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| Aisha Mohammad Aravi, was killed near a West Bank checkpoint south of Sh'chem |
Muslim clerics and much of the Arab media constantly
paint Jews in terms of evil conspirators out to take over the world. Pioneering Zionist Jews were
seen as European colonizers who came to Palestine and usurped Arab land for
that purpose. That was the case even before the State of Israel was founded.
When the UN partitioned Palestine and Israel declared
Statehood it was immediately attacked by neighboring Arab nations determined to
‘drive the Jews into the sea’. That resulted in a war that created Arab
refugees. These are the West Bank Palestinians of today - their children and grandchildren - who continue to suffer
at the hands of Israeli security needs. Needs that can be directly attributed
to past deadly Palestinian attacks against Israelis. Attacks fomented by Palestinian leadership.
I also understand why so many Israelis have negative
feelings against Palestinians. It is after all from their ranks that the vast majority
of terrorist attacks have taken place. It’s hard to love people that want to
kill you. It is pretty clear that many Palestinians do. Even those that are not
directly involved in attacking Jews - tend to support those that are.
It is
also however true that many Palestinians do not hate us. And even among those
that do and mistakenly blame Israel for problems created by their own leaders, most
just want to be left alone, get on with their lives and live in peace. But they
are unable to do so - forced to live in uncomfortable circumstances because of
those security needs.
But even under these circumstances there is absolutely no
excuse for what allegedly happened last week: From i24 News:
A 47-year-old Palestinian woman was killed after Israeli settlers threw stones at her vehicle late Friday night near a checkpoint in the West Bank, local media reports. Aisha Mohammed Aravi, a mother of eight from the nearby village Biddya, was traveling with her husband south of Nablus when a group of settlers reportedly began to throw stones at the vehicle.
If this story is true (and I have no reason to assume it isn’t) - what these settlers have done is abhorrent. In my view there
is little difference between them and Palestinian terrorists that decide to
kill Jews indiscriminately. It is only a matter of degree. Palestinians have a much greater terrorist record than these settlers. But it seems that these settlers are approaching it rapidly
People who throw rocks at an innocent passers-by with enough force to kill them are evil. They have joined the ranks of West Bank settler, Baruch Goldstein, who who many years ago massacred a group of innocent Palestinians as they were praying
at Ma’aras HaMachpela.
They may think they are acting like Jews. They might think
they are religious and may in fact be meticulously
observant of many rituals. But they are murderers no less. And deserve to pay
the same price any murderer in Israel must pay.
The settler community that spawned these disgusting murderers
needs to be dealt with once and for all. I want to be absolutely clear, here. I
am not talking about Israelis that live in established towns on the West Bank like Efrat, Maale Adumim, Beitar, or Kiryat Sefer. The vast majority of these ‘settlers’
are law abiding citizens that are probably just as appalled by this event as I am - or as any decent human being would be.
I am talking about a strain of ‘trailer trash’ right wing settlers
whose ‘vision’ is to rid all Arabs from the land by any means necessary including terrorism. They consider it all part of the ‘Mitzvah’ of settling the land of Israel.
In that goal they set up trailers homes deep
in the West Bank – many of them illegal - near existing Arab villages and
declare themselves to be a new settlement. They don’t care if their government considers them illegal. They believe they are answering to a higher authority by fulfilling
the Torah’s mandate to settle the land. That it might cause the
blood of innocent Jews (much less Arabs) is of little concern to them.
They will simply claim that their incitement of Arab neighbors is not the
cause of Jewish bloodshed. The Arabs hate us and want kill us anyway. They are not to blame - thus absolving themselves of any responsibility for
the ensuing bloodshed they might precipitate – as they ‘fulfill the
will of God’.
These trailer park settlements ought to be dismantled immediately
by the Israeli government post haste. Resisters should have the proverbial book
thrown at them.
They can cry all they want; recite all the psalms they want; passively resist all they want... all in the hope of generating public sympathy. Which I hope would not be given to them by anyone.
They also should be forbidden to resettle anywhere
else n the West Bank under penalty of serious jail time.
These communities do not bring honor to God. They bring shame
upon the Jewish people. Especially since they generate actions that result in innocent
blood being shed They may actually believe they are acting in the name of
God. But they are no more acting in the name of God than are Palestinian terrorists
that blow themselves up - killing innocent people while saying ‘God is Great!’
These people are evil. And Israel must do whatever it takes
to stop them.
