A Jew's view from the capital of Israel and the future site of the Third Temple, may it speedily be rebuilt.
לי אין ספק שבמשפטו של עולם יש לי הרבה חובות והמשפט הארצי הקלוקל הזה רק מזכה אותי בדין של יום הדיןYnet translated this as:
I have no doubt that this flawed trial is giving me a lot of points in doomsday courtThey should have translated something like this: I have no doubt that in the (heavenly) tribunal (of my deeds in this) world I have many bad deeds and that this substandard earthly trial will be to my credit on the day of judgment ( Rosh HaShannah ).
You do not have to know Hebrew in order to live in Israel, but it certainly helps.
It happened several days after the fire in the Carmel forest, exactly one year ago, where 44 people lost their lives and tens of houses were burnt down. A group of Jews from New Jersey visited Beit Oren, with the willingness to help rehabilitate the village.Nice story, isn't it?
Moti Dagon (53), one of the veteran members of the village and a professional tour guide tells us: "At the meeting the members of the delegation asked: 'What do you need? How can we contribute in order to start the rehabilitation?' The head of the village committee answered, 'We don't have a Torah scroll.' The others present agreed with him. The village exists 70 years, and there was never a synagogue or Torah scroll in it. Why didn't they request $10,000? That's hard for me to explain. It's astonishing."
Several months later one of the heads of the New Jersey congregations phoned the committee head. "Do you remember us from the visit?" he asked. "After much effort we succeeded in acquiring for you a Torah scroll that is 100 years old and we will send it to you soon", he said.
There was great excitement among the residents, but it was not complete, since they did not have a synagogue. "We asked ourselves: What good is a Torah scroll without a synagogue?" Dagon tells us. It did not take long before there was a surprising turn about. "A few days after we received the tidings one of the veteran members of the village, Mrs. Berta Ben-Chaim passed away. In her will she requested that a synagogue be opened in her home. The hand of Divine Providence was amazing - within a short time we received a Torah Scroll and a synagogue."
It was a festive day in the village when the synagogue was inaugurated and the Torah scroll was placed inside of it. "Everyone here cried in emotion", Dagon describes. "The event symbolized a new flowering, a new age. Now there are set prayers in the synagogue, mainly on the Sabbath, but perhaps that will expand in the future."
Dagon lives close to the synagogue. "In addition to the set prayers, the very presence of the synagogue in the village is heartwarming. It is something that we did not have, and now we understand how much it was lacking."
Even now, a year afterwards, the job of repairing and rehabilitating is still not over. "The government did not help us as much as they promised", protests Dagon. And as he speaks about the damage, he returns to that black night in the village. "We saw the fire approaching quickly. We did not appreciate its intensity. When the fire got close, it was too late. We tried to take our whatever was possible from the house. Everyone here fled, only we (a group of six residents - CX) stayed.
For hours we ran between the houses and extinguished the sparks - which saved many houses. In spite of the fire Dagon thinks that we must look forward: "Luckily, I did not lose my home, but my son's home went up in flames and there is nothing left of it. It is not simple to lose a home, but the people are continuing forward and are not stuck in the past."
Dagon says that when he lights the first Hanukkah candle, this week on Tuesday, he will say the words "sheAsa Nissim La'Avoteinu" (who performed miracles for our ancestors) with great intention. "A great miracle happened here. We lost our homes but we received a new life. There was a great danger to life here, but thank God nobody from the village was harmed."
“When the state apparatus broadcasts in an unequivocal manner that there is almost no price to be paid for shedding Jewish blood, it is not clear if it’s a good idea to let the police take care of these issues,” the rabbi wrote.Now the original Hebrew:
“At the very least, if there is a window of opportunity in which you can claim selfdefense so that the [legal] framework won’t be overtly damaged, it is better to kill the terrorist and so raise the price of Jewish blood, which has been continually cheapened.”
כאשר המערכת משדרת באופן חד וחלק שעל פגיעה ביהודים כמעט ואין מחיר (צאו וחישבו לבד תוך כמה שנים ישתחררו רוצחי משפחת פוגל..) – לא ברור אם טוב להשאיר למשטרה את הטיפול בדברים כאלה. אולי, לפחות כאשר נוצר חלון הזדמנות שבו אפשר לטעון להגנה עצמית וכך גם המערכת לא נפגעת כל כך, מוטב להרוג את המחבל וכך לייקר ולו במעט את דם ישראל שהולך ונעשה זול, למרבה החרפה
“When the state apparatus broadcasts in an unequivocal manner that there is almost no price to be paid for shedding Jewish blood (calculate by yourself within how many years the murderers of the Fogel family will be released) , it is not clear if it’s a good idea to let the police take care of these issues,” the rabbi wrote.All of the omissions are a disgrace considering that jpost put Rabbi Elitzur's comments in quotation marks and did not paraphrase him. However, the omission of the word "perhaps" in the second paragraph simply distorts what the Rabbi wrote. The word "perhaps" adds an important nuance and makes jpost's headline ("Better to kill a terrorist than call the police") patently false.
“Perhaps, at the very least, if there is a window of opportunity in which you can claim selfdefense so that the [legal] framework won’t be overtly damaged, it is better to kill the terrorist and so raise, even a little bit, the price of Jewish blood, which has been continually cheapened, to our great disgrace.”
"Freedom of speech has been stolen from wizened students by the police and the prosecution, because they believe it is deserved only by radical and post-Zionist academicians, who call on Arabs to refrain from renting to Jews in their neighborhoods," they said in a statement.Who are these "wizened students"? Obviously the Hebrew original was "Talmidei Chachamim" which could be translated literally as "students of the wise" but really should be translated as "Torah scholars".
The letter states, "There are quite a few Arab workers who give themselves Hebrew names. Yusef turns into Yosef, Samir turns into Sami, and Awabad turns into Ami. They ask to be close to you, try to find favor with you, and give you all the attention in world, they are actually here knowing to act with courtesy, acting as if they really care for you, say a good word, but their behavior is only temporary. The moment you are in their hands, in their village, under their control, everything changes."Say what? My gut feeling was that there is something is very wrong here. A quick check on the Arutz 7 web site determined that the letter was not composed by "female rabbis", but by the wives of regular Orthodox rabbis. Someone at jpost translated "rabbaniot" (in Yiddish "rebbetzins") as "female rabbis"! Among the signatories: Rebbetzin Esther Lior of Kiryat Arba (Rabbi Dov Lior's wife) and Rebbetzin Shlamit Melamed of Beit El(Rabbi Zalmen Melamed's wife).
"Your life will never go back to the way it was, and the attention you so desired will turn into curses, beatings, and humiliations," the letter warns.
"He cooked this dish in public in order to find favor in the eyes of those who hate Torah," it continues. "He, as a teacher, is kicking his rabbis. He is added to our troubles - peasants and haters of Torah sages - and caused a desecration of God's name."It should read, in my humble opinion:
"He burned his dish in public in order to find favor in the eyes of those who hate Torah," it continues. "He is like a student who has rejected his rabbis. He is added to our enemies - ignoramuses and haters of Torah sages - and caused a desecration of God's name."
