Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Building Bet Orot and All Israel

When my nephew learned in the Bet Orot Yeshiva many years ago, he showed us plans for a new Bet Orot housing where he would live one day with his future wife and family, IY"H. At the time he was sleeping in an old building in the most spartan circumstances. I was excited about his future home.
The residential zoning of the Bet Orot area was approved in 1990. This particular Bet Orot building project was approved in 2003, so when he spoke about his future home, we were confident it would happen.
It's seven years later. My nephew's not married yet (anyone got a fabulous girl for a fabulous boy??), but the Bet Orot project isn't built yet either.
Now it seems the PA's Mahmoud Abbas and US President Barack Hussein Obama don't want this project built. They don't want any projects built in Eastern Jerusalem.
Well, what did we expect? I wrote about it in Voices, http://www.voices-magazine.com/, several times already.

BUILDING JERUSALEM=BUILDING JUDEA & SAMARIA

Israel makes a distinction between Eastern Jerusalem, and Judea and Samaria. Eastern Jerusalem is the Heart of Israel. Judea and Samaria are the Biblical Heartland of Israel.
They both pump life into Israel and the Jewish people. They are both vital for our existence as a a people and a nation. The Temple Mount, the Kotel, the Old City, the City of David, Avshalom's Tomb, the Mount of Olives Cemetery, the graves of Shimon HaTzaddik and the Sanhedrin, and more and more treasured sites are in Eastern Jerusalem.
The site of the Tabernacle, the place of Jacob's Dream, the Cave of the Patriarchs, Rachel's Tomb, Joseph's Tomb, the graves of Ruth and Jesse, the place of King David's first reign, the Bar Kochba Caves, the sites of the battle of the Hashmonaim, Herodion, Sussia, the Path of the Patriarchs and more and more treasured sites are in Judea and Samaria. An even superficial read of the Bible (which the entire world accepts) produces the names and locations of all the Jewish towns in Judea and Samaria.
And yet, Judea and Samaria are pejoratively called, "The West Bank", "the settlements", the wrong side of the Green Line. Furthermore, no Israeli government ever said (as the Arabs do about their sites), "You must refer to these places as Judea and Samaria." In fact, Israel looks upon its own heartland with disregard, or sometimes worse, disdain. So, it's no wonder that Jewish construction has been so limited in Yesha, and now completely halted, although Arabs continue to build unchecked.

NO JEWISH BUILDING ANYWHERE

Israel might make a distinction between Yesha and Eastern Jerusalem, but to the Arabs and their supporters, it is all the same. Maps of "Palestine" do not just NOT include Judea and Samaria. They DON'T include ISRAEL altogether!!!
Israel foolishly agreed to stop building in Judea and Samaria, but that is not enough for the Arabs or the rest of the world, because they don't want building anywhere, unless it is Arab building.
So, what's going to happen to my nephew's future home? IY"H, it will be built. It might shlep on or be postponed yet again, G-d forbid, but it will be built, because building Jerusalem doesn't depend on Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Abbas or Obama. "Boneh Yerushalayim Hashem, nidcheh Yisrael yekanes." (The builder of Jerusalem is Hashem, the outcast of Israel He will gather in.) - Psalm 147
And what of the rest of Judea and Samaria? The ten month freeze will take much longer to thaw then ten months. Once the freeze is in place, it is very simple to just not approve any future building, even without formally declaring another freeze. The government's building freeze is a freeze of foolishness and fear, as are so many of the moves made in Yesha by the government. If Israel (its people and its government) would only appreciate the eternal gift it has, no frost would have power here and the entire land inside, outside, alongside the Green Line would blossom and grow.
If only the government of Israel would have faith in G-d, who gave us this land, and work to build the land instead of stifle it...
"For He (Hashem) has strengthened the bars of your gates, and blessed your children in your midst; He Who makes your borders peaceful...He scatters FROST like ashes." - Psalm 147

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