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| The late Hezbollah leader, Hashem Safieddine - another one bites the dust (TOI) |
Farrakhan once said that Hitler was a great leader. Wickedly great. But great nonetheless. For this he was thoroughly and rightly criticized.
It should not surprise anyone that an open antisemite like Farrakhan said flattering things about a man who succeeded in murdering 6,000,000 of our people.
But Trump has been one of the most pro Israel presidents in American history. And yet his former chief of staff, GeneralJohn Kelly said the following about Trump:
“He commented more than once that, you know, that Hitler did some good things, too,”
Trump has also said some other things about Hitler he liked. Like the loyalty he inspired in his generals. And that he (Trump) would like to choose people in his administration with that kind of loyalty to him too.
The Trump campaign denies he ever said any of those things. But it would not surprise me in the least that John Kelly is telling the truth and that Trump is obviously going to lie about it and deny he ever said anything like that to anyone.
I cannot imagine any Jew worthy of the name voting for someone that said anything positive about Hitler.
And yet, Trump has a far better record of support for Israel than Biden/Harris does. That is the truth too. And that is the conundrum we face in the next election.
I wasn’t going to talk politics today, but this story is too big to ignore.
In other news there is the following:
Hashem Safieddine, the top Hezbollah official widely expected to succeed slain secretary general of the terror group Hassan Nasrallah, was killed in an Israeli strike earlier this month, the terror group confirms.
This is good news, despite the fact that there are dozens of Hezbollah terrorists ready to replace the one last assasinated. Good news because maybe they will think twice before assuming a position that will very likely end their lives in very short order.
Meanwhile rockets keep being fired across the border from Lebanon into Israel while the media whines about how many innocent people Israel is killing. As though Israel just decided one day to bomb a neighboring country and kill innocent people for no reason. There is very little talk by the media about the fact that there has been non stop rocket attacks from Lebanon ever since Hamas massacred over 1000 Jews and kidnapped hundreds!
This is how ‘knee jerk’ liberalism works. The media sees Israel dropping bombs in Lebanon followed by innocent civilians suffering and they blame Israel without thinking about why this is happening and whose fault it really is. It is a ‘knee jerk’ reaction to the immediacy of what they see! But it is also evil to ignore the context.
They might be ignoring the context of the rocket attacks because Israel has been able to avoid the kind of massive carnage that Lebanon has not been able to avoid. But that is not for Hezbollah’s lack of trying. Hezbollah would love to kill as many Jews as possible if they only could. Israel is responding to their nonstop intent. Not their ability to carry it out.
It is the right of every sovereign nation to defend its people from foreign attack. That Israel has bee able to do so thus far and Lebanon has not does not mean that they will forever be unsuccessful. Israel must not be deterred from continuing their campaign toward victory over their enemies. Which will only come when their enemies surrender. Or their patrons in Iran are brought to their knees (As Trump tried to do when he was in office).
I don’t know when - or even if that will ever happen. But I don’t see that Israel has any other choice. They must fight on until they achieve the peace their citizens deserve. Which means a cease fire that will actually be permanent. Not the ‘permanent’ cease fire that Biden/Harris keeps demanding. Which will only be permanent until Hamas and Hezbollah reconstitute themselves and decide to attack Israel again.
Tomorrow is Simchas Torah (in Israel) exactly one year to the day (on the Hebrew calendar) since Israel was so viciously attacked by Hamas terrorists. I will never forget where I was on that day. I was in Israel visiting my children, grandchildren an great-grandchildren. And was on my way to Shul in the morning for Shachris and Hakafos when I heard what sounded like bombs going off not to far from where I was walking. (I later found out that what I heard was Iron Dome doing its job.)
I could not have known then what the world would look like a year later. I had thought that the war might be over by now. It did not occur to me that that the talk at the time of a long war would mean longer than a few months. So around last Pesach I bought tickets on Swissair to fly to Israel for Sukkos again. They were supposedly going to resume flights to Israel long before my flight was scheduled. But they didn’t. My flight was canceled and the fare was refunded.
The only airline that has continued flying to Israel is El Al. I managed to contact them and they had 2 round trip seats available for just over $10,000. That was a bit too rich for my blood. So we stayed home and have been spending Yom Tov with our American children and grandchildren.
As I enter Shemini Atzeres and Simchas Torah, it is with some somber thoughts. A mixture of joy about the day and trepidation about the year ahead. I do not want to see any more Jewish blood being spilled.
It is my fervent hope and prayer that the war ends soon. That all the hostages are returned to their families, and that a permanent cease fire - that actually IS permanent - takes hold in the Middle East so that our people can once and for all live in peace and security without fear of ever being attacked like that again.
Chag Sameach