When the Holy Temple was destroyed, there was a wailing voice heard throughout the whole world. The Ministering Angels said to G-d, "Master of the Universe, do You have such emotions of sadness? Isn't it written 'Splendor and glory are before You?' "
G-d answered: "My House is destroyed, and My children are manacled in chains. Shouldn't I be suffering?"
- Midrash, Yalkut Shimoni, Tehillim 679
From the day that Jerusalem and the Holy Temple were destroyed, there is no joy before G-d... until Jerusalem will be rebuilt and the Jewish People will return to it.
- Midrash, Yalkut Shimoni, Eychah 7009
(It is precisely at times of closeness - i.e. prayer - that G-d feels the most suffering over the destruction of the Holy Temple.)
Rebbe Yosie said, "I was once traveling on the road, and I entered into one of the ruins of Jerusalem in order to pray. Elijah the Prophet appeared and waited for me at the door until I finished my prayer.
"My son, what sound did you hear in this ruin?" he asked.
I replied, "I heard a divine voice, cooing like a dove and saying: 'Woe to the children, on account of whose sins ...   more »

Hundreds of settlers gather on hill near former settlement of Homesh in defiance of army orders
Efrat Weiss
Hundreds of settlers and their supporters gathered Sunday on a hill facing the former West Bank settlement of Homesh where they set up a number of tents.
IDF forces are preparing for a forceful evacuation of the right-wing activists if they disobey orders to leave the area which was declared an off-limit military zone since the 2005 pullout from Gaza and parts of the West Bank.
 Dozens of supporters were on their way to Homesh, which had witnessed confrontations between security forces and angry settlers bent on rebuilding the evacuated settlement.  
Earlier Sunday, the army blocked two groups of settlers from entering Homesh. Settler leaders instructed activists not to exhibit violence against IDF soldiers, and there were no reports of clashes between the two sides.  
The IDF said the settlers' march to Homesh was a burden on the army as hundreds of soldiers had to interrupt crucial training exercises for policing missions in the West Bank.  
The army blocked major roads leading to Homesh to prevent settlers from shuttling hundreds of activists to the former settlement.  
The army ...   more »

The Bible forbids Jews to participate in the uprooting of Jewish communities in the Land of Israel, ruled a council of chief rabbis from Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) on Thursday.
Israel National News reported that the rabbis had been asked by many Israeli soldiers whether or not it was lawful from a biblical standpoint to forcibly remove fellow Jews from portions of their God-given inheritance.
The response of the council was unequivocal: “It is forbidden to lend a hand to this task in any way.”
Fearing a national backlash, many rabbis declined to issue such rulings or interpretations of scripture prior to the 2005 evacuation of all Jews from the Gaza Strip. But with polls showing that a majority of Israelis now believe the Gaza “disengagement” was a mistake, religious leaders are becoming more bold in their application of biblical precepts to modern political moves.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert last week said it was an unrealistic “dream” for Israel to retain control of all Judea and Samaria, and that he intends to uproot additional settlements despite the public's views on further land withdrawals.
Original Source
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Knesset members censure military deal between Iran and Syria, with some, including Lieberman, calling for emergency national government
Amnon MerandaThe strengthening ties between Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Syrian President Bashar Assad "require Israel to prepare itself anew from a governmental, military and political perspective," said Strategic Affair Minister Avigdor Lieberman, in response to reports of a military deal between Iran and Syria
"The Iranian threat lies outside the realm of political argument. As such, I call on the government and the head of the opposition (MK Benjamin Netanyahu) to reconsider the possibility of an national emergency government," the Yisrael Beiteinu chairman, added.  
According to a Saturday report in the London-based al-Sharq al-Awsat newspaper, Tehran will help Syria fund future arms deals with North Korea and Russia, set up military plants in there and back Syria on the Lebanon issue. In return, Assad promised Ahmadinejad to refrain from entering peace talks with Israel.
The deal had a number of Knesset up in arms.  In light of the situation, Kadima member Isaac Ben-Israel also called for the establishment of a national emergency emergency government.
“Iran openly supported Hizbullah during the war against Israel last summer and came out unscathed. Now ...   more »

by Alex Traiman
(IsraelNN.com) Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert reiterated his belief that Israel "needs to withdraw" from the biblical Jewish provinces of Judea and Samaria.
Speaking at a gathering of farmers in the Jezreel Valley, Olmert maintained that Israel would have to make "tough decisions" with regard to territorial compromise.
According to the Prime Minister, anyone who thinks Israel can continue to hold onto the provinces captured in the defensive Six Day War of 1967 is "living in a dream."
"Everyone understands that the State of Israel can't exist without a guarantee of a Jewish majority," Olmert added.
Although many in Israel believe the question of Jewish majority to be a fundamental problem, recent research suggests otherwise.  A major demographic study published in 2005 by Bennett Zimmerman, Roberta Seid and Michael L. Wise revealed that the status of a Jewish majority between the Jordan River and Mediterranean Sea is much more stable than previously reported, with Jews representing at least 60 percent of the total population.
The data further suggests that the numbers of Arabs living in Judea and Samaria (commonly referred to as the West Bank) in particular have been grossly overstated.
Original Source
Olmert added in his ...   more »

by Larry Domnitch
After Tisha B'Av, the burning of the Temple continued for another day. Its affects continue to be felt throughout Jewish history.
The fires that consumed the first Jerusalem Temple began on the ninth of Av, and continued to burn until middle of the following day. The Talmudic sage Rabbi Yochanan stated, "Had I been alive in that generation, I would have fixed [the day of mourning] for the tenth [of Av], because the greater part of the Temple was burnt on that day."
As Tisha B'Av has been a day of misfortune throughout Jewish history, so too has been the Tenth of Av:
Expulsion from France
On July 22, 1306, the tenth of Av, the Jews of France were arrested and ordered to leave the country. Approximately 100,000 were forced to wander in search of new homes, and many perished along the way.
The Jewish community was not aware of the planned expulsion, as France's king, Phillip the 'Fair', did not want them to flee in advance with their assets. One of the monarch's motives for expelling the Jews was financial. Phillip saw plundering Jewish wealth as a way to shore up France's economic woes. No doubt, ...   more »

By Benjamin Lau  
This Sabbath we will be reading Parashat Devarim, the Torah portion that is always followed by a haftarah from Isaiah and which is read before the week when the fast of Tisha B'Av falls. The Torah portion, haftarah and the Book of Lamentations, read on Tisha B'Av, share a common feature: They all contain the word "eikha" (how): "How can I myself alone bear your cumbrance, and your burden, and your strife?" (Deuteronomy 1:12); "How is the faithful city become a harlot!" (Isaiah 1:21); and "How doth the city sit solitary ..." ; "How hath the Lord covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his anger ..." ; How is the gold become dim!" (Lamentations 1:1, 2:1, 4:1).
The midrashic commentary accompanying Lamentations refers to this linking word: "Three individuals prophesied using the word eikah: Moses, Isaiah and Jeremiah. Rabbi Levy stated: 'This is like the story of a matron who had three escorts. One of them saw her in her period of serenity; the second in her period of rash behavior; and the third in her period of degradation. Similarly, Moses, seeing Israel in its glory and in its period of serenity, asked ...   more »

by Hillel Fendel
(IsraelNN.com) Once again, Gush Katif expellee families find themselves shifted about in power struggles between the powers-that-be.
Some 50 families thrown out of northern Gush Katif two years ago still have no permanent solution on the horizon - and now they are being told they must leave their temporary homes as well.
Nearly 30 families from Elei Sinai, another 20 from Nisanit, and one from Netzer Hazani - former communities of northern Gush Katif that were evacuated and razed in the Disengagement/expulsion plan of 2005 - are living in Kibbutz Carmiya, just north of Gaza and west of Yad Mordechai.  They arrived there over a year and a half ago, after several months of living in even more temporary locations. Many of them lived in a tent city for over two months.
The State signed a contract with Kibbutz Carmiya according to which the State pays $450 each month per family, and the kibbutz provides land for upgraded temporary pre-fab homes, dubbed caravillas.  The kibbutz now says that the residents must leave within a month if the State does not agree to renew the contract - at $600 per month/family.
One resident told Arutz-7 that she is ...   more »

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert called over the weekend for direct peace talks between Israel and Syria, without any mediation.
His proposal came in response to comments from Syrian President Bashar Assad last week that Damascus would resume peace talks in the presence of an honest broker if Israel first provided a guarantee that it would return the entire Golan Heights.
Addressing veteran kibbutz members on Friday at Kibbutz Yifat in the Jezreel Valley, Olmert responded to Assad.
"I want to make peace with any Arab country, and I want to do it through direct negotiations. That's how it was with Egypt and with Jordan," he said.
The prime minister rejected the Syrian demand that before negotiations resume, Israel agree to withdraw from the Golan Heights. "When he [Assad] says Israel needs to withdraw to the June 4, 1967, lines, that is setting a precondition. I can't make any commitments before negotiating," Olmert said.
Regarding the Gaza Strip, the prime minister said he could not promise that the situation there would not develop into one similar to that on the northern border before last year's Second Lebanon War, but he cautioned against a large-scale military incursion or reoccupying the Strip.
On ...   more »

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit to Damascus proves that Israel must not open negotiations with Syria, GIL Chairman Rafi Eitan said Friday.
"[Syrian President Bashar] Assad is not showing any indication that he will cut his strong ties with Iran, Hamas and Hizbullah even after he starts peace talks with Israel," Eitan told Israel Radio. Ahmadinejad's visit Thursday posed a snub to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who has called on Syria to cut its relations with Iran as a precondition to restart peace talks, deadlocked since 2000.
On the road with Netanyahu in the US; on the agenda: Iran divestment
The Iranian president's talks with Assad focused on the Iraq situation, Palestinian territories and Lebanon, where both Teheran and Damascus wield influence.
"The enemies of the region should abandon plans to attack the interests of this region, or they would be burned by the wrath of the region's peoples," the hardline Iranian leader said at a joint press conference with Assad.
Ahmadinejad, accompanied by a high-level delegation, was greeted at Damascus airport by Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem ahead of the official reception by Assad at the People's Palace. Assad was sworn in Tuesday for a second seven-year term.
He ...   more »

By Yoav Stern, Haaretz Correspondent  
Minister of Strategic Threats Avigdor Lieberman on Saturday called for the establishment of an emergency national unity government in light of the strategic threat posed by the tightening ties between Syria and Iran.
The right-wing Yisrael Beiteinu patry head urged Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and the chairman of the opposition Benjamin Netanyahu to form an alliance after the London-based Arabic-language newspaper Ashraq Al-Awsat reported Saturday that Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had pledged to help Syria conduct nuclear research during a visit to Damascus earlier this week.
In exchange, Syria agreed not to engage in peace talks with Israel, the newspaper reported. According to the report, Iran also pledged to provide Syria with $1 billion in military aid to purchase arms from Russia and North Korea. 
In response to this report, Lieberman said that the relations between Syrian President Bashar Assad and Ahmadinejad "require Israel to reevaluate the political and military preparation" and added that "the Iranian threat is situated outside any political discussion, and therefore I urge Prime Minister Olmert and opposition chair Netanyahu to consider forming an emergency national unity government."
The Likud party, Netanyahu, did not embrace Lieberman's call for an emergency ...   more »

World Likud chairman Danny Danon widened the field of candidates in the August 14 Likud leadership race to three on Tuesday when he threw his hat into the ring, challenging incumbent Binyamin Netanyahu and Likud activist Moshe Feiglin.
A former chairman of World Betar and aide to former MK Uzi Landau, Danon was 25th on the Likud's list for the Knesset in the last election.
Danon's views are just as hawkish as Feiglin's but he opposes the religious elements of Feiglin's views. After MK Silvan Shalom quit the race last week, MKs who support Netanyahu told The Jerusalem Post they hoped "a straw candidate" would enter the race, so he would not have to face Feiglin one-on-one.
But instead of getting a "straw candidate," Netanyahu received a challenge from one of his most bitter critics in the party. Danon intends to use the race to force Netanyahu to answer questions about why he supported the disengagement from the Gaza Strip and what his emissaries offered former Syrian president Hafez Assad.
Danon said he intended to challenge Netanyahu and Feiglin to an "ideological debate," but he acknowledged that it was unlikely Netanyahu would agree. When Danon won an election for World ...   more »