The 90`s

Goldstein brought no blessing on the Jews

Note: Written by Howard Barbanel, Published week of March 9th - March 15th, 1994

Baruch (or Benny) went from his house with rifle in hand and fire and brimstone in his heart.  He wanted to torpedo the peace process; he wanted revenge for murder of Raabi Meir Kahane. He wanted to avenge the murders of countless innocent Jews over the last number of years who were victims of Arab terrorism.  Goldstein wanted to see a Land of Israel devoid of Arabs. He was mad as hell and wasn't going to take it anymore.

So, Goldstein walked, at the crack of dawn, dressed in full Israeli Army major's uniform, into the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron and emptied his rifle into the defenseless backs of kneeling Moslem worshippers.

Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin called this "the deranged action of a lunatic individual," and he's right.  Goldstein and his Kahane acolytes, are living in a David Koresh, Branch Davidianesque fantasy world of divine rights, voices and guns.

Goldstein and the Kach folks are just as whacked out as the people on the extreme left.  Both of these groups act chauvinistically, with much forcefulness, violence and bravado on the outside while insude they really have a deep-rooted sense of inferiority and Jewish weakness.

The lunatic right and left are bedfellows because niether group belives in the inherent internal strength of the Jewish people to confront challenges successfully and because neither group wants to live in peace with the Arabs.  The far-right doesn’t want to live with the Arabs so they advocate expelling or killing them. The far-left doesn’t want to live with the Arabs so they advocate withdrawing to the pre-1967 borders and even in a bi-national state where Jewish independence will cease to exist.

Real Zionism, brave Zionism, believes that through reclaiming the land, through economic development and through the ingathering of the Jewish people to our ancestral home that all crises, major and minor will eventually be overcome.  Cowardly Zionism surrenders, either to base appeasement or to base bestiality in the form of wanton murder.

Revenge for the murder of Meir Kahane? Great.  Let's get hold of El-Sayyid Nossair, his killer.  Revenge for the terrorist murders of innocent Jews? Fine, let's arrest those responsible, try them, convict them and punish them.  Israel should have the death penalty for terrorists. Those caught killing Jewish children should be killed themselves - after due process under the law.  Defend ourselves against pogroms? Absolutely. Initiate programs ourselves against others? No way.

Baruch Goldstein, perversly, might actually be one of the midwives for a Palestinian state.  How? This horrible incident will stiffen the necks of the PLO negotiators to reject the current agreement and demand more Israel concessions now.  How? Because with the venue of the peace talks shifting to Washington, the Israelis will be isolated under the kleig lights of the media and the thumb of the State Department, all looking for quick-fixes and Israeli flexibility.  How? Because the Israeli left will be so guilt-ridden over this afair that in the process of beating their breasts in one al chet after the next they themselves will bend over backwards to "make it up" to the Arabs. How? Because the government will further demonize and dehumanize the Jews of Judea and Samaria to pave the way for ethnic cleansing of the Jews from the territories.

Baruch Goldstein has handed the Arabs a public relations coup.  The Arabs will run around, sanctimoniously, demanding international protection from the Jews.  The discussion will no loner be one of history, territory and civil rights, it will be about protecting the Arabs from the Jews.  Arab violence, terrorism and extremism will be all but ignored.

Kach does not represent the settler movement.  Every opposition party in Knesset vigoriously condemned the incident.  Uri Ariel, head of the council of Jewish Communities in Judea, Samaria and Gaza denounced the attack and said "this condemnation is unequivocal."

What About the Jews?

We must not let this incident cloud the issues.  For example, where was the hue and cry from Arab quarters over the brutal murder last week by Hamas of 33 year old Tsiporah Sasson, a prenant mother of two, killed in the hail or 15 bullets while dirivng home to Ariel on the Trans-Samaria highway? Terrorism is up a whopping 285 percent over 1989, with as many Jews killed in the three months after the Rabin-Arafat handshake as were killed in all of 1989.  Every week Jewish civilians were murdered. No one condemns this. Not the PLO. Not the Arab states. Not the U.N.

Does the world care about Jewish rights in Hebron? Not really.  The attack occurred in the Moslem prayer area of the Tomb of the Patriachs, to be precise at the Tombs of Isaac and Rebecca.  The synagogue is located at the other end of the building at the tombs of Jacob and Leah. Abraham and Sarah are in the middle.  Until 1967 Jews were allowed no further than the seventh step of the building, yet despite this, Jews never left Hebron on their own accord.  Jews were driven out in 1929 when 69 were killed by Arab mobs.

What are they Arabs doing in the tomb anyway?  The building was constructed over 2,000 years ago by our King Herod and is the only fully extant Herodian structure in Israel.  It houses the graves of our patriarchs and matriarchs along with the grave of Joseph. Why would the Moslems want a Mosque there? Simple.  To deny it to Jews or anyone else. If the Arabs really venerated Abraham as much as they say, then why would they treat his children (the Jews) so contemptuously?  What could a Moslem possibly think about while praying next to Rebecca's grave?

What About the Media?

The media has been reacting to this vile incident with the usual anti-Israel glee.  The New York Times in particular has had a field day comparing this to the October 1990 incident on the Temple Mount where some 19 Arabs were killed.  The Times neglected to say that this was in self-defense after Arab mobs hurled hundreds of boulders, rocks and stone on thousands of Jewish worshippers at the Western Wall below during Sukkot's Bircat Kohanim festival.  The Time drags out the Deir Yassin calumny of 1948, accusing the Jews of wantonly killing 200 Arab civilians and sparking the exodus of tens of thousands as a result. Spurious accusations based on innuendo. The flight of Arabs in 1948 was self-imposed.  Deir Yassin blocked the road to Jerusalem. It was garrisoned by Iraqi soldiers who used the civilians as human shields (any surprises here?) even though the village was warned by loudspeaker an hour in advance of the attack that there would be one. Finally, this was during the War of Independence, not a random incident as this one was in Hebron.

Lastly, the media is ganging up on Orthodox Jews in general and those from Brooklyn in particular.  A very odious picture has been painted of Brooklyn Orthodoxy as a breeding-ground for Jewish extremism - as though all 400,000-plus Jews in Brooklyn were right now sitting in their basements plotting violence against Arabs.  Just as Kach doesn't represent the settlers, likewise, they also don't represent the Orthodox.

If Baruch Goldstein really wanted to strike a blow, to make a statement about Jewish rights, to exact revenge, he should have turn to success, not violence.  Success is the best revenge. Success like creating a new Jewish community out of swamps, desert or barren hilltops. Success like increasing the Jewish population and raising these children as proud and loyal Jews.  Success like building a new synagogue or yeshiva, or factory or farm.

Baruch Goldstein violated his Hippocratic Oath as a physician.  He violated his oath to obey the commandment not to kill as clearly set forth in the Torah.  He violated the trust place in him by his wife and four children by turning in to a kamikaze.  He violated the honor of his IDF uniform by using deceit to gain entry to commit murder. He placed in jeopardy the lives of countless Jews who will doubtlessly fall victim to Arab reprisals. 

Goldstein's act was more an attack on civilization than on the peace process.  Without democracy and the rule of law we cannot survive as a people. What does the word Torah mean?  It means the law. We are a people of the law and without the law we are not a people. 

In committing mass murder, Baruch Goldstein divorced himself from both the Jewish people and the law.  Let it be remembered that it was under the previous Likud government that the Kach Party was expelled from the Knesset as being racist and undemocratic.  We are opposed to the Rabin-Arafat Accords, but as Benjamin Netanyahu says, "We will fight this out in the corridors of the Knesset, not like our neighbors on the streets of Beirut."  As for Baruch Goldstein, I'm sure his place in the world-to-come is very hot indeed.