MKs slam PM over pullout comments; Olmert's own party members question timing of statement
Efrat Weiss  
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert' s declaration Wednesday that the war in Lebanon will create new momentum for further West Bank pullouts was met by a harsh response on the part of right-wing parliamentarians as well as members of the PM's own Kadima party.
"The backing Olmert received (for the war) went to his head," Knesset Member Zvi Hendel (National Union) said in response to Olmert's comments, which seemed to stun rightist Knesset members. "How many missiles and rockets need to fall on the North and South in order for Olmert to understand that state security cannot be achieved through bragging…and splitting the nation?"
The Council of Jewish Communities in Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip (Yesha), meanwhile, said in a statement that "the continuation of the blind rush to realignment provides terrorism with a backwind and encourages Nasrallah to continue until all his objectives are achieved. It appears Olmert is interested in breaking up the consensus around the war, while this tough time calls for finding the common denominator."  
Israel Our Home Chairman Avigdor Lieberman was also quick to condemn Olmert, saying ...   more »

In its war on terror, the U.S. would never accept the limits being pushed on Israel.
BY FRANK J. GAFFNEY
Wednesday, August 2, 2006 12:01 a.m.
WASHINGTON--On Sept. 11, 2001, a freedom-loving nation was attacked by a terrorist organization operating from the territory of a sovereign state with the acquiescence, if not the active complicity, of the latter's government. The United States retaliated with what can only be called a "disproportionate response."
How We Fight Terrorists
America launched air and ground assaults on Afghanistan, aimed at destroying not only the al Qaeda safe havens but toppling the Taliban regime. We damaged or destroyed critical Afghan infrastructure so as to deny its use to the enemy. Civilian casualties occurred, as did refugee flows. At one point, the U.N. declared the resulting dislocation a humanitarian crisis.
Once the campaign to eliminate al Qaeda was launched, there was no consideration given to negotiating with the terrorists or the government that afforded them protection. The United States would not have contemplated a U.N.-mandated ceasefire, let alone the insertion of an international peacekeeping force under a Chapter 7 mandate from the Security Council--whose purpose, inevitably, would have been to protect the terrorists from our military, ...   more »

by Rabbi Shraga Simmons
Appreciating the significance of Jerusalem's Holy Temple.



The world is like a human eyeball
The white of the eye is the ocean surrounding the world
The iris is this continent
The pupil is Jerusalem
And the image in the pupil is the Holy Temple.
(Talmud - Derech Eretz Zuta 9)
The holy city of Jerusalem has been the capital of the Jewish people for 3,000 years -- when King David bought a plot of land and designated it as the site of the Holy Temple.
What is it about this place? Why do Jews all around the world at the conclusion of the Passover Seder and at the end of Yom Kippur proclaim, "Next year in Jerusalem!" Why are synagogues around the world built so that people pray facing Jerusalem? Why do we request three times daily in the Amidah that Jerusalem be rebuilt? Why at every Jewish wedding -- at the height of our joy -- do we break a glass under the canopy in order to recall the destruction of Jerusalem? Why have the Jews never been able to forget about Jerusalem?
Source of Holiness
The holiness of Jerusalem preceded even King David. According ...   more »

Just as Israel is suffering the worst ever barrage of terrorist rockets, another kind of assault is aimed right at the soul of the Holy Land.
This coming Sabbath Day, Saturday, August 6, the largest gathering of militant homosexual activists ever will descend on Jerusalem, the most holy city in the most holy land on earth!
The so-called "World Pride" festival, an extravagant orgy of pornography, illicit sexual behavior and blatant recruitment of young people will take place in the great City of David. Organizers said they specifically targeted Jerusalem because of its religious significance.
A small group of biblically faithful Orthodox Jews--including Mayor Uri Lupolianski of Jerusalem--have asked Christians in America to help them dismantle this abomination before it happens.
- The overwhelming majority of Israelis oppose this shameful display in their spiritual and political capital city.
- The Orthodox Jewish community has announced they will "use their bodies" to prevent children from seeing disgraceful public nudity and sexual acts.
- Only a small group of secular government elitists with European backing have allowed World Pride to go forward. Certain members of the Israeli Supreme Court ordered the mayor of Jerusalem to issue permits, even though he and his ...   more »

In the last few days senior Iranian and Syrian officials, including Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, have stepped up their statements on the war, with the Syrian regime's mouthpieces in the media following suit.
The following are excerpts:
Iranian Revolutionary Guards Commander: We Must Keep the Hatred of America Burning in Our Hearts Until the Moment of Revenge Arrives
The Iranian conservative news agency Fars reported that Iranian Revolutionary Guards Commander Yahya Raheem Safavi gave a speech before forces from the Revolutionary Guards and the Basij [1] on July 30, 2006, in which he demanded that they be prepared to act against Israel and the United States:
"I hope that our courageous and great nation will succeed one day in taking revenge against Israel and America, avenging the blood of the oppressed Muslims and the martyrs.
"We see America as also being the cause of the death of the 200,000 martyrs in the war that was forced upon us [i.e. the Iran-Iraq war], since it urged Saddam [Hussein] to attack Iran. We must keep the holy hatred burning in our hearts until the moment of revenge arrives.
"In light of the Zionists' crimes and oppression, I ask God to hasten the ...   more »

By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, July 28, 2006; A25
What other country, when attacked in an unprovoked aggression across a recognized international frontier, is then put on a countdown clock by the world, given a limited time window in which to fight back, regardless of whether it has restored its own security?
What other country sustains 1,500 indiscriminate rocket attacks into its cities -- every one designed to kill, maim and terrorize civilians -- and is then vilified by the world when it tries to destroy the enemy's infrastructure and strongholds with precision-guided munitions that sometimes have the unintended but unavoidable consequence of collateral civilian death and suffering?
To hear the world pass judgment on the Israel-Hezbollah war as it unfolds is to live in an Orwellian moral universe. With a few significant exceptions (the leadership of the United States, Britain, Australia, Canada and a very few others), the world -- governments, the media, U.N. bureaucrats -- has completely lost its moral bearings.
The word that obviates all thinking and magically inverts victim into aggressor is "disproportionate," as in the universally decried "disproportionate Israeli response."
When the United States was attacked at Pearl Harbor, it did not respond with a parallel ...   more »