Open Housing versus Judein Raus

Ultimately, the issue of Jews living in the Shamron, and other parts of Judeah and Samaria, hinges on the right of open housing. In the US, and in the rest of the so-called "free world", people are able to live where they choose, keep their residences habitable, and (subject to legal codes) make necessary modifications including expansions to their domiciles.

In the US, this right, along with eating at any lunch counter or riding in any bus or on any seat the person so chooses, was secured as law through the Civil Rights movement. Despite bombings and predatations by men in hoods committing terrorist atrocities, heroic men and women of all races and religions stood firm to win these rights, often with their life's blood. Rabbi Abraham Herschel walked arm in arm with Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., on occassion; the Holy Name was invoked on numerous instances to deplore the existence of a society that would exclude a person from the right to choose where to live, where to eat, how to vote, and with whom to congregate.

How ironic that under this administration the very policies that were decried as racist are now the essence of the new path to peace. It has an old ring to it--just remove the Jews--THEY are the problem. Once again, we here the sound of a Final Solution to the Jewish problem.

It is this outright turn around in the current State Department's blitzkrieg on individual Jews living in residences in locations such as the site of the Tabernacle near the town of Eli, that was the subject of a recent meeting in Kafar Giladi of some 250 rabbis. At the conclusion of the meeting, HaRav Shlomo Moshe Amar, Chief Rabbi of Israel and the President of the Rabbinical Court of Israel, wrote out by hand a personal appeal to the Rabbis and Dayonim of the US to step forward to do whatever can be done to change this position.

This is a copy of HaRav Amar's letter. A translation, courtesy of my son, follows.

Kefar Giladi in Eretz Yisroel.

In a meeting of rabbis in Israel that happened here, to the degree of our brothers, our beloved rabbis of America and Dayanim [rabbinic judges] and the administrators, Presidents [of Jewish organizations] of the Jews in America,

We have come to state our deep sadness, the sadness of the Land of Israel, not from the political or state side but from the side of Jewish Law, the Torah commands of all Jews settling in Israel. As we hear nowadays the US government is pressuring the Government of Israel to not let Jews living or building their houses in wide areas of Israel.

In a time where it is allowed that any person can live anywhere they want--all around the world--and here they want to make a state where Jews will not be allowed to live in it--even to expand places that already exist and that we really need. They are stopping them.

It's a shame and anger. We are asking from your place that you use your status and position to influence the ordained officials in the US to weigh the matter in a way of true democratic justice to keep in mind the Torah and Jewish Law that obligates the Jewish people.

We trust you that you will know to find the right manner and the true way to bring these things in a way that will be heard by the right people. We trust in God's Benevolence that the endeavor will not be turned back, Heaven Forfend, empty handed.

Amen.

The irony is not lost that on the anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb, which ended the global conflict of the post depression era, that the world is confronting another voice of war and genocide. Appeal was made, then as now, to the US goverment. In Israel, at Kafar Giladi, the prayer is that the appeal of the current will not also fall on deaf ears.