Well, some of you may recall the last time my son stumped me with a complex question. He did it to me again today when he asked me whether God is made of atoms.

I told him I have no idea but that I’d check with some people…

Boobs Not Bombs
Dicks Not Death
Seriously, what would we do without California on a slow news day? I mean I’ve been out there a few times of late – there was the last 4th of July blowout (by the way, for those of you going back to school in September StandWithUsCampus.com is now up!) and of course Jewlicious @ the Beach and my subsequent road trip to Berkeley with Rabbi Yo. Nice place, awesome weather of course, certainly compared to Montreal in the winter. But then…

But then my senses are assaulted by this story about a naked protest in Berkeley, California that took place last week. It was titled Breasts Not Bombs and well… some people just should really not get naked. I don’t know what the political message was – who is going to insist on a bomb when a breast is available? Other posters had equally strange messages, “Dicks Not Death” displayed right next to “Plant Peace in the Middle East.” Let’s just say that the photos of this protest were traumatic enough, I can’t imagine how I would have reacted had I been exposed directly to this display.

Ahem.

Seriously. Keep your balmy weather and your Guvernator. I am glad to visit, but I can’t imagine living there. Oh the full display of photos is located here. But don’t go there. Seriously. Do not click on that link. Don’t do it.

An LA billboard promoting Johansson’s latest movie, The Island contained a photo of her cleavage that had been so digitally “enhanced” that when she drove past it she nearly got into an accident. She said:

I was driving through Los Angeles and I look up and see the biggest photo of me I have ever seen in my life on a massive ad space. I screamed and slammed on the brakes, I couldn’t believe it It’s very strange to see my cleavage the size of a brontosaurus. My breasts were huge …

Yup.

What? You didn’t really think I was just going to let this story slide, did you?

May the rest be pleasant and the food reminiscent of a lovely and innocent childhood.

The Holy See cannot take lessons or instructions from any other authority on the tone and content of its statements.

Muffti is sort of sorry he ever posted the first story on this; why shouldn’t the Vatican condemn or fail to condemn whatever they want? Why should we care what the Vatican has to say?

But the Holy See provided a newer, tougher reason for the omission and Muffti is duty bound to report. Initially the Vatican was inclined to say that they were only interested in ‘recent attacks’ and the attack on Netanya wasn’t quite recent enough. They used tougher words, however, in a press release yesterday:

It’s not always possible to immediately follow every attack against Israel with a public statement of condemnation, and for various reasons, among them the fact that the attacks against Israel sometimes were followed by immediate Israeli reactions not always compatible with the rules of international law…it would thus be impossible to condemn the first (the terror strikes) and let the second (Israeli retaliation) pass in silence

This statement is odd for several reasons. The one Muffti finds most amusing is that, given the Pope really believes that Israeli incursions are illegal and wrong, he preferred to not mention both the terrorists and the incursions rather than mention them both. Don’t worry, though. Papal correspondant Joaquin Navarro-Valls assured us that “…[the Netanya attack] falls under the general and unreserved condemnation of terrorism.”

Muffti wishes he’d never mentioned this in the first place. As he said at the beginning, who cares what the Pope has to say?

When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie that’s Amoré!

There are lots of bad things to say about Hamas. But one can’t deny their romantic side. Last night, Hammas held a mass wedding for some 452 couples in a Nablus stadium. This tops Islamic Jihad’s ceremony, held earlier this month, where merely 222 couples exchanged vows. Tens of thousands showed up to celebrate.

No doubt many of you are thinking that mass weddings aren’t really that romantic; however, as TM now complains about the cost of Jewish education, no doubt in some years we’ll hear him complain about the cost of weddings. They are expensive and the price of the mahr (dowry) can prevent poverty stricken people enjoining in holy matrimony. It gets better too; each couple received a gift of 200-300$, a wedding ring and bedroom furniture.

Why does Hamas bother with weddings while it could be plotting to blow things up? Hammas has maintained its status as a provider of social and economic benefits to needy Palestinians. They run schools and hospitals, none of which has gone unnoticed. As (one of the many) newlywed Hassan Ghanem put it:

Hamas is the only group that is helping the young people here. For many of us, they are the future.

Fellow newlywed Ali Khalil agreed:

This is a great day for all of us and we want to thank Hamas for this gesture. Had it not been for Hamas, I would not have been able to cover the expenses of a wedding.

Muffti can’t help but wondering if Jewish Mother has a counterpart, Palestinian Mother, whose dreams are coming true this week.

No, I didn’t go to an Israeli ’60s hack sci-fi convention and meet famed author Stanton A. Coblentz (although that probably would have been interesting). And I did not actually, per se, visit our planet’s lone satellite, immortalized by such groundbreaking cultural events as Apollo 11 and Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon. What I did do was spend several days on a kibbutz in the middle of the Arava Desert, somewhere along the border with Jordan not far from Eilat.

For those of you not familiar with this particular part of our people’s ancient land, the Arava basically looks like the surface of the moon. As I trudged across the endless fields of jagged rock devoid of any semblance of vegetation, I could almost hear Obi-Wan Kenobi in my mind saying, “The Jundland Wastes are not to be travelled lightly.” Although that could have been the 110-degree heat and the clouds of flies orbiting around me talking.

Obviously when an area of land gets up to 120 degrees in the sun, is covered by nothing other than sharp rocks, has no vegetation, one rain a year, and is inhabited only by flies and scorpions, this is nature’s way of telling you to turn the camel around and go back to Kansas. But of course that is not the Zionist way, and along the road from the Dead Sea to Eilat there is a whole string of kibbutzim who, using drip irrigation, sprinklers and probably black magic kabbalah pulsa-denura type things, have done a wildly successful job of, you guessed it, making the desert bloom. This land responds to us, there’s no two ways about it, and I think it’s in danger of turning me into one of those old, classic dyed-in-the-wool Zionists: “120 degrees? No water anywhere? Scorpions? Within rifle range from Jordan? Sign me up, Ben Gurion!”

But what kind of people decide to live and work on the moon? As it turns out, a motley crew of old-school kibbutzniks, new-school capitalist kibbutzniks, foreign volunteers from Belgium to Brazil and everywhere in between, and even a healthy smattering of both Israeli and foreign Arabs studying the Israeli desert irrigation miracle. As it turns out, we can all get along like the best of friends in the desert. My thorough investigation has led to me to conclude that the reason for this easy harmony is twofold: one, it’s too damned hot to be starting anything, and two, there is liberal usage of a certain crop that certain kibbutzniks have taken advantage of their reclaimed desert land to cultivate. No doubt mainly for its industrial application, of course, but why let the rest go to waste? Such is the harsh logic of the desert.

It’s encouraging to know that in some way some form of classic “make-the-desert-bloom” Zionism is still very much alive in Israel, that not everyone has decided that their life would be better served by a nice apartment with a functioning air conditioning, satellite TV and easy access to Tel Aviv’s trendiest acid washed jeans. Somewhere out there, there are still Jews crazy enough to go live on the moon. And those guys rock.

As you might imagine, I am a tad concerned about Jewish continuity.I mean I write for Jewlicious after all, and I appreciate having a nice large and vibrant audience. Well, I noticed that we had a new ad banner over on the side there, occasioned by an almost total revamp of their system.

JQS has been around for a while, but when I clicked on the banner what I saw was immediately completely different than what I they had before, at least cosmetically. As I ventured further into the site I saw that it was indeed quite different. I mean I haven’t checked out a Jewish dating site in, well…ever. But this was, dare I say it, kinda cool. Of course JQS has all the standard issue online dating elements – profiles with pictures, essays and preferences written by Jewish singles from all over the world. But one thing I found totally geek-worthy (in a good way) was the ability to have both regular text-based instant chat as well as voice and video chat.

My friends who are battle hardened veterans of the online dating world often complain about “meeting” someone online, getting to know them and then going on a real-life date only to find out that they do not even remotely resemble their posted photos. Video chat to the rescue! And the voice chat is good too because now you can talk to someone you are interested in without giving them your phone number. It never hurts to be cautious you know. And yes, I got a kick out of the silly emoticons too.

On a more practical level their prices are below average and you can sign up for free. As a free member you also get to reply to messages and video chats from paying members, and paying members can fully communicate with any member regardless of whether they’ve paid or not, a huge advantage for all involved compared to other dating sites. Well way to go JQS! And thank you for supporting Jewlicious.

If you wish to support companies that support Jewlicious, just click on the JQS banner and let them know we sent you. That trust fund isn’t going to just magically appear ya know!

At the risk of sounding petty, ever since they first announced disengagement I’ve been dreading the day the lettuce finally dries up.

The main industry in Gush Katif has been in agriculture. Alei Katif in in the Gaza settlement of Kfar Darom started selling the worlds first guaranteed bug free vegetables several years back, and now I’m freaking out that it’s all gonna end. Grown in hermetically sealed greenhouses, it’s the best, crunchiest lettuce anywhere in Israel, available at the shuk for just under a dollar a head.

Why does no one else seem concerned about this? Can someone please tell me that they will start growing it in the Negev or something? This is seriously going to affect me and the rest of the salad eating community. Won’t someone please think of the children lettuce???

All this arguing about whose Judaism is more authentic is giving me shpilkes. And not the good kind. In all the movements– Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, and everywhere in between–there are people who are devoted and people who are just going through the motions, people who are educated and people who are not, people who are on a spiritual search and people who are apathetic. There are apikorsim and atheists and true believers (oh, my). And how do we identify with one movement when our personal beliefs and observances are so individual, even within the community we’ve chosen to affiliate with?

Thank you Beliefnet, for providing the solution. A comprehensive (22-question) quiz designed to evaluate what kind of Jews we really are using the great objective equalizer (multiple choice) and identifying types of Jews as types of Jewish foods. (Warning: The Sephardim among us will likely rail at the clear Ashkenazi bias in the selection of the foods designated as categories.)

If anyone else is on the low end of the Lukshin Kugel index, you are cordially invited to be part of my new movement. Temple of the Ephemeral Jews, it’s not, but what is?

So sharpen your virtual #2 pencils and take the quiz. Eyes on your own papers, please.

Muffti doesn’t really think this is a big deal, but after reading an editorial at Jpost, he thought he’d post quickly. On Sunday, the Pope had the following to say about terrorism:

These days of peace and rest have also been disturbed by the tragic news of the execrable terrorist attacks, which have caused death, destruction and suffering in several countries, such as Egypt, Turkey, Iraq and Great Britain. While entrusting to divine goodness the deceased, the wounded and their loved ones, victims of such gestures that offend God and man, we invoke the Almighty to stop the murderous hand of those who, moved by fanaticism and hatred, have committed them and to convert their hearts to thoughts of reconciliation and peace.

Five points if you can name a country that suffers regular terrorist attacks but was not mentioned. 10 points if you can guess the Holy See’s explanation for the omission. 20 points if you can convince yourself that nothing else influenced the decision. 100 points if you get Muffti a trust fund.

The figures are pretty straightforward. Start with 100 Orthodox Jews, 100 Modern Orthodox Jews, 100 conservative Jews, 100 Reform Jews and 100 Unaffiliated Jews. Extrapolate on the basis of intermarriage rates and average children per family how many Jews you will have left after 4 generations.

That’s what Antony Gordon and Richard Horowitz did in a study that’s got to be an eye opener for anyone concerned with continuity and the future of the Jews in America. So how did our original 500 Jews fare after 4 generations?

100 Orthodox Jews, with an intermarriage rate of 3% and an average 6.4 children per family increased their numbers to 2,588 Jews after 4 generations. 100 Modern Orthodox Jews, with an intermarriage rate of 3% and an average of 3.23 children per family also increased their numbers to 346 Jews.

Non-Orthodox and unaffiliated branches of Judaism did not fare so well in the continuity equation. 100 Conservative Jews decreased in number after 4 generations to 24 Jews (intermarriage rate: 37%, Average children per family: 1.82). Jews affiliated with the Reform Movement also saw a significant decrease in number after 4 generations, going from 100 Jews to 13 (intermarriage rate: 53%, Average children per family: 1.72). Unaffiliated Jews with an intermarriage rate of 72% and 1.62 children per family, were left with only 5 Jews after 4 generations.

So what does this mean to the future of the Jews? Well, probably less investment in the manufacture and sale of Judaica aimed at Reform and Conservative Jews. Great deals on the purchase of formerly active Reform Synagogues will be available to those looking for a loft space with high ceilings and the convenience of a suburb. What does this mean to you? I guess that all depends on your priorities.

We earlier reported on Rabbi Yossi Dayan’s intention to use voodoo use pulsa denura, literally meaning ‘lashes of fire’, on Ariel Sharon. The ceremony took place last Thursday at the grave of Shlomo Ben-Yosef, a Betar member who was hanged by the British in 1938 for firing on an Arab bus in protest of numerous attacks by Arabs on Jewish targets. Activist Baruch Ben Yosef explained

Ben Yosef gave his life for the Jewish people and refused to recognize the British government, while Sharon does everything for himself.

This curse was invoked against Yitzhak Rabbin several months before his assassination.

Muffti’s casual research (read: use of Google) did not reveal much about the contents of the ceremony, other than a statement by Rabbi Ariel Bar Tzadok, from Yeshivat Benei N’vi’im. According to him:

The Pulsa DeNora has wrongfully been associated with a certain school of Kabbalah known as Kabbalah Ma’asit (magic). The Pulsa D’Nora is not a magical formula. Torah and Judaism have no connection to or tolerance of magic in any form. Therefore, the consideration of anything in holy Kabbalah, an integral part of HaShem’s Torah from Sinai to have any ties to magic is a spurious and offensive suggestion. The Pulsa D’Nora is actually not a ‘curse of death’ as many mistakenly believe. No Rabbi or Kabbalist has the right or authority to curse another to death.

Phew! And Muffti was worried that it was something weird! So, what is it?

In essence the Pulsa D’Nora is nothing more that a desperate cry of help to G-d. One who believes in the power of prayer will be impressed with this. One who does not believe in the power of prayer will ignore the Pulsa as such a one would ignore all other prayer.

Ah, well, THAT’s not so weird. Except for a quick qualifier:

It has been said, however, that the Pulsa D’Nora is not to be taken lightly. The ceremony does include the recitation of certain Holy Names. This itself is a sacred undertaking. It is said that when one approaches the Heavenly Court to judge the soul of the accused wicked one, the first one examined by the Heavenly Court is the petitioner. If the one seeking justice is himself not just and righteous, then the Pulsa can turn on his own head. It will be the petitioner who will meets his fate instead of the one who stands accused. For this reason, using the Pulsa D’Nora is a dangerous thing, for who can stand before the Heavenly Court and proclaim oneself to be righteous and just.

Ummn…a little weird?

Since Jewlicious has a participating Rabbi, perhaps he would be kind enough to fill Muffti in on the details.

ADDENDUM: Muffti forgot to write that according to Arutz Sheva:

Responding to the report, Yesha Council officials released a sharp condemnatory message, deploring the prayer service, emphasizing that it is not an acceptable action even in the ongoing battle against the expulsion plan.

Muffti would condemn the action too, but he thinks its too silly to bother.

And he was in New York, all the time. Can you imagine that? A single Jewish man in New York? Manhattan, even…and we never met…

Ari Goldman, 34, who lives in Manhattan, where he runs a highly successful vintage comics enterprise, outpaced dozens of other eligible Jewish males who were interviewed by a local production company in a global search to find a Jewish Prince Charming for 17 similarly recruited Jewish Cinderellas.

He outpaced dozens of other eligible Jewish males! DOZENS! Alert the media! But with a name like that, don’t even bother to Google him. (Trust me. All you’ll get is listings for former NY Times reporter, Columbia Journalism professor and author Ari L. Goldman.)

For those of you who read this far thinking I was announcing my engagement, I’d like to clarify that this is not my Prince Charming we’re talking about. This is Israeli reality television’s new star: the kosher Bachelor, if you will. From the producers who brought you the Ambassador and of course, everyone’s favorite Israeli reality show, Take Me Sharon. (Never heard of it? Harry has. He knows things. So does Allison. But I digress. Regularly.)

For your convenience, I’m pleased to present this list of the more vomitatious/comedic/interesting highlights (it’s a fine line…) of this article:

*The use of the phrase “love is an international language” to explain why it won’t matter that the guy’s American and doesn’t speak Hebrew, while many of the women–who hail from many countries including Estonia, Ethiopia and Canada–speak only broken English.

*The name of the show, Mikol Habanot B’Olam (”Of all the girls in the world”). “Goldman will complete the [contrived, I wannabeacatch] phrase at the end of the show when he tells the young woman of his choice: ‘Of all the girls in the world, I picked you.’” (Awww. Or baaarfff. You pick one.) It’s a wonder that the original slogan, “of the seventeen girls that the production team picked for me, I felt like you were the lesser of seventeen evils and PS, you’re hot,” didn’t make the cut.

(more…)

Last night was the annual Divers/Cité Gay Pride parade in Montréal. Participating in the parade, for the third year in a row, was a group called Feygelah representing the local Jewish LGBT community. They had an actual float this year with cool lights and streamers and all that and while it made for a great platform for dancing, the best part were the signs they were carrying (which yours truly designed) with the following slogans:

- One in Every Minyan
- I pray at Congregation Bette Midler
- Oy Vey! Je suis gai
- Kosher Queers
- Lipshtick lesbians

Those were very funny. Also funny was that they took my suggestion to wear orange t-shirts seriously. Apparently there are many Jews in the diasporah who are not aware of the relevance of the whole orange thing. I think the settlers missed a great opportunity at the Jerusdalem pride parade to make significant inroads amongst leftists; they really shoulda sent the kids with the orange ribbons there … Just sayin! In any case, good show Matthew, good job Marc and all the gang. You represented the Yiddles well.

*Sigh* One other thing…

No Mom. I’m NOT gay. Sheesh. Not that there’s anything wrong with that…

“Honey, where should I put the flowers?”
“In that yellow vase in the corner…you know, over by the Hitler.”

Yet another reason to blame Canada–now an auction house in (gasp!) Montreal (sacre bleu!) is selling Hitlers. (Get ‘em now, before the fuhrer dies down.)

Despite a glut of publicity, much of it negative, Montreal auction house Iegore-Hotel des Encans went ahead with its art auction Tuesday evening, selling almost all of its 212 lots, including the six Hitler items. The auction house came into possession of the items — two signed greeting cards on personalized Adolf Hitler Third Reich stationary[sic], and four architectural drawings done by the amateur artist and future dictator — through a party who wished to remain anonymous.

I’ll bet he does.

When the auction became public several weeks ago, auctioneer Iegor de Saint Hippolyte, 57, a Russian immigrant who came to Canada in 1983, was thrown on the defensive. “I understand why some people might be upset,” he was quoted as saying. “My own grandfather was in a concentration camp. But I’m doing it for the same reason I would sell a poster of Lenin or Trotsky. . . it is part of history and also my job.”

The poor auctioneer. Wait, did he just say that he “was just following orders”? Sounds familiar.

“We find it deplorable that these objects, originally belonging to one of the most reviled mass-murderers in history, would financially benefit either the seller or the purchaser,” said Ann Ungar, executive director of the Montreal Holocaust Memorial Center and Museum. “Without a doubt, these objects should be given to an institution devoted to education and research, for the benefit of the general public.”

In all, the Hitler items sold for a total of $32,400. Not bad for a dead megalomaniacal racist genocidal motherf*cker. I don’t know who the buyer was, but the auction house should donate the funds to the Holocaust museum, which is where the buyer should donate his new Hitlers.

But now, moving on to the comedy portion of our program which allows me to refer to one of my favorite uses of Hitler in pop culture….what would happen if Hitler cloning were to become the norm, as predicted by the soothsayers/proprietors of the now-defunct Mr. Show With Bob And David, who discussed this phenomenon in a sketch called “Cloning Hitler“?

As reparations for the Holocaust, the cloned Hitlers are being given to Jewish families as servants. At a bar where the Hitlers congregate, one complains about the dating scene (”Once they find out you’re Hitler, forget about it”), while an older Hitler explains, “We have a saying around here, ‘Get used to it, Hitler.’”

And now, your scrolling bonus: the wikipedia entry on Hitler in popular culture.

Persist in their Murderous Ways

IsraelReporter.com presents us with yet another Gaza-cam Picture of the day. In this photo, the killers of Dov and Rachel Kol kibbitz around at a press conference prior to their heroic mission of killing two defenseless people. Sadly the two martyrs, well, were subsequently martyred by the IDF. If only they engaged in civil disobedience instead, then everyone would still be alive! I guess they didn’t have Ghandi in their bookshelf or they just didn’t pay attention to the devastation wrought by the settlers – I mean what’s 2 dead people compared to a really bad traffic jam?

Mmmm, imagine having that sweaty piece of black leather all to yourself. Yes indeed, the trademark eyepatch of Moshe Dayan is on EBay and the price is set at $75,000.

Moti Sander, a partner at Pasarel, said that his company specializes in Judaica and jewelry, and that he had received Dayan’s eye patch from the minister’s personal bodyguard, who said that he had gotten it, together with a Smith & Wesson 38 revolver, minutes after the famed warrior died in 1981.

Though Dayan’s pistol appears on the eBay site, this is not for sale as the Web site forbids the trading of any arms. It is, however, for sale through Pasarel.

I don’t see why they’re bothering. Why not open a museum with Dayan memorabilia, and charge people $30 each for a photo of them wearing the eyepatch. With 2 million tourists visiting Israel per year, you have to think that you could make far more than $75,000 by year 2 if just 1% take up this offer.

And why stop there? For another $30, you could have people buy a photo of themselves in his old dirty underwear.

A second group has laid claims to responsibility for the bombing at Sharm al-Sheikh: the Mujahideen of Egypt. They offer tough words on a web site:

We announce to the whole world that five people from the Mujahideen of Egypt … drove five rigged vehicles — a local taxi, three taxis from outside Egypt and a minibus — into the citadels of the Zionists (Israelis) in our country…We tell the Jews and Christians that they have 60 days to get out of Egypt.

However, another group with ties to Al-Quaeda had already claimed responsibility. And some ‘experts’ were blaming Israel, who ironically are one of the few groups who seem to not want to take responsibility.

Muffti supposes that anyone can claim responsibility for this kind of thing. And since it’s going to happen anyways, Muffti thinks that Jewlicious should jump on the bandwagon and take responsibility for other people’s actions. However, to make it more Jewlicious, Muffti thinks we should only take responsibility for good things. So, Muffti claims responsibility for Jewlicious for:

Cracking an alleged child molester’s code, writing the new Harry Potter (in fact, we wrote all of them a few years back), winning the Tour de France (like that Lance guy really did it. Puhleeze!), fighting forest fire in Utah, causing record level immigration from France, arresting some suspects in the London bombing, and, finally, very much against Muffti’s vote and will, brought back tznius.

Well, well, well, after years of enjoying the support and protection of the state of Israel and of the IDF in particular, the settlement movement has decided to teach others a number of lessons:

1. How to be thankless. They are now calling Israel undemocratic; labeling their patron, Sharon, a traitor (and far worse), and; applying pressure to anybody among them who supports the government.

2. How to undermine democracy. They are breaking the law on a consistent basis. Usually the law-breaking has not involved physical harm to others, but economic damage has definitely been caused.

The reasoning they tend to use involves the illegitimacy of this government, its prime minister, the supreme court, and their decisions. They attack the media as if it is one big illegitimate block that aligns itself with the state and avoids real reporting. They attack the police for using “evil” tactics and the IDF for being politicized.

There remains not a single organ of the state which is not under attack. What is more disturbing is that rabbis are given respect not accorded to the government or its organs.

3. How to significantly weaken the IDF. This one is a particularly unfortunate decision they have made. By encouraging mass defections and mass refusal to serve or to obey orders, they have opened the floodgates. As Chief of Staff Halutz told their leadership today, they are establishing a prededent wherein Leftist secular soldiers could refuse to serve in, say, Hebron. The very act of refusal of a legitimate and peaceful government decision, and the obvious attempt to provide rabbis with greater authority than commanders also assures the IDF that in the future at least one part of its forces may not be reliable.

4. How to pin down the IDF, the police and essentially shut down the state. Now this is a particularly valuable lesson that the settlers are providing to the Palestinians.

First of all, the settlers were able to smuggle a few hundred people into Gaza last week, proving that Gaza cannot be sealed. The Palestinians are giddy with joy.

Second, the settlers are now planning to recreate their efforts at Kfar Maimon last week by doing it in two places simultaneously. Why? Because they were able to put a great deal of stress on both the IDF and police manpower capability at Kfar Maimon. They believe that two centers will really weaken these forces’ ability to respond and control large numbers of people. Oh my, are the Palestinians happy about this. I hear they are already pulling off their shelves the dusty copies of Ghandi’s abridged “How to Practice Overwhelming Civil Disobedience” and watching carefully to see how many locations and how many thousands of peaceful protesters are sufficient to overwhelm the IDF. In a coordinated move, one can see how this would work nicely with a coordinated attack from an enemy such as Hizbullah in Lebanon.

And so it goes. A legitimate disagreement with a government decision has made the settlers decide they will undermine everything about the state that has enabled the state to last this long and to have a promising future. I’m sure they’re telling themselves that the harder they make it, the better it will be in the long run because they will scare off any government that wishes to affect settlers in the West Bank. What they don’t seem to want to realize or acknowledge is that they are causing harm that is stressful to the system and the state, and jeopardizes both its democracy and its deterrent power with respect to its military and its police.

Pretty thankless, if you ask me.

“Fence Minyan” from the Gaza-cam at Israel Reporter.

This is not a joke. This is not a hoax. This is a real person, a 31-year-old woman from Long Island, who is engaged to be married in October, and who led a 345-city tour to raise awareness of the importance of blood donation, whose liver suddenly failed this week, and who needs a complete liver transplant (Type A or O) to survive.

There are very few of us who might be able to help in finding a liver. But if you know someone who can help, contact liverforalife@yahoo.com or go to http://helpshari.typepad.com. Link to the blog, send emails to your friends, send notes of support to her friends and family (via the blog)–do whatever you can.

And if nothing else, pray.

Nayef Hawatmeh announced Thursday that after the withdrawl is complete, he’ll relocate from Damascus to Gaza. Hawatmeh, you may recall, is head of the Marxist-Leninist Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), third largest wing of the PLO. He said:

I will return to the Gaza Strip after a full Israeli withdrawal from the area … The borders of Gaza will be open to any Palestinian wishing to return to Palestine.

Leaders of Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine have also been rumoured to have plans to live in Gaza. Which is good, because if there is one thing you don’t want, it’s gaps in your political spectrum.

Hawatme’s DFLP was formed in 1969, and have moved around a few times: Jordan, then Lebanon and now Syria. One of their more notorious attacks on Israel happened in 1970 in Ma’alot where they took over a school where scores of children from Safed on a field trip in the region were sleeping. Twenty seven people, mostly kids, died. Other attacks include Bet Shean in 1974, some grenade attacks in the 80s as well as an attack on a Hebron bus in 1985. He was however, one of the earlier PLO leaders to push for dialogue with Israel.

I went out to the Sulha for a few hours yesterday, the Utopian peace fest between Jews and Arabs. It was pretty much as I expected; a bunch of Jews struggling to come to terms with and admit the faults of our side, and a bunch of Arabs struggling to forgive us. After much dialogue and story sharing, it was brought up by several people in a circle of sheiks, rabbis, ex soldiers, ex terrorists and common folk that while we the Jews realize the sins of Israel from this forum, we don’t hear an acknowledgement of the sins from the other side. The answer from the Arabs took a winding path back through the faults of Israel never ended up actually addressing the question. Kind of disheartening.

There was also an ever-present film crew with ever-distracting boom mics constantly lurking as if our only purpose in being there was to prove that we were. The saving grace of the whole thing for me was that I got to spend time with my friend Dede (aka Haviva) and her new husband Yaacov. Dede works for Jews For Judaism and plans to make Aliyah next year to do Peace work.

I know, I’m part of the media. But the media is relentless in its attention to minutiae. First, we had the insanity of that whole Tom Cruise/Katie Holmes circus; then the Brad/Jen breakup and the subsequent “Pretty People Unite” coupling of the entity that would become Brangelina…

But now, the media’s new darling is Joe Lieberman’s shloshim (a 30-day period of mourning) beard. At least in Connecticut, the state that Joe represents.

According to the Connecticut Jewish Ledger, “at least three Connecticut dailies have published articles about the senator’s beard, explaining the religious significance behind it, and news broadcasts in the state have also mentioned it.”

The first paper to carry the story, the New Haven Register, reported that observers at one event “were surprised to see the usually clean-shaven” Connecticut Democrat “sporting a full beard.” But the story, a July 9 dispatch from the paper’s Washington bureau, noted that the beard “was neither a cosmetic experiment nor a break from shaving,” but “a solemn act of mourning” for his mother, who died at age 90.

Several days later, a reporter for the Waterbury Republican-American wrote that Lieberman’s appearance at a press conference in Washington was “scruffy enough” to elicit “a few raised eyebrows and whispers in the crowd.” But the comments came from people who didn’t know about “a deep-rooted Jewish custom,” the article continued.

Like the celebrity couplings, Joe’s beard probably won’t last, as the article notes that the senator is not likely to keep the beard after shloshim is over. But–and say what you want about his politics–the way I see it, the difference between TomKat and Brangelina and Joe’s Beard is that at the end of all the media coverage, celebrity couplings and uncouplings don’t teach us anything. It seems that, for better or for worse, everything Lieberman does provides an opportunity for the world to learn something new, and usually positive, about traditional Jewish life.

May Senator Lieberman and his family find comfort among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.