Judea Magazine, No. 3.3
Hebron Etzion
_______ Bloc Betar Jerusalem
/Kiryat \ _______ ______ _____________
/ Arba \ / Efrat \ / \ / \_______
___/ \____/ \__/ \____/ Maaleh Adumim
######### #### #### # Tekoa ______
# # # # # # # # _____ / \
# # # # # ### ##### / \ / \
# # # # # # # # # _/ \____/ \_
### ## #### #### # #
**********************************************************************
JUDEA ELECTRONIC MAGAZINE Vol.3, No.3 Iyar-Sivan 5755/May-June 1995
**********************************************************************
Contents:
* Russian Immigrant Harassed by U.S.-Funded Group
* How the Shabak Views the "Settlers"
* Turning Up the Violence
* Remembering Our Lessons
* Book Review: Jews Against Their Brothers
* Fighting for the Golan
* Massada Really Happened
* Jewish Heroes: Orit Taft - Lifesaver
* Jewish Roots in Southern Judea
* The Zionist Spirit Lives
************************************************************************
A New Prisoner of Zion?
RUSSIAN IMMIGRANT HARASSED BY U.S.-FUNDED GROUP
Well-meaning yet uninformed and misguided Americans, many of them
Jewish, are behind a campaign that has turned the life of one former
Jewish refusnik into a continuing nightmare. Boaz Moshkovich, 36, came
to Tekoa in 1986. As the result of an incident that occurred during the
tense days of the Gulf War in February 1991, Boaz was sentenced in 1993
to 5 months public service, which he performed at Hadassah Hospital. A
year and a half later, in late 1994, at the instigation of the U.S.-
funded B'tselem organization, Arabs filed a civil suit demanding $100,000
from Boaz. He has had to borrow money and spend from his family's income
to cover legal expenses. What happened to Boaz could have happened to
any Jewish resident of Judea and Samaria.
One unpleasant aspect of the episode has been the out-and-out
slander and public character assassination of a quiet, gentle man whom I
first met nearly ten years ago when he came to work in Tekoa Computers,
which at that time was next door to our home. Boaz was just finishing up
his tour of mandatory IDF service. The following exchange involves an
accusation made by a member of the Jewish Coalition for Peace and Justice
and student at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York against Boaz,
and his reply, reprinted here with his permission.
* * *
Sun, 20 Mar 1994
A story from Tekoa makes clear how important it is that we
re-examine our role as Jews in the West Bank and how much the massacre
in Hevron was an outgrowth of a long history of acceptable violence by
certain settlers.
When I lived in Jerusalem two years ago I used to go to an Israeli
Palestinian dialogue in Beit Sahour (West Bank) at the Center for
Reconciliation Between Peoples. As you can tell from the title, the
place and the town were a hotbed for the peacenik/moderate camp of the
Palestinians. One week a man who I had known for several months brought
in pictures of his cousin who had been shot up by a settler from Tekoa
and left by the road to die. He would have bled to death if he hadn't
been found. The man who did the shooting was Boaz Moshkovich from
Tekoa. That's the one whom I wanted to pose my questions to. One week
later I found myself at Tekoa, on tour with my school. I asked the man
who runs the mushroom farm there about the incident. He was proud of
what Boaz had done, and was not ashamed to tell us that Boaz was a free
man and had not even been taken in for questioning by the military.
Boaz was known to the Palestinians as a dangerous and violent man even
before this incident. (Signed) (Name withheld by editors)
March 24, 1994
Shalom,
From your letter to my neighbors in Tekoa, I learned quite an
interesting story concerning myself and the incident that occurred at an
intersection in Beit Sahour three years ago, during the Gulf War.
In order to fill in the picture that you painted, I would like to make a
number of points. These are issues where the version of the story you
have adopted, and the truth, are at odds.
1. The Arabs in Beit Sahour never knew me as a violent and dangerous
person, for the simple reason that they never knew me at all. Even if I
had ever wanted to make their acquaintance, it would have been difficult
for me to do so through the rain of rocks they threw at my car day after
day, while I passed by them without doing them any harm. If you would
only ask those who know me well, they would certainly tell you that the
sentence, "Boaz Moshkovich is a violent and dangerous person," sounds
like a tasteless joke.
2. I was accustomed to traveling the Beit Sahour road often, even
before the official beginning of the Intifada in December 1987. Even
then, the bus driver (who was an Arab Israeli citizen from Abu Gosh) had
already shown me the orchard from which they threw molotov cocktails.
Since December 1987, Beit Sahour became one of the hot spots of the
Intifada. Due to this violence, the authorities were forced to pour a
lot of money into road improvements on the bypass road around Beit
Sahour, in order to divert the traffic from the center of the town to the
outskirts. I, myself, over a period of years, received several tons of
rocks, nails that punctured my car's tires, and burning tires on the
road. To call this nest of terrorists a "hotbed of peace" is not a joke,
it is very sad.
One night about a year prior to the incident, as I was approaching
the area under discussion, they threw a rock at me which exploded the
back windshield, which did not have protective glass. The rock and shards
of glass hit the back seat of the car. Only by a miracle, my wife and
little daughter had not joined me on that trip, and weren't sitting in
the back seat. I try not to think about what would have happened had they
been sitting there. At that time, I didn't identify the source of the
rock, I didn't stop, and I didn't shoot. On the day of the murder in
Hevron, again I was hit with rocks, in exactly the same place,and again
one of my car windows was broken. My whole family was traveling with me.
By a gracious stroke of luck, no one was hurt. Can you imagine to
yourself the daily tension that arises on these trips, when every
rooftop, every turn in the road, every hill or olive grove is liable to
prove a threat to one's life? Is it clear to you the total impact the
violence on the roads has on the people who live in its shadow through
the years?
3. Many times, during a trip, when I was stopped by open violence, I
shot up in the air. You see, this is the sole method of defense available
to us. The surrounding Arabs usually laugh at us in situations like this,
as it is well known to them that we won't lower the barrel. There is
such a tremendous distance between this symbolic gesture, and the
fabricated stories told about us by members of B'tselem and other
organized dispersers of disinformation. A few days ago they published a
report stating that 62 Arabs were killed by the hands of Israeli
civilians since the beginning of the Intifada, among them 58 in
unjustifiable circumstances, all of which does not reflect any danger to
the lives of those who shot. I'm positive that I must be counted among
those 58 in unjustifiable circumstances, despite the fact that B'tselem
certainly never came to me to ask for my story, but rather automatically
accepted the Arab version (which is exactly what you did). Who are the
people who weighed the level of danger that these people were under? By
what criteria was it measured? In the tens of thousands of instances when
Jews have been attacked which occurred on the roads since 1987, 62 Arabs
have been killed. This is proof of the fact that we are extremely
careful, we are cognizant of the law, and that the fear of the law never
leaves our heads. If only half the rubbish and lies that is told about us
was correct, the number would not be 62, but 6200, at least!
4. That fateful night, I got stuck at a roadblock of rocks and a
suspicious object on the road. Rocks were thrown at me. This incident
happened at a populated junction,in keeping with the custom of the
"Intifada warriors" who like to surround us in their built up areas, and
thus use their families and neighbors as a living defense against the
reactions of the soldiers and civilians.It was a dark night without a
moon and with no lighting. I was threatened and I shot in order to shake
off my aggressors. As is explained in the evidence served in court in
Jerusalem, one of the bullets hit a kitchen window of one of the houses.
Inside the house it went into the living room through an open door, and
hit the Arab youth Msalem Mouslach in the head. The youth was brought to
the Arab hospital in neighboring Bethlehem, but he did not receive
appropriate care. He was transferred to another hospital in Jerusalem,
and he died on the way, after two and a half hours without treatment. The
story about the youth who was shot and left bleeding on the side of the
road has no connection with reality. I don't believe that the youth's
cousin didn't know the real story; the sad truth is that he knowingly
lied.
I didn't know that I had hurt anyone (if I had known, I could have
tried to gather up the incriminating cartridges, right?) The police came
to me within 2 days. I was arrested, underwent investigation for 6 days,
and was released on bail. After 2 years, I was indicted for homicide. The
indictment was served in the district court of Jerusalem. I might have
been able to plea in my own defense, and attempt to win my innocence, but
my lawyer suspected that there was a slight possibility that I might not
succeed in proving my innocence, and preferred to plea bargain with the
opposing counsel. I agreed, in the absence of an alternative, to the plea
bargain because I didn't feel that I had enough stamina to deal with the
legal action taken by the opposing counsel. I am not one hundred percent
certain that I did the right thing. I was convicted of negligent
homicide, and was sentenced to five months of community service and a
year's probation.
Life in the yishuvim is, in a certain sense, a package deal,
including both the good and the bad sides, the rewards and the price that
there is to pay. Those who come create the history of Am Yisrael (the
People of Israel). But the price is the violence of the Arabs and the
disfavor of the Attorney General.
We are here in Tekoa because of a choice of peace and life and the
future of the people and the state in this land. We have never ambushed
the Arabs, and there isn't, and has never been, inflamed Jewish violence,
rather only that which comes as a result of Arab violence. The Arabs see
the Jews in the Land of Israel as the Crusaders of the twentieth century,
and they act in accordance with the inherited tradition of Saladin who
defeated the Crusaders.
I believe you are not an unreasonable person, but rather a victim of
these lies and brainwashing. I hope that you will look anew upon the
question of your outlook, or at least you will inform those friends of
yours, to whom you have already told the story about the violence in Beit
Sahour, of the facts.
To conclude, here is some information about myself. I was a refusnik
for two and a half years. During most of that period I was evading the
draft to the Red Army and I spent the time in hiding. After my aliya I
studied computer programming and served in the army. I'm married and have
two small daughters, and we live in a house in Tekoa. Twice a year I am
called to reserve duty in artillery, usually in the Golan Heights in
guard duty on Mt. Hermon opposite the Syrians. By the way, reserve duty
on the Hermon is an excellent opportunity to sort out unresolved
questions. I invite you to join me in military service here so that we
will have enough leisure to sufficiently present our views and, who
knows, reach some common ground.
Sincerely, Boaz Moshkovich
*************************************************************************
HOW THE SHABAK VIEWS THE "SETTLERS"
Interview with Yaakov Peri, Director of the Israel
General Security Services (Internal), 1988-1995
"If we are speaking of the political right, the overwhelming
majority are Zionists who care deeply about the fate and security of the
State of Israel. And I would like to say here, that I am full of
admiration, as an official of the security services, for the restraint
shown by the settlers in Judea, Samaria and Gaza during all the years of
the intifada. They suffered from tons of rocks and attacks and
stabbings, and in the end, when you check on what their reaction was --
it was very restrained and respectable. There are a few marginal and
very noisy groups, some of whom also require the intervention of the
security service."
(_Maariv_ Shabbat, 5 May 1995)
*************************************************************************
TURNING UP THE VIOLENCE
The Arabs are throwing rocks again. Even though it's summer, we've
got to keep our life-saving plexiglass windows up. One of my neighbors
didn't and got hit in the face with a rock. There is an occasional
shooting as well. It doesn't make the news because no one was hurt, but
our neighbors have bullet holes in their car. My wife and daughter came
home from folkdancing in Jerusalem one night recently and found rocks
spread all over the road (and the army there as well). The Arabs can
turn the violence on and off at will. I don't read about it in the press
but I hear it from my neighbors.
The Arabs chose to make a political campaign out of the Israel
government's confiscating a small area of vacant land in Jerusalem that I
have seen with my own eyes and that does not contain a single Arab
structure. At the same time as their international campaign, in mid-May,
Jerusalem PLO chief Faisel el-Husseini, son of the notorious Arab gang
leader in the War of Independence, threatened the renewal of the intifada
-- over a year after "peace" was declared -- and a few days later the
rocks and shooting began.
When the Israel government bowed to Arab demands and rescinded the
Jerusalem land expropriation, after asking the American government to
defend it with a veto in the UN, the Arabs learned that pressure works
and that they now even have the power to veto government decisions inside
Israel's own Knesset. Doesn't that cross some sort of red line for a
Jewish state? - M.A.
************************************************************************
REMEMBERING OUR LESSONS
Nearly two years ago, Mordechai Lipkin was murdered by Arab
terrorists on his way home to Tekoa from Efrat (see Judea Magazine 1.4).
A crowd of well over 100 packed Tekoa's meeting hall this year on the
evening of Memorial Day for the Fallen in Israel's Wars, 2 May 1995, and
stood in silence as Mordechai's 7-year-old son haltingly recited kaddish
-- the Jewish mourner's prayer -- for his father.
* * *
Later that evening on Israel Television, the brother of a young
soldier killed a few weeks before in a terrorist bombing in Gaza reminded
us that although each family suffers the terrible grief of their private
loss, Israel was established and will continue to exist only as long as
the Jewish people remain willing to hold the communal interests of the
nation above their individual private concerns -- an idea that has fallen
out of favor in much of the Western world these days, including among
some in Israel.
**********************************************************************
Book Review:
JEWS AGAINST THEIR BROTHERS
Although Israel's struggle for freedom has been well documented,
certain "inconvenient" segments of the story have often been deleted or
distorted. In _To Win the Promised Land: Story of a Freedom Fighter_
(Walnut Creek, CA: Benmir Books, 1992), Eliahu Lankin describes his
experiences as a member of the high command of the Irgun -- the National
Military Organization associated with Vladimir Jabotinsky and Menachem
Begin. Lankin played an important part in that organization's fight for
Jewish independence from British colonial rule.
_To Win the Promised Land_ begins with a first-hand account of the
Irgun's attempts to rescue Jews from the European deathtrap through
illegal immigration to Eretz Israel during the 1930s, when the Jewish
Agency was afraid to join with the Irgun for fear of upsetting the
British. Lankin also notes that: "Contrary to popular opinion, by 1937,
its [the Irgun's] supporters represented almost half of the Jewish
population of Eretz Israel," and represented the majority of Jewish
opinion in some areas, especially in certain towns and cities.
In 1939, the Polish government brought 25 Irgun officers including
Lankin to Poland for secret military training. The Poles supported the
creation of a Jewish state as a way to rid Poland of its unwanted Jews.
The arrival of a second group for training was prevented by the outbreak
of World War II.
Lankin, as commander of the Jerusalem District of the Irgun,
describes "The Season" in 1946, an infamous period of betrayal when the
Haganah -- the Jewish Defense Organization of David Ben-Gurion --
kidnapped Irgun men and either turned them over to the British or held
them prisoner in caves and kibbutzim. Hundreds of Jewish freedom
fighters were betrayed to the British by their fellow Jews. Lankin
himself was kidnapped and eventually sent to a British prison camp in
Eritrea. Although he eventually escaped, it took him two years to make
his way to France where he was appointed commander of the Irgun in the
diaspora. Lankin, together with the help of thousands of Irgun
supporters in Europe, North America and elsewhere, proceeded to organize
a huge shipment of arms for the newly proclaimed State of Israel. These
arms were desperately needed by Israel in its defense against the
invading Arab armies, and were sent together with 940 trained Jewish
Irgun fighters aboard the ship, Altalena. Although many of the arms were
secretly purchased all over Europe, a major portion were donated directly
by the French government.
Eliahu Lankin's account of the Altalena affair is both exciting,
enlightening, and, at the same time, depressing. The "official" history
books depict this ship and its men as being part of a plan to take over
the government of Israel. Nothing could have been further from the minds
of people like Menachem Begin, then head of the Irgun, whose only goal
was to defend the Jewish people and its new state from the invading Arab
armies. Most of the arms aboard the Altalena were to be distributed to
the newly formed Israeli army. The Irgun wished to send some 20 percent
of the weapons to Irgun fighters in Jerusalem, an area which was not yet
under Israeli state control, and to assure that those former Irgun
members now in the Israeli army got their fair share of weapons.
Negotiations between the Israeli government and the Irgun regarding the
distribution of the arms had been going on for weeks prior to the
Altalena's arrival. The Israeli government was fully informed about the
ship, including at a meeting on May 15, 1948, between Menachem Begin and
Israeli Galili, Chief of the Haganah and Deputy Defense Minister of the
new State of Israel under Ben-Gurion. For Ben- Gurion to announce that
he heard of the ship's arrival just a day in advance was nothing short of
a bold-faced lie.
As for the claim that the arrival of the Altalena violated a UN
cease fire, the Arabs did not hesitate to resupply their forces during
the period. And indeed, the Haganah itself unloaded its own shipment of
arms at Bat Yam from the ship Inco on the very day the Altalena arrived
in Israel.
At 9 p.m. on June 21, 1948, the Altalena, commanded by Eliahu
Lankin, reached Kfar Vitkin, the Haganah base where they had been told to
land. There they unloaded the hundreds of fighters who immediately
joined units of the Israeli army. Two thousand rifles and machine guns,
together with 2 million rounds of ammunition, were also unloaded that
evening, arms that went directly to the army.
Then suddenly and inexplicably, those unloading the crates of
weapons were fired upon by an army unit. The ship's captain pulled the
ship away from shore, fearing that a mortar hit would blow up the
ammunition-laden ship. Then the Altalena, with Menachem Begin on board,
sailed a few miles south and was beached on a sandbar 150 meters off the
Tel Aviv coast opposite Frishman street. Army troops took up positions
on Tel Aviv rooftops and began to fire on the ship once again, to the
surprise and amazement of those on board, who did not return fire.
Finally the ship exploded. 14 Jews were killed and over 50 wounded.
Lankin and some 90 others were held as political prisoners on charges of
treason to the homeland. They were never brought to trial and after two
months were released. Lankin wonders to this day, "at what stage I
unwittingly ceased to be a menace 'to the welfare of the State of
Israel'."
The reason for the attack on the Altalena has never been fully
explained except as a result of the long-term political rivalry between
Menachem Begin and David Ben-Gurion, who somehow chose to ignore Begin's
pledge of loyalty to the new-born state on May 15th and the fact that
nearly all Irgun fighters had joined the army under Ben-Gurion's command,
except in the special case of Jerusalem which Ben-Gurion had not yet
incorporated into Israel.
It is clear, however, that destroying the Altalena deprived the
Israeli army of arms and ammunition they badly needed at the time. The
French had even offered heavy weapons, and a second trip by the Altalena
had been planned. A heavy price was paid because of the tragic error in
the judgment of Ben-Gurion's government, both in the Jewish lives lost in
the attack on the Altalena and in those other lives lost needlessly in
the War of Independence due to the shortage of arms. -- Y.A. and M.A.
***********************************************************************
FIGHTING FOR THE GOLAN
Every week the Israel government seems to be planning to give up a
different piece of Israeli territory. In May we heard that certain
kibbutzim in the northeast Golan were to be the first candidates for the
transfer of Jews and the destruction of their life's work for the past 27
years.
We also heard on Israel Radio (Reshet Bet, 28 May 95) the appeal of
a Druse IDF officer who called for a referendum among the 17,000 Golan
Druse whose four villages are to be returned to Syrian rule. The officer
stated that a secret vote would show a majority of Golan Druse to be
against being turned over to the control of the Syrian Baathist
dictatorship after nearly three decades of friendly relations with
Israel.
The Golan Multimedia Exhibit moves to Tel Aviv in June after packed
showings to 50,000 people at the Jerusalem Mall. With 3 movie screens
and stereo sound, you take a 15-minute ride in a helicopter flying low
over the Golan and the impact is breathtaking. Our favorite story,
confirmed by an eyewitness, is about the Labor party youth group that
came to picket the Golan exhibit, were invited inside to see the show,
and then refused their leader's calls to start the protest.
The Zionist residents of the Jewish villages in Judea and Samaria
know that the Golan kibbutzniks might not do the same for us, but as
fellow "settlers" of the Land of Israel we will join them to oppose their
deportation, if any such order is given. -- M.A.
*************************************************************************
Jewish Heroes:
MASSADA REALLY HAPPENED
In 1964, Yigal Yadin uncovered the proof that the Massada legend
really happened, just as it has come down to us. He found the shards of
pottery with the names of the last survivors scratched into them -- the
very ones used to determine the order in which they would all die.
Massada is a fortress and winter palace on the edge of the Judean
Desert, built by King Herod during the time of the Second Temple to help
protect the Jewish state's eastern border. Massada is a companion to
Herodion, next to El-David and opposite Tekoa, Herod's suburban Jerusalem
palace on the opposite side of the Desert.
In 73 AD, three years after the Romans destroyed the Temple in
Jerusalem, some 960 Jewish men, women and children -- remnants of the
Jewish freedom fighters -- took shelter on Massada, a Jewish stronghold
since the year 66 AD when Jewish freedom fighters defeated the Roman
garrison there. A 8,000-strong Roman army laid seige to Massada and began
building a ramp on the west side of the mountain from which they would be
able to batter and breach the fortress walls.
When it became clear that the Romans were about to break through
their defenses, the Jewish commander, Elazar ben Yair, reminded the Jews
of their brave struggle and their vow never to become enslaved by the
Romans; that it would be better to die by their own hands than to live as
Roman slaves. The historian Josephus writes: "The husbands tenderly
embraced their wives and took their children into their arms and gave
them the longest parting kisses, with tears in their eyes." Then the men
killed their families and laid down beside them to be killed in turn by
the ten chosen by lots to do the deed. One man was chosen to kill the
other nine and then he, too, slayed himself and fell near his family.
Two women saved themselves by hiding and they told of the heroism, and of
the final and terrible act, that ended the drama on the summit of
Massada.
The Zionists are the heirs to the Jewish fighters at Massada, who
dared challenge the Roman superpower to defend Jewish freedom and
tradition. They both believed in an ideal, and this gave them a strength
far beyond their numbers. It still does. - M.A. & Y.A.
*************************************************************************
Jewish Heroes:
ORIT TAFT - LIFESAVER
Pvt. Orit Taft, 18, serves in the Israeli Navy in the Gaza District.
On 9 April 1995 she was a passenger on the bus attacked by a suicide
bomber near Kfar Darom in Gaza, in which 8 passengers were killed and 50
wounded, most of them soldiers returning to base.
As a volunteer with the Israel Red Cross (Magen David Adom), Orit
always carried her own private first aid kit in case of emergencies.
Although lightly wounded herself, she immediately began to apply bandages
and tourniquets from her personal kit to over ten of the wounded. When
she ran out of bandages, she used the sleeves of her sweater to stop the
bleeding and save lives.
This week Orit received the highest medal of honor awarded by the
Navy for her "good judgement, initiative, and self-controlled actions."
Orit is a very quiet and shy young woman, and all the publicity
surrounding her act of bravery has caused her great embarrassment. "I
simply did what I was supposed to," she explains. (_Maariv_ Weekend, 12
May 95)
***********************************************************************
JEWISH ROOTS IN SOUTHERN JUDEA
After Israeli forces liberated the remainder of Judea in the
miraculous Six-Day War, Yochanan Ben Yaakov was part of a group of Jews
who explored the south Hebron hills in southern Judea to search for
traces of their Jewish past. They found Jewish synagogues in Eshtemoa,
Yatta, and Carmel. Indeed, in Yatta, one of the two major Arab clans
described their own Jewish roots. In winter they would buy candles from
the Jews in Hebron and light them for eight days. They refused to eat
camel, a common (non-kosher) delicacy, and would not intermarry with the
other clan in the village.
At the edge of the Judean desert the exploring group found a ruined
city known locally as Susiya, which, unlike other sites, had never been
resettled. At the highest point on the hill were the vague outlines of a
large rectangular stone building. Returning again and again to the site,
they dug out the earth that had filled in the structure until, at a depth
of two meters, they found the original mosaic floor of an ancient Jewish
synagogue.
Yochanan brought his six-year-old daughter to see the site and she
was able to read the 1,300-year-old Hebrew inscriptions laid into the
mosaic floor. There is nowhere else in the world, not even in China,
where today's children can so easily read such messages from the distant
past.
The efforts of Yochanan and his group led to a revision of our
knowledge of Jewish history in southern Judea. After the Bar Kochba
rebellion was crushed by the Romans in the 2nd century and Jews were
banned from Jerusalem, it had been thought that most of the remnant who
remained in Eretz Israel made their way northward to the Galilee. Yet
the new explorations revealed that some 40 new Jewish villages had been
established in the south Hebron hills after the time of Bar Kochba, which
flourished for 500 years until the Muslim conquest in the 7th century.
Yochanan told us these stories as our guide on a Friday morning tour
of the area sponsored by the Etzion Bloc Field School. He noted how,
because of the lack of water in the area south of Hebron, Arab settlement
was concentrated in four large towns, leaving huge empty spaces. He also
pointed out the tracts of new young olive trees, the results of a massive
organized PLO campaign begun after the Camp David accord in 1977 to claim
new land for the Arabs and to block its resettlement by Jews.
The Arabs know that the Jews have returned to reclaim their
birthright and their inheritance. They know that Judea is Jewish land,
the heart of the Land of Israel.
*************************************************************************
THE ZIONIST SPIRIT LIVES
"The great strength of the Jewish community in the 1930s and '40s
was that you could go to any kibbutz or moshav and tell them, 'Look,
tomorrow morning we need your trucks and tractors to help establish a new
settlement.' But try it today and see what happens. Yet go to a Gush
Emunim community and tell them that we need their equipment, their house
trailers, that we need to accommodate other families. And without a word
these people will leave their houses with their infants and children and
all their equipment. They will sleep at their friends' and sacrifice
their work and time and get done what has to get done. They embody the
spirit that once animated this entire country." (Ariel Sharon,
_Warrior_, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1989, p. 534)
*************************************************************************
Your comments and questions are welcome. Please reply to:
amiel2@crosswinds.net