Tip: Haveil Havalim #124

Issue no. 124 of the great Jewish blog carnival Haveil Havalim, for July 8, 2007, is hosted on Malachi Rothschild’s blog, V’HeChadash Yitkadesh, which gets kudos from me for 1) the radical innovation of using an exclamation mark instead of a hyphen for spelling “G-d”, and 2) including my submitted post. The second reason, as usual, merits my reciprocal, with the posts I liked best.

1. Top post goes for empathy this time: Cry for the Children, by Seawitch, from July 5, 2007, where the Jewish lament over cruelty toward the merciful, whether Jewish or non-Jewish, caused by mercy toward the cruel, is raised. No child deserves to be raised to be a suicide terrorist!
2. Almost knocking it, Jacob-like, for first place, is Make Noise! – A Heroine’s Cry, by SerandEz, from July 3, 2007, on the plight of Sderot.
3. In Suicide bombing doesn’t work, from July 6, 2007, Mr. Bagel, the Bagelblogger, otherwise disposed toward jokes, takes some mathematical analyzers of the pragmatic merits of suicide bombing to task for their failing to grasp the psychological effects of it. In other words: no country should ever have to live with this threat. Why this is so hard for people, especially statesmen, to understand is beyond me.
4. Speaking of leaders: a youngster like me is having trouble Rembering Entebbe: When Israel’s Leaders had Guts, but fortunately, Yid With Lid doesn’t, and in his post from July 5, 2007 he reminds us. It’s also a reminder of why we Jews set up our state in the first place. Aspiring leaders who wish to call themselves Zionist, please take note.
5. On with the theme of leadership: it appears that 38% of Israeli Jews prefer Bibi Netanyahu, according to a Tel-Aviv University poll, cited in the post Waiting for Bibi, from July 6, 2007, on Rick Richman’s site, Jewish Current Issues. Bad move: as I showed in my link from the previous issue of HH, Bibi is no less an appeaser than the rest of them, proved clearly with his latest stunt of proposing to invite Jordanian troops to “secure” Judea and Samaria. No, we need a strong, Torah-believing, expulsionist leader who’ll kick all the Muslims out of the Land of Israel. On the bright side, the same poll has it that 24% reject all three candidates (Netanyahu, Barak and Olmert). I think that last figure is much higher, though.
6. In his post Whatever… just don’t show up on my doorstep!, from July 3, 2007, David Bogner of Treppenwitz calls for Jews to calm down on the recent issue of the restoration of an old wording in the Catholic Mass. My take: even if it has real-world consequences, they are next to nothing compared to the danger we Jews now find ourselves in because of Marxist replacement theology. Fellow Jews, please update your list of enemies: not Nazis and Christian supporters of theirs, but Muslims and their Marxist sympathizers.
7. In her post In Search of Pluralism, from July 5, 2007, Irina Tsukerman of The IgNoble Experiment voices doubts about the identification of Jewish values with “Progressive” values. I agree: those of the “Progressive” values that are not antithetical to Judaism are only a subset of Jewish values. G-d puts human systems in the pockets of His system, not the other way round.

That’s all for issue #124. My post featured there: Between Golus and Joluth, from July 4, 2007, where I attempt to uproot the misconception that Jewish life in Christian lands was all oy and in Islamic lands was all joy, by showing that they were the same, Jewish life being a series of ups and downs in both. That for the purpose of choosing our friends and naming our foes more carefully.

Thanks. ’Til next time, HaShem willing!