this coalition, as set out in the various coalition agreements between the Likud party and these coalition members, if enacted, will threaten the rule of law in Israel, the independence of the judiciary, the rights of minorities, gender equality, the religion-state status quo and it will also have a lasting and potentially exposive impact on the Israeli-Arab conflict.</p><p><b>Rule of Law and Judicial Independence</b></p><p>Perhaps it is no surprise that a religion-based governing coalition would take inspiration from Jewish prayer. One part of the <i>Amidah </i>prayer (recited three times daily by observant Jews) is the attribute of God as one who "straightens the crooked." ("<i>zokef k'fufim"</i>). So the first order of business for this government, even before it was officially installed, was to pass a Knesset law that would allow convicted criminals to serve as cabinet ministers. This law was passed in the Knesset last week so that Aryeh Deri, the leader of the Shas party, can serve as Minister of the Interior and Health Minister and then subsequently, Minister of Finance. He will also be the Deputy Prime Minister. </p><p>Deri was convicted of bribery, fraud and breach of trust in 1999 for offences committed while he was previously the Minister of the Interior. He served his prison sentence and then rejoined Israeli politics years later, to eventually take back his previous position as head of the Shas party. Under Netanyahu's previous government, Deri again became Minister of the Interior. In 2021, Deri pled guilty to tax fraud and was given a suspended sentence. At his sentencing hearing, he stated that he would be leaving political life. Nevertheless, he promptly reneged and ran, once again, as leader of the Shas party. Under current Israeli law, he would be barred from serving as a Minister. So as a term of the coalition agreement, the first order of business for this government was to pass a law overriding the current law and allowing convicted criminals to serve as ministers. That law passed three readings last week and became law. The crooked Deri has been legally "straightened," even though I would venture to say that is probably not the type of straightening envisioned in the prayer.</p><p>The law has been challenged in the Supreme Court of Israel as violating the "Basic Law" of the State of Israel - which is the closest thing Israel has to a constitution. The hearing is scheduled to be held on Thursday January 5, 2023. However, the Supreme Court will be making its decision under an ominous storm cloud. The current government has stated that if the Supreme Court invalidates the law, the government will enact a new law overriding the Supreme Court's power. In short, Netanyahu's government has vowed to ensure that the convicted Deri can serve as a Minister, no matter what kind of legislative gymnastics are required.</p><p>This fight is not inconsequential. Several other members of this government are either facing charges, being investigated or already have criminal records. Included among them, of course, is Netanyahu himself, who is eagerly awaiting a favourable disposition of his criminal hearing, presumably as an unpublicized term of the coalition agreements that he has signed. Netanyahu is currently fighting charges of breach of trust, corruption and bribery. A favourable outcome for Aryah Deri is likely to assist Netanyahu in several different ways including setting the groundwork for a plea bargain deal that will not have a deleterious effect on Netanyahu's continued political life.</p><p>The newly appointed Minister of Justice, Yariv Levin, a staunch Netanyahu loyalist, has vowed to completely overhaul the justice system, though he has not set out everything he intends to do. However, he has made it clear that he aims to weaken the power of the Israeli Supreme Court significantly and revamp the appointment process for Supreme Court justices to ensure that politically compatible judges are appointed. Levin is charged with passing the "override" bill that will allow the Knesset by a simple majority to override any decision of the Israeli Supreme Court. A weakened and less independent judiciary will unquestionably impact the rule of law in Israel - significantly and negatively.</p><p><b>Minority Rights and Religion-State Issues</b></p><p>The new government has proposed several wide-ranging legislative changes to assist the Ultra-Orthodox and Orthodox communities. Yeshivas that do not teach secular subjects will be guaranteed funding. Yeshiva students will receive a large increase in monthly stipends that they are paid by the state while studying. The exemption from military service for the ultra-Orthodox will be strengthened. The law will be changed to allow businesses in Israel to refuse to serve certain groups for religious reasons (something like what the U.S. Supreme Court has been doing with respect to the LGBTQ+ community). </p><p>The first order of business for this group here yesterday was to roll back certain tax changes that the previous government had implemented including taxes on sugary sweet beverages like Coca Cola (to try to fight growing rates of diabetes in Israel) and on disposable paper and plastic products (to try and help the environment). The ultra-Orthodox argued that both of these taxes affected their communities disproportionately and demanded that these taxes be rolled back. Yesterday, the new Minister of Finance, Betzalel Smotrich announced that both of these taxes were ending immediately.</p><p>I should mention that the Speaker of the House is Israel's first openly gay speaker, Amir O'Hana. This was no issue for most Likud Knesset members or members from the rest of the Knesset, other than the Likud's other coalition partners. Members of the Shas, UTJ and RZ parties covered their faces or looked away while O'Hana was giving his first speech as speaker of the house. He vowed to ensure that all Israelis are treated equally and fairly including those who are members of minority groups even in the face of this proposed discrimination law. Some of his Ultra-Orthodox and nationalist Orthodox coalition members this week attacked O'Hana as unfit for the job and called him "sick" and "in need of help" because of his sexual orientation. With friends like these, who needs enemies? These are after all his coalition partners who got him elected to the speaker position.</p><p>O'Hana was hand-picked by Netanyahu to serve as speaker of the house. Some Shas and UTJ members this week said that this was a poke in the eye by Netanyahu since these parties have called for several anti-LGBTQ+ steps to be taken by the government. For example, they want to ban Pride parades, limit accesss to same-sex adoption and fertility treatments and allow discrimination in housing and other services agains the LGBTQ+ community. It is unclear whether Netanyahu is serving notice that he will protect the LGBTQ+ community by appointing O'Hana and that his government will refuse to enact agreed upon coalition promises - or whether he intends to try and use O'Hana as a fig leave to cover up for other discriminatory steps that his government plans to take as agreed upon with the other parties. We will have to wait and see.</p><p>The Ultra-Orthodox and Religious Zionist parties have also called for increasing power in the hands of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, undoing the changes of the previous government that partially demonopolized Kashrut rules across Israel, making it harder to convert to Judaism, limiting immigration, giving the Chief Rabbi of the army much greater power over soldiers, barring non-Orthodox prayer services at the Kotel (Western Wall) or anywhere near it - including closing the "Israel area" where egalitarian prayer takes place and many, many other initiaves. It is unclear how much of this agenda will actually get enacted - but the coalition has a majority and has some very motivated Knesset members. It will be difficult for the opposition to stop them. The only realistic reign on some of this agenda will come from centrist and centre-right Likud party members themselves who may not be prepared to back some of the more extremist measures.</p><p><b>Arab-Israeli Issues</b></p><p>On the one hand, Netanyahu has vowed to make peace with Saudi Arabia and to continue to expand the Abraham Accords, which would be beneficial for the entire region if it were to occur. On the other hand, the coalition agreements that Netanyahu as entered into have led to the appointment of extremists such as Itamar Ben-Gvir and Betzalel Smotrich in positions that will now give them control over the police and parts of the military in the disputed territories and other parts of Israel. Ben-Gvir is someone who was deemed unfit for national military service due to his extreme views. He is now in a position to implement police and military policy.</p><p>Early today, Ben-Gvir visited the Temple Mount - the area above the Kotel - at the <i>Al-Aqsa </i>Mosque. Ostensibly, he was visiting to mark the 10th of Tevet, a Jewish fast day. But Ben-Gvir and many of his supporters have stated that they intend to change the status quo, allow Jews to pray near the mosque regularly and, ultimately, rebuild the Temple on that site.</p><p>The Religious Zionist party also plans to expropriate more Arab land, ease the regulations for when soldiers can open fire on suspected threats, grant blanket immunity to Israeli soldiers for actions while on duty and take several other steps that are sure to inflame the Arab -Israeli conflict. These steps if taken would upend many of Israel's long standing policies that were implemented to ensure that Israeli soldiers always act within carefully measured rules. Once again, it remains to be seen whether Netanyahu will be prepared to reign in these extremists - especially while Netanyahu's trial is still proceeding.</p><p>Overall, the early signs are that this coalition will try to move quickly and implement as much of its agenda as it can, as hastily as possible. If the coalition retains support from all of its members, it can pass just about anything by a 64-56 margin. I expect that we will see very large demonstrations in Israel very shortly within Israel - as well as more violent confrontations between Arabs and Jews across Israel and the disputed territories.</p><p>One possible difficulty for the coalition may be internal. There is a sense that Netanyahu held a "fire sale" and gave up too much to the coalition partners while retaining less power than his party should have kept for itself. There are several disaffected, high ranking Likud members who did not receive plum cabinet posts and who have started to openly criticize Netanyahu for the first time in five years. These include David Biton, David "Dudu" Amselem, and others. Former Likud party member Dan Meridor appeared on TV on Saturday night and called this government that "greatest threat to democracy that Israel has ever seen."</p><p>If four or five of these Likud members decide not to pass some of this legislation, that could lead to a governmental crisis. Ben-Gvir seems to believe that he can increase his support and become the Prime Minister one day - by outflanking the Likud on the far right. He will want to head into the next election portraying the Likud as a bunch of "leftists" who refused to enact his agenda. </p><p>While that is a scary prospect that can't be ruled out, the Israeli public is not there, in my view. Ben-Gvir's plan could backfire. If this government collapses, the extremists could lose significant support.</p><p>That being said, I expect that they all realize this. As big as their egos are, I think the right wing parties recognize this as being a golden opportunity and intend to maximize the opportunity. Despite the anticipated demonstrations, increased levels of violence, internal and external threats and worldwide condemnation for some of the anticipated moves, I would expect that this government is not about to collapse any time soon, though it may not make it all the way through a full four-year term.</p><p>I have not gone through a comprehensive list of all of the proposed legislative changes, all of the ministers or each of the coalition agreements. Much of this information is readily available on various sites if you wish to delve deeper into this. But I have picked out some of the key proposals that have received widespread press coverage in Israel and other parts of the world and I have shared some of my concerns.</p><p>There are many people in Israel - and other parts of the world - who support much of this agenda. According to some recent polls in Israel, somewhere close to 42% of the Israeli public are happy with this government. There is also support from ouside of Israel from some sectors. Just two days ago, someone emailed me an article by Alex Traiman of the Canadian Institute for Jewish Research, arguing that this new government reflects the "will of the people," is not "anti-Democratic" and called this new government a "tremendous achievement." I won't say which friend or family member forwarded the article to me. But I guess we will have to wait and see what happens and which pieces of legislation the government actually implements. That being said, in my view, the partial list set out above includes quite a number of dangerous, anti-democratic, steps that are unlikely to be viewed by many as anything "tremendous." </p><p>As I mentioned at the outset, I think we will see significant challenges to the rule of law in Israel, initiatives that threaten minority rights, gender equality, Arab-Israeli relations and a host of other initiatives that will have a very negative impact on Israel. Hopefully many of these changes will be reversible.</p><p>Former Prime Minster Yair Lapid gave some closing remarks on his last day of his office. He reviewed the achievements of his government in what was essentially a "State of the Union" type address. He closed by saying, "we are leaving you with a State that it is in very good shape - please don't destroy it. We will be back soon."</p><p><b>Other Notes</b></p><p>New Year's Eve and New Year's Day came and went in Israel with little fanfare in most quarters. Like Christmas, New Year's Day is not a holiday in Israel. It was a normal workday with everything open and business as usual. There were certainly New Year's parties across the country though there was no special TV programming, national concerts or other official celebrations. </p><p>As we enter 2023, I am still hoping that some of the sports teams I cheer for will come up big in 2023. </p><p>Last night, as you might know, the Canadian junior ice hockey team won an incredible overtime game against Slovakia. The overtime goal by Connor Bedard (projected to be the next ice hockey superstar) was an stunning piece of art. Canada will play the United States on Wednesday night in what is sure to be another hard fought game - with the winner ending up in the finals on Thursday against Sweden or Czechia. The games start at 1:30 a.m. here in Israel but I am happy that I stayed up to watch last night's contest.</p><p>I was also planning to watch the Buffalo Bills play last night (after the hockey game, of course) but as you may have heard, this game was stopped early in the first quarter due to the massive injury suffered by Bills cornerback Damar Hamlin, who went into cardiac arrest. Hamlin was taken to the hospital and is said to be in critical condition. Hopefully, he will recover from this though the nature of his injuries at this point is unclear.</p><p>Not sure what the NFL will do after taking the rare step of postponing a game due to a serious injury. Perhaps the league is waiting and hoping for good news to be able to resume on some kind of positive note. At some point, I would assume that the league will resume play though I think any decision will be affected by Hamlin's condition.</p><p>As I have written in other blogs, Buffalo has one of the best football teams it has ever had and I have been super excited about watching them play. Hopefully Hamlin, the league and the Bills themselves will overcome this injury and the Bills will wind up winning the Superbowl. I am willing to give up some sleep when I am here to watch some of these games. These games tend to start at 3:30 a.m. Israel time (if they are the evening games) and end early in the morning. So I guess I am on a bit of a crazy schedule.</p><p>I think I will wrap things up for now here - and wish everyone all the best in 2023 - best of health, success, peace, stability and wise decision making for everyone. </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-73630456430923955752022-12-26T11:36:00.000-05:002022-12-26T11:36:22.548-05:00December 2022 Update from Israel<p>As we close out 2022, I am overdue to put together another blog. I could probably devote this whole blog to political developments in Israel - but that would be a depressing post and would probably bore those of us you who are less interested in Israeli politics. So I have instead put together a smattering of items. Hopefully one or more will interest you. That's not to say that I will skip Israeli politics entirely - I certainly won't. But this will be more of one of those "stream of consciousness blogs" hitting on a few different topics. Hopefully it will all come together.</p><p><b>"Holiday Season" in Israel</b></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBDKXnpp3vcVLPqZRWZhm9W5LsRXUcB2S5MDdaT9T7T_4Go7KDxzgdIdUYlcpKnJ0rJfwlP-Ws26ybWlQf3A2vSPjStGfJ44lvv31BZP_dp-ts8jAzojAa3kaE67TdsK_EqupQhCA3H8XoFlWmCKmKMoxVykNUTRuVpWZvV1D_elyUDsf7AnJsO2cO/s2992/20221224_141555.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2992" data-original-width="2992" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBDKXnpp3vcVLPqZRWZhm9W5LsRXUcB2S5MDdaT9T7T_4Go7KDxzgdIdUYlcpKnJ0rJfwlP-Ws26ybWlQf3A2vSPjStGfJ44lvv31BZP_dp-ts8jAzojAa3kaE67TdsK_EqupQhCA3H8XoFlWmCKmKMoxVykNUTRuVpWZvV1D_elyUDsf7AnJsO2cO/w200-h200/20221224_141555.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>This year, I came to Israel a bit earlier than usual in December since we had guests arriving for Chanuka. I usually tend to come back to Israel later in the month, once things quieten down in Toronto. For me, one of the nice aspects of being in Israel in December is the complete lack of Christmas and Christmas celebrations.<p></p><p>I don't mean that in a negative way towards those who celebrate. But in Canada, the November-December period is the time of year when I am reminded that I don't really belong. Decorations and trees are everywhere - in stores, office places, malls. The Second Cup that I go to in the mornings to grab a coffee starts playing all Christmas music 24/7 the day after Halloween. Is that really necessary? I guess if the majority of people enjoy it - then great. Even for people who fully embrace the holiday - I think they probably used to start getting ready in early December. Now the whole month of November has also become entirely Christmas oriented in many places.</p><p>I grew up in an environment in which in my early years the school I attended recited the "Lord's Prayer," (and forced everyone to do so) even though it was a "public school." We had Christmas concerts, Christmas Carols and other trappings of the ubiquitous Christian majority culture. As one the small minority who did not celebrate these holidays, I always felt that I just didn't fit in this time of year. </p><p>So for me, it is somewhat refreshing to spend this time in a place where things are completely different. Christmas in Israel, in most areas, is a normal work day. Everything is open and operates on a normal, non-holiday schedule. In some predominantly Christian areas, there are certainly festivities, decorations and celebrations. In Nazareth, Bethlehem, parts of Jerusalem and other areas, Christmas is celebrated actively. I certainly have nothing against that and wish everyone celebrating a Merry Christmas. But, around the rest of Israel, there is a totally different December atmosphere.</p><p>Although Chanuka coincides this year with Christmas, it is a relatively minor holiday. Some places have a Chanukiah set up for lighting (for example, this restaurant that we were at the other day - pictured above). But since it is not really a major holiday, most places haven't really done any decorating. No one is wearing ugly Chanuka sweaters in Israel (even though it is cold and rainy) and people are working as usual. Our visiting guests couldn't believe it since I think it was their first "holiday season" in Israel. </p><p>Our big holiday period is the September-October holidays - from Rosh Hashanah to Simchat Torah - or again over Pesach (Passover). During those time periods, many businesses are closed, there are festivals around the country and many people are off work, travelling or celebrating. I could imagine that Yom Kippur in Israel would feel very imposing to someone who is not Jewish since everything is closed. Though I don't know of any radio station in Israel that would start playing Yom Kippur and other high holiday music 6 weeks before the actual holiday.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoMEtueIsGf8BZfZImT4i2nF06Ky9-efNhzS_HHPADeQBpDCed8TapKK3I19O09hU53wTPsxIOaEtgQkjkSpiKqub88IscL5gj2QN5GT2_sDtFPuxtJiAd1DKUOMwcFMTh0wC-07x6egSByH7ZgVBHB-sTmgDOzR7hGwShtf2TpU9q8L7aIdlZNqTB/s2992/20221225_105440.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2992" data-original-width="2992" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoMEtueIsGf8BZfZImT4i2nF06Ky9-efNhzS_HHPADeQBpDCed8TapKK3I19O09hU53wTPsxIOaEtgQkjkSpiKqub88IscL5gj2QN5GT2_sDtFPuxtJiAd1DKUOMwcFMTh0wC-07x6egSByH7ZgVBHB-sTmgDOzR7hGwShtf2TpU9q8L7aIdlZNqTB/w200-h200/20221225_105440.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>In any event, I have been honoured to attend holiday celebrations with my friends in Canada - whether that is Christmas events, Diwali, or other religious occasions. And of course one of the great things about Canada is that people can feel free to celebrate whatever religious or other ethnic or cultural events they choose to celebrate. But the holiday season still reminds those who don't celebrate Christmas that they are very much a minority - starting as early as Halloween. I might add - that even in 2022 - Ontario, Canada is still a place where the government funds Catholic school education but not that of other religious groups. That's a bit of a digression but my overall point - simply - is that it is nice to be somewhere else for a change that time of year. <p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGzEgVGdN3IO1hJZ7L440z2im38TNJxQtTQ6-BhuQHNjsInRBJRyvC6N6wEKoU4Chfw8wG5YD6Dgr4oQfXOiFOHOW-aMF8O9f8n6T4yph8lcubXgyT1zfDpCG9vlL22xRLqWGmSqEH-WK8Hs2iAYL5yxAgrSLkEvmFf1v8WjMtcZ8a51HPwVVEQqAF/s2992/20221222_161847.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2992" data-original-width="2992" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGzEgVGdN3IO1hJZ7L440z2im38TNJxQtTQ6-BhuQHNjsInRBJRyvC6N6wEKoU4Chfw8wG5YD6Dgr4oQfXOiFOHOW-aMF8O9f8n6T4yph8lcubXgyT1zfDpCG9vlL22xRLqWGmSqEH-WK8Hs2iAYL5yxAgrSLkEvmFf1v8WjMtcZ8a51HPwVVEQqAF/w200-h200/20221222_161847.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>We did mark Chanuka by lighting the candles each night, eating some potato latkes, trying some donuts (I tried to minimize my consumption of the donuts...). But it was fairly low key.<p></p>We lit this beautiful Chanukiah that a friend of ours made. <br /><p>Here you can see an example of some of the types of "sofganyot" (filled donuts, basically) that are sold this time of year.</p><p>And even though we actively try to minimize the frying - every once in a while (like during Chanuka and Pesach) - we do enjoy a few potato latkes. I like them much more than donuts personally. In fact, I'll admit that I like them too much - especially with home made apple sauce or fresh sour cream. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFiSTA58LfoCU8K5w_4O0IjupcY7xA-JOzVbgi4bpoUzi-TOYsZRlnBKeJ9I5lrOYdEqsLOV2TC6BEM0iBhlpQ9wO9VZMIdpqrMw00g1CADKqBsDudfQSI8hLfjCjGrOFm2VmMfPrWf_zMdFW5nTkQ1nLyjJ-5DFpaWNvye79ESBpHNOS9mkSn-rZC/s2992/20221222_075250.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2992" data-original-width="2992" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFiSTA58LfoCU8K5w_4O0IjupcY7xA-JOzVbgi4bpoUzi-TOYsZRlnBKeJ9I5lrOYdEqsLOV2TC6BEM0iBhlpQ9wO9VZMIdpqrMw00g1CADKqBsDudfQSI8hLfjCjGrOFm2VmMfPrWf_zMdFW5nTkQ1nLyjJ-5DFpaWNvye79ESBpHNOS9mkSn-rZC/w200-h200/20221222_075250.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>Unlike the custom for many American Jews and some Canadians, we didn't go out for Chinese food on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. Partially, that is due my discussion above, that December 25th is more or less a normal work day here. But the other reason is that there are relatively few Chinese restaurants.<div><br /></div><div>Nevertheless, we actually wound up going out to pan-Asian restaurant - "Queen Lu" in Ra'anana - which is a mixture of Japanese and Thai, coincidentally on Saturday night December 24. The food was quite good and the service was great. Queen Lu is a Kosher meat restaurant - so they have meat and fish dishes as well as vegetarian options. </div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Sports Comments</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>By far, the biggest event in Israel for the year - and probably for the past 4 years - was the World Cup. It was so huge here that the TV stations were wishing people a "Happy World Cup Holiday" throughout the tournament, even though Israel wasn't even participating. Thousands of Israelis flew to Qatar to attend even though they were not the most welcome guests. Qatar does not have diplomatic relations with Israel but allowed Israeli to fly direct to Doha just for the World Cup. Despite some anti-Israeli incidents that took place during the event, nothing major occurred (that I am aware of) and the Israeli soccer (football) fans returned safely. </div><div><br /></div><div>Israelis were mixed on whether to cheer for Messi and Argentina or Mbappe and France in the finals - but I think, on balance, the pendulum was on the Argentina side and a majority of Israelis were cheering for Argentina and were happy to see Messi win. Sure there is a sense here (like everywhere else) that FIFA tournaments tend to be rigged. After all, the Qataris own the Paris-St Germaine club where Messi plays - and Qatar was hosting the tournment.....and Argentina (Messi's team) won even though they were not one of the top favourites to win. But all that being said, there were some fantastic games and I thoroughly enjoyed watching many of them. It was fun to see Canada play - even though our national team was not able to come up with a win. Canada did score its first ever World Cup goal and that was exciting.</div><div><br /></div><div>Other than watching some international soccer, I am not really interested in the Israeli sports scene. But I am excited about some other sports and sports tournaments which are a bit challenging to watch here in Israel.</div><div><br /></div><div>As you might know, the annual World Junior Hockey Tournament opens today in Halifax, Nova Scotia and Moncton, New Brunswick. For hockey fans - this is quite a big deal. This year's tournament features the much touted 17 year old - Connor Bedard - who is expected to lead the Canadian team and promises to be one of professional hockey's next great stars. Of course, trying to watch these games in Israel is quite a challenge - because of timing and difficulties in streaming the games. But I'm hoping to watch a few, especially towards the end of the tournament. I don't imagine that a huge number of my fellow Israelis will be watching - but that's their loss.</div><div><br /></div><div>I am also super excited about the Buffalo Bills this year - who are among the top 3 teams in the NFL with only 2 games to play. Maybe this will be the year to exorcise those demons of the past - where the Bills played in the Super Bowl four years in a row (1991-1994) without winning any of them. As a Torontonian, I grew up travelling down to Buffalo periodically to attend games - in what has to be the world's worst professional stadium. But the Buffalo tailgate party, the fan enthusiasm and the general excitement often make up for the terrible stadium. We used to bring barbecues, kosher meat and other foods, a decent supply of beer and whatever else was needed to enjoy tailgating starting at 7 or 8 in the morning - even on snow days. Sometimes, the weather was so severe that we left early. But since Canada does not have an NFL team - Buffalo is really Toronto's "home team" and I would love to see them win.</div><div><br /></div><div>I have also been watching the odd Toronto Maple Leafs game. The Leafs have one of the top records in hockey this year but Leaf fans know that hockey seasons usually end in disappointment. After all, the last Maple Leaf win was in 1967. Since I still have a share of Leaf season tickets - I am cheering for them - but I'm not yet convinced that this season will end well. Watching hockey from Israel is always a challenge since there is very little interest here and the times are less than convenient. But I have seen a few games - and during the playoffs I am willing to sacrifice some sleep to watch my favourite teams play. But that is not until late April - so I have some time.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Travelling Around<span> </span></b></div><div><b><span><br /></span></b></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDbz-KLS__nFv9NMxaqlnsH18M0prBkRejWHWMIibKbLqGQ0Dfg7VjXlCbzxdRqM8qwh0ukfP1eC8Ssei9K7WdhYh5VHMt3j79TjnXSQkNl5AFhtRSBDCCHN-lWAcL1FJ-mBSgajixd51_5KE1lacMdrJ2iJaonza61dV7aco9QmW4V_S9pqLf1CBU/s2992/20221223_054937.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2992" data-original-width="2992" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDbz-KLS__nFv9NMxaqlnsH18M0prBkRejWHWMIibKbLqGQ0Dfg7VjXlCbzxdRqM8qwh0ukfP1eC8Ssei9K7WdhYh5VHMt3j79TjnXSQkNl5AFhtRSBDCCHN-lWAcL1FJ-mBSgajixd51_5KE1lacMdrJ2iJaonza61dV7aco9QmW4V_S9pqLf1CBU/w200-h200/20221223_054937.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>If you are planning to be in Israel - and looking for something fun to do with young kids - the Yodfat Monkey Forrest in north-central Israel features a large collection of squirrel monkeys that roam free in the park. Kids love feeding them (with park-supplied food). So do many adults.</div><div><br /></div><div>The park also has a collection of other animals wandering the park including sheep, rams, goats, peacocks and pea hens, and a variety of caged birds including parrots and other talking birds. Nothing dangerous, as far as I could see. People spend about an hour and a half in the park, which closes most days around 3 p.m.</div><div><br /></div><div>Right next door, there is a fantastic vegetarian restaurant, the Yodfat Cafe, which has a wide ranging menus of salads, pasta dishes, crepes, pizzas and delicious coffee. We have been several times and have never been disapppointed. Next to the park, there is a also a strictly Kosher bakery/cafe with take out baguettes, croissants and quiches, as well as a small food-truck style Kosher pizza stand.</div><div><br /></div><div>There are also a whole bunch of interesting shops including a boutique wine store, a cheese shop, a sock store and a range of other interesting stores and galleries all right next door to the Monkey Forrest.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Israeli Politics</b></div><div><br /></div><div>As you know, Israel held its fifth election in a period of four years on November 1, 2022. This time around, Netanyahu and his Likud party captured 32 seats which was not nearly enough on their own to establish a government in the 120 seat Knesset. However, political parties on the right that were prepared to support Netanyahu reached another 32 seats in total. That meant that Netanyahu was on track to put togher a 64 seat governing coalition. </div><div><br /></div><div>At first, Netanyahu thought that this would be easy to do and might take "only days." However, it has now been more than 7 weeks and the government has still not been sworn in. Netanyahu has advised the President of Israel that he has reached agreements with his coalition partners and he is expected to swear in the government on Thursday December 29, 2022.</div><div><br /></div><div>This version of Netanyahu's government will be the furthest right government that Israel has ever had. Netanyahu's coalition includes two ultra-religious parties (Shas and United Torah Judaism) and the Religious Zionist Party - made up of three ultra-right nationalist parties. </div><div><br /></div><div>The coalition talks have been difficult for Netanyahu since each of of these five coalition partners have been demanding enormous concessions and Netanyahu has felt obliged to given in, presumably with the hope of getting out of his own legal difficulties in exchange. </div><div><br /></div><div>Among the intended, reported agreements:</div><div><br /></div><div>A change in the law to allow the Knesset, by a simple majority, to override any decision of the Supreme Court of Israel.</div><div><br /></div><div>A change in the law to allow convicted criminals (like Shas leader Aryeh Deri) to serve as a cabinet minister without waiting for a seven year "cooling off" period.</div><div><br /></div><div>A change in the law to allow "freedom of religion" to override anti-discrimination laws - examples provided include the areas of housing, medical treatment, the military and other areas. It is apparently targeted at LGBTQ+ people, non-religious women, Arabs and other minorities. If this is actually implemented, I would imagine it would create worldwide backlash against Israel, even among Jewish communities in countries around the world. </div><div><br /></div><div>Changes to further deligimize Reform and Conservative Judaism in Israel (and worldwide) and to strengthen the power of the Ultra-Orthodox Rabbinical Authority.</div><div><br /></div><div>Changes to the land, civil and military authority in Judea and Samaria (the "West Bank") to give significant power to the Otzma ("Jewish Power") party, led by Itamar Ben-Gvir and the Religious Zionist party led by Betzalel Smotrich. This will impact Palestinian housing decisions as well as decisions relating to the growth of new settlements. It will also impact a wide range of other decisions affecting daily life throught the disputed terrorities and the rest of Israel.</div><div><br /></div><div>This is only the tip of the iceberg. In fairness, it remains to be seen which of these intended and announced changes will actually be implemented - by a government that has not yet even been sworn in. But I have no reason to believe or expect that the changes will only be "minor" or that these changes won't get implemented. </div><div><br /></div><div>Overall, in my view, it is a very frightening government, moving us closer to countries like Turkey or Iran in which religious fanatics have signficant power over the lives of all Israeli citizens. One can only hope that all of the in-fighting that we have seen over the past 7 weeks (they haven't even been able to form a government yet) will continue to create dissonance that will prove too difficult to overcome.</div><div><br /></div><div>To be clear - I think that is overly optimistic. This new government is likely to last for a while - and it is likely to cause signficant damage to Israel as a democracy, as a place that values the rule of law and as a place that welcomes Jewish people and others from all over the world as visitors and as potential immigrants. The retroactive legalization of different crimes including corruption, bribery and tax evasion, (by allowing those convicted of these crimes to serve as ministers), the legitimization of discrimination, the hand-over of power to nationalist extremists and religious extremists - and other intended changes to the law are all are all steps that should worry Israelis and Jews around the world who have been proud of Israel's accomplishments as a liberal democracy - even as one with warts and spots that inevitably accompany any country.</div><div><br /></div><div>On the political front, I am hoping that 2023 will bring better news for Israel but I am not counting on it. </div><div><br /></div><div>Wishing everyone the best of health, happiness, success and fun times in 2023.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><p><br /></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1710228798415703303.post-42916911579318380872022-11-22T16:17:00.001-05:002022-11-22T16:17:23.815-05:00World Cup 2022: Canada, the Middle Eastern Teams and Israel. Go Canada!<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyy3ApcDVBgnLFCuObIFemB5eNd1dP0t0R7xXyFVo791TFkPMVpMFC9jSjfbuDQmXbafoikrZkM_xSDpC1vdTHUZfPoxjwI-rmNl-b8k1hEX0sqyKjOxzzfQpzogxb6GAigha4ITosnoY2ogcqx2ruuNcT8IUNDtReyYpU0vWwrTEgsjicECK0Q47Q/s1296/World%20Cup%20Trophy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="729" data-original-width="1296" height="113" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyy3ApcDVBgnLFCuObIFemB5eNd1dP0t0R7xXyFVo791TFkPMVpMFC9jSjfbuDQmXbafoikrZkM_xSDpC1vdTHUZfPoxjwI-rmNl-b8k1hEX0sqyKjOxzzfQpzogxb6GAigha4ITosnoY2ogcqx2ruuNcT8IUNDtReyYpU0vWwrTEgsjicECK0Q47Q/w200-h113/World%20Cup%20Trophy.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>It is a huge day in Canadian Soccer history tomorrow. The Canadian national soccer team will compete in the FIFA World Cup for only the second time in Canadian history. Canada's first time out was in 1986. The Canadian side failed to score a goal. Instead, it let in a total of 5 goals and lost all three matches - to France, Hungary and the Soviet Union. This time out, the Canadian team was quite impressive over the course of the qualifying rounds and is hoping to have better success. The first game will take place at 2 p.m. EST (9 p.m. Israel time) on Wednesday November 23, 2022 versus Belgium, one of the tournament favourites. Canada will also play Croatia on Sunday November 27, 2022 at 11 a.m. EST and will finish its round of three on Thursday December 1, 2022 at 10 a.m. EST vs Morocco. Team Canada has its work cut out for it, having to face Belgium and Croatia, two very strong sides. It probably has a better shot against Morocco. Hopefully, the Canadian side can score some historic goals and surprise the world with a victory or two. <p></p><p>Israel has only played in the FIFA World Cup once, in 1970. Israel managed a 1-1 tie with Sweden, a 0-0 draw with Italy and lost 2-0 to Uraguay. Italy wound up losing that World Cup final 4-1 to Brazil, so a 0-0 draw for Israel against Italy was a pretty decent result. More recently, it has been very hard for Israel to qualify since it has to qualify through the European conference instead of the Middle East, where it belongs. </p><p>For the 2022 World Cup, Israelis can only watch from the sidelines, though many are in Qatar attending the games live. It is only a three hour flight to Qatar and Tus Airlines is offering direct flights for "only" $666 USD. All of the games are being shown on Israeli national TV on channel 11 and feature some rather amusing Israeli commentators. Israeli press has sent delegates to the games to try and speak to Iranian fans and other fans from different Arab and Muslim countries about Israel and about their thoughts about Israel. Some have refused to speak to the Israeli press, but a surprisingly large number of Arab and Muslim fans, even fans from Iran, have been willing to speak and say some nice things about Israel.</p><p>Israeli commentators covering the games were thrilled to see Saudi Arabia shock Argentina earlier today with an historic 2-1 victory. One commentator said that "Saudi Arabia had won a huge victory for the whole Middle East," and that this represented a "new dawn for Middle East soccer." Commentators were equally effusive about Tunisia's impressive scoreless draw versus Denmark, later in the day. It will be interesting to hear what they have to say when Canada plays Morocco.</p><p>Watching all of these teams from the Middle East play - including Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Iran and Qatar, Israelis are clearly convinced that their national team should be at this World Cup taking up one of those spots since they would almost certainly be able to qualify if those were their primary obstacles. Perhaps if the Abraham Accords continue to expand - and more countries sign full peace deals with Israel, FIFA will recalibrate its conferences and put Israeli in the proper place, where it will have a much better chance of qualifying.</p><p>For now, Israelis will jealously watch the tournament and hope that their chance to attend for a second time ever is not too far off in the future. If Israel were to make it into the tournament one day, the game days would almost certainly be national holidays since the entire country would be watching. Even now, without Israel in the tournament, the TV stations continue to wish everyone a "Happy World Cup Holiday."</p><p>As for me, I am cheering for Canada in the 2022 World Cup - hoping that I will not only get to see Canada's first World Cup goal ever - but a bunch more - enough to advance Canada to the next round, even though their odds of doing so are currently set at about 200-1. Miracles can happen. Go Canada!</p><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2