Four years ago, on July 22, 2001, with the goal of coming together as a unified Jewish community, we stood with 10,000 others on a closed-off section of Wilshire Boulevard for a solidarity Rally in support of the people of Israel.
Approximately 80 people attended a memorial service July 13 at Beth Jacob Congregation to remember the two Israeli Bnei Akiva counselors murdered in Hebron, in the Gaza Strip, by Fatah terrorists on June 24.
At the moment, Benjamin Netanyahu is working under Prime Minister Ariel Sharon as finance minister, but at a stop in Beverly Hills last week, Netanyahu sounded like he\’d rather have Sharon\’s job.
\”Bibi,\” who served as prime minister from 1996 to 1999, has denied rumors that he will soon resign his post, but has been sounding more and more like a political candidate in recent months.
Most notably, he\’s staked out a position opposing Sharon\’s plan to evacuate settlers and troops next month from the Gaza Strip.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon conceived the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank as a unilateral step, but it\’s increasingly being coordinated by Israeli and Palestinian negotiators.
Israel is about to face painful internal tensions this summer as thousands of Israeli settlers are to be relocated from their homes in the Gaza Strip and the northern West Bank.
It\’s not every day that Israel\’s No. 1 soldier expresses doubts about the country\’s long-term survival. But that was part of a bleak message from Lt. Gen. Moshe Ya\’alon that has shaken the country\’s political establishment.
In a wide-reaching, early June interview in the daily newspaper, Ha\’aretz, the retiring Israeli army chief of staff pulled no punches. He put key existential issues on the table, questioned the wisdom of Israel\’s planned withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank, debunked the notion of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and said it could lead to a \”situation in which there will be no Israel here in the end.\”
Forever the rebel with a cause, Soviet-refusenik-turned-democracy-proponent Natan Sharansky has left the Israeli government rather than take part in the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.
The appointment of new commanders to lead a reformed Palestinian Authority security force would seem to be a step toward meeting one of the Palestinian Authority’s key obligations under the “road map” peace plan.
>It was a balmy spring evening, and the Jewish elite of Los Angeles had gathered in Beverly Hills to hear two U.S. senators provide a top-level briefing on Israel and the Middle East. The dinner at the Beverly Hilton was hosted by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the nation’s pre-eminent pro-Israel lobby, and it was a record-setter, with 1,100 in attendance, checkbooks in hand.
Many of the major Jewish religious streams, lobbying groups and civil rights groups are encouraging the Bush administration, lawmakers and opinion makers to maintain political support for Israel\’s July 20 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and four West Bank settlements.
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