The Real "Legitimate Resistance"

I've been trying to take a break from blogging to deal with neurology appointsment, school issues, bank and house-building issues (a post in itself) but I couldn't refrain from comment today.

Anyone watching the news knows that Hamas has escalated its rocket attacks on Israel, yesterday reaching the grounds of a hospital in Ashkelon, the usual civilian targets in Sderot, and Sapir College in the Negev, a haven of left-wing idealistic multicultural universalism which provides Bachelor's degrees to both Arabs and Jews. Yesterday's attack killed a father of four children as he stood in the parking lot. One of the students taken away by ambulance was an Arab student wearing hijab, a symbol of her adherence to Islam.

And the comment from our Moslem "peace partner" on the Palestinian side, Mahmoud Abbas (aka Abu Mazen, because all guerilla fighters have to have a nom de guerre, even terrorists who masquerade as 'freedom fighters' while massacring unarmed students and women on civilian buses), the current gang-boss of Fatah and the West Bank (for the moment)?

He not only didn't condemn the deaths and injuries of civilians, but spoke with pride about the fact that he was the one to "fire the first bullet of the resistance" back in 1965. He added that it was the PLO that taught many around the world "how to resist, when resistance is most effective and when it is not."

In 1965??!! Hello, world!! Are you listening? WHAT resistance was the PLO leading in 1965? The Six Day War was in 1967, and prior to that war, the West Bank and Gaza Strip were owned and operated by Terror, Inc (oops, I mean the "Palestine Liberation Organization"). The PLO was funded, armed and trained in terror camps in Jordanian-occupied West Bank and Egyptian-occupied Gaza, then sent across those cease-fire lines to terrorize Israeli civilians....and there was no Occupied West Bank or Gaza to "liberate."

There was nothing to liberate in 1965 -- except Israel. That's right. The PLO was founded and funded with one goal and only one goal--the destruction of the State of Israel. Never mind that the League of Nations and the U.N. voted on this issue and agreed to provide the indigenous Jews with their own statehood (European genocide and Arab expulsion added to the population) alongside the Arab state which would have been "Palestine." The Arab world went to war to prevent the fruition of this U.N. vote, and lost. Jordan took the West Bank and annexed it to Jordan; Egypt held Gaza as their colony, not allowing Arabs there to enter Egypt, leave Gaza, or build homes instead of refugee camps. Egypt deported its own Muslim Brotherhood problem to Gaza to teach the Arabs there that everything was Israel's fault, jihadism was the solution, and terrorism was "legitimate resistance."

In 1965, "liberation" was nothing more than Orwellian Newspeak for "Annihilation."

Nonetheless, Israel was established fact in 1948. The Arab League then spent the next 19 years launching terror attacks against Israelis from Gazan and West Bank territories until the Arab states rearmed sufficiently to launch the Six Day War with Russia's backing. They lost that one, too. And Israel ended up with the West Bank and Gaza. In 1967!

So, Abbas, our alleged "peace partner" prides himself on firing the first bullet of the resistance in 1965? I wonder if he understands the import of what he just said? He's proclaiming to the world that "resistance" is not against Israel's "occupation" of the West Bank (we've already surrendered Hamastan, formerly known as the Gaza Strip, in exchange for European plaudits and promises of peace which never materialized) but against the very existence of Israel.

And Olmert is talking to this guy?! We're going to make a "peace deal" with a man who denies the Holocaust happened, and was part of the Arab terror infrastructure before any 'occupation' of 'Palestine' ever happened?

But wait, we're not done!

"Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said Thursday that he does not completely rule out the possibility of resuming the armed conflict with Israel."

Oh? Really? And just exactly what has the last 60 years been? Please point out to me when the "armed conflict with Israel" stopped, because frankly, we Israelis haven't noticed. There have been stabbings, shootings, car-bombings, suicide bombings, rocket attacks, mortar attacks, and thrown hand grenades from 1947 until today, without respite.

Since the Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in mid-June 2007, 838 rockets and 937 mortar bombs have been fired at Sderot and the western Negev.

Prior to that, however, Abbas's Fatah was in charge. From the time of Israel's pull-out from Gaza in mid-August 2005 until the Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip, the rocket fire from the Gaza Strip was 1,826 missiles fired into Israeli territory.

This wasn't "legitimate resistance," Abu Mazen? I guess that indiscriminate murder of Jewish civilians is just the Palestinian version of a hobby...?

Hardly. This is what anyone not blinded by left-wing insanity can see plainly: it's war. It's been war since 1947. It's going to continue to be war until we win or we lose. If we lose, we're dead. If we win, we can, like the Allies before them, dictate the peace.

Wake up, everyone. This exercise in political survivorship by Olmert is setting us all up for mass murder either by Hezbollah, Hamas or Iran or some combination of the three.

And the Palestinians aren't keeping this a secret. Hamas declared months ago that these rocket attacks are strategy. During an interview in August 21, 2007, former Hamas foreign minister Mahmoud A-Zahar explained why Kassam attacks are so much more effective than suicide bombers (apart from my cynical suspicion that its easier to build rockets than recruit martyrs).

In response to the question, why did Hamas chose to stop suicide bombings two years ago, A-Zahar said, "Which do you think is more effective, martyrdom operations or rockets against Sderot? Rockets against Sderot will cause mass migration, greatly disrupt daily lives and government administration and can make a much huger impact on the government. We are using the methods that convince the Israelis that their occupation is costing them too much."

Our "occupation" contested by the Palestinians is not "The Occupation" which the Far Left posits is the problem. The Palestinians are still defining the "occupation" as the very existence of Israel. They don't want the West Bank -- they want it ALL!

No, the people engaged in 'legitimate resistance' are the civilians of Israel's south--the people of Sderot, of Ashkelon, of Sapir College, of the moshavim, kibbutzim and small towns within rocket range. Their steadiness under fire is the true resistance of the human spirit, the real resistance of the Israeli citizen, the resistance of defiance against the terror barrage of ruthless racists who cannot abide a Jewish state in the neighborhood.

The Line Thing

Israelis are the greatest people on earth when it comes to helping each other out. Look at the way the people (not Olmert's government) have rallied around the people of Sderot; look at the way folks responded to Hezbollah's bombardment in 2006; most of us have numerous examples of everyday folk stopping to help someone in need.

The exception to this good-heartedness is The Line.

It doesn't matter which line--any line brings out the heart of darkness in the average Israeli. The line at the pharmacy, the line at the grocery store, the line to get past security at the Mall, the line of traffic on Derech Chevron....

Today, I ran some errands in the morning with Yossi, and we ended up in Armon HaNatsiv at a local grocery store. Because we each had exactly one item, we chose the Express Lane. This lane was better than most, it being Erev Shabbos and the store was packed, but still it was slow because the two elderly women in line in front of us didn't get the concept of "express line" -- their cart was full of 20-30 items.

Ma la'asot?

However, the line backed up behind us and people waited with various degrees of tolerance for the two elderly women to finish. To their credit, they were very quick about it, moving their purchases briskly on to the counter and paying quickly with a credit card at the end. However, the line behind us continued to grow until there were half a dozen men waiting, each with a mere handful of items.

As our purchases were rung up, an extremely elderly man of uncertain balance limped up to the cash register, holding a loaf a bread. The man was obviously frail. He limped slowly to the cashier, gripping his cane. His eyes were rheumy and he appeared very short-sighted. He held the loaf out to the cashier while leaning on the cane and said something quietly in Hebrew.

Pandemonium broke out behind us. The half-dozen men, none older than 50, all of them apparently able-bodied, cried out, "There's a line!" "That's not right, sir!" and other protests to this act of line-cutting.

The cashier, to her credit, ignored them all. She grabbed the loaf of bread, rang it up, made change and sent the elderly customer on his way in under 60 seconds.

The bank was no better. Today is Erev Shabbat and a lot of people are off work or working a half-day. Since we've been snowed in for two days, the lines were worse than usual. My bank has a procedure where you place your card into a machine and the machine prints a ticket to tell you your place in line at various windows. I go inside and walk to the least crowded machine where only one woman is getting a ticket. I stand behind her, but being of American origin, I don't want to crowd her. My mistake. A young man wearing a black kippah immediately walks up behind me, then around me, and stands behind the woman at the machine. I tapped him on the shoulder.

"Excuse me, adoni -- there's a line and I'm next," I said politely.

"No, I'm next because I've been here at the bank and the teller sent me to another window, and so I have to get a ticket for that window but I've already been here for half an hour, so I'm ahead of you," he declared.

Ma la'asot?

I wasn't in THAT big a hurry, I understood his point as I've been directed to other windows myself, and I simply didn't have the energy to argue in Hebrew about it. I really didn't care all that much.

The Huband has the best standing-in-line story, dating back to his Yotvata days. The softball team was heading for a game in Tel Aviv and the bus pulled into the central bus station in Beersheva. There's a ten-minute break so everyone gets off and rushes over to the felafal stand. The Husband waits patiently in line, orders his felafal, and as the counterman hands the finished felafel to him, a hand appears over his shoulder and snatches the felafal.

The Husband turns around in time to see the guy behind him, a total stranger, chowing down on the felafal.

"What are you doing?! That was MY felafal! I ordered it, I paid for it, and YOU took it!! What were you thinking?!" he roared.

The other guy explains, a bit defensively, "But I'm in a hurry!"

"This is a bus station, you idiot! We're ALL in a hurry!" The Husband roars back.

Shamefaced now, surrounded by a bunch of irritated kibbutznikim softball players, the guy looks down at the hijacked felafal and then holds it out to The Husband. "Do you want it back? You can have it," he offered.

The Husband looked at the felafal, now missing one end where the mooch took a big bite out of it, and declined. "No, I'll order another. I don't want one you've eaten half of already," he said disgustedly.

This is the same mind-set that dictated that the father of several children in a large Hundai van suddenly swerve into my left-turn only lane from Derech Chevron to Ester HaMalca the other morning. I'd made the mistake of leaving daylight between me and the car in front of me, and hey, he's in a hurry, so never mind that we're both transporting our children in heavy traffic -- he simply swerves in front of me and the only way to NOT hit this idiot is to stand on my brakes.

Israelis are the world's most terrific people, in my humble opinion, EXCEPT if you're standing in line with them. Hearts of gold on the street, in the office, in their homes -- but ravening madmen when you put them in a line.