Destruction in Jerusalem

This weekend, observant Jews (and many biblical Christians, acting in solidarity with Israel) will mourn the historic and tragic consequences of “anti-Semitism” that have occurred on this date. And the 9th of the Hebrew month of Av (Tisha B’av) this year is seeing a renewed focus of Americans who have decided they no longer want to see the United States funding and financially supporting groups who have not renounced their violence towards Jews and the destruction of holy sites within the Holy Land.

The history of the Temple Mount being involved in violence is remarkable. Most people are aware that both temples in Jerusalem were destroyed (Solomon’s Temple in 587-6 BCE and Herod’s Temple in 70 CE). However, the history of which most people are unaware is that the Roman army plowed this site with salt in 71 CE on this very same day. Then, on the 9th of Av in 130 CE, the Roman Emperor Hadrian ordered the Governor Rufus to plow Jerusalem over. The final destruction of Bar Kochba’s army occurred on this day, in 135 CE, when the last Jewish fortress at Betar fell. And, one year later, the Emperor Hadrian established a heathen temple on the site of the Temple and rebuilt Jerusalem as a pagan city.

In addition, the Jewish people have suffered tremendously on this day through a form of brutality that was related to a hatred of them simply because they were Jews. The Jewish people (along with Moslems of that time) suffered at the hands of the Crusaders (radical Christians intent on conquering the Holy Land and taking it from the Turks by force). The Crusades began on the 9th of Av in 1096. Later, under orders of King Edward, the Jews were expelled from England on the 9th of Av in 1290. In 1306, they were expelled from France and, in 1492, they were expelled from Spain – all on this same day.

In 1882, the pogroms against the Russian Jews began on this day. WWI was declared on this day in 1914 and, at the same time, Russia launched persecutions against the Jews as they prepared to mobilize for WWI. On the 7th of Av in 1941, S.S. Reinhard Heydrich was appointed by Goering to carry out something called the “final solution” … the murder of all of the Jews of Europe. Two days later, on the 9th of Av 1941, S.S. Chief Heinrich Himmler formally presented his plan to the Nazi party on this “final solution” to the Jewish problem. And, one year later to the day, that plan was formally implemented, with the first Jews being killed at Treblinka. People forget that radical Moslems supported the Nazis in all of this.

Now, a mere 60 years later from the beginning of the Nazi Holocaust, we have a group of people who again want to eradicate the Jewish people. This time, their enemies want to eradicate them from their national homeland, which was established in 1948-9 by the will of the people of this planet (i.e., through the auspices of the League of Nations and, later, of the United Nations).

The only ones to object when Israel was established were certain leaders of the Arabs (and the most “radical” being the most vocal) who have never accepted a Jewish state in the Jew’s ancestral homeland. Even though the establishment of this state has legal and moral and ethical dimensions. And even though the majority of the land which was set aside by the British Mandate for the Jews was given over for an Arab Palestine through the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan (originally called Transjordanian Palestine).

Today, we again have a movement (the Intifada), which is designed to rout out the Jewish people from their land so as to deny them a homeland. Radical Islam also wants to deny the Jewish people rights to the Temple Mount itself, claiming that the biblical Temples never stood there. Many people believe that is the reason why there’s a desecration of the archeological remains going on under the present day Temple Mount.

And people are beginning to assert themselves and their voice to the U.S. Congress to pass a new bill, HR #2566, introduced on July 19 by Rep Condor. This legislation would stop American taxpayer sponsorship of the erosion of the Judeo-Christian heritage within Jerusalem.

You can get an auto-generated e-mail of the bill and write, or call, your congressional representative to let them know your position. There’s also a petition that people can sign in support of this bill.

Another alarming situation arises from the comments made at the G-8 meetings last week about international observers. After U.N.-peacekeeping forces had filmed the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers by the Hizb’allah, they denied having this video, then they finally released it with the identities of the kidnappers distorted. How can any nation ever again trust the U.N. to be impartial? They claimed they did this to protect U.N. forces from “reprisals” … and they would most likely do the exact same thing within the “disputed territories.”

According to a news article in Ha’Aretz of July 20, there were “diplomatic sources” that had called the decision about outside observers a blow to Israel. This because “Jerusalem had expected the U.S. to prevent any decision calling in third-party monitors, and the statement is ‘very balanced between the Israelis and Palestinians.'”

An acquaintance of mine thinks that these so-called “diplomatic sources” (quoted anonymously) could be a cover for interested parties who typically lean towards the Arab side, but who want to appear to be even handed (to manage perceptions – i.e., spin). While clearly seeing that the G-8 decision was “a blow” to Israel, those diplomatic sources still called it “very balanced.” Such “very balanced” decisions have been delivered before about the Jews! Consult your memory … or history!

The G-8 are also the clients and suppliers of the oil-rich Arab and Islamic countries whom they have to placate. The European post-WWII “uneasy conscience” towards the holocaust survivors has had time to fade away. Surviving the repeated onslaught from all its neighbors (for the past 53 years) has made Israel look less threatened. Now, if the oil-motivated U.N. comes against Israel, we’ll perhaps see the “apple of God’s eye” being picked at by vultures.