It's Yom Yerushalayim !!!

'Awe at First Sight'... Kotel 1967.

This Picture has always made me stop & stare.  It represents 'Awe' ...  It Impresses the Importance of 'The Return of Jerusalem'  & it's continued importance to EVERY JEW on this earth!

Today is Yom Yerushalayim ~ 'Jerusalem Day' ~  ~  יום ירושלים     From Sundown today,  28th of Iyyar, 5771,  marks the 44th Anniversary of the Liberation and Reunification of Jerusalem, Israel's Capital.

THE LAW OF JERUSALEM

*Jerusalem, Complete and United, is the Capital of Israel.

* Jerusalem is the seat of the President of the State, the Knesset, the Government and the Supreme Court.

* The Holy Places shall be protected from desecration and any other violation and from anything likely to violate the freedom of access of the members of the different religions to the places sacred to them or their feelings towards those places.

*The Government shall provide for the development and prosperity of Jerusalem and the well-being of its inhabitants by allocation of special funds, including a special annual grant to the Municipality of Jerusalem (Capital City Grant) with the approval of the Finance Committee of the Knesset.

*Jerusalem shall be given special priority in the activities of the authorities of the State so as to further its development in economic and other matters. The Government shall set up a special body or special bodies for the implementation of this section.

MENAHEM BEGIN

Prime Minister

YITZCHAK NAVON

President of the State

(July 30, 1980)

    ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  ~ ~ ~  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I do not set Jerusalem above my highest Joy."

And this second  photograph shows Reverential Awe ..... Thirty Years On!

"The Jewish people were building Jerusalem 3,000 years ago and the Jewish people are building Jerusalem today."   Prime Minister Netanyahu

"Jerusalem is not a settlement. It is our capital."   Prime Minister Netanyahu

"Jerusalem is above politics"  Eli Wiesel

"Jerusalem is the heart of our heart, the soul of our soul."   Eli Wiesel

"Jerusalem belongs to the Jewish people and is much more than a city, it is what binds one Jew to another in a way that remains hard to explain."   Eli Wiesel

“For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the L-rd from Jerusalem.”  ~  Yeshayah 2:3

“Without Jerusalem, the land of Israel is as a body without a soul.” ~  Elhanan Leib Lewinsky ~ (1857-1910),  Hebrew writer and Zionist leader

"We regard it as our duty to declare that Jewish Jerusalem is an organic and inseparable part of the State of Israel, as it is an inseparable part of the history of Israel, of the faith of Israel." ~ David Ben-Gurion,  Knesset speech, December 1949.

"For three thousand years, Jerusalem has been the center of Jewish hope and longing. No other city has played such a dominant role in the history, culture, religion and consciousness of a people as has Jerusalem in the life of Jewry and Judaism. Throughout centuries of exile, Jerusalem remained alive in the hearts of Jews everywhere as the focal point of Jewish history, the symbol of ancient glory, spiritual fulfillment and modern renewal. This heart and soul of the Jewish people engenders the thought that if you want one simple word to symbolize all of Jewish history, that word would be ‘Jerusalem'." ~ Teddy Kollek ~ Jerusalem, (DC: Washington Institute For Near East Policy, 1990), pp. 19-20. Former Mayor of Jerusalem.

Beautiful Jerusalem  ~  A Jewish City & Israel's Capital City!

Infolive.tv brings excerpts of the wireless transmissions of paratroopers as they broke through into the Old City and the late IDF commander Mota Gur declares "the Temple Mount is in our hands."   

This is what the Rare Youtube video below depicts ...... Forty Four years later the words are just as moving as they were then !!! 

Remember, Remember .....

It is Memorial Day in the USA!   And in LA, where I have lived for the last 19 months.  So today, I too Remember & pay tribute .....

Memorial Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the last Monday of May. It commemorates U.S. Service Members fallen while in  military service.   First enacted to honour Union soldiers of the American Civil War,   it was extended after World War I to honour All Americans who have Fallen in All Wars.

O CAPTAIN! my Captain! our fearful trip is done;
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won;
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring:
But O heart! heart! heart! 

O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up ~ for you the flag is flung ~ for you the bugle trills; 

For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths ~ for you the shores a-crowding;
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head;
It is some dream that on the deck, 

You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip, the victor ship, comes in with object won; 

Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.  

~ Walt Whitman. 1900 ~ 

Those Who Are Remembered Do Not Die !!!!!

Bravehearts & Book Bans !!

Is Scotland still living in the Shadow of the Shoah???   It would seem so with this week's decision to ban Israeli books.  A Scottish municipality has banned from its libraries books by Israeli authors and those that were printed or published in Israel.   The West Dunbartonshire Council, consisting of towns and villages west of Glasgow,  ordered new books by Israeli authors to be banned from the council's libraries. It isn't a surprise that this measure is so popular in Dunbartonshire. This area wildly supported Neville Chamberlain and his appeasement policy with Hitler. They ridiculed WInston Churchill when he opposed Hitler. Nothing has changed in Dunbartonshire all these years later it seems.   And, Ten other councils have apparently  agreed to join the boycott.  Is banning books by Jewish Authors next???

 The Scottish city of Dundee also issued a recommendation to boycott goods produced in Israel, but it was set aside after city legal advisers said it was likely illegal under European Union law. The city instead will distribute posters throughout the city asking its residents not to buy Israeli goods and place a special sticker on products that are made in Israel.  "Special treatment" for Jews????

"A place that boycotts books is not far from a place that burns them," Israel's ambassador to the U.K., Ron Prosor said on Tuesday.  European Jewish Congress President Moshe Kantor called the banning of Israeli books and the marking of Israeli products in Scotland  "eerily reminiscent of darker times, and perhaps there is a level of hatred that connects them.”

“While those behind the boycott will claim that this is not anti-Semitic, targeting the only Jewish state, a democracy, while ignoring serial human rights-abusing nations tells us that this is indeed anti-Semitic in intent and in effect,” Kantor said in a statement released on Tuesday too. “This demonstrates how far ‘respectable anti-Semitism’ has come. Clearly it has become acceptable to boycott and discriminate against Jews, as long as there is a thin veneer of anti-Zionism which purportedly covers the hateful act.”

Europe has a shameful history of burning of Jewish books. The first event in the Western world was ordered by Pope Gregory IX, who in 1239 consigned the Talmud to the flames. In Toulouse, the Catholic Inquisition burned the books of Rashi in 1319. In Venice 1,000 copies of the Talmud were destroyed in the fire.  Throughout the German spring of 1933, students, professors and librarians worked on a list of “degenerate” Jewish books. The list included Stefan Zweig, Erich Maria Remarque, Thomas Mann and Heinrich Heine, whose conversion to Christianity didn’t wipe off the stain of the Jew. In the largest event outside Berlin, 18,000 Jewish books were destroyed.   The orgiastic hatred against Israeli intellectualism has recently raised its ugly head in the placid Scotland, in the form of banning Israeli books from public libraries. A provincial council near Glasgow, West Dunbartonshire, where the trade union has already pursued a policy of boycotting Israel, will ban Israeli books from local libraries.  This is George Galloway's area!!!!!

A spokesman for West Dunbartonshire says that the ban will “only” affect books printed in Israel.   Scotland is part of the UK and as such is also responsible for the violation of the League of Nations Agreement regarding Palestine's borders.   During the Mandate the British usurped more than 70 percent of the Jewish land being returned to the Jews and gave it to the Arabs. 

Throughout Europe, there’s a river of oily, bloody money that feeds those who incite for anti-Jewish boycotts, while spreading anti-Israel lies under guise of “objective journalism” and “academic research.” There are careers to be made through the betrayal of intellectual standards and by making the Jewish State the object of an unremitting demonology.   Just a few examples .... The new pro-Hamas flotilla had its first conference in the building of the Journalists Association in Rome. In Oslo, hundreds of cultural figures just promoted the boycott of Israel. Indeed, it’s impossible to make an exhaustive list of the economic actions against Israel, with radical anti-Jewish venom spreading through the West.  The process of Israel’s de-legitimization, which began with the Soviets’ pathological assault on its legitimacy, has penetrated mainstream media and intellectual circles. The British Guardian ran an editorial titled “Israel Has No Right to Exist.” Last week, acclaimed Danish director Lars von Trier defined Israel “a pain in the ass."  He at the same time claimed to "understand" Hitler .... see last Friday's Blog!!!!

However, the Scottish decision marks the first time that a European region has been officially cleansed of the presence of Israeli books. Book burning and banning is aiming to cut off cultural transmission from generation to generation.  Anyone familiar with the history of books under the Holocaust can easily understand how abominable is Scottish decision is.    Remember too, that pro-Hamas ex-MP George Galloway is Scottish. Also Scotland released the bomber of "Lockerbie/Pan Am" to Libya too!!

But,  the judenrein libraries in Scotland are a new example of Heinrich Heine’s dictum that “where they burn books, in the end it is men that they will burn.”    This past winter, terrorists from Gaza launched phosphorous shells on Israeli civilians. These are chemical weapons able to burn the human skin. International newspapers and television stations didn’t report the news. Indeed, the burned skin of the Jews was never of much interest to the West. It's time for European intellectuals to stand for truth because the worst of all anti-Jewish persecutions, that of Hitler, almost marked the end of European history.  Now, the stage is set for it to  happen again & Scotland, of all the unlikely places is in the forefront of the assault.  

I'm a wondering too ..... are cellphones & computers & software programmes, anti-virus protections, USB connectors & many life prolonging medications also being banned as Israeli Inventions ?????  Or does Hypocrisy reign supreme in the land of  'the brave' ???

But, Ha'Shem has not developed Myopic Vision ..... Scotland has also been assailed with a plume of ash from an Icelandic erupting Volcano which grounded all flights in Scotland for almost a week now.  Storms of unpreceedented severity (especially in Summer) have hit this week too.  These events have cost the country several millions in lost revenue.  Tsumnamis, Earthquakes, Hurricanes, Tornado's or a nuclear disaster have hit countries that have employed anti-Israeli measures this year.   Seems to be happening to all the anti-Semitic countries right now, this year, this month, this week!!  I would not swap my Irish slippers for Scottish shoes right now!

 As a Gael, I love Scotland.  It is a Special place to visit & to love.  But, as a Jew I ask .... Where has Scotland the Brave gone???  Has it swapped it's specialness for anti Semitism ?????

Love Hurts ....

 A Guest Post today from   Yosef  Ben Shlomo  Ha'kohen   (added to & edited by me),   on what unsurprisingly is a big, big issue in Eretz Yisrael at the moment.   And,  Jews everywhere should be really, really concerned about the assault of Evengelical Christianity,  masquerading in friendship, whose sole desire is the Spiritual Destruction of Judaism & Am Yisrael !!!!

These 'christians' have swamped Israel in recent years with their covert agenda of conversion  & replacement theologies.   They 'love' Israel & Jews .... but NOT from any pure purpose of heart or desire for Judaism, or to see true Torah Law revived in Eretz Yisrael, but because they 'believe' they will see their supposed  'Mangod Messiah'  there.   So, it is self serving.   (Incidentally, they don't specify whether this will be after their celestial journey where they wil be "caught up in the clouds" on a 'high' flying expedition called the 'rapture' ~ remember last weekend's failed prediction!!)  But that is not even the most Dangerous aspect of this assault.  They believe that Jews will bow down to their invented imaginary 'Messiah Man'   in our holy Temple in Yerushalayim,  and they shall replace us as 'priests' in his service there. In our 'holiest of holy' places, the home of Ha'Shem in this world.   WHAT AN ABOMINATION !!!!!!!

They seek our conversion to their Idolatrous practices in direct contravention to Torah truth.  And, such "sharing" is against the LAW in Eretz Yisrael.  This law MUST be much more strictly enforced!!!!!! 

Taken from Parsha Vayishlach .....

There have been articles in the media about the growing efforts of many Evangelical Christians to convert Jews in Israel and the Diaspora to Christianity.  These Christians also tend to be very supportive of the State of Israel, and this raises the following question ..... Should we be concerned over the fact that these supporters also seek our conversion?

According to a number of our Sages, an answer can be found in the Torah portion for this Shabbos, and I will begin with the insights of Rabbi Sh'muel Bornstein, a noted Chassidic sage of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. These insights are found in his work, Shem MiShmuel, which provides a commentary on the weekly Torah portion.

In his commentary on the Torah portion of this Shabbos ~ which describes the encounter between Yaakov and his brother, Eisav ~ Rabbi Bornstein discusses a deeper meaning of the following words from Yaakov's prayer to be saved from the harmful plans of his brother, Eisav .... "Save me, please, from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Eisav." (Bereshit 32:12).  

The following is a summary of Rabbi Bornstein's commentary .....

Why does Yaakov first refer to Eisav as "my brother" and then refer to him by name?  Some commentators explain that Yaakov was more frightened of Eisav as a brother and friend than as Eisav ~ the one known for his violence. This is because Yaakov was concerned that Eisav might attempt to become close to him in order to draw him to Eisav's harmful philosophy and distorted ways. This was potentially very dangerous to Yaacov and his family, for it could lead to the end of the spiritual mission to which Yaakov had dedicated his life.  We are therefore told that Yaacov primarily feared his "brother," and only then "Eisav."

This episode teaches us a great lesson. For the sake of our spiritual mission, we must try to emulate Yaakov and ensure that our priorities are correct in all eras of our history.  We must remember that spiritual life is always preeminent.    Throughout the generations, there were Jewish men and women who emulated Yaakov and who gave priority to the spiritual  raison d'etre of our people. They resisted all the attempts to convert them ....  thus, their spiritual priority helped to ensure the survival of our people!

The idea that Yaakov, our forefather, was first concerned about spiritual survival is also found in the Beis HaLevi ~ a commentary on the Torah by Rabbi Yosef Dov Ber Soloveitchik, a noted Lithuanian Jewish sage of the early 20th Century.   Regarding Yaakov's prayer to be saved "from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Eisav,"   Rabbi Soloveitchik points out that it would have been sufficient for Yaakov to say, "from the hand of my brother, Eisav." Why, then, did he refer to two hands ~ the hand of his brother and the hand of Eisav?   Rabbi Soloveitchik explains that Yaakov was concerned about two facets of Eisav's strategy ~ the hand of brotherhood and the hand of violence.  He first mentions the hand of brotherhood, for he recognized the serious danger posed by the "love" of Eisav when its goal is to wean Yaakov away from the right path.  Does anyone see the paralells here ????

Rabbi Soloveitchik cites the teaching, "All the actions of the forefathers are auguries for their descendants"   thus, the prayer of Yaakov,  our forefather, is relevant for each generation of our people.  Rabbi Soloveitchik points out that there are descendants of Eisav who deal with us in the same two ways as Eisav sought to deal with Yaakov.  Initially, they promulgate brutal decrees designed to convert, persecute and even destroy us; however, when HaShem, the Compassionate One,  does not allow them to eliminate our presence as a people, then they seek to live in peace with us.   Through this strategy, they hope to distance us from our path and our Judaism.      

Rabbi Soloveitchik then cites various midrashim that describe how, in a later stage of our history, these descendants of Eisav will ask us to modify our tradition so as to lessen the distance between their religion and Judaism. Rabbi Soloveitchik explains that they will even adopt certain tenets of Judaism in order to tempt us to give up some of our heritage. 

Who are these descendants of Eisav that will seek to tempt us in this way?  An answer can be found in the concluding passage of the Torah portion for this Shabbos, where we find a list of various rulers that descend from Eisav, including "the chief of Magdiel." (Bereshit 36:43) The classical commentator, Rashi, writes....  "Magdiel ~ this is Rome!" (cited in Pirkei D'Rabbi Eliezer 38)

According to Jewish tradition, Rome became the kingdom of Eisav, and the christian civilization, which became centered in Rome, is a continuation of this kingdom.  As Rabbi Soloveitchik reminded us, this kingdom of Eisav initially tries to convert us through force and when this fails, it will conspire to distance us from our way of serving HaShem by developing peaceful and brotherly relations with us.     

In our day, for example, there are millions of Evangelical Christians proclaiming their "love" for us with the hope of persuading us to convert to Christianity.   They want us to follow them by abandoning our direct worship of HaShem and replacing it with a human intermediary that Christians deify.   Although there are also Christian denominations that no longer seek to convert us, the Evangelical Christian denominations are growing in numbers and influence.  In addition, some of these large denominations openly target Jews in their missionary work.  One of their methods is to start churches that preach the Christian doctrine, but which are disguised in "Jewish" garb in order to attract Jews.  For example, they call their churches "synagogues" moreover,  they incorporate some traditional Jewish prayers and customs into their service which are dedicated to the human intermediary that they have deified and whom they also view as the Messiah.

Our sacred scriptures record Divine promises indicating that they will not succeed in their missionary goal,   moreover,  instead of asking us to follow them,  they will seek to follow us.  For example, HaShem promised our people that in the messianic age, "nations will go to your light." (Yeshayah 60:3) . The following promise of Ha'Shem concerning this new age can serve as another example ....  "Thus said HaShem, G-d of the hosts of creation~  In those days, it will happen that ten men,  of all the languages of the nations, will take hold, they will take hold of the corner of the garment of a Jewish man, saying, 'Let us go with you, for we have heard that G-d is with you.'" (Zekharyah 8:23)

In this age of universal enlightenment, the eternal message of our people will be vindicated, and the conflict with Eisav will finally be over, as it is written in the portion of the Prophets that we chant on this Shabbos .... "Then saviours will ascend Mount Zion to judge the mountain of Eisav, and the kingdom will be HaShem's." (Ovadiah 1:21.)   In his commentary on this messianic prophecy, Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch explains that our people will fulfill our mission to become the saviours of humankind, and he adds .... "They will go up to Mount Zion not as the 'saved' ones, but as the  "the bringers of salvation."  

This will cause "Eisav" to realize that he has misjudged "Yaakov" and to finally recognize his brother's universal mission. As a result, states Rabbi Hirsch, "the fight between the brothers has come to an end ~ there is only one height on earth and that is Zion's height. And there is only one kingdom and that is the Kingdom of HaShem." 

These IDOLATORS will NOT achieve their desired Destruction of Am Yisrael!!!!! 

Yosef Ben Shlomo Hakohen is the author of "The Universal Jew" (Feldheim Publishers) and the Editor of the Shema Yisrael network website, "Hazon: Our Universal Vision" .

(Additions/All Emphases & Highlights are mine!)

Lonely as a Cloud .....

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said  last Thursday morning that unnamed western countries are causing droughts in some areas of the world,  including Iran & he has   threatened legal action against European countries that blocked the Rainclouds   .... “using especial equipment.” 

Speaking at the inauguration ceremony of the Kamal-e Saleh dam in Shazand, in Iran’s Central Province, Ahmadinejad said some European countries using “especial equipment”  have prevented rain clouds from reaching certain eastern areas including the Persian Islamic state.  Ahmadinejad claimed that a western politician had written an essay predicting that certain areas including Turkey, Iran and other parts of Asia would be hit by a water crisis in the next three decades.   According to official Iranian news agency IRNA, Ahmadinejad said the countries area which the essay refers to cover countries which “scare the West most"    because of their   “capacity for initiating civilizations and influential cultures.”    This is Iran .... what more can I say??????  

“The legal experts in our country will follow up on this issue,” Ahmadinejad vowed. He “stressed”   that “such a dark actions should not be repeated again,”   IRNA reported.

The next war will be a “water war,” he predicted .....  Hey, Mahmood,  If You swap your War Dance for a Rain Dance   ...... I'll even let you play with my Rain Stick!!!!

Tomorrow is Judgement Day !!!!

My regular readers know that I have been living in 'Planet Hollywood'   for a while .... and the billboards of Orange County have been proclaiming   May 21st, 2011,   ~ like tomorrow ~ as   Judgement Day or the Day of the Rapture, for a while now!

From Oakland to Los Angeles to Orange County & beyond, billboards warning of  May 21st as our Judgment Day Deadline can be found scattered throughout cities and on signs near Highways. Supporters of Harold Camping,  and the idea that May 21st, 2011,  will bring the Rapture with the Second Coming of Jesus, have strategically placed these billboards to help spread the word.  While it’s impossible to confirm that tomorrow will indeed be the Day of Judgment, but based on all of the signs of the Apocalypse, I think that there is a good chance that the End Times are coming. The recent tornadoes in the midwest, fires in Texas, dead fish in various states and massive Earthquake & Tsunami in Japan are all warnings from their G-D that Jesus will soon be sent to Earth for Armageddon.   

And then there's Obama's Abandonment of Israel .....  but, seriously,

Why would these people pay money to place billboards all over the place?  Family Radio and Harold Camping don’t really gain much from the exposure .... except perhaps a lot of ridicule next week????

Their Bible states apparently that 7,000 years after the great flood,  Jesus will return to rule over the Earth for three and a half years before G-d’s End of the World. The Times of the End are a very scary thing for both religious, and non-religious idiots alike..... Ooooooh!    Those Saved in the Rapture will be taken away from their earthly families in an instant as they are saved by Gd,  and will spend the rest of eternity in his glory in a Disney funworld called Heaven. 

  

All christians or 'believers' (does that mean believers in today's midnight apocalypse, or the Idol called jesus I wonder, hmmmm?)  will be "caught up in the air" to meet their 'make'r & live in 'rapture' in a mythical place called Heaven! I often pondered in a quiet moment how 'rapture' could be achieved outside of "hades" or "hell", but perhaps that is my undoubted unbelief!!!  Or maybe my definition of 'Rapture' is radically different!

Anyways, back to theme ..... I culled this off the internet today ..... "But when I say that the Rapture and Judgment Day begins on May 21st, 2011 after which all hope is gone, I am not saying this in at all the same vain as any other predictions ever made. In fact, I am not even including May 21st, 2011 in the category of prediction, but in the realm of absolute fact. Why? Never before in all history has Gd brought forth from the Bible alone so much evidence and proofs that we are right at the end of the world. These proofs have not come through dreams, visions, tongues, a voice, a so-called word of knowledge, or any other extra-biblical revelation, but from the Bible and the Bible alone, which can be shown to be true ..."    WTG,  Harold Camping!!    At least you're not afraid to put your money where your mouth is!

And,  the Seal of truth on the matter .... there is even a Facebook event page called 'Post Rapture Looting' set to activate an event at 12 noon tomorrow in all the major cities of the world!   More than 10,000 people have subscribed to this farce so I want Dibs on the Vatican .... not only can I return what they stole from my people, but I can be an Indie Girl for sure!!!!! (..... I want Nathan Fillion to be my Indie boy!!)

Wonder if the Sperminator is involved ..... so for today he can be the Scareminator!!!!

And if the rapture occurs while we are sleeping,  and that makes tomorrow Judgement Day then today is the 'Eve of Destruction' !!!!

Enjoy the Music ......   & the Satire as Sweet & Stinging as a Sabre's Slash!

Shabbat Shalom!

Today's Jews News wiith Eliyokim Cohen!!

A Guest Post today .... My friend Eliyokim tells it like it is ..... Jews News Today!!

Why not Visit our News Page on Facebook .... Jews News Everyday !!!!!

(Click on the Badge below to get there ...)

Understanding Hitler .......

Yesterday,  Danish Filmaker  Lars Von Trier  was interviewed at  the Cannes Film Festival ....  & as any of my regular blog readers will know ~ I Love Movies!!!!

 I did not,  however,  love Lars statement there  ....  

"What can I say? I understand Hitler. He did some wrong things, absolutely, but I can see him sitting there in his bunker at the end ... I sympathise with him, yes, a little bit."

Attempting to extricate himself from his self-dug grave, he added: ...  "But come on, I am not for the second world war, and I am not against Jews. I am very much for Jews; well not too much because Israel is a pain in the ass. But still, how can I get out of this sentence ... OK I'm a Nazi."

Actually, Lars,  it is very much NOT okay  that you "are a Nazi".  Or choose to identify with Nazism.  I had wanted to see 'Melancholia'  .... now I doubt I will want to.  And,  I won't be Alone.  What were you thinking??

 "I'm a Nazi" and that I "understands Hitler" ??????????

 

He also jokingly claimed he was writing a four-hour-long hardcore porn film featuring Melancholia stars Charlotte Gainsbourg and Kirsten Dunst.    It would, he said, contain "a lot of very, very unpleasant sex"!! 

Okay, that I can deal with,   even like  .... but, Nazism remarks!!!!   which were jestingly made ?????   ...    in response to a question about his German roots, would probably spell career suicide if uttered outside the rarefied atmosphere of the Cannes film festival ~ and indeed may yet!!   .......   How does one be a Nazi in jest?????

As Melancholia's star Dunst looked on ashen-faced ~ at one point attempting to halt his flow with a restraining arm on his shoulder ~ he said:.....  "I thought I was a Jew for a long time and was very happy being a Jew ... Then it turned out that I was not a Jew ... I found out that I was really a Nazi which also gave me some pleasure".  

What part of being a NAZI gave you pleasure, Lars????

"What can I say? I understand Hitler. He did some wrong things, absolutely, but I can see him sitting there in his bunker at the end ... I sympathise with him, yes, a little bit."  

Attempting to extricate himself from his self-dug grave, he added: ....."But come on, I am not for the second world war, and I am not against Jews. I am very much for Jews; well not too much because Israel is a pain in the ass. But still, how can I get out of this sentence ... OK I'm a Nazi."

NO.   It is NOT okay!

The organisers of the festival issued a statement saying they had been "disturbed" by the remarks, that he had apologised, and that the festival would never allow the event to become the forum for such pronouncements.  Von Trier issued his own statement: ....  "If I have hurt someone this morning by the words I said, I sincerely apologise.  I am not antisemitic or racially prejudiced in any way,  nor am I a Nazi."

Just how believable do you think that now is, Lars?? 

U.S. distributor Magnolia Pictures also sent around a release, which included an extended statement from von Trier.  It said the question that led to von Trier's remarks came from the Times film critic, Kate Muir, about his German origins and the influence of  Gothic on his work.  Von Trier said "he let himself be egged on by a provocation", the festival statement said.   

I Love things Gothic!   What a pity your anti-semitic blight comes to the fore!     In an another capricious riff, which Gainsbourg and Dunst watched in a state of what appeared to be nervous hilarity,  Von Trier claimed Dunst had insisted she be filmed naked for a scene in Melancholia.        

"And now she wants more,  That's how women are, and Charlotte is behind this. They want a really hardcore film this time, and I am doing my best.   "I said let's have a lot of talking in it, and they said, 'We don't give a shit about the dialogue, we just want to have a lot of very very unpleasant sex,' and that's what I am writing right now."

No one could accuse Melancholia of a lack of ambition.   If Terrence Malick's   'Tree of Life',   which screened earlier in the festival, sets a family drama against the origins of the Cosmos,   then Von Trier's Melancholia  sets a family drama against the end of the world!     The film's first screening was greeted with applause, but has already split its early viewers .....  though it seems likely that the film itself will be overshadowed by the Director's public Anti-Semetic statements.   Rightly so!

In any case, Von Trier himself is apparently siding with Melancholia's sternest critics.  He said, "Maybe it's crap. Of course I hope not, but there's quite a big possibility that this might be really not worth seeing."     At this stage a large part of your Potential audience probably is thinking that too .... including me!!!!

He said that he felt he may have got carried away with the film's high Germanic Romanticism, with the first 10 minutes devoted to a series of visually arresting,  apocalyptic tableaux set against the complete Prelude to Wagner's Tristan und Isolde.  

Of the mood of the film, he said: ~   "Melancholia is a good title ... and melancholy is a quality that is in all art that I like, and I am sure it is part of all good art. It was the starting point of the film and the inspiration came from there. To be melancholic has to do with a longing, which is something a little special for this film."

 He did Apologise,  but it was one of those "If I've hurt someone, I'm sorry" statements.  You know what Lars,  I really  did want to see your movie,  a lot,   but now I'm going to suggest that my friends & readers  .....   BOYCOTT THIS BASTARD  !!!!!                  

I can't review your Film for Friday review as it is not released yet, but as a person Von Trier you are a failure.   I hope you "understand"  the message! 

Jews News Briefs with Eliyokim Cohen!

A Guest Post today .... My friend Eliyokim tells it like it is ..... Jews News Today!!

Why not Visit our News Page on Facebook .... Jews News Everyday !!!!!

(Click on the Badge below to get there ...)

The Non-Existent Naqba !!

The Key to Anhilating Israel .....

   
Naqba Day,  meaning "day of the catastrophe" is an annual day of commemoration for the 'palestinian people' of the anniversary of the creation of the Jewish State of Israel. It is held every May 15th, the day after the anniversary of Israel's Independence according to the Gregorian calendar and the day marks the flight of these Arabs from their towns and villages in the face of Jewish  advances and the Arab leaders calls to leave until the Jews are driven into the sea, with the consequent displacement, and the loss of their property.  In 1947,  the United Nations General Assembly proposed partitioning 'The British Mandate of Palestine' into two states, Jewish and Arab.   The Jewish community accepted the UN partition plan despite the miniscule land area afforded to Israel, while the Arab community in palestine, supported by the Arab League,  rejected the UN proposal and vowed to oppose it by armed struggle.

There is one fundamental and intractable issue in the Israeli-'palestinian' conflict, and that is the steadfast unwillingness of the Islamic world to tolerate a non-Muslim state in their midst. From this one issue all else flows, including the call for an 'Intifada' or a Third Terror War against the Jewish State of Israel.  It is the terror 'government' of Hamas, directed from Gaza,  that is leading this Terror Inititave .... an Islamist struggle against the existence of a Jewish state. Secular?   No Arab state is secular.   Arab states vary in the degree of their religiosity but make Islam the dominant core of their subordinate societies & anti-semitism their modus operandus. 

 Zionists are constantly pilloried in the media as being an "obstacle" on the path to peace, but instead it isthe Arab narrative which is the biggest obstacle to peace in the Middle East , with it's talk of Nabqa & Intifada inflaming the supposedly disposessed allied to it's offensive occupation of Israeli land!! 

The establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 and the aggression by five well-armed Arab countries, assisting local Arab gangs and militias who had been attacking Jews for years, placed Jews in Israel in mortal danger.  Fighting back, Israel eventually negotiated an armistice in 1949, the Naqba ("catastrophe") for Arabs, that allowed them respite from open war, albeit not terrorism, and without peace. The Egyptians occupied the Gaza Strip, the Jordanians occupied Judea, Samaria and the eastern part of Jerusalem, including the Old City and its Temple Mount, Syria continued to occupy the Golan Heights, from which it constantly shelled Israeli settlements ~ All these states trained and supplied terrorists who raided Israel. The United Nations did nothing.

Arabs who left homes and property in Israel, and many from other countries who joined Arab armies and did not want to return, remained in Lebanon, Syria and Jordan, most as "refugees" under the care of UNRWA. This heterogeneous population was called "Arab refugees," not "palestinians," because at the time there was no such group or people.   One reason they were called "Arab refugees" was because there were a lot of other refugees in the palestine area who were Jewish.  Hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees from Arab countries streamed into Israel under threat of death & mutilation if they did not vacate the lands of 'Allah'.  UNRWA offered no aid, although Jewish refugees had lost everything and the newly established state had few resources.   It took a crafty Egyptian, Yasser Arafat, to create the PLO with his friends to promote the destruction of Israel and the return of Arab refugees.  Arab countries saw them as convenient proxies in their war against Israel,  in it's new terminology .... to "liberate Palestine" !!!

Yasser Arafat,  creator of  palestinian myth

Except for Jordan, no Arab host country permitted the newcomers to obtain citizenship ~ as temporary residents, their civil and humanitarian rights were harshly restricted. The designation "palestinian" did not become widely accepted until after the war in 1967, in which Israel, in self-defense, captured areas that had been assigned to a Jewish State by the League of Nations and Mandate, and then occupied by Arab countries: Judea, Samaria, eastern Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights ~ rich in Jewish history and archeology ~ and the Sinai Peninsula.
 

As the PLO launched mega-terrorist attacks around the world, "palestinianism" became accepted, backed by the Arab League, Muslim and "non-aligned" countries, and the United Nations. As the proportion of anti-Israel countries in the UN grew, "palestinians" were given more and more recognition, support and legitimacy, unlike any other group.   And the fraud worked!!!    It worked so well because the world's media accepted the palestinians' self-definition and their cause. Even the Israeli media, politicians and jurists adopted this myth. Academics promoted "palestinian archeology," "palestinian society and culture." Every time someone writes or speaks of "palestinians", it reinforces this myth.

Most major newspapers use only the term "West Bank" ~ a Jordanian reference from 1950 to distinguish the area from the "East Bank" ~ rather than its authentic names,  Judea and Samaria, apparently to deny its Jewish history.    "palestinian" came to mean Arabs who lived in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, as well as those in UNRWA-sponsored "refugee camps" in Lebanon,  Syria and Jordan, and hundreds of thousands of "palestinians" living throughout the world. By UNRWA's unique and controversial definition, anyone who claims to live or have lived in Eretz Yisrael, and all descendants,  forever, are considered "palestinian," with full rights and privileges.

Spread among 58 "refugee camps" (in many cases, entire towns), there are about 1 and 1/2 million "refugees in camps" and five million "registered refugees, supported by UNRWA's over half-billion dollar budget.   As palestinian nationalism spread among Israeli Arabs, the term became an identity magnet for Arabs on both sides of the 1949 Armistice Line ~ the "Green Line" ~ as well as those living in other countries. Today, "palestinian" can be anyone who, for whatever reason, identifies as such, including their children, grandchildren, etc.  This amalgam of national identity is possible because "palestinian" is not a separate, unique linguistic, cultural, ethnic, religious or racial group.  Nor does this motley group, currently led by Fatah and Hamas terrorist organizations, aspire to a country with clearly defined borders.   

Their goal is not statehood, but exterminating all Jews, thereby "liberating palestine."

Jews Massacred in Hebron ~  A Real Naqba?

The success of "palestinianism"  is a tribute to what money,  influence and Jew-hatred will buy and attract. That Jewish and Israeli media and NGO's support Palestinianism stems from liberal ideals of helping those who are less fortunate, the underdog, and even a genuine, although misdirected, desire to live in peace, a supreme Jewish value. And one that is cried to G-d for at least three times a day!   Although there's probably no way to prevent the virus of "palestiniansm" from spreading, there's no reason to ignore it, and even less to accept it. Like pollution, it may be one of those things we have to live with ~  but we can and must resist its proliferation!!

Arabs are entitled to civil and human rights in the countries in which they have resided for generations. That there needs to be a second Arab Palestinian state, in addition to Jordan, which was carved out of palestine ~ or rather the land set aside for the building of a Jewish Homeland in Palestine ~ and whose population is two-thirds "palestinian," and whether such a state will resolve all the attendant problems is extremely doubtful.  That the State of Israel should commit suicide to accomplish this goal is unthinkable.   Israel has the right to be according to international law,  the Israeli government just needs to do something about it.  And scream it loudly from the rooftops .... which will help drown out the frequent bigoted UN and EU pro-'palestinian' statements

What is mine is mine & what is yours is also mine is the Arab position.  "Arab palestine", 78% of the former British Palestine Mandate has an Arab Muslim "palestinian" majority. No Jews may reside or own property there.  Gaza is 'Judenrein' (cleansed of Jews) and the same is now proposed for Judea and Samaria (being marketed as the 'West Bank').  Of course Arab Muslims, who call themselves "palestinians " are allowed to live and own property in Jewish Palestine aka Israel. 

 WHY THE DOUBLE STANDARD ??  Why dont we hold the 'palestinians' to the same standard as we do Jewish Israel where the land was, is, and always will be Israeli land??   Are they less responsibly human??

As a result of the United Nations Vote that established the State of Israel some 860,400 Jews had their bank accounts frozen, their real property had liens placed upon it and they were evicted from their homes and businesses.  Many were required to sell, abandon, or smuggle their property out of the countries they were fleeing .... more was 'donated' to the various states national treasuries.  Some were forced to walk to Israel,  800,000-1,000,000 (one million) Jews left,  fled,  or were expelled from their homes in Arab countries. That is a somewhat more real Nakba, n'est pas????  The Youtube video below details this & gives some statistics .... details in a blog to come!

 At the very least, then, the deliberately dangerous & destabilising 'Nakba narrative' precludes Middle East peace.  But it’s also,  as it happens, a myth ~ a radical distortion of history.  An Arab invention to mask a land grab of legitimate Israeli land.   When will the world adopt this truth??

It is Yom Ha'atzmaut ..... Am Yisrael Chai!!!

 
Yom Ha'atzmaut (Hebrew: יום העצמאות ) is the national Independence day of Israel, commemorating its Declaration of Independence in 1948.   Yom Ha'atzmaut is nominally celebrated on the 5th day of Iyar (ה' באייר) in the Hebrew calendar, the anniversary of the day in which Israel independence was proclaimed, when David Ben Gurion publicly read the Israeli Declaration of Independence. The corresponding Gregorian date was May 14th, 1948.   This was declared a day earlier than the end of the British Mandate for Palestine, which was due to finish on the 15th May 1948.  It is always preceded by Yom Ha'Zikaron, the Israeli Fallen Soldiers and Victims of Terrorism Remembrance Day on the 4th of Iyar.

Jewish History!   That whirlpool of tragedy, drama, and courage, whose richness and color dazzle anyone who plunges into its depths. And the American Jew, whose ignorance of self is devastating, knows it not. It is so important that he travel backward through the pages of his own times! It is so necessary that he learn what his stubborn zeydes did or refused to do and how, but for their obstinacy, he would not exist today…

Listen, you who begin to believe in inanities and who begin to doubt the legitimacy of a Jewish State. You who weep for the oppressed Arabs and gnash your teeth at the ‘fascist’ Zionists. You who waver in support of Israel and who suggest that she lie down and die. Listen.

You are too young to remember the day. It was a moment in May, the 14th day of that loveliest of months, and they stood in the streets. They, the Jews; they, your people; they, the Zionists. The year was 1948, but to Jews it was 1878. One thousand eight hundred and seventy-eight years since the long exile began. You see, that is how your people count history.

They stood in the streets and waited, these Zionists. To look at them, you would never have imagined them to be part of an international cabal, hand-maidens of Rockerfeller’s Esso and other monopolist oil interests. Beholding the old men, and the rapturous women and the glorious youth, one might easily have been moved to consider them the farmers and tailors and housewives and mechanics and students ~ and Auschwitz survivors ~ they claimed to be.

And as they stood, they listened to a proclamation that tolled an end - and a beginning - of an impossible dream come true. The words entered their ears, filling the minds, choking their throats, gripping their hearts, flooding their eyes ....

“We hereby proclaim the establishment of the Jewish State in Palestine, to be called ‘Medinat Yisroel, ’ the State of Israel…”

 And as the last words drifted off into the cloudless mid-eastern skies, the ‘fascists’ of Tel Aviv burst into song, the song. The words were written a mere sixty years earlier; the idea was 1, 878 years old. With tears streaming down their reactionary cheeks and radiance lighting up their faces, they sang

“Od lo avda tikvateynu…
Our hope is not yet lost -
The hope of two thousand years.
To be a free people in our land
The land of Zion and Jerusalem.”

How they sang and how they rose ~ for just that moment in time ~ to the heights of immortality. And happy were they eyes that merited seeing that moment, while how sad for you that you were not there to taste the sweetness of a miracle.

And when they finished singing, with the stains still fresh on their skin, they danced ~ oh, how they danced. Never was there a dance such as this and never will nations know the ecstasy of such vindication…

Listen, young descendant of a stubborn zeyde. Listen and try to understand the tenacity of the Jew who sat in countless synagogues on the night of Tisha B’Av with flickering candles and tearstained Book of Lamentations, with stockinged feet and bearded face as befits the mourner for Zion and who mournfully remembered the anniversary of the destruction and sadly intoned the words: “How doth she sit solitary; the city that was filled with people hath become a widow.”

Listen to all this and ask yourself the question ... Was it truly United States oil that created Israel? Was it really the military-industrial complex that gave birth to a Jewish State? Was it the United Nations that brought us home? Was it British imperialism that created this dream?

There was no Esso when Jews were driven from the land in which they had lived for centuries and to which they vowed to return. There were no Arabs when Bar Kochba went down to defeat, and Jews were already turning to Zion three times a day. There was no Pentagon when Yehuda Halevi, the greatest of Medieval Jewish poets, wrote ... “My heart is in the East and I am in the West.”

  

Israel came into being because it never came out of being. Israel came back to life because it never died. It was the Jewish State in the days of Joshua; it was the Jewish State when there were Pharaohs; it was the Jewish State when Assyrians and Moabites and Edomites and Philistines and Babylonians and Persians and Hellenes and Romans drifted through history and passed out of it again. It remained Jewish because Jews never left it and there was never a time when Jewish communities did not remain in Zion.

Do you think Theodore Herzl created Zionism? Not so!  Zionism came into being the day that Jews went into exile and was nurtured by every religious law and custom. Every Jew who practiced his faith and every Jew who observed his tradition was a Zionist. Herzl was merely a man whose time had come, and Jews simply put into practice the goal and dream and aspirations of two millenia. Had there been no Balfour Decleration ~ there would still have arisen the State of Israel. Had there been no United Nations ~ there would still have come into being a Jewish State. The stubbornness of Jewish zeydes can be denied for only so long…

After suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous Gentile fortune and a sadistic world for too many centuries, the Jew in the late 19th century decided that he had had quite enough of moving eulogies over his grave and wished to become quite as normal as those who persecuted him. He dreamed a dream of Zion, woke up with its memory firmly captured and decided to do the impossible ~ go home!

 ~  Rabbi Meir Kahane  ~ 1971  ~ Never Again ~