ONE PEOPLE, ONE DESTINY

It’s no coincidence that the kidnapping of three Jewish high school boys took place near Chevron and all rescue efforts are presently focused on this area. The one who handed Chevron to the terrorist organizations was the incumbent prime minister who ran into their waiting arms during his first term in office and presented them with the Holy City of our Forefathers in the ‘Chevron-Wye Plantation’ agreements. Now he has the opportunity to rectify his blunder. The IDF operation underway in Chevron must become the trigger for reconquering the city and reinstituting military control over its entire territory.

Translated by Michoel Leib Dobry

1.  Even before we start looking for the guilty parties responsible for the kidnapping of three yeshiva students in Gush Etzion – and there definitely are – we first have to reflect on the marvelous unity and exceptional solidarity that has encompassed the Jewish People since the incident became public knowledge two weeks ago. There’s no other nation like Am Yisroel that can recall within an instant how it’s actually one body, one people, with one destiny.

This terrible abduction immediately reminded us of the true proportions by which we are living today. Until a couple of weeks ago, everyone was preoccupied with the battles of left vs. right, chareidi vs. national religious. Yet, in a heartbeat, we have once again become one people. During its most difficult hours, the People of Israel manage to rise above petty concerns and suddenly all divisions seem insignificant in nature. It’s true that not all Jews share the same sense of dread over this calamity. There can be no doubt that Telmon and Gush Etzion have experienced the fear in recent days over the kidnapping far more intensely than the residents of Tel Aviv. Yet, in the final analysis, we have once again revealed that we are one people with one eternal destiny connecting us in a firm and unbreakable bond. 

Two weeks ago, we saw the tremendous power of the Jewish People, and above all, the strength of the kidnapped boys’ families. This time, contrary to other cases, the families didn’t make an immediate call to the government to release terrorists, nor did they blame the government for its weakness. Instead, they conveyed a message of great strength to the entire Jewish People, calling upon them not to be dispirited and not to surrender to terrorism. In this story, they are the ones who are giving strength to the government, as it conducts this military operation and wages war against terrorism with resolute determination.

2.  In any case, we also cannot avoid the accusations being leveled against those who never drew the proper conclusions and asked themselves why they are paving the way to the next kidnapping. This includes Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who only a few weeks ago removed a moderate and limited proposal from the legislative agenda that would have slowed down the mad rush on the issue of releasing terrorists. 

In the end, the proposed law turned out to be one big “bluff.” Although the outside world saw this as an attempt to pass legislation preventing future terrorist releases, in practical terms, the proposal’s maximum potential was to give high court justices the authority to rule that a certain terrorist could not be released in any possible prisoner exchanges. However, the prime minister even tried to torpedo this watered-down idea, when the state attorney general rejected the proposal due to a “question of its legality.” Yitzchak Rabin once said that terrorism must be fought without the Israeli High Court of Justice and without the ‘B’tselem’ human rights organization. This still hasn’t happened.

Instead of passing a clear law imposing a death sentence on terrorists, as they do in the United States where capital punishment is a part of the criminal justice system, Israeli policymakers stammer in the face of the terrorists and their hunger strikes. But worst of all, successive Israeli governments continue to release Arab murderers wholesale, enabling the terrorist organizations to keep dreaming about the next abduction. After all, they know that for every kidnapping, they are rewarded with hundreds of freed terrorists – if not more – without paying any price.

If anyone is responsible for this latest act of terrorism, it’s those who have been showing weakness to the Arabs for years, pushing for another deal on releasing terrorists, as if it would bring peace to Israel and prevent war with these vile killers. Just this past year, another “phase” of terrorist releases took place as a gift to the “Palestinian Authority” for agreeing to renew diplomatic negotiations with the Netanyahu government. Hundreds of Arab murderers were released, and no one bothered to ask himself what kind of support and encouragement this action gives to the terror organizations.

3.  The kidnapping of these three yeshiva students provides an excellent opportunity for us to come to our senses and remind the terrorists who’s the boss in Eretz Yisroel. It’s no coincidence that this incident took place near Chevron, and all rescue efforts are presently focused on this area. The one who handed Chevron to the terrorist organizations was the incumbent prime minister, who ran into their waiting arms during his first term of office and presented them with the Holy City of our Forefathers through the ‘Chevron-Wye Plantation’ agreements. 

Now, he has the opportunity to correct the situation. The IDF operation underway in Chevron must become the trigger for reconquering the city and reinstituting military control over its entire territory. If we were in full control of Chevron now instead of abandoning it to the enemy, we could operate an intelligence corps on such a level that we could locate these boys immediately, without the need to send thousands of soldiers to make a house-to-house search for the terrorists’ lair. 

As the residents of Eretz Yisroel now clamor for effective government action, they don’t have to settle just for cutting off water and electricity in the Gaza Strip until these boys are released. Instead, they should demand a return of the security situation that prevailed before the “Oslo” process began. This is the time to renounce the concept of “the new Middle East” and its nightmarish vision of peace by abolishing, once and for all, the fictional entity known as the “Palestinian Authority.” Since we are the ones who collect the tax money for their coffers, what would happen if we gave them municipal control, similar to what exists in any normal Israeli city, with their own mayor but without any national sovereignty?

The Arabs have long ago ceased to honor the Oslo Accords, and even the coordinated security arrangements in existence to this day are expected to end due to the unity pact between the PA and Hamas. Only the government of Israel, past and present, has continued to fulfill its international obligations to this farce, despite the Arabs’ persistent and blatant violations of these agreements. We now have a golden opportunity to establish clear rules and teach the other side that it simply doesn’t pay for them to abduct Jewish children. 

4.  Those who said that the previous government of Israel is more responsible than anyone else for this kidnapping are absolutely right. After the government didn’t want to make an official freeze on building in Yehuda and Shomron for political reasons, it opted instead to release terrorists. Those who made this arrangement on freeing murderers instead of freezing settlement construction committed a terrible sin against the Jewish People. Regrettably, the settlement freeze wasn’t really lifted, as proven in the recent campaign by Yesha Council leaders. They claimed that there is actually a quiet freeze in Yehuda and Shomron while hundreds of terrorists were released, providing a tremendous source of encouragement to the terror organizations.

There’s no need to search for guilty parties, as the facts clearly show that every time the government of Israel degrades itself, the terrorists stand tall and take action. It happened with the murder of Shelly Dadon Hy”d in Migdal HaEmek, it happened with the murder of Tomer Chazan Hy”d in Bat Yam, and again with the murder of Evyatar Borovsky Hy”d at Tapuach Junction – while we acted with restraint. We have become accustomed to Arabs killing Jews in Eretz Yisroel as routine occurrences. The terror organizations have never been made to pay a price for their brutal activities, as they continue shedding more and more Jewish blood. 

During the last two years we have repeatedly heard reports of a third intifada on the horizon. While the state-run media has hardly mentioned the terrorist incidents that continually take place in Yehuda and Shomron, the lives of local residents have become more and more perilous. The recent abduction of these three boys is merely the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Since the kidnapping, the Israeli media has been trying to claim that this incident was the direct result of hitchhiking, and the controversy swirling around the hitchhiking issue has become the central point of discussion on the media agenda. It’s only a pity that all those arguing about hitchhiking have forgotten that more than a thousand Jews have been killed over the past twenty years in terrorist attacks – not by hitchhiking. Shelly Dadon was murdered on her way to a job interview in Migdal HaEmek, Tomer Chazan was murdered by his Arab co-worker in a Bat Yam restaurant. Terrorism has never distinguished between venues for their acts of violence; the terrorists believe that anyplace can be designated as a suitable location – even the Dolphinarium in Tel Aviv, the Maxim Restaurant in Haifa, and the Machane Yehuda marketplace in Yerushalayim. Therefore, those who steer the public debate to the issue of hitchhiking seem to forget that terrorism has always existed in Eretz Yisroel and it is not the result of people taking rides with strangers. It is the direct result of our display of weakness towards these violent and murderous groups.

5.  The Jewish People are a very strong people who reveal their inner strength during the hardest of times. We discovered last week how strong and united our people really are. We must channel this strength into an unequivocal demand from the government to put an end to this vicious bloodletting, once and for all. The Arabs have always been trying to kill us. Terrorism wasn’t born in 1967, as the left-wing would have us imagine. The Tarpat pogroms took place eighty-five years ago, long before the “occupation” began. Anyone who thinks that diplomatic agreements or submitting to the terrorists will bring us the long-awaited peace in the Middle East is delusional. The only way to restore security to the residents of Eretz Yisroel is to remind the terrorists that it just doesn’t pay for them to tangle with us. We know how to protect our citizens with all the required weapons of war, and anyone who wishes to harm us will quickly find out that Jewish blood is not cheap. 

Just a few weeks ago, the United States Government made its own prisoner swap, slightly different from the deal made in Eretz Yisroel to secure freedom for Corporal Gilad Shalit. While this deal also involved the release of a soldier held in captivity for five years, only five terrorists were freed, as opposed to more than a thousand. Yet, even this prisoner exchange aroused harsh criticism against the Obama Administration from across the political spectrum. Americans had no qualms about asking how its commander-in-chief could agree to submit to terrorism by releasing five of Al Qaeda’s deadliest killers in exchange for one soldier who had gone AWOL and deserted his unit. In this affair, the government of Israel can learn from America how to relate uncompromisingly to terror organizations.